In general, a person eats himself up over his past and present, not realizing that everything was already predetermined from the start and everything had to happen. The two principles: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me?” and “There is none else besides Him” must be integrated and not just alternate one after the other like a day of work and night of resting.

Every time you need to integrate these two principles before each effort and also after it. After the fleeting moment it’s absorbed in the world of Infinity and it’s forbidden to take anything into account concerning it. All the accounting is now only with the Creator.

Baal HaSulam writes in the article, “Thou Hast Hemmed Me In Behind and Before,” that if a minister doesn’t do the right actions with a letter, then the Creator brings it down and puts another letter in its place. We still don’t understand exactly how this works, but we need to understand unambiguously that we shouldn’t be sorry about the past and the present! We only need to be in fear of the future: Will I be able to prepare myself for the discovery of the next Reshimo in order to satisfy the Creator?

The past and the present are completely under the control of “There is none else besides Him” and so I have nothing to clarify except my relationship to what was done. This is the one thing that we need to do. We don’t change the reality itself, the reality is changed regarding my relationship to it. Everything depends on my angle of viewing a particular object; however, the object itself is unchanged. Only my comprehension is changed. Is my comprehension egoistic or altruistic? And from this each and every thing in reality is changed.

I change my senses. Those ten Sefirot are revealed but everything depends on this: Is my desire equipped and shielded with a “screen” against the egoistic pleasure? This completely changes the entire picture.

If I think that what happened in some way depended on me and that I myself chose how to behave, it follows that there is one other authority besides the Creator: my own self. So does it follow that I myself determined how everything is supposed to happen?

If I sit and eat myself up over what I could have done yesterday and didn’t do, or I am sorry that I didn’t come today to the lesson, then it follows that I determined my actions myself and decided not to come. This is to say, that besides the Creator there is another force that is acting in reality: my own self. About this the Creator says: “I and he cannot dwell in the same abode.” If I want to dwell together with the Creator in one dwelling, I must absolutely nullify myself. Then I will be together with Him.

Therefore, about the entire past that happened up until a moment ago, I must say that everything came from the Creator and so it had to be. For that is how the Creator thought and arranged everything from the start, and I must be thankful for this, as for a very great prize, about all the failures and the things that I did that were not okay. For this, the Creator now obligates me to sit and be sorry about everything that was done, so that I will say that everything was done according to the desire of the Creator with the goal of teaching me to behave otherwise in the future.
[123536]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/18/13

Related Material:
It Is Pointless To Regret What Was Swallowed In Ein Sof
There Is Nothing Worse Than Regretting The Past
Gratitude For The Past Prepares For The Future

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