According To The Original Desire

 

The wisdom of Kabbalah is revealed to humanity gradually. The first Kabbalist to attain it was Adam, a Kabbalist who lived 5,579 years ago. But it was revealed more explicitly through Abraham, about 3,600 years ago.

Today the wisdom of Kabbalah is going through a very interesting phase of becoming familiar to humanity.

In the past, it was known only to a few Kabbalists who were secluded and apart from the rest of society, but today it begins to gradually spread all over the world. This is the reason we also participate in and are witnesses to a unique phenomenon in which the essence of the world we live in, the cause and effect of our existence, and the plan of human evolution are gradually revealed to humanity.

People are divided into five levels (just like the general desire to receive) according to the level of their development and the level of their participation in life.

There are people who are not concerned about anything other than themselves. There are those who care about their family, the society they live in, etc. Those, on the next level, are concerned with the Earth, the planets, and space. At the same time, they are not interested in breaking through the frameworks of this world. There are those who want to reveal and to know what happened in the past and what will happen in the future.

However, there are people who are interested in the general system of creation, the extent to which we participate in it, and the extent to which the creation exits by itself, where it stems from, what happens to it, and how. They aspire to understand the general picture of mutual cooperation between all the parts of creation.

It is actually the principle of the global, integral connection of all of nature that they find most interesting of all. They want to know how everything is connected, why, for what purpose, and how one component responds and manages another and impacts all the other parts. They have such a big desire that they want to know and to attain the general system, the general schema, the general structure, of everything there is, not only in our world, but also beyond this world, and they cannot find peace in ordinary life.

By trying to resemble others, they try to engage in all sorts of corporeal problems, but this does not last long. The first chance that fate brings an opportunity their way, they immediately fly somewhere, which means that they cannot engage in daily problems.

They are more concerned with problems that are not even on a cosmic scale, but above that (which means with problems that the word “everything” incorporates). It is not space, not our world, but something whole. Such people who do not settle for a general idea—they find it troubling and it gnaws them from the inside—reach the wisdom of Kabbalah.

This question does not necessarily reach its maximum level in each and every one of them, but it is still a bit higher than our world. There are questions of a lower order, when people are interested in knowing what determines things like their health and their fate. They are fond of mysticism or start practicing folk medicine, etc.

Thus, we begin to revolve around the wisdom of Kabbalah from below, from the lowest beastly level, all the way to the highest level in which a person feels the need to sense and to attain the whole creation, the whole system and its leadership.

There are different upgrades of desires, and therefore many reach the wisdom of Kabbalah, but once they hear that it is about the highest levels, they understand that it is not for them because they are more interested in the corporal implementation of both mankind and of the wisdom of Kabbalah. They accumulate some knowledge and move to their level.

This is actually how it has to be. This is the reason that we never force anyone to stay, those who come, or those who leave, since it is their private business. Each one should find his balance in this system, on all the levels of the attainment of creation and according to the demand of one’s soul, which means of one’s internal, original, personal desire.

This is how we exist.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 2/5/19

A Healthy Growth Of The Ego

 

Question: What are the signs of a healthy growth of the ego in corporeality and spirituality?

Answer: Healthy growth of the ego takes place when I ascend above it and perform spiritual actions. By doing so, I force the ego to grow to my level.

Suppose I perform a certain spiritual action. As soon as I ascend to its level, my ego also ascends to its level. I yearn to advance, perform the next spiritual action, and ascend to the next level, and my ego ascends further from that level too. This means that to the extent that I grow in spirituality, my ego also grows.

This is how they follow each other, as it says: “He who is greater than his friend, his desire is greater.” It turns out that when you grow to be a good Kabbalist, you become a great egoist.

But then the ego is controlled by the spiritual attribute that you have acquired, which means that you work with the intention in order to bestow, and you push your spirit, your spiritual state, which in its turn pushes your ego upward.

Thus, our spiritual level actually grows thanks to the ego, because everything that the Creator has created is basically the ego, and everything else is its derivatives.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 11/11/18

Preparation Of Egoism For Future Changes

 

Question: Why has it taken humanity such a long time to get to equitable conditions and equality of all before the law? Also, although it is not spiritual equality, do you still see some progress in this?

Answer: Yes, I do see some progress. It has taken humanity such a long time to get to the current state because we work with egoism. At the lower stages of its development, egoism is really impenetrable. It has taken thousands of years to somehow prepare it for future changes.

We do not yet feel these changes, but soon they will begin to manifest themselves. We will see how at different stages of human development, at different historical stages, we were preparing ourselves for these changes. We can get through them.

The fact that everything has been distributed in such a way over time only indicates that nature understands who it is dealing with and knows how to do everything according to the law of its intrinsic development.

It is necessary to gradually bring egoism to an awareness of the need for ethical, moral, and eventually spiritual changes.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 9/11/20

The One Inside Me

 

Comment: There is pain in the world. As you keep saying, this pandemic is not the end of it. The UN has already accepted that we have lost this fight with more than a million dead and more than 30 million infected, and that we need to unite. But how? How can we unite? Suddenly Karabakh! Nation on nation! Such hatred is spilled out that did not exist before. What’s going on in Belarus?! What’s happening in America?!

My Response: The world, of course, has descended…

Question: What about Israel? The government can’t make basic decisions. It seems that we were not put in apartments, in rooms, the virus didn’t scare us.

Answer: Mutual pretensions are the strongest.

Question: This is staggering! What kind of nature is this?! How can we work with it?

Answer: This is the next state of egoism. The fact that I pay less and less attention to the consequences that are allegedly threatening. I am threatened, others are threatened, it doesn’t matter, I don’t feel it. What can I do?

Question: A person has no responsibility. Should there be a change of mind or a change of heart?

Answer: “What the mind doesn’t do, time does,” the Bible says.

We are trying to speed up this process of the revelation of evil. For what? For humanity to tell its ego: “That’s it! You don’t rule me anymore! I’m separating myself from you! This is you, and this is me.”

What can I do to realize that it is guiding me all the time? I get up in the morning and feel that it is guiding me: “Get up, go there, do that, sit down this way, that way…” It commands me all the time.

Question: Should I admit that I am its slave?

Answer: I don’t admit it. I begin to understand this and begin to rebel against it because I see that, in principle, it does not prepare anything good for me.

We need to rise above this so our earthly nature does not guide us. We can’t go on living this way anymore.

Question: We can talk about egoism and man, about the fact that egoism turns us, pushes us, spins us, and, in principle, pushes us into the abyss. Can an ordinary person reason like that or not?

Answer: If you explain all this to him all the time, he will eventually be able to see, on the one hand, the explanation, and on the other hand, the blows of fate.

Explanations must always be before his eyes. And he would not see them, read them, or anything. But the time comes, he gets blows, and then he suddenly sees. Or begins to search frantically: “What should I do?! How do I get rid of the problem?!” And then he begins to see, to listen.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 10/1/20

We Don’t Hear Each Other

 

Question: Everyone needs to be able to listen. Parents should listen to their children. Children should listen to their teachers who give them assignments. A manager needs to listen to his subordinates, and so on.

Most people consider themselves very good listeners. I read research that shows only 10% of people have the ability to listen to others. What is the reason? Why do people think they can listen, but we see the opposite?

Answer: Because one plays along with his ego, wants everyone to see how friendly, attentive, and responsive he is. In fact, he wants to listen only to himself, see only himself, and justify only himself. Therefore, it is very difficult for us to communicate with each other well. We cannot hear each other.

Despite the fact that today there are all kinds of methods of video and audio connection, we should check just how connected we are to each other. We have not become any more sociable. We can sit and listen to various programs that supposedly connect us to each other, but we cannot hear or see anyone but ourselves.

Question: There is a basic rule of interpersonal relations that says that the meaning of a message cannot be clearly understood. On a physiological level, we are unable to grasp this message.

In the research I read about, it was established that our audio perception is only 25% effective. Even in informal conversations with friends only 60 to 70% of the information is absorbed.

What is the reason for this gap? There are things that egoism is receptive to.

Answer: It does not matter what the ego is receptive to or not. Since everyone is wrapped up in self-love and wants to feel only themselves, whatever reaches us is still interpreted incorrectly and therefore remains somewhere in the air.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 8/14/20

The Most Precious Gem

 

Confucius: “The gem cannot be polished without friction, nor man perfected without trials.”

Man must polish himself. Moreover, polish to such an extent that sometimes he literally rips off layers, egoistic layers. If only one would be able to endure. This is very painful.

Question: Can a person do it at all?

Answer: There comes such opportunity, such contempt, when you feel that anger and aversion to egoism is greater than the pain, and you want to erase it from yourself.

Question: Is this how the precious gem is revealed?

Answer: Yes.

Question: If man were able to go through this state, what would he reveal then?

Answer: He reveals the Creator within him.

Question: When you say “To reveal the Creator within yourself,” what do you mean?

Answer: I find Him there. It turns out that He was within me. I thought that there was some kind of egoism in me, an animal. But in fact, it was the Creator!
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 7/27/20

Everything Is Bought And Sold

 

Question: Should we understand that in this life we are bought and sold?

Answer: Not everyone, of course. Yet, the fact that this happens—yes.

Question: We are indignant, and nevertheless we are bought and sold. Why?

Answer: Because we are not aware that we are selling and buying, but we want to sell and buy everything in this world.

Question: What do we want to sell?

Answer: Everything that you can be a profitable deal.

The character Panikovsky, a petty criminal in Ilf and Petrov’s, The Little Golden Calf said, “I will buy and sell all of you, buy you, sell you, buy you, and sell you again, but for more.”

Question: So I sell it for a deal, for myself, to make a profit?

Answer: Yes. I buy what I can buy cheap and then sell at a profit. This is human. At every level! Every minute!

Question: What a low creature a human is! Do you see something at least a little elevated in humans?

Answer: In a person who lives in this world and by this egoistic world, there can be nothing else. Just to sell, buy, and sell for even more.

Question: Does one always want a bribe?

Answer: Only!

Question: How is it possible to rise from this state, in what way?

Answer: Through the recognition of evil, that although I exist within the framework of this nature, in the end, I act to my own detriment. To my own detriment! And, based on this, I already begin to think, “How can I do this differently?” Then I begin to understand that my evil and the evil of others are one and the same.

Question: Do I say that this makes me feel bad and start from there?

Answer: Yes, you should start from yourself.

Question: Will a person recognize now that he feels bad because of his “purchase”?

Answer: It is because he recognizes that he feels bad and begins to look for what to do that he will come to the conclusion that he must get rid of his egoism, of this “bad,” and perceive himself in a different way, in a different connection with others. If it is bad for others, then it is bad for me. There is no other way out.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 8/31/20

Our Faithful Assistant

 

Question: A study was conducted at Harvard for 80 years where scientists have tried to figure out the main factor for happiness in people’s lives. They concluded that relationships between people is most important.

On one hand, we really want to be happy, and we understand that the most important factor is relationships. We invest a lot of money in medicine, devote a lot of time to a healthy lifestyle even though we understand that the decisive factor even for human health is the relationship between people.

And still, no matter how much we invest, we cannot fully realize, even purely selfishly, that relationships between us are the most important thing. Why?

Answer: Because egoism is a helper against you. It does not just push you to do what is good for you. This is a very special assistant that leads you not to achieve the most comfortable animal state, but to achieve a higher state. Only in a special way.

Selfishness is built based on the fact that you abandon it and rise above it. It is constantly pushing for this, but in exactly the opposite way.

Therefore, in the material world there is no greater helper for our development than egoism although it constantly confronts us with ourselves. It constantly pushes us to struggle, to opposites, to contradictions, all in order to find out who we are, what we are, what we are for.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 7/30/20

“What Is The Definition Of Altruism?” (Quora)

 

Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is the definition of altruism?“

Altruism is egoism’s opposite, and egoism is self-centeredness, or a desire to enjoy at the expense of others.

Altruism is thus giving from oneself to others, to what is outside of us—humanity and nature.

Egoism is an inward direction—a desire to receive—and altruism is an outward direction—a desire to give.

After the definition of altruism arises the question: How can human beings become genuinely altruistic?

Becoming altruistic requires participating in a supportive social and learning environment where we can learn how nature operates altruistically, and practice how to think and act similarly to nature, together with others.

Genuine implementation of altruistic attitudes in a certain environment awakens forces dwelling in nature that can instill in us an altruistic perception and sensation of reality. That is, by regularly influencing one another in a certain social setup with the greatness and importance of altruism—how it is a nature-based quality, and how our becoming altruistic can solve all of our problems and lead us to much happier and more secure lives—we can then invert ourselves from being naturally egoistic, to acquiring a second altruistic nature.

We would then become beings with outwardly-aimed thoughts, desires, actions, intentions and goals—opposite to our current inwardly-aimed egoistic operating system.

Preceding participation in an egoistic-to-altruistic transformation process is a conclusion that more and more of humanity is reaching: the understanding of our egoistic nature leading to no positive outcomes, and the realization of the need for a shift to altruism, that altruistic forces that could grant us secure our survival, and even more so, invigorate, energize and enhance our lives.

Filed under: Egoism, Q&A, Quora | Add Comment / Ask Question →

View From The “Second Floor”

 

Question: Is there a punishment for the sins of a generation? Is there a concept that children should pay for the sins of their fathers?

Answer: In general, yes. After all, we do not exist by ourselves, as we think. Usually, people believe that they can do whatever they want without realizing that they are within the framework of nature, which has its own laws.

We gradually reveal these laws at the inanimate, vegetative, and animate levels. But at the human level, we cannot reveal them. We can only assume that they exist.

The fact is that we look at inanimate, vegetative, and animate nature from the top-down, and therefore, we can understand it and somehow manage it. And we can only look at other people at our level. We do not have a “second floor” from which we can look at them. Therefore, on a human level, we constantly make mistakes. We have nothing to compare with, we do not have a second floor  to look from above to below.

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, we must rise to the next level, called faith above reason, from which we will correctly see our earthly level and understand who we are and how we should behave.

Question: Where did the term “descent,” “decline,” or “coarsening” of generations come from?

Answer: We see that each generation develops in its own egoism, which is becoming more sophisticated, multileveled, and complex. Therefore, it pulls us down. We must necessarily balance it by striving upward.

We do not understand this yet. But in our time, we have already come to a state that allows us to understand how we can balance egoism and more or less influence our existence.

Question: Can we say that it is precisely the different level of egoism that is the cause of conflicts between generations?

Answer: Naturally. We are all selfish, but each one in one’s own way.
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From the TV program “The Post-Coronavirus Era” 5/21/2020

“Survival Of The Fittest Is A Lie We Tell Ourselves” (Medium)

Medium published my new article “Survival of the Fittest Is a Lie We Tell Ourselves”

With each passing day, we have to realize that despite the growing tensions, we hate the wrong enemy. We think the enemy is that man who supports the other party, or that woman who belongs to the other race, or that person who is more privileged in some way, who is richer, smarter, prettier, luckier, or any other “er” that I would like to be or have.

There will be no winners in this war because it isn’t the right war. The right war is against our own egos, and we can defeat them only if we fight it specifically alongside those who are unlike us, whom we dislike, and of whom we disapprove, since this is the only alliance that our egos will never support.

But none of them are my real enemies. There have always been people who were more successful than we in some way, and there always will be such people. But they didn’t use to make us feel bad, and they didn’t use to make us feel that we want them out of our lives, and if possible, out of existence. They have always been here, but we were different. We were less self-entitled, less absorbed with ourselves, or simply, less selfish. Yes, our own egoism is our enemy.

We can’t control it; it’s growing from within us and is so much a part of who we are that we don’t even feel that it is the problem. But if we don’t learn how to work with our ego, it’ll lead us into civil war because we won’t be able to tolerate anyone’s existence but our own and those who think like us and look like us.

There will be no winners in this war because it isn’t the right war. The right war is against our own egos, and we can defeat them only if we fight it specifically alongside those who are unlike us, whom we dislike, and of whom we disapprove, since this is the only alliance that our egos will never support.

But it has to be a common decision, taken by the whole society on all its factions, or it is bound to fail. And should you ask what will motivate people to cooperate with those they hate, or even relate to them positively? The answer is that we have run out of options. If we don’t do it, we will all fall. We’ve come to a state where we are totally dependent on each other, and we are dependent the most on those we most dislike.

Actually, not only we, but all of reality consists of opposites that complement one another. They do not like each other, but are completely dependent on each other and their own existence guarantees and sustains the existence of their opposite or “rival.”

Think of “night” without “day,” “winter” without “summer,” “dry” without “wet.” Or when it comes to people, think of Black without White, Republican without Democrat, Liberal without Conservative. Can you imagine a coin that has only one side? This is how dependent we are on one another.

We think that when Darwin discovered the principle of “Survival of the Fittest,” he meant that only the meanest and most belligerent survive. This is a complete misinterpretation of his words that our pugnacious egos impose on us. A recent book by Brian Hare and Vanessa Woods titled Survival of the Friendliest writes that “to Darwin and modern biologists, “survival of the fittest” refers to something very specific — the ability to survive and leave behind viable offspring. It is not meant to go beyond that.” Moreover, they add that “Darwin was constantly impressed with the kindness and cooperation he observed in nature,” and quote his book Descent of Man, which states, “Those communities, which included the greatest number of the most sympathetic members, would flourish best and rear the greatest number of offspring.”

We are headed in the opposite direction. We are breaking our social fabric, tearing apart our communities, and dismantling the country. In such circumstances, we ourselves will not survive. And the only culprit is the human ego. We are now at a point where either we unite against it and help each other overcome it by encouraging each other to connect, and by trying to unite with those unlike us, or the ego will win and we will all lose everything.

Why Should We Rise Above Discord?

Question: There are various conflicts in nature, especially in the animal world. Why, on a human level, should we rise above discord? Let’s live by nature!

Answer: We are descendants of the animal world, who have risen to the level of Man (Adam). Even our egoism is not the same as that of animals. They have it instinctively, given to them by nature, and they are not able to change it. They can only make the most of it for their own benefit.

Therefore, the animal level cannot be an example for us. Man is a social animal. To be socially useful, he must correct himself. There is nothing we can do here. We must do this; otherwise we will not have a future.

Remark: But we are part of nature…

My Response: We are part of nature only according to our animal body, but not according to our egoism. Do not confuse these two levels in us.
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From KabTV’s “The Post-Coronavirus Era” 5/21/20

Management By The Brain

Comment: New research suggests that the human brain responds more emotionally to negative actions that people perform and so it is easier for us to blame than to give them compliments. In order to compliment a person, we need to activate the part of the brain that is responsible for analytical thinking, whereas in order to insult and reprimand others, pure emotions and spontaneous feelings are sufficient. This means that the brain is to blame for everything. On the other hand, you say that the ego is to blame for everything.

My Response: The brain is merely a small machine. It does not produce anything. But in the end, when we read information, we see that it is harder to say something positive about another than to say something negative.

A negative reaction is purely emotional, and emotions are our direct ego, so we don’t need energy in order to use it. On the other hand, reaching positive conclusions about another person is great internal work, so of course a person is not inclined to do so.

Question: So does this mean that all the crazy unexplainable wars that are going on right now are a clash of emotions.

Answer: Of course!!! Isn’t this logical?

Comment: And you need to rise above your emotions, but you immediately claim that it is impossible.

My Response: It is impossible. How can we rise above our feelings if the feelings are who we are? We are not human beings without feelings, but computers, and we cannot operate this way.

Question: Does this mean that humanity will continuously clash in these wars?

Answer: Yes, unless it changes its feelings, it will not change its ego, and it will not correct it. So we are facing the era of the correction of the ego. It is not a simple matter, but it is clear and good. Here the wisdom of Kabbalah is revealed as the method of the correction of the ego.

Question: Does this mean that all we need is to reach the recognition of evil; that is it?

Answer: Yes, that’s all. What else do we need? There is no evil in the world other than that. Everything will work out for the best.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 12/18/18

“The End Of The Ego Era And The Decline Of The Ego Kingdom” (Linkedin)

My new article on Linkedin “The End of The Ego Era And The Decline Of The Ego Kingdom”

The United States is a unique country. Its people immigrated there with the sole purpose of building a good life for themselves and to escape from the bad lives they’d had in their homelands. In many ways, its pioneers were escapees. They came from England, the Netherlands, and Germany, and built a country that idolized such values as “To each his own” and “What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is yours.”

The virus told us that our exploitative civilization, where people are alienated from each other, cannot go on, that we must change how we relate to one another and to nature, and that the predominance of the ego must end. Naturally, the country most influenced by egoism suffered the worst blow: The United States of America.

And America succeeded. While other countries were chained by religion, tradition, manners, and culture, Americans were free to build their own lives for themselves, and they did it with vigor. They made religion one’s personal business with which the state must not interfere, sanctified private property more than the sanctity of life, and the country kept growing as more people from more nationalities and cultures kept pouring in.

Eventually, even slavery was abolished, ethnic diversity peaked, and America thrived. It seemed as though hard work would grant each person a house in the suburbs, a car in the driveway, and a picket fence around the lawn, or simply, the realization of the American Dream.

But something’s changed in the last few decades. The wage gaps grew, prices rose, and tuition fees spiked. Gradually, the Land of Opportunity became a land of disappointment, frustration, and despair. The ego, which the Bill of Rights crowned as the ruler in America, is failing to keep its promise of lush and easy living. Now, in the third decade of the third millennium, life in America has become hard, harsh, and hopeless.

But it’s not because Americans did anything wrong. For a long time, the American way has been the way to go. For a long time, America was proof that diverse ethnicities and cultures could live side by side (more or less) peacefully. The diversity of American society was a testament to the American motto of unlimited possibilities, and gave it strength and flexibility that no other country had.

But the ego isn’t passive. It is a monster that keeps growing and unless you tame it, it will rise against its owner. This is one part of America’s woes. The unbridled ego made inequality grow to such levels that while some people cannot feed their children, others have more billions of dollars than they can count. Such a society is unsustainable.

The other part of America’s woes is nature itself. It has become intolerant to egoism. If, until recently, you could get away with polluting as much as you want, mining and drilling as much as you could, and extinguishing species left and right, this year, nature has stopped humanity’s celebration through a tiny servant with a big name: SARS-CoV-2, aka. Covid-19.

The coronavirus stopped civilization in its tracks and showed us for just a few weeks of quarantine how beautiful the world could be if we only stopped destroying it. Moreover, the virus told us where to start, by watching out for each other’s health through wearing masks and staying six feet apart.

The virus told us that our exploitative civilization, where people are alienated from each other, cannot go on, that we must change how we relate to one another and to nature, and that the predominance of the ego must end. Naturally, the country most influenced by egoism suffered the worst blow: The United States of America.

All the countries suffer, and all the countries will continue to suffer from the economic, social, physical, and emotional blows wrought by Covid-19. But America, whose population is the most diverse, and whose culture is the most individualistic, will suffer the most.

We are witnessing the onset of a new era, where people learn to cooperate and think of one another, where care and consideration take the helm, and self-absorption and entitlement become contemptible. Naturally, the country that led the world in self-indulgence will be the last when the new era sets in.

But all hope is not lost. America is a land of pioneers, brazen people who dared the unknown and beat the odds. It will need to reinvent itself, restructure its society, and reeducate its people, but if any country can do it, it is America.

At the moment, the U.S. is undergoing civil disintegration that could become a civil war. But if there is a will, there is a way. If the American people want to save their country, they must pull together and change their society into a cohesive, mutually accountable entity that serves as an example of the right way to live in an era of mutual dependence. The only question is whether Americans have the will.

How Do Generations Differ From Each Other?

Remark: We can see from history that the duration of the change of generations is shortening. If before generations changed in a few thousand years, then in a few hundred years, today twenty years is enough.

My Comment: Yes, but what has changed in these twenty years? In principle, people do not change much. Only their attitude to material values changes: the pursuit of acquiring cars, smartphones, and clothes, the desire to travel abroad, and so on.

All of this does not define the generations. They do not change qualitatively in their inclination to the question about the meaning of life. Therefore, their names X, Y, Z, and so on are all quite conventional. Practically, what is there between these generations? The toys they play with.

Remark: There are common experiences. One generation survived the war, another, some other historical event.

My Comment: We just replace one with another. We replaced the purpose of creation and our aspiration to it in different epochs with something absolutely shallow, corporeal.

Question: What is the conflict between fathers and sons, i.e., between generations?

Answer: I do not see any significant conflict here. If the fathers played with primitive computers, the sons are now playing with more advanced machines. Yet, what is the qualitative difference between them? Is the difference in the approach to the meaning of life, to the revelation of the essence of our existence? There is none of this.
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From KabTV’s “The Post-Coronavirus Era” 5/21/20

The Dominant Desire

Question: Can we say that today the desire for self-realization prevails over other desires?

Answer: In our generation, we are already turning the pyramid of desires into a circle. Since all nature is integral and is a huge ball in which all levels are connected and support each other, all the aspirations that manifest in humanity take place, whatever they may be. Not only to wealth, entertainment, knowledge, and discovery, but to absolutely everything.

We cannot say that the modern stage is characterized by something special in comparison with other periods. The only thing is that now a person begins to develop an attraction to reveal the Creator.

In the current generation, the desire for self-realization is more and more evident in the understanding of the main law of the universe.

Question: Psychologist Abraham Maslow believed that no more than 4% of the human population could reach the highest level of the hierarchy of needs (the desire for self-realization). Moreover, a person feels happy even if the thirst for self-realization is satisfied by only 40%.

Do you think that the realization of your potential is the highest point in the pyramid of desires?

Answer: Naturally, if the realization actually occurs. And if the desire is there, but it is not realized?

For example, in our time, many seek not even to know, but to reveal the Creator. Knowledge is open to all, and can be the lot of everyone. But if we are talking about the revelation of the Creator, it is not given to everyone, and therefore, it can no longer be said that a person reaches this state and is happy.
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From KabTV’s “Management Skills” 6/25/20

A Taste For Basic Needs

Question: The needs of the lowest level of our desires do not disappear; they are preserved at all levels. Therefore, even if I am at the top of the pyramid today, will I always have animalistic needs?

Answer: The whole set of them. Each of us contains the entire pyramid of desires. Moreover, the higher we rise in our values, the stronger our connection with the lowest levels becomes.

Therefore, in Kabbalah it is said that the higher a person rises, the stronger his craving for basic needs become—food, sex, family.

Question: That is, it is not that a person begins to neglect them, but on the contrary, he begins to feel a taste for them, a taste for respect, for money, etc.?

Answer: For everything.

Question: Is such a struggle constantly taking place in him?

Answer: This is what his growth is about.

Question: It means that he does not become indifferent to this whole world, money, and everything else?

Answer: Never and in no way. It is only in books they write that spiritual people are supposedly all “God’s dandelions.” On the contrary! As their spiritual desires grow, so do their bodily, egoistic, earthly desires.
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From KabTV’s “Management Skills”, 6/25/20

Don’t Believe! Check It Out!

Question: Today there is a massive denial of scientific knowledge, belief in something. The world is confused, people have to choose how and what to believe. We do not believe in the safety of vaccines. Coronavirus is fiction, and if not fiction, then science is powerless. We no longer believe in doctors, but in unofficial science, shamans, predictors.

Do you know how many methods to cure coronavirus are there? A huge number! A million views! Everywhere it is written: “I am cured”, “I am cured” …

What should we believe today?

Answer: I do not believe in anything. I do not feel that life obliges me to believe in something.

Question: What should an ordinary person begin to believe in?

Answer: The fact is that we live in a time when people abuse their egoism. They undermine self-confidence. If a doctor says to me: “I think that such a medicine is good for you, it is worth using it,” I might already think that he has connections with the pharmacy, that he makes money on it, that pharmaceutical companies pay him, etc.

Everything passes into egoism like through sand, and therefore we no longer believe in anyone and in anything.

This is the general picture of the world today when we have slaughtered all the “holy cows.” Absolutely nothing is sacred; we do not believe in anything: not in ourselves or in God, not in the devil, in anyone, or in anything. A person is really left without anything, like a small child stands and cries that he was forgotten. In this form.

Question: What is the Creator’s program here, to lead us to such a small state?

Answer: Of course! So that we turn out to be like this: here I stand in front of you as if naked.

Remark: I see that constant work is precisely to bring a person to this: like a bunny under a bush—I do not trust anyone, I do not know anything, I am afraid of everything.

My Comment: Yes, and there is no one to hope for—only a higher power, which he will gradually come to when he understands what it should be, that it is based absolutely on bestowal, absolutely on love, absolutely above his egoism.

When he understands what this higher power should be, and how he can turn to it, then enlightenment will come, and he will come to the truth.

Question: Will a man not need doctors then?

Answer: In principle, doctors are not needed. Doctors are needed only for the period of the Creator’s concealment. Then everything will fulfill the person’s connection with the Creator.

Remark: But this is a very distant future.

My Comment: I think it will happen very quickly.

Question: What is your advice? What is an ordinary person to believe in today? How can he live?

Answer: Do not believe in anything. He should simply understand that everything that has happened to us and is still happening is only so that we really feel the need for the real Creator and not for something invented by some grandmas and so on.

Now everyone is inventing God for themselves. There were many such deities. As it is written about Abraham, he destroyed these gods, i.e., all beliefs in different gods.

Question: “Different god”—does this mean a god that suits my egoism?

Answer: Yes. And if it is real, true, He can be only one—altruistic, built only on that which is higher than egoism.

Question: When I do not believe, when I feel bad, does it mean that here I need to search? My egoism is bad. Does that mean that the Creator is somewhere nearby, He is approaching me? Is He exactly the opposite of that?

Answer: Of course.

Question: And what are my actions at this moment?

Answer: Search. Seek and very clearly realize what He should be like after all. What should I be in order to find Him?
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 7/27/20