Question: What is a “prayer of an individual?”

Answer: A “prayer of an individual” is a person’s clarification. On the whole, one can pray a “prayer of an individual” or a “prayer of many.” A “prayer” is a deficiency that I discover in my heart. But I discover it intentionally by first clarifying the prayer, which is called “a prayer before a prayer.” On this preliminary level I make many corrections in order to reach the special inner deficiency that will be compatible with the amount of Light that is before me and which I want to acquire.

I acquire it; purchase it by paying with my exertion, my power, my deficiency, by my “appetite.” It’s as if I enter a bakery shop and “freeze” in front of a marvelous cake. But I am put on a scale, my deficiency is measured, and I am told:

– You have deficiency of only 150 grams and this cake is worth half a kilogram so you can’t buy it.

Then my taste buds are examined by a special sensor, and I am told:

– Your taste buds don’t work. You actually want fish and not a cake. The two can’t even be compared, come back another time when you have the right quantity and quality for a cake, and then you will receive it.

So I need a deficiency for bestowal. Where can I purchase this deficiency in our world in order to come to the Creator’s “store” with it and buy that “cake”? Where can I get the money to buy the ticket with which I can enter bestowal? This is already “a prayer before a prayer”; I constantly think about the deficiency in quantity and in quality that I must have, since otherwise I don’t have a real vessel.

If I understand this whole process, then there is a “prayer of an individual” and a “prayer of many” in it. But these are only names. In fact, I always pray by myself, I am always one, and there is nothing but me. But I want to attach and connect those who are seemingly external to me: all my desires and thoughts that were thrown outside by the ego and that seem to be scattered according to the corruption in my vessel. I want to work above this “thickness” of the desire, and thus I am drawn to “a prayer of many,” by wanting to see them as one whole unit…
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/6/13, “A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar”

Related Material:
Despair And Confidence: The Components Of A Prayer
Standing Before The Absolute
How Can An Egoist Pray For Bestowal?

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