Question: How does one feel a friend as a degree in attaining the Creator?

Answer: A friend is not me; it is something from the outside. If I get used to the fact that I strive to connect with him, then this is already a degree on the path to connection with the Creator.

The desire to feel a friend is different from the desire to feel the other. These are different feelings.

We should try to feel the friend as ourselves, so close as if he is inside me. By this we prepare the Kli (vessel) for the revelation of the Creator within us.

Question: What do I want to give to the friends, or what do I want the Creator to give them?

Answer: You must first feel what they want, and then try to be an intermediary so that they receive it from the Creator through you.
[317137]
From the Daily Kabbalah lesson 8/16/23, “To Come to Feel Others”

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Question: We are used to material gifts. How can we learn to give and receive gifts when we are connected virtually?

Answer: It does not matter. It is not about a material gift where you give me some kind of party favor or box tied with a ribbon. We talk about giving each other gifts in order to feel connected.

The point is that you want to give me something nice, and I feel that you are giving to me from the bottom of your heart and want me to feel it in my heart.

We need to soften our hearts a little so that they begin to feel each other. Start doing such internal massages, each on one’s own heart, so that we feel our attitude toward each other.

Try to do such exercises as if you are rubbing your hearts together. Try to feel each other through the heart so that everyone’s heart feels the hearts of others. It will work.
[317021]
From the Daily Kabbalah lesson 8/13/23, “To Give the Creator a Gift”

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Question: How do you become included in the Creator in order to connect with everyone else there?

Answer: First we must connect with each other, from the love of friends to the love of the Creator. But sometimes we can also do the opposite because we are neither in this nor in that yet. Therefore, by wishing to connect with the Creator, we come closer to the friends. By becoming included in the Creator, we acquire strength and opportunity to connect with them.
[317064]
From the Daily Kabbalah lesson 8/13/23, “To give the Creator a Gift”

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Baal HaSulam gives an example of a guest and a host to illustrate the system of receiving for the sake of giving. The host offers the guest various dishes, but the guest first refuses, does not want to receive them, and makes a restriction.

This is a natural reaction, originally inherent in us. We do not like to be the receivers due to shame.
In that case, the first thing I have to do is have a screen. Then I still begin to receive, but this receiving will no longer be for my own sake but for the sake of the Creator, for the sake of the owner, for the sake of the giver.

Therefore, I can receive once I have pushed away the light; that is, I have demonstrated that I do not want to enjoy but only want to please the Creator. By pushing away the light, I begin to slowly accept it in a way that pleases the Creator.

If we consider this process in the example of a guest and a host, then first I am offered, say, water, and I consciously decide to accept it. Then, it could be salad and so on. And at the very end the meat dish. In other words, at first, I can accept only 20% for the sake of the Creator, then 40%, 60%, 80%, and in the end 100%. But all this is gradual.

The system gradually reveals to me more and more pleasures and checks if I can work with them.
[316450]
From KabTV’s “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah” 7/30/23

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The “Introduction of The Book of Zohar” says that there is no greater pleasure than resolving contradictions because each contradiction contains an amazing opportunity to reveal a special degree of attainment of the Creator.

This means that if, when revealing contradictions, a person wants to overcome them with his inner qualities, then he approaches the state where he sees the common in all the diversity and contradiction of objects and phenomena. It is the realization of unity that is perfection.

Question: Suppose a person sees some kind of catastrophe and contradictions arise in him regarding the way the Creator governs the world. He cannot justify the Creator. After some time, is it suddenly revealed to him that it was for his own good, that the Creator had good intentions because this moves him forward?

Answer: Yes. The removal of contradictions is the reason for attaining perfection. At the same time, the greater the contradiction, the greater the pleasure afterward.

The Kabbalist constantly lives in such contradictions. At first, he does not justify the Creator when seeing a paradox in what is happening, and then he understands that all this was for his own advancement.
[316761]
From KabTV’s “Introduction of The Book of Zohar” 8/6/23

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What does it mean to be like the Creator?“

To be like the Creator means to be like the singular force of love, bestowal and connection that governs reality and leads us toward the goal it has set for us, which is to enjoy through resembling and identifying with that force.

The wisdom of Kabbalah engages precisely in how to shift from our inborn animate state of existence, where we are opposite to the Creator, to a state of existence where we become like the Creator. It involves learning about the two opposite natures—our egoistic nature and the altruistic nature of the Creator—and how we can attract and work with the higher altruistic nature until we fully resemble it.

Such a transition is considered shifting from the animate to the human level of existence. The word for “human” in Hebrew (“Adam”) comes from the word for “similar” (“Domeh”) because the concept of becoming human means that we become similar to the Creator (“similar to the most high” [“Domeh le Elyon”]).

“What was the purpose for which the Creator created this lot? Indeed, it is to elevate him to a higher and more important degree, to feel his God like the human sensation, which is already given to him.” – Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), “The Teaching of the Kabbalah and Its Essence.”

Based on KabTV’s “Kabbalah in the Modern Turbulent World” on August 3, 2023. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Preparation to the Lesson

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1st part of the Lesson — Writings of Rabash, “What Is ‘For Lack of Spirit and for Hard Work,’ in the Work?”

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2nd part of the Lesson — Writings of Baal HaSulam, “General Preface,” Item 2

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3rd part of the Lesson — Lesson on the Topic, “The Intention in the Heart”

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Selected Highlights

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Question: Is it possible to feel the spiritual reward so that I receive it not as a gift from above, but because I have actually earned it?

Answer: Of course. But what does it matter? The main thing is to yearn for the Creator all the time, to express our attachment to Him and our dependence on Him, and then we can advance. After all, no matter what we do, we can advance only with His force, with His mind, with what we receive from Him.

Therefore we do not need to make any calculations regarding what we should give Him. Ask and use everything you receive.

You ask the Creator like a favorite student asks for help from his teacher. Or the way a child feels that he cannot achieve something without his parents, and asks them for help. This is exactly what the teacher or the parents are waiting for and are happy to help with.

One must treat this with the heart. Nothing influences the Creator more than our heart.
[317105]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/14/23, “All My Bones Shall Say”

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Question: I want to break through to the heart of every friend, but not everyone is ready to open their heart and accept you. How can one not lose the fire of love and continue to knock on his heart?

Answer: It is quite natural that a friend does not want to hear about it. This means he has healthy egoism.

You should try to reach him through other friends. Do not lose optimism because this is the purpose of creation. The “place” in the heart of a friend that you need to hit several times is your desire to be in his heart. In the end, everything will work out.

Question: I am sending “bullets” into the hearts of my friends, and they are sending “bullets” to me. The heart ignites, burns, and then it cools down a little. Is our task to turn the heart into an eternal flame? Can we survive it?

Answer: There are no problems. We can all burn together constantly with eternal fire, and the Creator will be inside it. He is the material that will burn within us.
[317067]
From the Daily Kabbalah lesson 8/13/23, “To Give the Creator a Gift”

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