An Opportunity To Ask The Creator For Help

The wisdom of Kabbalah differs from simple popular blind faith in that it speaks of working during descents, distancing and rejections from the Creator through all kinds of events in our life.We seem to be ready to say that “There is none else besides Him.” After all, it is right and good that there is just one force that creates everything and controls everything. However, we forget about this as soon as we feel rejection from this force, when we receive all kinds of problems that are supposedly unfair.

In addition, it turns out that they were planned by the Creator for each of us in advance, even from the beginning of creation, because everything is predetermined until the end of correction. Therefore, our life is a film that we need to add 620 times more to through our efforts and precisely during the time of distancing.

The main work is during the descent. The Creator burdens our path by sending all sorts of troubles, problems, and concealments, placing barriers before us. But we know how to overcome all this, and not for the sake of winning like heroes jumping over all the obstacles. Overcoming means relating all the disturbances and burdening of the heart to the Creator and not asking to cancel them. Disturbances are those degrees that we must climb.

Every time a desire to receive grows, a problem appears as an invitation from the Creator to ascend and determine His uniqueness on the higher degree. Therefore, we live from problem to problem, from disappointment to disappointment, from fear to awe. But it is in this that we must see the benevolence of the Creator, who does not leave us, moving us forward.

This happens to all the people of Israel in general and to every single person advancing to one’s completely corrected state. It is during the descents that we have the opportunity to ask the Creator for help. It turns out that descents are states when the Creator invites a person to come closer precisely through overcoming confusions and disturbances intended to separate us from the Creator. If despite all the disturbances we declare that they come from the Creator in order for us to ask Him for help to rise above the disturbances toward even greater adhesion, then the disturbances turn into means for connection, into this glue with which we adhere to the Creator.

It turns out that disturbances were help, leading to a request in response to which a person received from the Creator the force of bestowal, faith above reason, above disturbances. Thus, one advanced. Therefore, our work consists of being joyful for the disturbances as an opportunity to ask the Creator to bring us closer to Him.¹
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/24/19, “There is None Else Besides Him”
¹ Minute 2:10

Back To School And Bullying

From My Facebook Page Michael Laitman 9/4/19

Bullying in the classroom begins outside the school walls.

As the school year opened, the sore wound of the bullying phenomenon opened along with it. Yes, it happens everywhere and many children live in social isolation and suffer from bullying and insults for months or years. They will carry the internal scars with them for many years into their future. Parents, if they even know what is going on, are helpless in the face of a system that often silences the issue in order to maintain a good reputation.

It is true that bullying has always existed, even when I was a child, but in our day and age, the phenomenon has become extremely worrying. The endless harassment breaks through the classroom walls and haunts the bullied child all the way from classroom to his mobile device, so there is nowhere to escape and find some peace and comfort.

It typically starts from a single child, the leader of the attack; a child who likes to control everyone and who is considered popular among his peers. Why is he doing this? Because he enjoys the satisfaction of being above someone else, so he degrades another child and organizes the whole class against him. However, that child is following his own internal urges as well as the examples he is absorbing from all directions, whether it’s reality shows, YouTube videos, or the adults he is looking up to.

Since our lives have become so filled with power games of pride and control, we shouldn’t wonder why kids are behaving the same way nowadays. We did not form a good enough environment for them, we did not pay enough attention, or provide the right education so as to nurture healthy, positive connections between them, and now the bitter results are coming back to bite us – mainly in the form of bullying.

So how can we deal with all this bullying? First of all, talk to the leader and explain what a terrible injustice he is doing to others and to himself. Equally important is to talk to those who follow the leader so that they do stop give power and fuel to the “leader.” We have to organize the power of many to counter the power of that leader. Why? Because young children instinctively understand what is “good for me or bad for me,” and a child who tries to initiate an attack and sees that it is not going well or even working to his detriment, will stop trying of his own accord.

With older children you can chat. You can show them how they, too, could remain on their own if they continue down this road of bullying. So if they have a desire to attract others around them, they should be positive leaders that everyone wants to follow and imitate.

But instead of finding ourselves looking for ways to combat bullying at school, it’s much better to treat the disease at the root before it spreads by building a healthy social environment for children from an early age. To make positive social relationships the center of attention in our educational programs, rather than individualistic success. And the sooner we do it, the less bullying we will see.

“Will The Amazon Fires Have A Significant Effect On Climate Change?” (Quora)

Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Will the Amazon fires have a significant effect on climate change?“

The Amazon fires won’t have a significant effect on climate change. In order to understand whether nature will act toward us positively or negatively heading into the future, we need to understand how we influence nature, and how nature reacts to our influence.

Contrary to the opinion that we influence nature through our external actions on nature itself, such as the waste and pollution we inflict upon our environment, according to the wisdom of Kabbalah, such actions are not the ones that lead to all kinds of natural disasters and crises.

What leads to natural disasters and crises is solely at the human level, in our connections. At the level of our thoughts, attitudes and behaviors toward each other, we cause ripples throughout human society and nature, and nature reacts to us according to how we relate to each other.

If we relate positively to each other, aiming to positively connect with each other, then we will experience positive reactions from nature. If we relate negatively to each other, aiming to harm and exploit each other for personal benefit, then we will experience negative reactions from nature. This is what we currently experience.

Nature is organized according to four levels: still, vegetative, animate and human.

If we delay our correction in establishing positive connections among us, starting from not harming each other to endlessly improving our connections, then we will experience more and more negative effects upon us from nature.

For instance:

• If we fail to correct our relations at the still level, which for the time being can be interpreted as not working on the hatred toward others that surfaces in us, there will be disruptions in nature at the still level, such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.
• Likewise, if we fail to correct our relations at the vegetative level, which can be interpreted as failing to stop ourselves from harming others, then there will be problems at the vegetative level, such as fires.
• If we fail to correct ourselves at the animal level, i.e. allowing ourselves to slip into wars and conflicts, then we will find problems on the animal level, such as extinctions of certain species, as well as the resurfacing of past diseases and new diseases.
• Nature’s positive or negative reaction to us in the future depends on how much we activate our human ability, i.e., our ability to connect to each other above our divisive egoistic drives.

Accordingly, when we see the complete system of a person as a small world and the world as our encasing environment, then we will see the level of integration that we humans need to have with the world: that our attitudes to each other need to undergo an upgrade: to become considerate and positively connected as a replacement for the currently antagonistic egoism that’s growing within us and increasingly dividing us.

Then, according to the integration of the still, vegetative, animate and human levels within us, between us, with the environment and with nature’s complete system that envelops us, we will experience either harmony if we realize positive human connections, or crises and blows if we don’t.

Slave Of The Creator

Question: There is such a concept, being a “slave of the Creator.” But the quality of the Creator is a quality of bestowal and love. If you are in it, is it a free state or not?

Answer: Free, of course.

Question: Why then is it called “slave”?

Answer: Because you chose this state for yourself. You, yourself have chosen it.
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From Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 5/12/19

New Life #1140 – Finding Purpose In A New Approach To Life

New Life #1140 – Finding Purpose in a New Approach to Life
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

Today, we are transitioning from focusing on our professions and making money to discovering a new life on a higher spiritual level. We are dissatisfied and are demanding to know the purpose of life. When we ask this question, nature comes to our aid and directs us toward our true destiny, which is to build an integral system of mutual, human bestowal. We are built by the force of reception and must learn to connect above the human ego and discover the power of balance in the system by studying the wisdom of Kabbalah.
From KabTV’s “New Life #1140 – Finding Purpose in a New Approach to Life,” 8/11/19

Video: Play Now | Download

Audio: Play Now | Download

Make The Right Choice: The Creator

Bina is an abstract property of faith, but this faith is realized in Malchut because faith can work practically only where there is a property of receiving. The desire to enjoy appears first at the level of Hochma, but it has not yet been realized by the created being. And the desire to bestow appears in Bina but still without its practical realization. From the combination of both appears the fourth stage, Dalet, where there should be faith, and to the extent of faith, reception. The desire to receive in Malchut is a consequence of the desire to bestow in Bina and the desire to receive in Hochma, which Zeir Anpin completely connects together.¹

The 15th of Av (Tu B’Av) is considered one of the best days for Israel. A good day is the day when you can bestow to the Creator the most. Tu B’Av symbolizes receiving for the sake of bestowal, but for the benefit of the future, when Malchut will already be corrected. In the meantime, although the ascent of the worlds takes place, it is due to the awakening from above, not to the work of the lower.

The end of correction takes place on Purim. Tu B’Av is a combination of the receptive desires of Malchut in the presence of all the right conditions that have come out of the four stages, represented as four groups of girls looking for suitors: Hochma, Bina, ZA, and Malchut.

The beauties said: “Turn your eyes to beauty, for a woman is for beauty.” The noblemen said: “Cast your eyes on family, for a woman is for sons.” The wealthy said: “Cast your eyes on the wealthy.” And the unsightly said: “Take us in the name of Heaven and crown us with gold ornaments.” In this way, all the stages passed by: Hochma, Bina, ZA, until the turn of Malchut came, and it turned out that Malchut Shamayim (the Kingdom of Heaven) must be poor and meager, not wealthy, beautiful, and noble. Only through our work can we become loyal to it.

This holiday represents our searches and disappointment in our own strength, our readiness to separate ourselves by any means from the desire to enjoy and our becoming devoted to bestowal, that is, to not demand anything for ourselves. I ask the Creator to provide me with protection against my desire to enjoy, my major enemy. I must hate my egoism to such an extent that I do not succumb to any temptation.

Let my egoism die—it will not get anything! Let me disappear—it does not matter because I have to go through the point of complete restriction and be born on the other side of the barrier, which means the death of my desire to enjoy for my own sake. This will be life and light for me: life is only on the other side of this barrier (Machsom).

To do this, one must reach the fourth stage, Malchut, an ugly, poor, lowborn bride called faith. If I am able to remain faithful to her despite her being poor and meager, then I have gained faith. This is the condition for gaining Malchut: consent to cleave only to her, despite other seductive images.

Faith is accepted without any conditions, otherwise it will not be faith but a calculation or a deal. Faith cannot have any selfish basis. I want to get rid of the egoistic calculation. Otherwise, I will not enter the spiritual world. This is a condition for entry: to cleanse myself of egoistic desires and remain only in bestowal. The property of bestowal is the absence of any calculation of self-benefit.

If I try to achieve faith, I go through all these stages, one after the other, getting acquainted with the “brides” preceding Malchut: beautiful, wealthy, and noble. But in the end, I reach the state when I want nothing but to get rid of all this “nobility.” I want only the Creator to exist and not me. This is how spiritual life begins.

I am ready to give up on all my calculations and cling to the Creator without any reasoning. This is how I become a spiritual seed. I want the Creator’s program to govern me, defining all my behavior, thoughts, and desires. Let a different engine work in me.

An egoistic engine is currently spinning in me, looking for how to gain more, to succeed, and to enjoy itself. I want a new engine to constantly turn me toward the Creator and not to seek anything for itself so that a new program of bestowal will work within me. This means that the upper light is being revealed in me, giving me a new perception of life, and with these new eyes, I see the upper world.²

Of all the “brides,” of all the desires, after a long clarification, we choose the one that requires nothing but adhesion and wants to base all of its reception only on faith. This is the condition for gaining Malchut, receiving for the sake of bestowal.

This bride seems ugly to our desire to enjoy, lowborn, poor, and meager. But precisely when I get nothing for my ego, I can be faithful to the Creator with all my soul. I am ready to die in order to remain faithful to Him. This is the condition for crossing the Machsom.³

Tu B’Av means choosing Malchut Shamayim. After the 9th of Av, I had nothing left for myself; everything collapsed: both the First and the Second Temple. Then the 15th of Avcomes when I can base my attitude toward the Creator only on the property of bestowal. Therefore, the 15th of Av is considered the greatest holiday.

Thanks to the revelation of the shattering on the 9th of Av, on the 15th of Av I gain the ability to hold onto the Malchut Shamayim, to choose the right bride, Malchut.

The four brides from whom we choose is our attitude toward the group, the expectation to receive wealth, knowledge, and nobility from it. But in the end, I see that I will get only one thing—through my devotion to them, the achievement of devotion to the Creator. For me, this is the greatest asset.

All this seems ugly to my desire to enjoy. I see nothing good in this group and I would be happy to do away with everyone, but this is exactly the form through which, if I accept it, I can reach the Creator.

The whole world shows me how it hates me because I am engaged in bestowal and how it would support me if I were as egoistic as everyone else. The world is becoming very harsh in this regard. No one blames me for egoistic reception, but everyone attacks me for the aspiration to bestow. If I change, then I am immediately promised a good life and the return of the three profitable brides: the stages Aleph, Bet, and Gimel.

Here, one has to be very straightforward and must not make any compromises. The Creator will confuse me in every possible way. But the condition for crossing the Machsomis to say: “I am better off dead than living such a life.” Then, I will see how all these mirages dissipate and disappear.

A real bride is the one who will be with me provided that I agree to accept her anyway, may she be the ugliest woman in the world. She has neither beauty, nor wealth, nor nobility—nothing attractive. Why do I love her and get close to her? It is because only in this image she brings me to the Creator.

I see that the Creator plays with me through all these mirages, seducing me with wealth, intelligence, knowledge, nobility, bribing my ambition. But in the end, I understand that the greatness of the Creator is in His modesty. Therefore, I need to reduce my pride and my requirements and look not for beauty and nobility, intelligence and wealth, but only for the desire to adhere with all my heart, and then I can get married.⁴

The period of the 9th of Av is the time of death and destruction. But starting from the 15th of Av and further on, from the joyful day of Tu B’Av on which we chose the correct Malchut Shamayim, we begin preparations for the congress: for the connection between us and merging with the Creator already with the correct desire.⁵
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/16/19, Writings of Rabash “The Fifteenth of Av,” Article 35 (1986)

Make The Future Yourself

Question: Are the future states determined in sensations? How do we recognize these feelings? Is it possible to predict the future?

Answer: It is easy to predict the future. However, we should have no interest in predicting the future. Instead, we should be creating the future.

So what if you recognize a chain of events? Even if they clearly appear before you? What comes next? It will not make your life easier. Moreover, it will even harm you.

You have to create the future yourself. That is the problem. Turn a blind eye to the future, if it will be revealed to you, and make it yourself.

I think that the more you engage in Kabbalah, the less you will be interested in the future. You will understand that you create it yourself.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 4/28/19

“What Is Liberalism?” (Quora)

Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is liberalism?“

Liberalism:

Everyone has a place to say what they want,
No hatred of anybody,
You can speak your mind openly and pluralistically, i.e. in a way allowing for multiple opinions,
We can reach a dialogue—first and foremost, understand each other, and gradually integrate with each other.
As a result of such human conduct, we’ll develop a greater understanding of human society.

However, if the situation continues as it does today—where one side hates the other—then it cannot be considered as “liberal” or “democratic.” The side that is calling the other side “non-democratic” is already a non-democratic side.

This form of interest-based politics is dead.

I learned it upon myself in the Former Soviet Union. They would use pleasant words about brotherly love and unity to cover their killing of the people. It was used only with power motives to cover the social division and hatred, which was the reality of the time. Their high investment in the propaganda of this idea impressed not only its own people, but societies as far as Western Europe.

It worked for a while, and then it all collapsed.

However, today where we have one side saying that it is liberal and democratic, and absolutely hates the other side, wanting to eliminate it completely, going as far as forcefully protesting against them, what kind of democracy is that?

Democracy is that we sort these problems out peacefully and reasonably.

Liberalism is when I gather together other people’s opinions, wanting to connect everyone together in a social dialogue.