Baal HaSualm, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Item 26: That means that their excessive will to receive, which had already been eradicated and rotted in the second state, must now be revived in all its exaggerated measure, with no restraints whatsoever, meaning with all its past flaws. Then begins the work anew, to convert that excessive will to receive to be only to bestow.

We have to discover that the desire to receive is entirely bad, in the worst degree. We will see not only the size of this evil, but also its evil essence in its current form, without a Masach (screen), that it is evil not only to us but also to the attainment of the goal of creation. It turns out that the desire to receive without a Masach isn’t suitable for the attainment of creation and so it is called “evil” and also “dead,” since we cannot receive the Light of life and feel the force of vitality in it.

When we understand all that, we will reach a turning point and begin to revive our desire. It is called the “resurrection of the dead”—thus we begin to correct the desire to receive so that it will be in order to bestow. We need this turning point on the way, so that we will feel the corrupt desire and decide that in this form it is “dead.”

Today the desire to receive doesn’t seem corrupt. What’s wrong in wanting to enjoy the things I love?

I have to discover all the desires inside me and to understand that when I enjoy them in the ordinary way, I prevent myself from bestowing upon the Creator. This is because bestowal is when I stop using the desires the ordinary way and enjoy each of them only when I bestow upon the Creator. I connect my desire to Him in order to understand how to bestow upon Him and so that He will enjoy the use of such a desire. Only to such an extent, for such a pleasure, when I yearn to bestow upon the Creator, do I act—receiving the Light inside me in order to feel that I bestow upon Him by that.

Thus we reach the corrections. It is impossible to reach the final state (state three) from the initial state (state one) if there are no “dead” desires on the way that are revived.

Question: How can we understand that the desire is actually dead and it is time to revive it?

Answer: It is a different type of work: Each time I kill more and more of my desires. It is impossible to know in advance that I have passed the whole way. It always seems as if there is nowhere to advance to, but the next day a new layer is revealed.

Yesterday, for example, we reached a peak; we discovered a bit more unity, impression, and excitement, we felt a special state that was a result of a new and stronger connection, which we have never felt before.

We attained it thanks to the illumination that was created among us. We evoked it and it filled us. In phase one we feel excitement and elation, but the illumination continues to act inside the desire that we managed to tie to it. It expands its activity to phases two, three, and four and the full depth of that desire is revealed to us, the new layers in which we have not reached connection yet.

Today, however, we feel heaviness. If we acknowledged that this heaviness comes from the Creator; that he sent it to us on purpose, and that he makes us feel sleepy on purpose, we could do something, we could resist the heaviness.

It is true that I feel like sleeping now and that I don’t feel like doing anything—but it comes from the Creator. He wants to develop us, and He is revealing a new vessel inside us now. How do you immediately wake up to life within the fogginess, within this sleepiness, the indifference and the confusion?

My sleepiness was caused by the weak Light. The moment it gets stronger, I will immediately wake up, like a flower that turns in the direction of the rising sun. It isn’t about lethargy; we are speaking about spiritual states that are determined by the level of the Light. The correction of the desires at midnight, before dawn, doesn’t depend on the time.

So if we woke up now to a stronger connection, and it were a truly serious internal effort, and not just singing songs, we would discover what we have gained thanks to the extra desire that we received in the convention. The whole point is to come back to life after the first surge of awakening has been replaced by the dark thickness of the erupting ego.

It doesn’t matter whether the new ascent doesn’t seem as special as the one we felt in the convention. There we were like kids and we were impressed in clean, pure desires—today our reaction is becoming deeper and we understand things in “thicker” vessels. This is how the idea of “an opposite value of Lights and vessels” is expressed.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/8/12, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”

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