Human Development
with Limor Soffer-Fetman, educational psychologist and psychotherapist,
and Eli Vinokur, education content manager for the Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Education & Research Institute
Eli Vinokur: Today we are going to talk about human development, particularly, the stages of child development. We will also hear what the wisdom of Kabbalah has to say on the topic. So without further ado, let us begin.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: When I encountered materials from the wisdom of Kabbalah, I was surprised that there is something very coherent about the method. It is as if it is built on foundations or concepts that are continually developing, yet without contradicting each other, they coincide. It is like a single, uniform method.
So if I may ask,How is it that there is a single method, while we have at least eighteen psychological approaches to explain the same thing?
Michael Laitman: The thing is that in our entire approach in this world, even in science, we are researching a world that we are not familiar with. I’m talking about those who want to research truthfully, being honest with themselves and with others, without any calculations such as wanting to make a name for themselves or to be known as discoverers. I’m talking about genuine research, one that is determined by the researcher’s nature and perception, by groups, times, and location of examination. The problem is that this is constantly subject to change.
In the wisdom of Kabbalah, however, we come from a basis that is general for all—the basis of nature, the desire for pleasure, the desire for self-fulfillment. We speak only about that foundation, and always start from that point when we research, so we don’t have a problem.
This is how I examine: First, the will to receive was created, which begins to evolve through the levels of the still, creating the inanimate matter, and then the vegetative. At the vegetative level, the will to receive already wishes to develop and as a result plants emerge from the still. Then comes the animate, which is already not just growing, it is also moving, and has other ways of reproducing. And finally, there is man. This is what we see in evolution.
I build all that atop the ego, atop the desire for pleasure that exists in every creature and develops from generation to generation. In other words, the first element that I establish in my mind is the desire to receive, according to the level of development that I am researching. I don’t accept these things as a given, but because it gives me a uniform basis, it is very helpful to me in avoiding confusions.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: Does that mean that it is not only a method to explain the development of an individual, but the development of the whole of nature, too?
Michael Laitman: Yes, of course, from the beginning.
Eli Vinokur: While we were talking before the show, Limor was explaining that there are numerous schools in psychology, which divide the human development into different kinds of development.
Michael Laitman: When we look at that development, we see that everything evolves up to a certain point. Today, we are in an unprecedented, unique stage. Up until now, it was a relatively linear development of the desire for pleasure, what we call “the will to receive,” the ego. It continually pushed us to develop, conquer, discover the world, and establish all kinds of human societies.
But today we are in a unique situation. It can be sensed more distinctly in children than in adults because adults still have their “load” from the previous century, they are still carrying their dreams. But children don’t have those illusions anymore; they have a very different approach to life, fundamentally different to what previously existed.
Five hundred or a thousand years ago, if the father was a farmer, the son would be a farmer; if the father was a tinsmith, the son would be a tinsmith.
Everything was known to a youth. He knew he would marry the neighbor’s daughter, and that his house and land would be here. Today, such things don’t exist anymore. The generations are completely disconnected. Parents don’t know what their children think or want; they cannot comprehend their approach and perception of life.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: It also leads to a great deal of intolerance. I encounter intolerant children at an extremely young age, intolerant toward school as well.
Michael Laitman: Yes, toward everything because their ego has grown so much, they can’t satisfy it anymore. It is already on a higher dimension: this world does not satisfy them, but they don’t know where to find satisfaction. Children are in a situation where they cannot find anything to be worthwhile.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: It is perceived by the parents as a bad generation, unruly, lazy, intolerant toward work.
Michael Laitman: But what if a child gave his parents a truly honest answer, what would he say? “What do you want me to be? To be a doctor, an architect, a lawyer, an accountant?” They see it as empty from the outset. Worse than empty, as a prison: a life where you work from dawn to dusk, ten, twelve hours a day. And perhaps you’re paid well and you’re covered materialistically, but it is pointless, tasteless.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: They are saying, “I don’t want to work so hard and then have no free time. I want the free time right now. I don’t want to exert myself.”
Eli Vinokur: Is this is a more developed generation, a generation that wants everything right now, this instant? It’s as if the previous generation was more developed. We wanted to achieve something, we had aspirations. Here it seems the opposite—no aspirations, no desire, just freedom now. It doesn’t seem more developed.
Michael Laitman: It is above our desires, above our aspirations; youth today find them empty. Everything that evolves, always evolves upwards. But now they are truly searching, “So now what?” And here we are in a very precarious situation. I see teachers, educators, and children alike being – truly helpless, they don’t know how to resolve the problem.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: I don’t see a single system that is content. And within the system, the children aren’t content, the teachers aren’t content, the principals aren’t content, and the professionals are unsuccessful.
Michael Laitman: And there seems to be no method.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: Right.
Michael Laitman: In other words, in the past we were searching for a method; now we’ve come to a situation where all we want is to put out the fire, to calm it down a bit. Ritalin is our only weapon, and this is really a very big problem.
Here we are going to need the power of the real Torah, as it is written, “I have created the evil inclination, I have created Torah as a spice,” since we will find no fulfillment for any of our desires. We are a generation that is truly lost.
Perhaps you still don’t see it, but the time is coming when people won’t be able to satisfy themselves in any way or anything. People’s desire for drugs or for such recreation as going to the beach will be gone. They will suddenly feel all those as empty. And then there will be such a cry, horrific distress.
And then we will reach the truly good situation: people will discover the wisdom of Kabbalah. That is, they will discover that there is a higher force in nature. There is such a force in nature, which we can evoke only if we come together. And here we arrive at a solution that is on the one hand very close to us, and on the other hand, even closer to children.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: So this is an issue of development. Can I ask about development?
Michael Laitman: Yes.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: If there is one method, then perhaps there is also an explanation on what impacts our development more – our social environment or our genes?
Michael Laitman: No, there is no one, single answer, and there can’t be a single answer because it depends on correlation, on the extent to which the interior, meaning what one is born with, and the surroundings are harmonious.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: You mean the tendencies?
Michael Laitman: One’s natural tendencies, call them instincts, along with what is acquired at home during infancy, prior to entering society, say until the age of three or four. In other words, everything one is taught when he was born. All those are considered one’s “internality.” Beyond that, it is the surroundings.
If we arrange the environment properly, all of those inner traits can be directed in the right direction, and a person will use them correctly, even if he or she was not brought up so well or has less than favorable heredity.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: Today, I encounter a lot of frustration among parents. They don’t know what to do.
Michael Laitman: The system, the educational system, should start with them, at least during the time period before they become parents.
Eli Vinokur: What should such a couple be taught? What do they need to acquire?
Michael Laitman: Everything we just discussed—the human desire, which is the ego, how it evolves, why we end up with frustrations and emptiness in our lives, why it is particularly so in our generation, and the difference between the aspirations of the young generation compared to the previous generation.
When they become parents, it is a radical change. It is a huge psychological shift between the pre-parental period and the parental period. We become conservative. We want to enclose the baby just like animals in nature. We decline from the human degree to the animate degree. We treat our child the way animals do to protect them. This is all right; it should be so. Nature evokes that protective animal force in all of us.
However, here we need to make parents aware of what is growing in their hands, the future of their baby. It is not even about who he or she will become, but what they will become. Parents need to know that this future human being will demand something completely different. Here we need to elevate the parents from the animate degree of being two parents of a child, to the level of a human being, so they will be on a par with the level of the child, who will demand of them the proper development. If they wish to establish their child in the new world and allow him to realize all his tendencies, they must actually transcend themselves.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: I’m detecting a message in what you’re saying, that it’s not their fault.
Michael Laitman: Our whole society is like that.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: Parents feel very guilty these days. There are numerous television shows, for example, about how to be better parents, as if the problems are because of them, as if there is some method or as if they are not good parents and need to be taught how to be better parents, because there are problems constantly.
Michael Laitman: Right, but where will they learn? There is nowhere. The problem is not a system. We need to provide the right explanation, a clear method. First, we should prepare the material, and then build a system that will convey the information to the parents. Here the media should be very much involved, or we will lose the campaign.
Eli Vinokur: If I am an aspiring parent or am already one, how would you recommend that I connect to this process? What do you recommend that I learn or read?
Michael Laitman: According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, we are in such a generation that we will simply have to study it.
Eli Vinokur: Study Kabbalah?
Michael Laitman: Not the wisdom itself. You, for example, studied psychology, but you don’t teach everything you learned to parents. You only need to give them clear, practical advice that an ordinary parent can put into use. In much the same way, I’ve been engaged with Kabbalah for 35 years now, but it isn’t necessary to convey all that to each person. Small, easily transmitted and concise pieces of advice are all that’s needed, so everyone will know the nature of human beings. Kabbalah explains only about nature, nothing else.
We need to explain the nature of people, how it evolves, and the degree that we reach, as we just discussed. We must know what is unique about our generation, and what a dramatic inner shift our generation is going through.
We are the first of all the generations that must rise to the degree of bonding among people instead of exploiting people. Nature is demanding that of us by showing us that we are all globally connected in an integral bond, and through the global crisis. It is a crisis in our relationships: we are unable to build a uniform society and by consequence, we cannot relate properly to ecology, to ourselves, or to the human society. All of these things should be conjoined into a single picture, and then it will be clear to parents.
Actually, here we can reach the parents because it is very difficult for us to reach governments and all kinds of organizations because they are not interested in hearing. But with parents, who are actually hurting over it, here we have someone to reach, someone who’ll listen. Their motivation is to see their child succeed, accomplished, happy, and secure. So if we explain to them that this is what they need to do, I think we will succeed. And in this way, through the children we will also educate the parents.
Eli Vinokur: The topic we gathered to discuss is the development of the individual. Can you describe in general terms the stages of a person’s development from the moment of conception? I’m asking because I know that in Kabbalah there is a clear division of stages according to the age.
Michael Laitman: Yes, but that is not what is most important. I think that psychology can also agree that much depends on the parents’ attitude toward life, even before they approach having children. In the wisdom of Kabbalah, we say that it all depends on the intention, on the extent to which the intentions are correct. I think there is a similar study about wanted and unwanted children, and the parents’ attitude toward them.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: There is a theory that the fetus senses the atmosphere in the family, and it knows, as if somehow perceives it.
Michael Laitman: Because it is one system.
Limor Soffer-Fetman: What does that mean, “one system?”
Michael Laitman: The fetus’ perception is through the mother. The mother doesn’t control her senses or her sensors. What she perceives passes through him. It is a single mechanism, at least with the mother. We are not aware that it has everything; we think “it hasn’t developed yet, there is nothing there but a drop of semen or a few grams of flesh.” This is not true. There are entire systems there already, and only the flesh is missing in order for us to relate to it, but the child itself already exists.
Eli Vinokur: Could you expand on the importance of intention?
Michael Laitman: Throughout the history of humanity, we see that people have been paying growing attention to the relationship between them. In the past, to marry, a girl would be brought to a guy, they would marry and that was that.
But now human nature demands emotion, connection, something more internal, a kind of bonding, and people cannot give that up. We can no longer stay with a woman just because of some mercantile calculation, money, or other interests such as the relationship among family members. I have to have a deeper connection here, more human, more of the woman bonding with me and I with her.
So I think this interaction is actually very important. We have yet to discover how important it is, when we truly bond. I think that the stage in history where people get together the way animals do is already over. Soon, people will consciously search whether they can be together because of the soul.
Eli Vinokur: And what will the child be?
Michael Laitman: The child will be the result of the correct bond—the emotional and not the physical. The physical connection, too, comprises a huge complex of things. Even animals choose their mates and don’t mate with just any other animal. There is a lot to it, but again, with us, there is an additional requirement after all, beyond genetics, where we sense one another subconsciously, the way animals do.
Eli Vinokur: You mean something higher?
Michael Laitman: I think so, something higher. This is why we need to explain. And not just to couples, but even before. This is the education we should receive at school.
July 5, 2010