Interconnection + Protectionism = Crisis

Interconnection + Protectionism = Crisis

Question: A student from the Education Center is saying: You talk about unity and the need to disseminate the wisdom, and that we also have to study it. But how can I connect with someone? I never did it, ever before. I always felt separate. I couldn’t connect with anyone.

Dr. Michael Laitman: I’m not saying you need to do it now. I’m just saying we have to start explaining that our world is going through a crisis in our attitude toward the world, meaning toward humanity. Our attitude toward humanity has to change.

Through recent studies and everything that is happening to us, we are beginning to see that we are all interconnected, whether we want to be or not. Look at what is happening in countries, between countries, in commerce and industry, in the economy, all over the world, with the climate, etc. Everything is becoming more and more connected, except for the connections between us, and that is the crisis. The crisis is in our perception of where we are.

We are all connected, but everyone is only out for themselves, which is protectionism. What is going to happen if you are connected, but each is pulling his own way? That is today’s world. If they want to have a good life, and that is what the world is thinking about, then they have no choice, but to change their attitudes. The only question is: How much suffering and problems will it take? Because Nature will run its course no matter what attitude we have towards it.

Imagine that you are tightly connected with others and you are acting against this connection, and the whole world is doing the same: What kind of situation can you bring yourself to? You will reach a state where you will not be able to feed yourselves, and provide yourselves with the most basic necessities. That is written in the Kabbalistic books.

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What Is the Connection Between the Wisdom of Connection and the Wisdom of Kabbalah?

What Is the Connection Between the Wisdom of Connection and the Wisdom of Kabbalah?

Question: Dr. Laitman, in a talk about the ONE Convention that you had with convention organizers—which is already on the convention preparation page—that we have to learn how to scrutinize the results of our dissemination. What does that mean? How do we do that?

In other words, many friends, the more veteran friends, are working in education and dissemination with the broad public. They’re asking: What’s the best way to bring all these impressions as a result of the integration with the broad public to the ONE Convention? Should we write them down? You had said that it’s very important to bring these impressions.

Dr. Michael Laitman: We need to understand that we are on borrowed time. We are working on Nature’s command, or call it “God’s command” or a “command of the Upper Force.” Judging by the situation in the world, we have to make the world know what is the right kind of life. What is the correction method? What is the remedy that will cure all of our troubles, which are increasing?

Therefore, if we have the wisdom of connection as a means of dissemination to the rest of the world, and we will also talk about during the ONE Convention, and we will want to exchange experiences and impressions of what we do; every big group that is doing it should go up on stage and tell us briefly what they are doing. Then we’ll get impressions. We’ll know what they are doing. It will inspire us. It will give us direction. We’ll hear about what they’re doing, how they’re doing it, etc. for everyone. It will give us a kind of awakening, what to do in our group, for example, how to work, what kind of materials we can take from them. Maybe they did something that we need, so why build something that already is built?

The convention is also proper study of the wisdom of Kabbalah and the wisdom of connection, and also general participation of how we learn it and how we teach it, but most of all we have this integral wisdom—the wisdom of Kabbalah and of connection—which is actually one and the same, i.e. how to turn a broken vessel into a complete vessel. That’s all. That’s what we’re talking about. The more the Kli [vessel] is completed, we will feel in it Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Haya, Yechida—the feeling of this general, collective Kli.

That is what we’re talking about—either on behalf of the wisdom of Kabbalah, the wisdom of connection, whatever is more convenient for a person depending on where the person is at. What is important for us is not to have a contradiction between those two parts, because they are the same. When you teach a child calculus in first or second grade, does it contradict mathematics that you study at university? One is the initial part of the same science, and one is the advanced part. It’s the same here.

Where do we discover the wisdom of Kabbalah? Within the wisdom of connection, to the extent that we connect. How did Kabbalists attain the wisdom of Kabbalah? They started coming out of themselves through the light that reforms, connecting to others, and all of a sudden they discovered that in their connection with others they found a new space, a new place, a new desire. In that desire, called the desire to bestow, which exists between them and others, they began to discover the new, spiritual world. That is what they wrote about, and that is the wisdom of Kabbalah.

This Q&A is based on the Special Q&A Session with Dr. Michael Laitman in Preparation for the ONE Convention, which took place on Sunday, June 16. Watch the whole video & stay up-to-date with ONE Convention preparation materials here »

North America ONE Kabbalah Convention - August 8-10, 2014 - New Jersey, USA

ONE Convention Preparation eBook

ONE Convention - Together as One

Dear Friends,

Thank you for taking the time to ask your questions toward the special Q&A session with Dr. Michael Laitman we held last Sunday, June 15 in preparation for the upcoming ONE Convention this August 8-10 in New Jersey.

We are happy to announce that much of your Q&A with Dr. Laitman from that session has been compiled into the ONE Convention Preparation eBook – Version 1.0, and we’re happy to provide you with a link to the eBook, so that you can download it onto your computers, smartphones and tablets and go through the material in an organized way, at your own pace:

 Download the ONE Convention Preparation eBook Here »

Due to having more of your questions than we had time to answer, and also due to Dr. Laitman’s request, we will be having another Q&A session with Dr. Laitman very soon, and we’ll update you in advance of yet another special occasion of preparation for this year’s biggest spiritual event in North America!

We look forward to seeing you at more such preparation events and at the ONE Convention itself this August 8-10!
Thanks!
The ONE Convention Team
kabbalah.info/convention

ONE Convention

10 Kabbalah Quotes about Self Transformation

The Creator Doesn't Change; We Change

We cannot attain any reality as it is in itself. Rather, we attain everything according to our sensations. And reality, as it is in itself, is of no interest to us at all. Hence, we do not attain the Torah as it is in itself, but only attain our sensations. Thus, all of our impressions follow only our sensations.

Baal HaSulam, Shamati [I Heard], Article no. 66, “The Giving of the Torah

Baal HaSulam, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”Therefore, we must not inquire how the sages of the Kabbalah, which fill the entire wisdom with their insights, differentiate between the various Lights. That is because these observations do not refer to the Lights themselves, but to the impression of the vessel, being the above-mentioned force, which is affected by its encounter with the Light.

In addition, the form itself will change in a person according to his ups and downs, as we have said above that the Light is Simple Light and all the changes are only in the receivers.“There is no change in the Light.” Rather, all the changes are in the Kelim, meaning in our senses. We measure everything according to our imagination. From this it follows that if many people examine one spiritual thing, each will attain according to his imagination and senses, thereby seeing a different form.

Baal HaSulam, Shamati [I Heard], Article no. 3, “The Matter of Spiritual Attainment

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What Will It Take for Humanity to Wake Up to the Need to Connect?

Diagram 1 - ONE Convention Preparation Q&A Session,

Question: I wanted to ask a question that a student from the Education Center is asking in relation to the sketch you made with the different phases, 1, 2, 3.

Dr. Michael Laitman: They are not stages, they are types of people, 1, 2, 3.

  • In number 1, the spark in them is either on top, so a person discovers that he is attracted to spirituality.
  • In number 2, the spark is the one we have, so we only woke up recently to the wisdom of Kabbalah, say in the last 100 years.
  • There are people that we can see are not waking up. Those are number 3. They just won’t wake up, so we call them the rest of humanity. They have no questions, other than how to have a better life, better health, family, vacationing, business, all within the framework of this world, from birth to death, only wanting to satisfy those desires. Some people go beyond all that.

Question: What the student is asking is: Stage number 2, where the point in the heart is evoked, maybe it is through all the suffering…

Dr. Laitman: It’s all together.

Question: She is asking whether in number 3, they will have to undergo a catastrophe in order for that point in the heart to awaken in them?

Dr. Laitman: If we, through integral education, cannot wake them up, perhaps because we will not make sufficient efforts for it and perhaps for other reasons, then the world will undergo great suffering. Moreover, this suffering will be inflicted on the people who had to give this world the right direction to draw it to the surrounding light. If we don’t do it, the world will start suffering, and we will suffer more than the rest of the world. We are the ones who have to draw it to the light and we have enough power and means to do that.

This Q&A is based on the Special Q&A Session with Dr. Michael Laitman in Preparation for the ONE Convention, which took place on Sunday, June 16. Watch the whole video & stay up-to-date with ONE Convention preparation materials here »

North America ONE Kabbalah Convention - August 8-10, 2014 - New Jersey, USA