Question: People cross oceans to find some land or discover something. This is hope. How can we not lose hope when everything has burned out, when all the candles of hope have flickered out—love, faith, peace of mind, everything?

Answer: It is by knowing that everything is in the hands of the Creator because a person realizes for sure that nothing is in his hands.

Question: Is this candle a hope? Everything is in the hands of the Creator, is this the next step?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Why does the Creator always leave us this little step, this last candle?

Answer: To catch us at the last minute, the last second, or the last moment, and to continue on together with us.

This candle is a candle of connection between a person in this world and a person in the upper world.

Question: Does it burn all the time, this candle?

Answer: It escorts the person onward.

Question: Are there states when this candle does not burn, when there is no hope? Do you think such states exist?

Answer: No, it is always lit.

Question: Is this what we call “the Creator is good who does good”?

Answer: Yes, otherwise, such a person would not have been born, for the Creator knows his whole life in advance until the end.

Question: Why do we so often not see this candle and lose hope?

Answer: We are not so attuned to our existence.

Question: What is the right attitude?

Answer: The right attitude is that the goodness of the Creator is always before us.
[350381]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman”

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Comment: Any system, any hierarchy, is built on a leader.

My Response: No. In Kabbalah, the leaders are different. Our leader will be the one who completely annuls himself in relation to me. People still do not understand how strict the hierarchy is in the spiritual world.

In any corporeal sciences or in any corporeal achievements, you can surpass your teacher, move forward and further, as, for example, in the development of sciences. The same applies to children: We want them to develop even more and deeper.

But in Kabbalah a very interesting process takes place. There are two paths in it—from top to bottom and from bottom to top, from the world of infinity to us and from our world to the world of infinity.

Receiving information and spiritual instruction occurs from the top down, and therefore it goes through Adam, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Joseph, David, and so on, that is, through all Kabbalists, and ultimately through my teacher and me to those who are my students and even those who are not.

Suppose people listened to us for a bit, picked up this contact, and they disappeared to who knows where; it does not matter. Even if they live somewhere else and study with someone else, it is not important. As a result, they will come to the same result and then, as if, return back.

What do I want to say? In receiving information from above, a student must annul himself before me. This is called the condition of learning from me “mouth to mouth” (“peh el peh“) on the common level of the screen. This is very important! Baal HaSulam writes about this in many of his works.

I cannot say this to the students, because, first of all, there are those who will think that I need their worship, or that they should completely “erase themselves.” The student must gradually understand what it means to cling to the upper, and on the other hand, he must try to be independent all the time.

Any spiritual state consists of two opposites, and the problem lies in our adapting us to it. Therefore, I am very sorry that sometimes such rejections of students from me occur. But nothing can be done.

Either they do such stupid things themselves that can only be compensated later by many years of searching and by other alternative actions of correction instead of those that they should have done earlier.

It was the same for me with my teacher. There is no such thing as going through it absolutely smoothly. There were many small, stupid distances from him: disobedience, even neglect, depending on the level at which all this is evaluated, measured, weighed.

I am absolutely certain that there has never been a student in history who could completely, from the first moment to the last, annul himself before the teacher, so that information would flow into him from top to bottom in the same way with as a fetus in the mother’s womb, when it completely annuls and therefore becomes an integral part of her body and thus develops.

I see that what happened to me happens very often to my students. I was not the most compliant student; on the contrary, there was something in me…

Question: Is it better for a student’s advancement when he is compliant or rebellious?

Answer: It depends on the root of the soul.

Comment: You know that there are students who do everything without question. On the other hand, there are those who resist.

My Response: This is not the kind of resistance and this is not the kind of submission. Submission can stem from pride, while resistance, on the contrary, from the desire to feel as quickly as possible at the junction of contact, in contradictions, where a person must change himself.
[350375]
From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Pyramid” 9/18/10

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Comment: Several studies have been conducted about the search for meaning in life with varying conclusions about it being beneficial or stressful.

My Response: The main thing is to find your natural point that you already live in. It may still be in development, but you are in it, not floundering about, not knowing where to go.

Comment: But you always say that searching for the meaning of life is good.

My Response: I’m not talking about a state where a person doesn’t understand what the meaning of life is. He must determine what this meaning is and move toward it. Moving toward the meaning of life—when you understand and know how and what, this gives you enormous fulfillment, pleasure, and calmness, together with enormous dissatisfaction, inner imbalance.

Comment: With falls and rises…

My Response: Yes! But you receive tremendous delight from all of it. You enjoy the process. This is the “proud Stormy Petrel.”

Question: And what if you have a fall, despair, when you suddenly think: “Did I choose the right point?”

Answer: But that is still better than being a non-living element, working in some office and sitting at home watching football. Or not? It depends on the person.

Question: Do you trust only the research that you yourself have gone through and verified?

Answer: First of all, I don’t trust anyone in the world. Because there is no one to trust. We see what is happening in the world. Therefore, I rely only on myself. On my own experiments. On my universities.

Question: And they say that after long searches you find the meaning of life, adhere to your teacher, and go? With falls and rises.

Answer: Only this way.

Comment: I remember you once told that you had such descents that you couldn’t even get out of bed.

My Response: That is natural. This is the path of searching. There is no way around it.

Question: And you call this a happy path?

Answer: Of course! Absolutely! “The exhilaration of the battle,” in the fall.

Question: What would you wish people who enter the path of searching for the meaning of life?

Answer: I wish people to enjoy the metamorphoses taking place within them. Everything happening inside them, everything boiling—that is life! Don’t grow old ahead of time. Or at least try not to, internally.
I can’t climb mountains, I can’t struggle with the waves in a raging sea. No. But inside me all of this exists, and all of this gives the sensation of life.

Question: And then a person remains young regardless of age?

Answer: Of course!

Question: Do you yourself feel young in this sense?

Answer: In two ways. On one hand, everything inside me is boiling. On the other, I know how to balance it. Meaning, my ship is still holding steady on all the waves.

Comment: Yes. This I can testify to.
[259033]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman,” 12/23/19

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Question: What are the actions in the ten that we perceive as reward and punishment?

Answer: To get closer to each other despite mutual alienation is our reward. And vice versa: to not get closer to each other is our punishment.

A reward is getting closer to the Creator, understanding the Creator, and feeling that He is among us.
[350590]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, 12/7/25, Baal HaSulam, Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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Comment: You once said that 99.9% of people who study Kabbalah leave before they reach the initial state.

My Response: Usually, in their attempts to ascend, many fall from this path. Then in the next cycle, or after several years, they try again. It is very difficult.

In principle, 99% leave because they do not understand or do not realize that 99% of their effort is the effort of the upper light. The light works on them, and they need to contribute only 1%.

But this participation must be very subtle, delicate, and selective. It must be precisely such that it draws the influence of the upper light upon oneself. A person, when he carries out certain actions, should assume that through these actions he is drawing the upper light onto himself, and see his future and his fulfillment in this alone. It is as if you are waiting for air, for something that does not depend on you, it will come, and that is it!

This is the state that we must have, where we act with all our strength—we study, we try to unite, to disseminate, anything—and on the inside there is this feeling of waiting. This is the concept of “awaiting the Messiah.”

This is why Jews were called “zhidy”—from the word “to wait”—those who wait for redemption. This is the redemption.
[350534]
From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Soul without a Body,” 10/5/10

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Question: What does it mean to reveal the Creator’s attitude toward oneself? How can I influence this?

Answer: You must bring yourself to a state in which it becomes clear to you what the Creator wants from you, and you desire to realize His attitude toward you.

Question: How should one correctly relate to concealment?

Answer: A person must strive for a state in which he is as close as possible to the Creator.

Question: If a person does not find contact with the Creator, does this mean that he is not connected with his friends?

Answer: No, a person must constantly examine himself and clarify why it seems to him that he is not sufficiently connected with the friends and with the Creator.

Question: How can one reduce oneself to the complete “point in the heart”?

Answer: The point in the heart is the single desire that I have toward the Creator. If I reduce myself to such a desire, beyond which I have nothing else, then I am in the point in the heart.
[350584]
From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/7/25, Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot“

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Question: What does it mean that we reveal the Creator through a friend?

Answer: It means that through my attitude toward my friend I discover the measure of my own desire to attain the Creator.

Question: And who is this friend that I am constantly searching for?

Answer: It is the Creator Himself.

One must strive to attain the Creator as one’s great friend, the one before whom you can open yourself entirely, in what is called “face to face.”

Do not hide anything from Him. Simply desire that every concealment be lifted and revealed.
[350587]
From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/7/25, Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot“

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Question: If we do not sense the Creator, how can we receive His qualities and become similar to Him?

Answer: A person senses nothing outside of himself, outside of his body, whether it is the Creator, a friend, or the group. Therefore, we must first work on our bestowal to the other, to love the other as ourselves. And if I can attain bestowal to the other, then I will be able to bestow to the Creator as well.

If I agree to work only for the Creator but not for the other, this is a sign that I am not ready to work for the Creator either. After all, I am still not making an independent calculation “outside my own interest.” I remain within myself and receive results of the work, the reward.

That is, all the work is only in relation to the group, within which we create the place for the revelation of the Creator.

We do not receive any light; we are filled with our own bestowal! I “generate” this quality from within myself with the help of the force that comes to me and gives me the ability to be in bestowal, and in this I feel the force of the Creator clothing in me. This serves as my fulfillment.

I will never reveal anything “outside of myself,” even though it is said that we “go out of ourselves” and connect with others. This is all my imagination, my perception, as if I am going out of myself.

It is said that Malchut of the world of Atzilut is called “the image of the Creator.”

And it is also said that I must bring joy to the Creator through all the states that I receive from Him. But what does it mean to receive states from Him; after all, they depend on the desire awakened in me: more or less, depending on my overcoming my egoistic desire and correcting it. How is this related to the Creator, who does not change?

And what can I even give Him? There is no one to bestow to, no one to receive my work.

In the end we reveal that we correct only our own qualities and never leave them. And the very quality of bestowal is a pure quality; I cannot work for any kind of “benefit” of it. I can only value it as a special, exalted quality according to my attitude of awe toward the light and toward the other, which inspires the sense of the greatness of bestowal and love in me.
[41640]
From Kabbalah Lesson 4/27/11, Baal HaSulam, Shamati 1, “There Is None Else Besides Him”

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Question: Why is it easier to endure personal misfortunes when you have friends?

Answer: When I am connected with friends, my personal problem is shared among us. If there is truly a strong bond between us and they support me by sharing my sorrow, then it is distributed among all of us.

This is precisely the meaning of visiting the sick. We tend to think that people visit the sick just to check on them, to talk with them, to bring them apples and oranges, but there is a much deeper meaning. Such a visit can actually ease the illness because we share the suffering of the friend and give him our strength.

We are all connected in one system regardless of the fact that each of us exists in a separate body. If we are connected, then all our systems connect: intellectual, emotional, and many others that we do not yet know about.

As a result, we create a shared system of connections between people, and in truth it is much greater than we imagine. Illness is a kind of malfunction in my personal system that makes me feel ill. But when my friends who are connected with me come to visit with the intention of deepening the connection, they enter my damaged system and take part in it.

If two friends come to visit me, then my malfunction is divided among the three of us. It does not yet divide evenly, but it should if we are strongly, properly, and correctly connected. We will clearly feel how we take on the other’s pain, and give the sick person our own joy and happiness in return.

Question: So if someone tells me about their problem, does it make it easier?

Answer: If there is no connection between you, this has practically no effect. Yet we know that hearing good or bad news can influence a person strongly, either lift their mood or depress them.

But if this is my friend, then we are connected as if we exist within one body. Therefore when he comes to visit me during an illness, the defect in my system is transmitted to him, and it becomes easier for me.

It is precisely because we are separated by bodies, but able to connect on a sensory level, that a friend can help heal my illness, as if taking part of it into himself. He takes a portion of the imbalance from my system and equalizes it within his own.

He eases my suffering simply by performing a good and correct action, and takes this unbalanced part onto himself with love. And besides that, his healthy system can absorb this fragment of another’s illness precisely because it is not inherently his. He takes part of the illness, isolates it within himself, and heals it within his own subsystem.

Question: Does this happen unconsciously?

Answer: Usually it happens unconsciously, but there are people on a higher level who can see how it occurs.
[155820]
From KabTV’s “New Life 242 – Happiness And Social Ties,” 10/17/13

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It is very easy to determine whether a path is spiritual: everything we agree with is not spiritual!

What does belong to it are precisely the opposite things, which are not accepted by our reason and feelings and are unwanted and hated. Those are exactly what we must work on.

If I do not feel any benefit from some state, neither emotionally nor mentally, then only by rising above that state can I begin to build the spiritual. After all, in such a case I am certainly not bribed or seeking personal gain, and in order to rise above it, I will need the help of the Creator.

So I constantly check myself: to what extent does my body resist my work? And this becomes a sign of correct advancement for me.

Then I need to look at why I am doing this. Maybe I want to rise above myself and pursue some personal goals.

Or maybe I want to find the love of the Creator, which is repugnant to our “body”—the egoistic mind and feeling. And I am looking for love that is entirely built on hatred of egoistic thoughts and desires about myself.

But often we do not try to rise above our body, but regret that we cannot work according to the mind and feelings contained within the body, rather than seeking the state that lies above reason and feeling, and desiring to be in it.

First of all, we must push the body down with all its feelings and reason, be above them, and not take them into account. That is, we take them into account only in order to rise above them. This is called faith above reason.

Instead we lament: why is everything not revealed to my mind so that I could act like a sensible person, and know that I possess intellect and my own strength for proper advancement?
[20274]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, 8/30/10, Rabash, Article 35

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