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Altruism is the quality of the soul, or in other words, the soul is a quality of love and bestowal. How can such a quality exist within us if our world, our nature, and everything we feel are built on an opposite egoistic quality of enjoying at others’ expense, which is essentially a quality of reception and hatred? This is precisely why knowledge about the structure of the spiritual system is necessary. Our world is constructed on egoism, on taking for ourselves and rejecting others. The spiritual world is its complete opposite. It is built entirely on the altruistic quality, bestowal and love.
If we replace our inner qualities from hatred and reception to bestowal and love, we begin to feel entirely different phenomena and processes within ourselves. This new perception is what is called “the upper world.” It is not somewhere outside of us. On the contrary, it becomes revealed within us, through our change of qualities.
People sometimes say that they have altruistic impulses. But we must be honest: for the sake of what? Any altruistic impulse is ultimately for the sake of self-benefit. If it were not profitable in some form—emotionally, socially, or psychologically—we would not act kindly. Such behavior is not true goodness. It is rather refined self-interest. Egoism, which in Kabbalah is called “evil,” is our world’s fundamental nature.
Therefore, the world is me. Everything I perceive is inside me, inside my egoism. If I change myself, I begin to exist in another dimension. The external world does not change; my perception does.
So where can one find the good force that can balance the evil inclination? There is only one place. If we indeed wish to acquire it, we need to study the wisdom of Kabbalah. Through this study, a good force gradually forms within us. We suddenly discover that qualities appear and begin to live in us that, by definition, could not have existed there before. Those qualities are the very altruistic qualities of the soul.
Based on the Virtual Kabbalah Lesson with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on March 3, 2018. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.