The Attitude Toward The Group Determines Everything

The main thing we must remember at each and every instant is that all of us are a group, and every one of us, as a member in this group, must be in personal inner criticism: Am I a righteous person within a society of righteous people? Do I and the whole group want to reach self-annulment and love of others, in which we will reveal bestowal to the Creator and Him as bestowing and sustaining us? We must pay attention to that all the time.

At every moment when I am not in it, I automatically fall under my nature -the will to receive. And then I am found in "Moshav Letzim" (a place of scoffers), in an egoistic society, because a person's attitude toward the group is what determines it. And then one has nothing to expect-instead of the potion of life he enters the potion of death. The changes from one edge to the other are determined by: Do I pay attention to the right things to the degree that I am capable of doing so, or do I not pay attention to them? Therefore, we must toil in this scrutiny nonstop.

Cannot Do Without The Light That Reforms

After one invests some time in studies and work in the group, the Light that Reforms brings him to the right discernments -that the quality of bestowal, the quality of love itself is what gives one freedom. Then he comes to the recognition that he wants spirituality because it is more worthwhile for him than all of corporeality. And this is already a very nice discernment in the level "Lo Lishma" (desiring spirituality egoistically for oneself). "I want to be bestowing, loving, to come out of myself, to annul myself. To leave the prison. It is nice; however, "I want to come out of myself because I will be happy. But I definitely want to leave this prison of the egoistic inclination."

When a person is in a group and yearns to attain the spiritual goal alongside additional friends, they are no longer called "Moshav Letzim" but "Kabbalists," in relation to the goal that they wish to attain. And then, when he begins to work with the others and try to come out of himself, he begins to feel that nothing in him is changing, that he cannot change himself. The Light that operates on him brings him those discernments. In each and every state, the Light that Reforms is what brings him the emotion, the intelligence, the vision, the feeling of connection with the others, and the scrutinies. And then he realizes that he cannot do without the help of the Upper Force, and demands the third component.

In other words, "I and the group influence one another positively, but we are nothing." There are very great disappointments here; there begin to be tensions and group problems, and I hope that we will feel really well how all of us are simultaneously receiving a nice sway, as it is written, "the Lights shake the vessels." But as a result of that we already begin to enter some kind of harmony, even though it is a negative one, and perhaps it is actually positive, who knows? But at least this thing is occurring in mutuality, in some kind of connection, together. And then the Light begins to influence every single one more intensely, because each and every one begins to feel those changes very sharply, as if through an amplifier. And then they come to the recognition of the evil-that they can no longer do without the Creator, without the Light that Reforms.

Attaining The Feeling Of The Creator

Look how difficult it is for us to enter the concept of "One" in all our thoughts  and all our desires, and to attribute ourselves day and night, nonstop, to some kind of Upper Force who "Thou Hast Hemmed Me In Behind and Before;" look at how much we are running away from this connection. Do not say "I do not feel Him," of course you do not feel Him. If you felt, you would be connected to Him; this feeling would have already required you to do so in a necessary way. We, who are already discussing it and reading about it, are incapable of attributing everything that occurs in society, in the family, inside of us, in the world, in our inner work, to the One, the Only, and the Unique Creator. This is because we are not feeling the Creator.

Until I feel Him in my senses, until I am connected to that source through a light beam, until I am within Him and He is within me to some extent, I cannot think about Him once something happens to me, but rather I immediately think about a thousand and one other reasons, and not about Him. According to his egoistic nature, a person is incapable of being connected to the concept "One."

Question by a Student: Why?

Answer by Dr. Michael Laitman: Because we are in a split, because we are built of Light and a vessel, of darkness and light, of heat and coldness. Our feeling consists of the desire and the feeling of fulfillment or of some kind of deficit inside this desire. One comes directly from the Creator, whereas the other comes from Him indirectly. Both the pleasure and the deficit come indirectly, and therefore I cannot attribute them to the Creator. How will I attribute them to Him?

It turns out that until a person comes to the recognition, to the feeling, to the revelation of the Creator, every time we say, ""Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one," it is a lie. Indeed we are not truly feeling so. Therefore reaching this slogan and truly saying it, means to attain the "revelation of the Creator."