At A Turning Point Of Evolution

Dr. Michael LaitmanWe change from generation to generation in the process of evolution, and after thousands of years of our development we arrive to a special state where we exist on this earth as a global and integral society, commanding knowledge and capability. In the process of our development, we received strength, intellect, and ability to perceive and sense many things, everything that we didn’t have before.

Whatever forms, however unpleasant, we may take on during all the states we experience, ultimately they bring us to some perfect states at the end of the path. We don’t see its end since we are still in the process of development, but let’s hope that soon we will manage to feel these states.

We need to learn to do what needs to be done at the given moment in order to ensure an easy, kind, and comfortable process of development for ourselves, which will lead us to the bright future, security, prosperity, and happy life.

As we go through various states in the process of our development, we see that we aren’t really able to control them. Certainly, we try to make our life more comfortable, we change society, family structure, the system of upbringing, culture, and our mutual relationships, while all the time trying to bring ourselves to a better, more comfortable state. We strive precisely towards that since we are merely the desire to receive pleasure from life, and to whatever extent possible we try to obtain these pleasures. This process happens gradually, and each time we use means available to us at the given moment.

Whenever we want to change our life, we lean on scientific achievements. We study to see what else we can extract from nature, and above all, in what ways we can emulate it in order to organize our life; which laws of nature can be used in order to protect us. For example, it is useful for us to know the weather forecast: what conditions await us in every season. We need to study the nature of man in order to supply ourselves with healthcare, medications, to develop technologies that make housekeeping work easier, such as washing machines, food processors, and other household appliances.

In other words, above all we concern ourselves with securing comfortable conditions for our existence. At the same time, we try to avoid suffering as much as possible, both the small private suffering and the big, global kind, and along with that, we try to derive pleasure from every state. This is the nature of man, and all our efforts are directed towards satisfying our natural needs.

We develop through the influence of internal impulses. In every moment, at any stage of development, a new desire arises in each one of us and we strive to fulfill it. If we look at ourselves from the side, we’ll see that we behave similarly to little children in whom desires change every minute. Now I want to eat, now to drink, then to sleep, and after that to watch some interesting program on TV. And on top of that, I’m also obliged to go to work….

In other words, I am constantly developing under the influence of a few forces. One of them pushes me from behind: I have to work and to prepare life’s necessities for myself; after all, nothing happens by waving a magic wand, and the pleasure that I desire doesn’t just arrive to me on its own. This only happens in paradise, not in real life.

And here, first of all, a question arises: Where do our desires come from? Part of them is determined by the physiology of our body, which at certain times must fill itself with food, to rest and sleep. And in between, it wishes to delight in something interesting.

We divide all of our desires into desires for food, sex, and family. This is a basis without which we cannot exist, just like any other part of the animal world. And besides this animal life, we desire to have interests worthy of a human being. And that includes money, power, honor, knowledge, culture, upbringing, religion, and many other similar things that we ourselves develop and need no less than food, sex, and family. At times, we’re ready to sacrifice food, sex, and family just for the sake of receiving a better education, to make scientific discoveries, to enrich our cultural life. There are people who are prepared to literally sacrifice themselves in order to become rich, to achieve fame, or to gain power. And then food, sex, and family aren’t that important to them anymore; they barely pay attention to that, just enough to achieve what they desire.

All these desires are intermixed inside each of us, and everyone tries to realize them according to his or her possibilities. But there is a complete set of them in any person, and the means through which he or she is ready to realize them depends on that person’s upbringing and environment.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” Episode 3, 12/29/11

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