A summary of Baal HaSulam’s article “There Is a Difference Between Corporeality and Spirituality” (article #164 from Shamati):

In corporeality, the force precedes the act. Such is the arrangement at the end of correction: no act is done until there’s enough strength to carry it out.

In spirituality, the act precedes the force. Everything takes place according to a step-by-step disclosure of desires suitable for correction, from the easiest to the most difficult. Therefore, the work needs to begin even before one has the strength to carry it out.

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A question I received in response to my post “A Call for Ideas – New Children’s Games“: How can one help a child mature if the child resists? I understand “Mosif daat mosif mahov” (“increase knowledge, increase pain”) but it’s still difficult to observe a normal boy, 13 years of age who wants to be like an 8 year old.

My Answer: You can impose a more grown-up environment upon him by involving him in his peers’ hobby groups, and keeping him out of the house.

A question I received in response to my post “Comments about Depression, Seeming Egoistic to Others, and Parenting“: How do I defend myself against evil people that hurt my feelings and constantly bother me? How can I deal with the stress that results from this?

My Answer: Find an environment that will allow you to feel secure and healed. Whatever you do, don’t isolate yourself. Find amusement, sports, a change of scenery, and be hard on yourself for being sensitive.

A question I received in response to my post “The Creator = Nature“: Why isn’t the Creator indifferent towards me? Is He more concerned about me than others? If this is true, then why?

My Answer: Put simply, the time has come to correct your individual soul in the general collective of souls, of the single soul of Adam.

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A question I received: Newspapers are full of reports about a mother having sexual relations with her two sons, allegedly to spite her husband. The 38 year old resident of Netivot, Israel was arrested on suspicion of having sexual relations with her two sons. She said that she did it to spite her husband, whom she is divorcing.

Lately we’ve been hearing about many cases of mothers raping their children. Why is this happening now, and with mothers? After all, a woman’s love for her children is the most natural, pure, real, and essential feeling! So what is making mothers abuse their children so cruelly?

My Answer: Egoism is assuming these horrible forms because we should have started correcting it on the mass scale a long time ago. The time of correction began with the Ari, and Baal Shem Tov also tried to achieve this by spreading Chassidut in Eastern Europe.

Egoism has grown beyond the boundaries of the natural, animate level, and is manifesting in a supernatural form, in order to force us to reject it and instead adopt bestowal and love. Unless we realize this and start correcting ourselves by studying Kabbalah (i.e. acquire a basic understanding of nature, life, and the world), then in the near future we will face even uglier manifestations of egoism, such that the world has never seen.

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