Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is the most important factor in raising children to be honorable decent human beings?“

The most important factor in raising children is to prioritize their positive connection with each other, which comes from their absorbing positive examples from adults.

Since children learn from their elders, then if we succeed in improving our relations, and by doing so, embody a living example of well-oiled connections that bring about harmonious outcomes—happiness, confidence, security, love and care—then the children will follow suit, and naturally build positive relations to each other and to nature.

Positive social connections are key to realizing our full potential as human beings. If we truly care about our children growing up to be healthy, happy, confident and safe adults, then we need to be concerned that we ourselves upgrade our relationships, since that is most important factor to both our own and our children’s better lives.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What are the necessary skills for 21st century students and future leaders?“

Future leaders will need to know how to unite people above their differences and divisions. Of course, this does not mean using force against people’s will, as it has been done in the past. Instead, we will need leaders who will seek to unite absolutely everyone.

The primal importance of unifying all people is tough to understand, since we currently live in “us versus them” scenarios. However, with further development, we will need to reach new heights of understanding how nature works inside and outside us, and by doing so, realize how to rise above human nature and enter into positive connection with others.

Our positive connection with each other will harmonize us with nature’s perfectly connected and altruistic quality, and by achieving balance with nature, we will experience a whole new kind of life—happiness, health, confidence, and safety, the likes of which we currently cannot imagine.

Future leaders will have to be equipped with knowledge, wisdom and experience in rising above their egoistic nature in order to positively connect with others, as well as the ability to guide others to do the same.

They must perceive and sense nature’s altruistic and integral nature, its purpose and value, understand the process humanity is undergoing, and the moment in human development that we have reached: that the time has come for us humans to balance with nature by uniting above our differences and divisions.

Future leaders should be experienced in the paths that can guide people to unite above their divisive drives, and know how to draw the necessary strength to aide the process of connection with others above the cunning human ego.

Other than basic survival needs, human nature is egoistic, a desire to enjoy at the expense of others, while on the contrary, the surrounding nature is altruistic, operating to bind everything and everyone together. Therefore, in our connections, we will need to invert our nature from egoistic to altruistic, and by doing so, we will resemble the interconnectedness and interdependence of the surrounding nature.

Future leaders will thus need to be able to guide people to undergo the transformation from egoistic to altruistic, hateful to loving, and divisive to positively connected. Moreover, since they will rise above the human ego in positive connection with others, and project altruism, concern, consideration, and responsibility toward others, then they would also become concerned about the whole of humanity, not only their own country, region, city, or other grouping that they lead directly. By caring that humanity as a whole unites above its differences and divisions, and placing their own direct area of responsibility within the wider envelope of humanity’s perfect connection—like how cells and organs function within their host organisms—then the world will be on course to discovering the perfection that stems from our entering into balance with nature.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How do I get rid of the coronavirus naturally?“

The remedy for the coronavirus is very simple: positive relations among people neutralize the virus.

We all hold the remedy for this virus in our hearts: by activating positive connections among all of us, coming closer to each other’s hearts, then we will all witness the virus’ disappearance.

It might seem far-fetched, but if we understood how nature is developing us, and what nature expects from us in our current stage of development—that we make moves to positively connect, and by so doing, resemble nature’s interconnectedness—then we would reach balance with nature, and would not experience its influence as negative.

If humanity would somewhat hear and absorb this message, then that would already be a major part of the virus’ cure.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What do you think about Israel ordering a second coronavirus lockdown after bungled reopening?“

As I live in Israel, I think that we are truly advancing in our understanding as to why we are being locked in, that greater forces beyond what people instigate in this world are shutting us in to give us an opportunity to sit and contemplate the deeper reasons behind this whole fiasco.

When we understand that the laws of nature are to bring us into positive connection with each other, and that nature only requires of us to improve our attitudes and connections—that we become more considerate, responsible and loving of one another—then we can measure ourselves in relation to such an expectation and see where we are going wrong.

Currently, we have made no moves to positively connect with each other above the fiery hatred burning within our society. Our negative attitudes to each other result in phenomena that we perceive as negative, but it is like children who misbehave and whose parents tell them to go to their rooms in order to sit and think about what they’ve done wrong.

Israel is full of hatred. Also, the worse the situation becomes, the more the hatred seemingly grows. As such, it becomes unclear just how much worse it will continue becoming if we fail to pinch ourselves in order to wake up from our negative course.

That is why I support the current lockdown in Israel.

On one hand, it will pressure many people here, but on the other hand, and more importantly, it provides an opportunity for us to ask about its ultimate purpose, and what we can ultimately do about it.

I therefore wish for the people in Israel to understand that the negative phenomena unfolding here are fundamentally due to our hatred of each other. The coronavirus thus emerges as a kind of punishment for our failure to rise above our divisiveness and animosity.

We have reached a stage in human development where nature expects us to start following its laws—laws that sages expressed many generations ago in the tenet, “And you will love your neighbor as yourself.” Positive connection and unity among all people is the rule of the Torah, and it was our initial observance of those rules that granted us the name “the people of Israel” to begin with.

Undergoing a serious self-scrutiny to see how our egoistic human nature operates on us, behind our every action, thought and desire, in a way that parts us from each other, is an important part of our progress to a much better life for us all. By discovering the evil embedded in our egoistic nature, we can then proceed to wish for a correction of such evil, and start building new and positive connections above our divisive drives.

If we succeed in contemplating our current state according to the lines mentioned here, we can then expect the coronavirus to fade away—as we would then enter into balance with a new stage of development nature is inviting us to.

Photo by Robert Bye on Unsplash.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why is almost everyone becoming blind due to hatred?“

While hatred is bursting at the seams today, it has always been latent within us. Hatred blinds so many of us today precisely in order for us to learn how to open our eyes above the hatred, and see the world through new lenses of love and kindness.

Moreover, hatred sweeps throughout humanity today, which is precisely so that humanity as a whole learns how to rise above hatred with love and unity.

Humanity has reached a very significant transitional phase in its development. Our global interdependence and interconnectedness has become painfully evident together with our rising hatred and divisiveness.

We find ourselves in this paradoxical entanglement so that we see how, on one hand, we have reached tightening global interdependence and interconnectedness without any special strategizing or planning to bring about such a state; and on the other hand, we find ourselves increasingly hateful and disconnected in our attitudes to each other.

Currently, the most apparent example of our “external connection versus internal disconnection” scenario comes with the coronavirus: a global pandemic that has forced populations around the world to adhere to similar conditions in the struggle against it.

However, while we simply find ourselves in such global circumstances without any special strategizing or planning, and where the more we connect externally, the more we find ourselves hating and detaching from each other internally in our attitudes to each other, then the sooner we will reach a very significant self-examination: where is our free choice and free activity in such a process?

The answer: it is in our motion to positively connect to each other, to develop ties of love and kindness above the innate hatred and estrangement.

We have reached a point in human development where, with a little guidance, we can reach the realization that if we fail to actively love and positively connect to each other above our involuntary hatred toward each other, then the hatred will blind us, consume us, and lead us to various tragedies, so that we learn how nothing positive results from blindly following our hateful impulses.

We need to dust the dirt away from the treasure that we’re so close to discovering. By seeking how to develop ties of love and kindness above the innate hatred we feel toward each other, then we will reveal newfound happiness, prosperity and confidence that we never would have dreamed is possible.

We just need to raise our sensitivity a little, to feel how the hatred flaring up within us is not an emotion that we should follow through with, in order to inflict pain upon others, and ultimately, also to ourselves; rather it is an invitation to become conscious and aware human beings in the fullest sense of the term: to make conscious moves in elevating love, kindness and unity above the hatred, and by doing so, unlock a new reality and discover a whole new world of fulfillment.

We can expect nature to surface more and more hatred and divisive attitudes within us, and while it does, we would be wise to build a society that supports each other to rise above those involuntary nudges from nature, and build a new world—one where we construct new bridges of positive attitudes among each other, and by doing so, discover no less than perfection.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How do you think the Biden-Trump debate will go on Tuesday night?“

First of all, it will definitely be a nerve-racking display, and we can expect an outburst or two. The US presidential race is vicious, and becoming all the more so every day. The air in America is so thick with animosity that the debate will likely—and unfortunately—only further exacerbate America’s divisiveness.

If you were to ask me who I’d give my vote to, if it were possible, then I’d say that we’d first need to analyze who has an inclination to unite Americans above the rampant divisions currently spreading like wildfire throughout the country. After all, what government could run when its society is full of hatred?

Ultimately, America’s path to a positive future rests in the American people’s inclination to unite above divisions and differences. Failure to do so will lead America down a course of self-destruction and chaos. Therefore, the next president needs to prioritize unity of American society above all else, literally in order to save Americans from the potentially devastating outcomes of intensifying hatred.

While the topics are already set for tonight’s debate, I would nonetheless raise the question about how each candidate for the next US presidency plans to unite Americans above the soaring hatred and division in US society. I trust that the answer to this question, above all others, will illustrate what route America will take heading into the future.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Can planet Earth sustain a human population of 100 billion?“

The Earth has no problem to provide 100 billion of us with all of our life’s essentials, including all the food and housing we need and that we are used to, as well as a system of education and upbringing for our children, and so on.

The experience of such a state as happy, pleasant and safe versus one of great stress and suffering depends solely on whether we can improve our attitudes and connections to each other.

What stands in our way to improve our attitudes to each other?

It is none other than human nature, i.e., the egoistic desire to enjoy for personal benefit alone.

Our egoistic nature pits us up against each other, blocking us from sustaining kind and caring relationships, and we thus feel an accumulation of problems and crises the more we develop and the more the population rises.

How, then, can we improve our attitudes and connections to each other?

To start with, we need to dispel myths about the need to reduce the human population, as well as those of trying to be satisfied with less.

Population reduction is no solution because we fail to see just how much each and every person in the world plays a role in absorbing a certain amount of burden that befalls humanity at any given moment. In other words, if humanity needs to endure X amount of suffering, then is it better that 2 billion people accept upon themselves that amount of suffering, or that it becomes dispersed among 8 billion people or more? Of course, if we saw what we were really dealing with, then we would treat each person in the world with a lot more importance than we currently do in our narrow egoistic vision.

Also, the idea of trying to be satisfied with less is no solution simply because our desires continuously grow, and at a certain stage, we will be unable to fulfill our growing desires by trying to be satisfied with less. Such an approach will backfire on us severely, as it runs contrary to human nature.

In order to improve our attitudes and connections to each other, and adapt ourselves to conditions that become all the more interdependent and interconnected from one day to the next, we need to apply ourselves to a completely different kind of education than we were raised with—an education that emphasizes how to connect to each other positively above our divisive drives, and how reaching positive connection among each other means balancing ourselves with the laws of nature.

That is the key to shifting our lives from our current divisive and tense course to one where we harmoniously connect as an interdependent and interconnected humanity.

Photo by ActionVance on Unsplash.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Do you think the story of Jonah and the whale is true or a metaphor?“

The story of Jonah explains that we need to place the benefit of others ahead of our own.

It starts with God giving Jonah a mission, which is to pass a message to the people of Nineveh that they need to repent their evil ways, and change their attitudes to each other from hatred to love.

Jonah, however, dissatisfied with the mission, escapes it by boarding a ship and sailing away. His getaway sparks off a storm. The sailors eventually comprehend that Jonah is behind the storm, and as a result, they push him overboard. In the ocean, Jonah becomes swallowed by a whale, spends three days and three nights in its belly, and afterward gets discharged to land, where he then moves forth to Nineveh to complete his mission.

Jonah’s story holds immense significance to the Jewish people, and all the more so today than ever before.

The Jewish people, like Jonah, have an inescapable mission. It is the same mission today as it was in ancient Babylon, when Abraham united them as a nation upon the foundation of “love your neighbor as yourself”: to generate Jewish unity in order to become a positive example of connection for humanity, i.e., “a light unto the nations.”

The Israeli nation had been constructed as a sort of gateway by which the sparks of purity would shine upon the whole of the human race the world over. And these sparks multiply daily, like one who gives to the treasurer, until they are filled sufficiently, that is, until they develop to such an extent that they can understand the pleasantness and tranquility that are found in the kernel of love of others. – Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee),” Item 24.

Over the course of history, the Jewish people have felt how the interaction between them and other nations functions: During times of Jewish unity, e.g., the First Temple, both Jews and humanity prospered; and on the contrary, during times when the Jewish people failed to rise in unity above their differences and divisions, anti-Semitism reared its ugly head together with various crises that struck the world.

As time passes, and the Jewish people continue failing to acknowledge their mission—to unite (“love your neighbor as yourself”) above differences (“love will cover all transgressions”) in order to become “a light unto the nations”—they head more and more toward a situation where unity appears to become a grave impossibility.

Jewish self-hatred gets out of hand as divisions between secular, religious, ultra-Orthodox, pro-Israel and anti-Israel Jews become painfully apparent. Unknowingly, the failure of the Jewish people to realize their mission heads them into a downward spiral of unfounded hatred, and prepares the conditions for an enormous storm.

During the Holocaust, the sailors in the Jonah story dressed up as Nazis; during the pogroms, they acted as Russians and Eastern Europeans; and during the Spanish Inquisition, they became Catholics.

In our era, we have just come out of the year with the highest recorded anti-Semitic crimes and threats in the United States, and a decade of anti-Semitic normalization around the world. Just after a spate of anti-Semitic crimes in New York at the close of 2019, concerned Jewish community members, lawmakers and politicians started expressing that a “slow-rolling pogrom” was unfolding in New York, and that the next Holocaust could take place in America—concepts that had previously seemed unthinkable in relation to Jews in America.

In the last few years, there has been a sharp rise in anti-Semitic crimes and threats running parallel to a sharp increase in many other problems: depression, suicide, drug abuse, social division, terrorism, and natural disasters, to name a few. The more humanity experiences crises and problems, the more their fingers point at the Jews as the source of their problems.

The Jonah story describes the roots of anti-Semitism.

Jonah’s escape from the mission he was granted describes the Jewish people’s escape from their role to unite above their divisions and exemplify that unity for humanity.

The sailors’ realization of Jonah as the cause of the storm, and the throwing of Jonah overboard today describes the rise of the Jews being blamed for all kinds of problems people experience.

The time will come when the Jews will have to be thrown overboard, and enter into the whale, i.e., undergo a serious scrutiny of what it means to be Jewish: Why do so many people hate the Jews? Also, how can the Jewish people improve the situation both for themselves and the world?

The question is only in how much suffering the Jewish people will need to experience until they reach that self-scrutiny: Is the current amount of anti-Semitism enough to spur on this self-scrutiny? Or, will the Jewish people continue escaping their mission, and will that suffering need to take on proportions of world wars and holocausts?

When the Jewish people agree to accept their role—to “love your friend as yourself” and to be “a light unto the nations”—will they and the world experience a new tendency toward peace, harmony and happiness, i.e. the whale that brings them to the safe shore, to Nineveh.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Could you tell me something about collective consciousness?“

Consciousness exists in the collective.

We all exist in the collective consciousness similarly to how a holographic item, when it encounters light, seemingly divides a single light into different spectra.

However, the extent to which we realize collective consciousness relies on the extent to which we input each of our individual thoughts and desires into it.

While we each exist within collective consciousness, our comprehension depends on the extent of our engagement with such consciousness.

Therefore, the holographic picture exists both on collective and individual scales, as we each potentially hold the entire collective picture within each of us individually.

Reaching awareness of collective consciousness requires opening ourselves up to the collective desire and thought that exists outside of our own individual desires and thoughts.

We have the ability to pierce through our individualistic perceptions by connecting with others, i.e., aiming to feel and fulfill their desires at least to the same extent as we each aim to fulfill our own desires.

By conducting ourselves in such a manner—over time and through various states that make us face the boundary between our individualistic perceptions with the collective one, and also by organizing our environment to support our choice of the collective picture over our individualistic one time and again—we then gradually discover a wider world.

We discover that wider world within our own thoughts and desires, i.e., within us, but in that space, we feel and act toward the collective as if to ourselves.

When we reach such a state, we realize pure harmony, happiness and the sensation of eternity.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Is this world going in a right direction?“

The world has been through enough preliminary phases, including regimes tilted to the far-left and the far-right, and it has experienced a great share of turbulence, turmoil and mistakes.

Now the impending question is: What path will we take next?

Over the course of humanity’s history, we were constantly trying to work out what way to head next: to the right or to the left.

What are we left with today?

We have reached a stalemate in every field of human engagement, personally, socially, educationally, economically, ecologically and globally.

We worked with all the systems we could devise, and ascertained that there is no single system or plan remaining that could steer us confidently into a bright future.

We have entered a deadlock with no vision of a better future motivating us, and also nothing to goad us forward from behind either.

Our era is thus characterized by the end of our egoistic trials and tribulations. The human ego gracefully stood behind every human endeavor, and every prior breakthrough and progress, giving just enough fuel for it to unfold and reveal how it fell short in providing lasting fulfillment and happiness.

While engrossed in our ego, we can either receive egoistically or give egoistically. With an egoistic intention lying behind any act of receiving or giving, destruction is the inevitable conclusion.

Nazi Germany was a harsh example of a regime based on receiving egoistically taken to an extreme, and on the other end of the spectrum, communist Russia was also a harsh example of a regime based on giving egoistically taken to an extreme. Both led to devastation.

We have squeezed out all the juices from these egoistic forms.

We now need to leave our egos alone, acknowledge that they lead us to no positive outcome, and build a new level above them.

This new level should be one of giving above receiving, and connecting positively above detachment and estrangement to each other.

In order to build this new level, we need access to a new kind of fuel and motivation, which doesn’t emerge naturally in our egoistic desires and thoughts.

Such access can be granted via a new method of education—a method of connection—that shows us how we can develop positive connections above our egoistic differences and divisions.

If some person, organization or movement wishes to pull people to a certain direction, to the left or to the right, then it is bound to fail, and we have the examples of such failure in Nazi Germany and communist Russia.

Today, we have the additional advantage of such experiences—that we can see how our egos devise systems that ultimately divide one people from another, and that such systems are setup for failure.

Recognizing the failure of working according to our egos, we would thus be wise to accept a new kind of education: one that guides us on how to connect harmoniously above our egos.

Connection above the ego is the world’s only path left.

This path means that we accept the fact that humanity is a single whole, and that we are all parts of this whole, as cells and organs in a human body. If a single cell takes from other cells more than it needs to survive, then it becomes cancerous and spreads disease throughout the body.

Today, we experience such disease as myriad problems and crises spreading throughout humanity. And they all share the same root: each person locked in their narrow egoistic corner, acting in a tug-of-war battle with everyone else.

We thus need to conclude that the human ego, which has based all of our development until today, has reached its expiry date.

Using the ego unabated—with no inclination to acknowledge how it constantly operates on us, and with no motion to rise above it—delivers us all the problems we experience.

The days of moving back and forth between left and right have reached their dead-end. Today, our survival, at the very least, and moreover, our ability to draw motivation, happiness, success and confidence from a fresh new source of vitality, depends on us rising above our egoistic nature, period.

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