Entries in the 'Perception' Category

Daily Kabbalah Lesson, 09.06.2009

michael-laitman_daily-lesson_sep-03_0001_previewPreparation
I can feel empathy for someone in the material world, but this will only be a measure of my participation in his suffering. It won’t be pain that I myself feel.
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Part 1, on Baal HaSulam’s Letter 23
The spiritual world is not a theory. Actually, it is much more real than the “reality” we are familiar with now.
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Part 2, on Part 12 of Talmud Eser Sefirot, “Inner Observation”
All the corrections are made by the Light. So if a person acts on his own, he is acting inside his egoistic desire.
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Part 3, on “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot,” Item 142
Reality is something that you have in common with the Light. You gradually perceive one more part, and then another one, and so on, but you always perceive only the things you are ready for.
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230 Years Later…


A question I received: Kabbalah says that there are 230 years left until the end of the world. Will babies still be born in 231 years – in the world to come?

My Answer: We think of time in terms of our perception of reality and therefore we can’t grasp the way a person alters reality by changing his or her attributes. Reality is what I feel within. By changing my inner attributes, I discover a different picture of the world.

Take a computer screen, for example. When you press a button, you change the pictures that appear on the screen. That is how you are now living in different pictures, jumping from one movie into the next.

The 230 years that you are talking about, and babies that are or aren’t born, are not real issues. That is because when you rise to the spiritual dimension, you will suddenly sense that everything you used to perceive, all these bodies, people, men, women and children, this entire world, including you who eats and drinks, simply don’t exist.

You will suddenly realize that what you saw before was just an image on the screen, while in reality this picture was drawn by the two real forces standing behind it all – the will to receive and the will to bestow. The “reality” you sense now, simply does not exist. It exists only on your screen.

What does it mean to give birth, to build a house, and to live in this world? It is a certain combination of these two forces, which create such a picture for you. And that’s all! So, you don’t have to wait 230 years to experience the sequence of images that will come one after another.

What does it mean to live in the world? Is it my body that lives? I exist in a specific form of the will to receive, until I complete all of my corrections, whereby I will attain the will to bestow.

I have to rise from the lowest point, called this world, until I reach the highest point, adhesion with the Creator. Then, at the last stage of the correction process, the Lev HaEven (heart of stone) will also be corrected.

What happens after that? The picture changes, altering everything along with it: all the attributes, awareness and comprehension. If you ascend spiritually even a little bit, you will already begin to sense that this world is what you feel within. The sensation will shift, and something different, more internal, will emerge to take its place.

Everything takes place inside your desires. This is why it is written: “I saw a reverse world.” And that is why there won’t be anyone left in 230 years that will still perceive the world the way you do today.

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Spirituality Isn’t Somewhere Up There, But Here, Among Us

The Condition of Entering the Upper World Is Mutual GuaranteeThe spiritual world is a real sensation, not just a theory or fantasy. It is a reality that one feels even more strongly than the regular life we are all used to. However, this spiritual reality is currently concealed from us. We have to start revealing it by making personal efforts, and we will then begin to feel all sorts of spiritual forces, events, and occurrences. Moreover, we will feel and understand them even more than the material world. But the only way to do this is through studying Kabbalah in a group of like-minded people.

Then you will see that the group, the studies, this entire world, and the spiritual system all unite into one whole inside your perception. To the degree you make efforts, you will reveal that the spiritual system you are starting to feel is far more powerful and determines more things than the material world that you perceive. This is how one advances, until one comes to see that the spiritual system is completely in charge of the material one. Then, the material world becomes secondary, like an imprint of the spiritual world.

In order to accomplish all of this, you have to study and work in the group. Today you have a regular, mundane perception of reality, and you must now reveal the picture of the general system. It has to be “projected” inside you like a photograph becomes projected from a negative. And then, this picture has to be depicted more and more clearly within you.

The way to do this is by working with the original, authentic Kabbalah sources and by studying in the group. The spiritual sensation is then added to your current perception and sensation of the world. Of course, your sensation of this world will change and expand as well, but it won’t disappear. Spirituality then joins corporeality, so it never takes place “somewhere up there, beyond the clouds.” A person remains inside his current life, inside the same perception of reality, but he supplements it. This new supplement gradually becomes the most important thing to him in life, because it becomes revealed as something that determines and governs everything.

The Quantum Hamlet Effect, Or How To Be The Hamlet Of All Reality


In the News (from Quantum Physics): Quantum Hamlet Effect” In this work, by use of a formalism similar to formalism of the quantum Zeno effect (decrease of the decay probability of an unstable quantum system by frequent measurements) and quantum anti-Zeno effect (increase of the decay probability of an unstable quantum system by frequent measurements), we introduce the so-called quantum Hamlet effect. It represents a complete destruction of the quantum predictions on the decay probability of an unstable quantum system by frequent measurement. Precisely, by means of some especial, correctly defined, frequent measurements, decay probability of an unstable quantum system can behave as a divergent series without any definite value. In this way there is quantum mechanically completely unsolvable “Hamlet dilemma,” to decay or not to decay.

My Comment: Kabbalah explains that everything happens relative to us and inside us. Everything is completely dependent on our qualities. Everything that is observed is observed by us. Therefore, by controlling our thoughts, we can “mentally,” but practically, control all matter. So, every one of us can be Hamlet, always, and in all of reality!

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The Spiritual Revolution Is Unlike Any Other


A question I received: No new system is established in its pure form. In one way or another, it always makes a compromise with the former system, from which it develops. There is simply no other way. Do you agree?

My Answer: Yes and no. We are talking about a completely new level, qualitatively speaking, and therefore it will not develop in the traditional way – egoistically, from smaller to greater. We are talking about a qualitative revolution, which is changing from an attitude of consumption to an attitude of bestowal. People will begin to feel the world by coming out of themselves. They will feel the world beyond themselves. This model is inverse to anything that came before, because it is not built by development on the past.

People will continue to live in the world, along with all of their experiences and culture. However, when people begin to perceive and feel the inner, hidden connections in the world and the inner forms – the forces and souls, then the world will become transparent. The objects and actions of this world will then be seen as inanimate consequences of the Upper Forces, and the Upper Forces, a deeper layer of the world, will be clearly revealed to everyone.

Our current state of crisis is pushing us towards the need to attain this hidden reality, which contains the forces and actions controlling our world. Essentially, the present crisis is but a preparation, making us more able and willing to perceive something cardinally new, due to there not being any other choice.

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Did Modern Science Break Through Into A New Dimension, Or Reach A Dead End?


A question I received: Modern science has broken through into a dimension that is incommensurable for our current human consciousness. I get the feeling that scientists don’t know what to do with this knowledge because they are only starting to build general pictures of the universe, very slowly, but it is difficult for them to piece together a complete new picture of the universe.

My Answer: First of all, people’s knowledge and feelings are strictly subjective. The picture of reality is always formed within us, and there is nothing outside of us. We are always talking about the models that exist in us. Our world is inside us, and even we are all inside of ourselves.

We don’t know what happens outside, and there is no such thing as “outside” at all. Everything is within a person. If we take away the human being, there will be nothing to discuss because everything we know, everything we discuss, and everything we feel, is perceived within us, although it is presented to us as existing outside.

Question cont’d: Can the picture that physics and synergy illustrate for us provide spiritual elucidation?

My Answer: No, it will only lead to a dead end. A person has to realize that he must correct his desires. That is how he will change his perceived picture of the world. He needs to understand that he perceives reality in his qualities, and unless he changes his qualities, reality will not change!

Reality is the projection of our qualities against the background of white Light. Until we come to understand this, we will continue to wander around in the dark.

We have finished developing in our egoistic desire, in our qualities. All the current theories are finite. The only way to begin feeling the next state is by changing one’s qualities. The world is your subjective picture, your perception, and your own reflection. If you wish to change it, then change yourself. That is how you will change the world.

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The World Of Infinity Is Here, But We Are Indifferent To It


Out of all reality, I perceive only the things that are worthwhile for me, from the standpoint of profit or loss. Everything else I do not perceive. I may be surrounded by thousands of other things, but I remain indifferent to them all. And if I am indifferent, I simply don’t see them.

In this regard, a person does not have to change in any way, or transform himself into a “winged angel.” He only has to annul his limitations and open up his senses so as to see, hear and sense the world that exists outside him. And that is done by perceiving everything “for the benefit of others.”

Then you will truly sense the world outside yourself, and exist in the World of Infinity. But where is this World of Infinity? Is it behind some star or galaxy? No. It is here and now.

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The Journey To Infinity Starts With A Point Of The Soul

How to Keep Effective Virtual ConnectionsBaal HaSulam says that when we start looking at the world through the point of the soul, we develop a different perception of reality. This is a new sense, in addition to our five corporeal senses (sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste).

Within this new sense, I perceive an image that I call “the Upper World,” or another dimension. I then perceive both myself and this world inside this new, different sensation.

When you start perceiving the true, Upper Reality, you start seeing that your former perception is relative, that it is just one possible reality, and not the only existing reality, the way it seemed to you before. You start looking at the former reality in a detached way, and you see that this it is relative: it may exist, or, if your body dies, it may not.

However, when we switch from one perception of reality to the other, the new perception of reality does not annul the former. You begin perceiving them together and you see one of them as originating from the other.

But then you embark on yet another journey to an ever-expanding, true, eternal and absolute reality of the Creator.

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You Have Never Seen Anything Like This!


We were born into a world that came with certain conditions and was already arranged a certain way. That is how we know it. We have never felt anything else and we have gotten so used to this world (in which everything is so natural for us) that we don’t imagine that it is subjective, and could be completely different.

Our imagination and fantasies do not go beyond the boundaries of what we have gotten used to in this world. That is why it is difficult for us to understand what the Kabbalists say about another reality, which is revealed to a person if he attains a new level of perception.

Today, we are awakening to a new reality, and as the entire world reveals this new reality, this perception will cause people to change. As the new reality is born within us, the science of Kabbalah talks specifically about how we can develop the inner feeling of this new reality within ourselves and avoid the suffering that we will experience should we choose to come to this involuntarily.

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The New Generation Will Have A New Mind


Three questions I received on the new generation’s changing traits and values:

Question: In the last few years, psychologists have shown that younger people are much less able to focus their attention and to anticipate and build models for future actions.

My Answer: This is actually a positive phase of their development, because there cannot be anything negative in nature. People have to go through this, since all the positive properties and qualities originate from the negative ones.

Question: People who enjoy books, such as myself, are now being replaced by number-oriented people, who have completely different values and a different kind of perception. Because they are so different from people like me, they often just can’t hear or understand us. How can we communicate with them so they will actually listen to us?

My Answer: If this change is happening, it means that it is precisely these types of people that must start becoming aware of and sensing the spiritual world, rather than the philosophers and other thinkers of the past. Things just might work the opposite of how we expect them to: the awareness, logic, and ability to analyze and synthesize that the great, enlightened thinkers have, could actually be an obstacle that keeps them from entering the new, spiritual world.

Question: Then what type of thinking is preferable?

My Answer: Our thoughts arise as a result of our desires, because desire is the basis of our nature. Therefore, reason appears only according to one’s desire to attain something. If I desire to fulfill myself with something, then my mind develops accordingly. Otherwise, I would not have a mind (or reason).

The more I desire something and the more this desire is aimed at something higher, something new and unknown, the more my mind develops in new ways along with this new desire.

When Kabbalah speaks of reason or the mind, it is not talking about the egoistic kind of reason, which is handed down to us by various philosophers, thinkers and scholars. It is not talking about the kind of reason people are normally proud of, which they consider the human part of man. This kind of reason is not present in man, but in an egoistic creature whose mind works only for satisfying one’s egoistic desires, desires that are aimed at science and cultural values, but not bestowal. All of these desires are based on reception and egoism, but not bestowal.

This is why all the previous cultural and academic values will gradually decline. They will come down from the high pedestal they currently reside on will be considered insufficient. People will use them as a mere base to help them achieve the next, spiritual degree.

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