Ego Recognition Is An Important First Step

recognition A question I received: What should I do if I’m not bothered by the fact that I hate everyone and wish to use everyone to satisfy my own desires?

My Answer: Keep going. Reaching this realization is a great accomplishment. But now ask yourself: Along with your hatred, do you understand that it is purposeless, useless, and harmful to you? Do you understand that the goal lies on the other side of creation? You have to reach a mental understanding that the goal of creation is not inside you, but it pertains to what is outside of you.

Our problem is that we tend to forget about one single element: the Upper Light, the Upper Force. Everything we do – including the studies, dissemination, and work in the group – is necessary only to draw the Upper Light, instead of to gain more knowledge or feelings. Only the Light changes us and takes us through the necessary thoughts and feelings.

This is how we advance toward the goal. We don’t need wisdom; we just need to attract the Light that Reforms. This is why we have to arrange an environment around us that will always give us the necessary support. Then we will be able to see that only the Light – a force outside of us – can save us.

The Only Force That Can Change You

laws A question I received: How can another person’s desire become my own vital need?

My Answer: This can only happen if you really see that this is so. You shouldn’t force yourself to give out candy and flowers to people, or to smile at them all day long. And you shouldn’t hypocritically try to be a “nice person.” Rather, Kabbalah is talking about an inner correction that takes place consciously, as a result of you seeing the goal; you see how reality is arranged and you see yourself in comparison to it.

You then begin to move away from evaluating things by your sensations of good or bad, since they revoke your freedom of will and turn you into a helpless animal. Instead you begin to realize the greatness of the goal; it becomes the highest thing to you. However, you don’t value it out of the egoistic benefit it promises, but based on a completely different principle.

But how is this possible, if our whole life revolves around sensations of good and bad, fulfillment and emptiness? It’s because you actually acquire a new criterion of true and false which is not based on self-satisfaction, but on spiritual importance. It is brought to you by the Light, although you do not even realize this.

That is how the force of bestowal comes to you. It is something you have never felt before, and little by little, it begins to influence you, giving you the quality of Bina which is above all your current calculations. You acquire a different nature, one with which you are currently unfamiliar, and it becomes your yardstick for measuring all the actions and changes taking place.

However, in the meantime, everything you do is necessary only in order to awaken the influence of this force. The entire method of Kabbalah lies in learning how to attract the Light that will cause a change in you. Without its help, you will never change on your own. You will remain forever trapped in the labyrinth of philosophical intricacies. On the other hand, if the Light influences you, you will begin to see and will learn everything.

This is why we have begun studying The Book of Zohar: in order to give every person (even total beginners) an opportunity to be in contact with the Light, on which we depend completely.