Entries in the 'Unity' Category

The Reaction Of Healthy Egoism

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Conventions where we actively were using the workshops as a way to unite produced the astonishing results.

Some friends, who in the past couldn’t find the common language, suddenly, by rising above personality differences, were able to unite. However, at the same time there were people who could not enter this process, they could not force themselves to sit in the circle.

Answer: The reaction of rejection is taking place. These people have a good and healthy egoism. They will too go forward, but we have to be patient for a little while and not push them! Gradually it will happen in them as a result of the influence of the common field. I know these problems many of which I experienced myself in different ways. Generally this is all legitimate.

In any condition, in any combination, in any possible form these friends should participate in common events; they can do it purely in the mechanical way, they can help do some work, sit at the computers, help with the general connection between the groups during that time. It doesn’t matter what they do. Gradually it will come.

There are such types of egoism, which have a very hard time establishing a contact. Even sitting together in a circle and talking about something only in the mechanical way is not so easy. In this regard we have to always raise another person and try to justify him.
[78792]
From the Virtual Lesson 5/20/12, “Fundamentals of Kabbalah”

Related Material:
What Is More Important: Common Consent Or Common Impression?
A Discussion In A Circle
My Friend Is A Representative Of The Creator!

I Manage Myself With The Help Of Two Reins

Dr. Michael LaitmanA person needs to see himself as a point that receives everything from the outside. The friends and the world in general, and even the inanimate, the vegetative and the animate, are all parts of my soul. All of this is one Malchut (kingdom), one Kli (desire/vessel), one man who stands across from the Creator.

Therefore, to the extent that I try to connect the enthusiasm and impressions that reach me now from the friends, not to cancel them, to that extent they become real, since I join the parts of my soul to myself. And then I acquire a new intellect and emotions as a result of the connection of the broken Kli.

It’s forbidden to extinguish any state. We need to rise above and examine it from a higher level; this is the correct approach. And therefore, it doesn’t matter how I feel during the workshop: good or bad, since in any case I must rise above everything, and clarify where the feelings come from and why, and then continue. We need to gather and accumulate the most positive and negative impressions in order to advance onward above them.

I must, in advance, agree to every state that comes, since my self – annulment will be built above all of these states. Everything that I go through is necessary in order to teach me to take control of all my states and above them to connect with the friends in spite of my rejection. The most important thing for me must be the connection that I will manage seemingly via two reins, and all my feelings and experiences will be in the background. The end of the act is in the initial thought. If a person behaves in this way, then he correctly uses all of his discernments.

It’s forbidden to allow your horse to run away, not to the left or right. There’s a goal in front of you and you need to constantly examine yourself according to it: if you deviate to the left, then you need to add from the right line, and if you deviate to the right, you need to add from the left line. Everything is determined only by the direction to the goal, and the goal is unity. We don’t see any other goal in spirituality other than the point of unity, Arvut (mutual guarantee).
[78481]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/20/12, “Talk About Past Conventions”

Related Material:
Focusing On The World Of Truth
The Union Of Plus And Minus
Seeing The World Through The Prism Of Unity

Growing Inward And Upward

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the elevator by which we rise to the center of the group?

Answer: I rise by absorbing the desires and aspirations of all the friends. I subdue myself and raise the others by seeing them as more important than me, and thanks to that, I receive power from them.

This power pushes me and enables me to adhere to the center of the group correctly. First, it helps me imagine this center, because I am always confused and keep losing this concept. I have to hold on to it like to a gun sight and constantly correct myself.

We started from this central point because we will deal with it all the time. We grow only on its basis, starting from this point and rising higher and higher. The growth doesn’t simply represent a physical height, but an increasingly growing concentration of the inner connection.

Therefore, in the future workshops, we have to clarify what a desire, a feeling, and an attainment are, how they are connected and to what extent, so that we can attain our root in them, the Creator.

This is practical work which we have to perform all our life and not only in the workshops. I am constantly in a workshop with myself: before the lesson, after the lesson, 24 hours a day, in order to connect “Israel, the Torah, and the Creator.” I have to listen to the friends, not just when they say certain words, and hear what their hearts say. I receive all these impressions through the center of the group, through everyone.

The Creator treats us as a corrected system, but I can’t see it this way. Instead I judge it according to my deficiencies. If I correct my egoistic defect just a little, I will join the corrected concept of the group, as the Creator sees it. In order to do that there is no need to wait for the specific time of the workshop: Our whole life is a workshop called internal work, the work of the Creator!
[78967]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/24/12, ”Talk About the Workshop”

Related Material:
Spinning Around The Central Point All Week Long
Towards The Center Of Life

What Is Born In The Center Of The Group?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What do we give birth to together in the common center of the group?

Answer: Every time in the center of the group, we give birth to the force of connection, unity, guarantee, bestowal, and love above our egoism, on its foundation, but rising above it. And so, we create the condition for the revelation of the upper Light, a place for the revelation of the Creator. It is called Shechina, because Shochen, the Creator, ascends the throne in it.

The center of the group, from the perspective of desires, is a sensation of the extent to which we want to connect all these desires together. Man sees that the whole world depends on him, and on the other hand, he sees the extent to which he depends on the whole world. It is a twofold feeling. One moment, I feel myself standing in front of a perfect system; the next moment, I see that the system is all broken because of lack of my participation in it.

We always reveal two polar opposite qualities. But by reconciling them by compensating with the upper Light, we reach the middle line. This middle line includes in itself a multitude of components; it is not necessarily a direct path but something in the middle between the right line and the left line. It is not simply their averaging-out but their compensation of each other to 100%. A 100% thief and a 100% altruist-philanthropist connect in the middle point and use both qualities in all their force, not by half.
[78660]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/22/12, “Talk About the Workshop”

Related Material:
Connecting Through The Central Control
Towards The Center Of Life
One Life And Common Prayer For Everyone

At The Epicenter Of World Correction

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the connection between the center of the group and dissemination for the entire world?

Answer: First of all, we need to strive toward the center of the group to realize the great rule of the Torah: Love thy neighbor. Otherwise, it will not be the center.

And through this central point, which determines the beginning and ends at the end of correction, through these definitions, I relate to all of reality and the entire world (the 99%). After all, I want to see all of humanity in this central point, and I surely will see it there!

To the extent that I correct myself in the center of the group, in relation to the rest of the world (toward the ninety-nine percent), with all of the positive and negative qualities that I discover in it, with all of the opinions and perceptions already formed inside of me, to that extent, I will see all of humanity in the center of the group, already corrected and ready for my realization. In this way, I will act from the internal part of the world outward.

By these means, I will establish spiritual dissemination. Then, I will see how effectively it helps the world, and how the world is moving forward and changing.

While the external form remains, in the same way, this world is obliged to exist until the very end of correction, until all of this imaginary reality disappears from our perception. That is why we need to apply effort in external dissemination as well.

However, then we will be able to define the right relationship toward the internal and external and distribute our strength. Our evaluations will change.

So, the center of the group is a point toward which we are aiming before everything else, as if we were setting out from all of the worlds of BYA into Malchut of the world of Atzilut, and then from Malchut of the world of Atzilut, wanting to join into ourselves all of the desires of all of reality and raise them ever higher; we discover ever higher qualities called Zeir Anpin, YESHSUT, Bina, and so on. With these new qualities and understanding, we correct and build the Shechina, the collection of all of the souls.

This is because, when addressing it with my uncorrected qualities, it is as if I am building it; I am joining it as a beneficial, active part. The Shechina is rejoicing in the fact that she no longer needs to separate her organ from herself, but can return it and connect it to herself.
[78658]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/22/12, “Talk About the Workshop”

Related Material:
Let’s Think About How We Can Help the World
Seeing The World Through The Prism Of Unity
Israel’s Role In The World

What Is More Important: Common Consent Or Common Impression?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Do we need to specifically prepare people to keep order during the workshops?

Answer: Any friend who has already participated in seminars, feels and understands their essence and meaning can do this.

The group can select a topic for discussion ahead of time, and the person responsible for order can sit outside the group and observe order during the discussion.

The main thing is for us to reach a common impression at the end of the discussion, not common consent: We do not have to share an opinion. All of us, together with our opinions, want to reach unity above these opinions, which can be absolutely different; we might not even be able to understand one another, but each one of us assumes that specifically this will help us unite and that is it: This is enough.

We must never try to convince one another! We might be speaking about a certain problem, everyone will express his point of view, they will be completely different and disconnected, but at the end we want for our common “I” to get together, for us to achieve this.

Question: We have examined many nuances, but all this disappears during a seminar. Where can we read and see a list of these rules and questions before a seminar?

Answer: In your heart. This does not exist anywhere; you cannot list it. And if you begin to list it, another thousand questions will arise, and this will continue without end.

Questions must appear in the heart, and the answer must be received there without a discussion.
[78785]
From the Virtual Lesson 5/20/12, “Fundamentals of Kabbalah”

Related Material:
My Friend Is A Representative Of The Creator!
The Mutual Guarantee Connection
The Secrets Of The Heart

Changes That Lead To Equality

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the center of the group?

Answer: The center of the group is the center of our reality, its utmost spiritual point. Reality doesn’t exist on its own, but exists in regard to the person who attains it. It is only possible to attain reality in the center of the group where I annul my ego and connect with the others equally so that it is stabilized inside me.

At the same time, I change the relationship between us on purpose, sometimes I subdue myself before the friends by seeing them as the greatest in the generation, and other times I rise above them in order to bestow something from myself. Eventually, by looking at the group once from above and once from below, I find an equal attitude towards it. This equality doesn’t exist at first; it is a result of my exertion.

On the one hand, I yearn as much as I can to be above the friends in order to help them, but on the other hand, I place myself below them in order to live and to be the one who receives through them. By these two poles, I suddenly discover what it means to be equal, although I didn’t aim towards this before and didn’t see this point. I see myself in Ein Sof (Infinity) higher than everyone else (+∞), and at the same time in Ein Sof lower than the friends (–∞); suddenly I find the center of the group where everyone is equal and discover that it actually exists. My corporeal life is left behind and only the devotion remains, the mutual guarantee, adhesion with everyone. I feel that I increasingly summon the Reforming Light, the Surrounding Light, which fills the whole “space” of my attributes. By discovering more powers, more support, more care from the outside, I feel that I am being stabilized, and that is the center of the group.

In the center of the group, I really discover the group, the friends, and no matter what they discover, in my reality everything is completely accurate. This is because the world of Ein Sof already exists, and the descent into this world is only meant to build the steps of the ladder of the spiritual revelation, the recognition, the understanding, and the feeling in us. When these steps appear in a person and he begins to climb them, he doesn’t depend on anyone: Everyone is in Gmar Tikkun (the end of correction). I am in front of the place where the Light of Ein Sof exists and everything depends on me, everything and all of reality are in me, and there I discover the truth. But this truth depends on my own investment, on my loyalty to the group, to the teacher, and to the sources, and I need to reveal it in practice.

There is nothing but the center of the group. I discover that it must become the center of the whole world, the place where all the souls assemble, all the corruptions and all the corrections. This is Malchut of Ein Sof with everything it is going to collect and include in it. In other words, when a person devotes himself to Malchut of Ein Sof, Divinity, by wanting to be an inseparable part of it, he becomes Malchut of Ein Sof himself, and by that connects it with the first nine Sefirot, meaning with all the worlds until Ein Sof, and so we advance.
[78599]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/22/12, “Talk About the Workshop”

Related Material:
The Center Of the group Is the Place Of The Correction
Breakthrough Via The shared Center Of the Group
The Creator In The Center Of The Group

One Life And Common Prayer For Everyone

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe center of the group is the point in which we become free from all the fragments of the breaking and want to concentrate only on our sparks uniting them together. And the more we seek to unite these sparks, the higher we rise on the spiritual ladder.

Due to these efforts, we reveal a new depth of desire in us, and a greater Light is revealed in the unity of sparks. The connection of sparks is the “Reshimo de Hitlabshut,” and the depth of desire, above which we want to connect, is the “Reshimo de Aviut,” and thus we begin to connect in our first common spiritual Partzuf in which we will feel one soul.

The first time we will feel ourselves in the integral reality where we are all connected to each other, and inside it we will feel spiritual life—one for all. As it’s said: “There is none else besides the Creator,” one for everyone: one thought, one light, a unified system. We will feel ourselves living inside one upper force.

And then, we will begin to recognize it more and more, distinguish more features in it, different attitudes towards us relative to the size of Partzuf. But the very first point from which we have to begin is the point of our unity, called the center of the group. It consists of two elements: The first one is overcoming of our egoism, the Reshimo de Aviut, and the second one is our desire to unite through our sparks, which determines the Reshimo de Hitlabshut.

If I install them correctly relative to each other, it’s called faith above reason. It all comes down to one reality, to a single state. Faith is the connecting sparks, and knowledge is the force of the egoistic desire, above which we want to build our connection.

It doesn’t matter if we fail to reach the desired and connect in the center of the group. The main thing is how much effort we have put into it. The extent of efforts determines the successful state.

We will never achieve success directly through our actions, but only will attract the Light to ourselves, so that the Creator finishes this work for us! After all, “a prisoner cannot free himself from the jail;” everything happens due to the help from Above, through the prayer and the answer to it.
[78878]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/24/12, “Talk About the Workshop”

Related Material:
My Friend Is A Representative Of The Creator
From A Point To The Creator
The Letter And Spirit

From A Point To The Creator

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Zohar tells us about the ways we connect, which create the vessel of perception. By our connection in different manners, we discover the Creator. The Creator has no form and no image. His form is the extent and the manner of our connection. If we connect, we acquire the attribute of the Creator, His form.

At first the Creator was revealed in the starting point of the creation—Malchut of Ein Sof (Infinity). There was no connection there but just a point, one desire. Then this desire developed under the influence of the Light and received all its attributes. But it was still one, until the oppositeness of the Light in all its opposite attributes appeared in it.

By connecting, we discover the forms of the Light, the forms of the Creator. Therefore, to be connected also means to be adhered to the Creator with the attribute of love and bestowal.

The way we connect is the form of the Creator we discover. The intensity of our connection is the level on which we discover the Creator. The Creator is revealed in the connection among us.

The desire remains the same desire that was created at first, as a specific desire. The Light shattered it into many separated desires. By connecting them we discover the Light 620 times stronger in quality than before: We discover the thought, the mind, the thought of creation.
[78698]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/23/12, The Zohar

Related Material:
The Secret Of The Upper Light
The Place Where There Is No Separation
The Zohar Becomes Revealed In Love

Many Roads Lead To The Creator

Dr. Michael LaitmanMan feels the desires, which arise in him, and based only on them he perceives reality, feels it and lives in it. The perception of the world depends on the informational data (Reshimot) revealed in a person, and that is why people don’t understand each other. Indeed, each person sees, feels, perceives, and interprets what’s going on according to his own needs.

Besides this, there are no two similar moments since new desires emerge in us all the time and in accordance with them so do thoughts. That is, the perception of reality changes constantly: A person never remains that same person. From this, one needs to understand that we have no possibility to judge ourselves in our own states, or even more so to judge others.

This is because each person is controlled by that sprout of desire that awakens in him at that moment. The only decision is to learn how to aim towards commonness and unity, above all of these desires. And if all of us are mutually connecting into each other, then we can reach the “common denominator,” which is called the center of the group, unity, the point of connection, Malchut, the collection of all of the souls, longing for the Creator.

It is impossible to judge particular qualities and perceptions of each person at a given moment since this is predetermined from Above. There are people who come to study because they want to receive knowledge and automatically memorize what is written. There are those who are searching for new perceptions and possibilities to discover the upper Light, angels, and spirits.

There are people who by their nature are closer to this method and instinctively long towards unity, while others, having perfectly studied all of the articles about the group, nevertheless, cannot understand that it relates to them and that they need to realize this on themselves. Alternatively, they agree to realize it, but purely externally, like religious rites, instead of investing their heart into this.

All people are different, and based on this, we cannot judge a person. His behavior is derived from the root of his soul and there are many roads which lead to the Creator. That is why only longing is needed for each person to be under the maximum influence of the correct environment, which will help him move on his own path at his own pace, and what will happen, will happen.

We need to be more patient and tolerant of each other regarding the things that have to do with spiritual development. For here a person possesses the freedom of choice only in joining the correct environment. And this depends on the kind of Reshimot that will be revealed in them and which kind of Light that will be influencing him. And the pace and order in moving forward in joining the group are very different from person to person.

There are people who grasp these principles very quickly and are ready for unity. However, this may be because they have a weak desire, which does not cover up the value of unity from them. While in others there may be a very large and rigid egoistic desire, and that is why it is so difficult for them to accept that the whole spiritual goal is revealed inside unity with others.

They are not able to attach importance to commonality and that is why they move forward in another way, the larger part of it in darkness, in concealment, with much hardship. However, at a later time, suddenly, a leap forward happens.
[78688]
From the preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/23/12

Related Material:
Newspaper Publishing Is No Longer Profitable
Common Forces Against Individual Egoism
Keeping The Direction Towards The Creator