Question: What is intention? Did the Creator create it? Or do we create it ourselves?

Answer: Specifically because a person has the possibility of being in opposite and contrary states, one state is intentionally expressed in relation to another.

If I want something, this indicates that I have an intention to receive a particular kind of pleasure for myself. In general, we call this intention desire. The question is in what manner I want to apply it: Is it for myself or for others? Here an intention already appears from the next level in relation to the Creator. We define the word “intention” as the realization of each desire in a unique format. In every desire or intention, there are many levels.

Question: If my intention is directed for the sake of another person or for the sake of the Creator, this is called altruism. Does an intention like this reach a person from the Creator?

Answer: Yes, it comes from the Creator, because it is from this that a person learns how he must bestow.

Question: Is a Kabbalist really constantly making calculations? “For whom am I drinking? For whom am I going now?” After all, it is possible to go crazy like that!

Answer: No. When you carry this out inside, within the desire, this doesn’t require any energy, on the contrary, you receive energy from it.

Question: Well, this is a constant struggle! According to my nature, I want to drink tea for my own sake, but I need to drink for the sake of the Creator. Am I always found in such a war?

Answer: A person receives enormous additional pleasure from bestowal, not just pleasure from the tea that he drinks but because he is doing it for someone. Suppose that your mother asks you to drink a cup of tea; an impression is left in you that you did this for your mother, and then the pleasure becomes egoistic. I received that and enjoyed it.

And what’s next? It is necessary to progress onward. Which is to say, it is now up to you to receive an even greater pleasure and again build an intention.

Question: Is this talking about pleasures like drinking tea, coffee, and the like?

Answer: Why not? The same pleasure that is found in a cup of coffee, if it is possible to call it pleasure, is found in the infinite eternal Light. There is only one source of pleasure, the Creator, and we are a desire that was created to enjoy receiving from Him.

Question: In our world, a desire appears in me to drink tea, but what pleasure can there be in the next world from this? After all, there is no body there.

Answer: What is the difference? Desire is also not corporeal. In the upper world, there is only a desire to give pleasure to someone and to have pleasure from this. I understand that this is a more exalted, better, infinite, and unlimited pleasure, not because it is good for me, but because I want others to have pleasure. This is the characteristic that I receive from the upper Light.

You can ask, “Do you give pleasure to the Creator, as if you feed your baby with a spoon?” The answer is “Yes.” “Then it’s not a problem, I also feed my little son with a spoon and enjoy this.”

But this is purely an egoistic calculation. To avoid this, you must first hate the object for which you do this. There is no love without hatred. Everything should necessarily be built on two opposite qualities. At that, hatred is by no means destroyed, it supports love, and love supports hatred. And so they exist together.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 2/26/17

Related Material:
Where Is The Intention?
Delighting The Creator
Intention And Its Influence On Reality

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