Question: What is the meaning of the phrase, “Everything that has to be collected is as if it is already collected”?

Answer: This says that everything lies in front of you from the start. All the things that you are about to discover already exist. When a person is born, he gradually discovers new things for himself, and it seems to him that they haven’t existed before. This is how it feels. But actually, everything already exists; we only need to prepare our Kelim (desires), and the corresponding limits of the universe will be immediately revealed in them.

In general, for the entire reality lying in front of us it’s necessary only to add the intention to bestow, the Light of Hassadim, and to that degree we discover the perfect reality. We lack only this.

And therefore I don’t intend to correct the present corrupted reality. I intend to add the attribute of faith, the attribute of bestowal, to my relationship to everything. This is correction—faith above reason.

Accordingly, I don’t need to correct myself from within, I simply need to exit myself to the outside and connect with what is there. Everything is already in front of you, the problem is that you are not there, outside of yourself. It’s necessary to carry out this action, going outside of yourself, and then this reality will become yours. Today, you aren’t ready yet to reveal it, but it exists. You only need to “put on your glasses” in order to see it.

We build the spiritual Kli above the will to receive, above impurity. “Pharaoh” does not disappear anywhere, the will to receive remains, and moreover, it remains in its brutal form, and at the end the “stony heart” is added to it. But we need to rise above it, to go over it.

I protect the impurity (Klipa) that covers my will to receive; similarly, the peel protects the fruit until ripens fully. Otherwise, the fruit will rot, and I will not attain my completed correction. I construct my entire relationship to reality while the peel protects my will to receive: “Don’t just disappear for me. My hatred, jealousy, cruelty, laziness, all these things remain, I need you.” It’s as if I wrap my egoistic characteristics in some package, and I exit from them to the outside. And on the contrary, if they disappeared, I would be left with nothing, and I would have nothing upon which to build myself.

Question: So how does a person go outside of himself?

Answer: For this it’s necessary to reach total helplessness. Then a kind of hole in the heart will open for you, in which you feel that you can go outside—and you will ask for this. But in the meantime you haven’t reached true prayer, you haven’t been “pushed” enough to find the Creator.

Question: How does a person reach true prayer in order to get help?

Answer: This happens only after he loses hope completely, but he still stands on the path. It’s necessary to reach a state of recognition of evil on one hand, the greatness of the goal on the other, and to maintain this gap.

First, I feel bad because I am in the egoistic state. This state is an unbearable evil for me. But the problem is not that it’s bad for me. I have to cancel my “self” and want this to be bad for me because I am not ready to bestow to the Creator. Thus, the evil manifests opposite the love of the Creator. And second, I recognize the greatness of the goal, which for me is goodness.

When I hold these two extremes, I reach the true prayer, a request for correction.

The goal is so great in my eyes that I can’t abandon it. And all the time my concern is that the greatness will only grow more. Ultimately, I hold onto two extremes: the greatness of the goal and the evil of my present state.

There must be pressure here from the group that gives me awareness that the greatness of the goal is namely to bring contentment to the Creator. And then I begin to think of how to flee from my present bad state, which is bad specifically because I am far from the goal.

These are the conditions that need to form within me. For this I have everything: the group, the Creator, the sources…. But the awareness of the importance of the goal is the key to everything (1), it is prior to all the other conditions. I need to be focused on the goal, and within all states to look only at it, to adhere only to it. And then, as a result, I truly need a group, a teacher, the studies, and dissemination.

After all, “the end of an action is in its initial thought.” The goal obligates me to everything. By aspiring to the goal, I understand that I can’t manage without the environment because I will reach the goal specifically among the friends. I know that I can’t do without the teacher because he holds me together with the group on the path and brings the Light that fills us. I understand that I can’t do without books because with their help I learn the spiritual system and arouse myself. When I study, it’s as if I am in that system, and I summon from there the Light that Reforms. And finally, I realize that I can’t manage without dissemination since the group is a small part of the collective vessel of humanity which I also need to be concerned about.

Everything derives from realizing the importance of the goal. I interpret to myself the final state in which I, the group, and the teacher are joined with all humanity such that the entire spiritual system comes to life among us. Its Lights will fill and tie us with one another into a single Malchut of the world of Infinity. And in it, we will reveal the One who has formed it, the Root that has produced the four phases of the Direct Light. And this is the Creator.
[102673]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/13/13, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar” 

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