Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do people relate to their reflection in others?“

We do not see other people but our own reflection in them.

Kabbalistic sources describe this phenomenon of our perception extensively, that we do not see others, but we see them in our perception, and what we see as their positive or negative traits or behaviors depends on our own habits, mentality and upbringing.

We do not perceive other people in and of themselves. Rather, we perceive them as correlations of themselves and ourselves.

The world is a reflection of your desire. Everything you see is your desire outside of you.

Based on KabTV’s “I Got a Call. I Am a Mirror for Others” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 6, 2012. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: All people in the world have a first and last name. Where did this structure come from?

Answer: In general, a surname is something unnatural and artificially invented. A person must have a name, the name of his father, some position, or a reference to an address. Let’s say: “Lumberjack Byaka, son of Shmyaka, from Kudykina Gora”—everything is clear, you cannot go wrong.

This has always been the case for all nations, the most extended identification of a person. Where the surnames came from, I do not know for sure, I did not research this subject.

Perhaps it refers to belonging to a tribe, a clan. After all, there used to be many different tribes that today are represented by one nation.

Of course, surnames also indicate ancestry identification. For example, the last name Abramov means that there was definitely an Abram in this family. How else to identify a person? You just need to point to a person.

In Kabbalah, the name of a person can indicate maximum spiritual achievement; this is the most important thing. What difference does it make to me what his or her name is in this life? But if he was a son of a special person and received his spiritual heritage from him, then, of course, this is important.

Usually a sage is called: “So-and-so, a student of such-and-such” not by his father, but by the origin of his school.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Meaning of a Person’s Name” 6/16/12

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Question: When you describe the various states, you say that we have to go through them ourselves. Does it happen that you talk hypothetically about what awaits everyone, but you have not passed these states yourself?

Answer: No, how would I be able to talk about them?

Question: Does it mean that you have passed through everything you talk about inside and out?

Answer: No, not inside and out! I have not gone through everything that we read in the books yet. Where am I compared to their great authors?! I have not reached many degrees of my teacher, especially Baal HaSulam or other great Kabbalists.

But what I am saying comes from my feelings. From what else can I answer questions?

I have made particular progress in explaining the connection between our world and the upper world because this is what our generation needs.

The current generation needs the wisdom of Kabbalah in order to link its internal state, structure, and psychology with the upper world, with integral education and upbringing, with inanimate, vegetative, and animate nature, and the state of “man,” with the development of egoism, crises, and with the influence of the outside world on us. We need to know how to organize a group that includes all of humanity.

I am constantly digesting all this in order to create such a good sphere around humanity in which it could find itself and begin to adapt to the general universe, to go beyond the human body and our five senses. I think this is the most important thing.

That is, I am like a point of contact between what an ordinary little person feels and at least the first spiritual degree to which I would like to bring him.

If I could bring a large mass of people to the first spiritual degree while I am still in this world so that it would work out like this, billions are in the feeling of our world, and hundreds of thousands are in the feeling of the upper world, and the rest are between them, on all levels, then there would be contact between the upper dimension and ours. And I have actually helped to create it. This is my dream!

Question: What are the chances?

Answer: I think there are chances. I am an optimist! As long as I live, I hope.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Laitman’s States” 8/5/12

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why is English considered an international language?“

England once fought with Germany to spread their respective influences on American territory, and the German language was set to prevail at a certain point. If it did, then today we would very likely be in a world with German as the common international language.

But human development took a different turn.

Instead, the English branch of culture—which is not far from the German one, but which is more open—became the international one.

At that time, the Germans wished to overpower and enslave others by force. The British, however, planted their own culture and language, expanding in a completely different way.

The English had a softer and more preferable attitude to the world and to the discovery of new lands than the Germans, and English thus prevailed. Due to this difference in approaches, English is closer to being corrected as an international language than German.

Despite the prevalence and spread of German culture throughout Europe, we find that the German language is not used other than in Germany and some nearby countries.

Unlike our past development, however, today’s path to unification will not be through the expansion of nations and languages. Instead, our next form of unification is one that nature is forcing on us, where we become increasingly interconnected and interdependent worldwide.

We are now developing to a critical tipping point where we will need a new method of connecting to each other above nationalities and languages. Without upgrading our attitudes to each other—to positively connect above our differences and divisions—then we will feel our tightening global interdependence as a negative phenomenon that brings us more and more suffering.

I thus hope that we undergo this major transition to new positive, supportive, considerate and encouraging attitudes to each other above our differences sooner rather than later, and realize how much better, harmonious, joyful and peaceful our lives can be.

Based on KabTV’s “I Got a Call. English Language” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on June 2, 2012. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Comment: There is a personal, touching story on the Internet about someone’s grandfather who died. The grandfather was in the hospital and before leaving forever, he slowly removed his oxygen mask and put his hand to his mouth. We thought he did it because of pain, but it turned out that he sent three air kisses to his wife,  and he left.

How does this happen? When there is nothing left in front of us, we can perform some kind of an act so that another person feels good. Many people say that before death confessions of love are made that people  leave with such a feeling of gratitude toward someone. They pass warmth to someone. But in life, it does not happen. Why?

My Response: It is because of egoism. As long as egoism lives, prospers, and flourishes, it wants to fill itself, and you have no opportunity to think about somebody else.

Question: Can I do anything selflessly?

Answer: No.

Comment: And here egoism says that it already understands that it is ending.

My Response: But here there is no egoism anymore, you no longer feel yourself in your body; you gradually leave it, and you feel light and free.

Question: Is this a moment of freedom?

Answer: Yes.

Question: And all my life I was just a slave to egoism?

Answer: Yes. Therefore, a person who dies is called Niftar, liberated from egoism.

Question: Is it possible to live all the time as if you are leaving?

Answer: That is the way to live!

Question: Like on this border?

Answer: Yes.

Question: And then you will be able to give, to bestow, and to love?

Answer: This is what is called to constantly adhere to the Creator.

Comment: That is, I must live as if in a moment I will not exist.

My Response: Not even that you will not exist in a moment. It is as if you have already disconnected from your body, from its concerns about everything, and you only want to be connected with the Creator.

Question: Then I do not care about my future and do not care if it will return to me somehow, right?

Answer: It does not exist anyway.

Question: Is it liberation all at once?

Answer: Of course, that is why it is called Niftar, liberated. Or as they say: “The dead are free.”

Question: Can you learn to live this way throughout your life?

Answer: Surely.

Comment: Then we will learn to give, to love, and to bestow.

My Response: Of course.

Comment: And we will not live in this constant, black care for our life.

My Response: Yes.

Comment: It would be nice to learn this.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 1/12/23

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Question: How can I personally insist that the light affect me?

Answer: You do this with the help of a group, by connecting with others by wishing to increase your yearning for the quality of connection and mutual guarantee, by wanting to be with them in one single desire, above egoism by lowering it, and by directing your aspirations to the upper world, to bestowal and love.

By creating such a common desire, when all your egoisms are lowered and all yearnings for the Light are above them, you want the upper light to create an instrument of perception similar to it in you. To the extent these egoistic desires are rejected downward, and to the extent the altruistic aspirations, meaning mutual love, connection, and similarity to the light, are raised up, you come closer to the light in terms of quality, in terms of values.

This light that constantly surrounds us, this physical field affects you all the time.  Although it is permanent, its effect depends on your effort toward it.

As a result of its repeated influences, an organ of perception of light is formed within you. That is, the difference between these two opposite points becomes such that the upper light can enter into it and fill it. As a result, the Partzuf, a system, is formed. Your desires become similar to the light since it enters into these desires according to the law of equivalence of forms.

Then you begin to understand, to feel its qualities, its program, its intentions, and its beginning, end, and purpose. Without it, you cannot do anything.

Therefore, the entire method, in general, is simple. But a person does not agree with it. Firstly, his egoism rejects everything. And secondly, he cannot believe that in this way something can change.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Making the Light Work” 6/9/12

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is the difference between God and Nature?“

“It is best for us to agree and accept the words of the Kabbalists that ‘the nature’ (Heb. ‘HaTeva’ [‘הטבע’]) has the same numerical value as ‘God’ (Heb. ‘Elohim’ [‘אלהים’]—eighty-six. Then, I will be able to call the laws of God ‘nature’s commandments [Mitzvot],’ or vice-versa (God’s commandments [Mitzvot] by the name ‘nature’s laws’), for they are one and the same.” – Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), “The Peace.”

There is nothing besides the system of nature, which Kabbalists equally refer to as “nature” or “God,” and we are integral parts of this system.

Therefore, when we say that there is one God, it means that there is nothing besides one force acting in this single system we are parts of.

The desire of the single force acting in reality is to bring us into connection with it—not via coercion, but through awareness in a positive manner.

As much as we understand, feel and attain this force as one that is good and benevolent, then we can adhere to it and reach its level of complete awareness.

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson on March 13, 2023. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: You said that Rabbi Shimon conducted pure light, and Rabbi Aba clothed it in letters. What was the function of the other nine disciples of Rabbi Shimon in this chain?

Answer: They represent a common system. If they had not been there, Rabbi Shimon would not have felt anything and Rabbi Aba would not have been able to open the upper light and clothe it in letters. After all, all these ten people are ten Sefirot, a complete Partzuf. How could anything happen without it?

Question: When Rabbi Aba clothed the light in letters, what exactly did he transform?

Answer: He clothed the light in a type of shell you need to acquire to reveal the upper light.

The rest of Rabbi Shimon’s disciples worked in this system together, in harmony, to reveal the upper light that emanated from their teacher.

Comment: Interestingly, Baal HaSulam worked independently and described all this as well as they did.

My Response: Firstly, Baal HaSulam also had his own disciples.

Secondly, when a person enters the spiritual world, he already has other students and another company: those properties, those desires, those corrected and uncorrected elements of the general system, which we simply do not detect with our five senses.

There, contact takes place at the level of desires and thoughts, and not at the level of the bodily matter that we imagine.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. How The Book of Zohar Was Written” 6/2/12

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do some people find thrill-seeking activities such as bungee jumping or skydiving exciting rather than scary?“

Whether it is bungee jumping, skydiving, other extreme sports, thrill-seeking theme park rides and even scary movies, in such instances we want to feel the limit and how we breach it: that we reach a state beyond our capabilities.

We then enjoy the state. There is pleasure in exercising a certain level of control over fear.

The pleasure of having control over fear then becomes stronger than the instinct of fear that surfaces.

When fear dominates us, it feels like it penetrates every cell of our bodies, all the way to our bones’ marrow. That is why the pleasure we experience when we feel a certain level of control over fear is very powerful.

However, if we felt that our lives had a higher eternal purpose, and we set ourselves on a path to attain that purpose, we would then feel no need for these kinds of transient pleasures, no matter how strong they are.

We would also then not fear anything because we would see that we are controlled by the upper force, which wishes solely to develop us in order to benefit us with its eternal and perfect quality of love, bestowal and connection.

Based on the video “What Are You Afraid Of?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: Why is there such a factor as a surname in nature?

Answer: Because this is how we are arranged. Animals have the same thing, only their identification is of a completely different kind. A dog in order to find out about another dog does not need to ask for a passport. A dog will smell it from all sides and knows everything at once: who it is, what it is, and where it is from.

Question: Do names and surnames have any spiritual roots? For example, in Kabbalah, sages are given certain names according to their spiritual achievements. But there are also human names.

Answer: These names are given according to origin.

If we value a person in our world, first of all, by his social status, wisdom, family, professional, national, or state affiliation, then according to this we attribute all sorts of epithets to him.

For example, a doctor, professor, or laureate. We attribute all this to the name in order to emphasize the essence of this person.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Meaning of a Person’s Name” 7/10/12

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