Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 113
Can We Determine What Desires We Are in During the Stage of Preparation?
During the stage of preparation, we cannot determine what desires we are in. We do not know where reception or bestowal are. We do not know or understand exactly what we are working on.
The key to correct work during the preparation stage is to attribute everything to the upper one. This is because the lowest spiritual state that we enter and are included in, after crossing the barrier (Machsom), is called “embryo” (Ubar). It is a state where we annul ourselves before the upper one and let the upper one act on us as it wills. This is called attributing everything to the upper one and recognizing the greatness of the Creator, that He is the one acting and that He does everything within and around us.
This is the truth, yet we must exercise it because we cannot fully attribute everything to the upper one. It repeatedly slips away from us, and we must return to this truth again and again, wash our minds with it, and convince ourselves that it is indeed the case. But we simply cannot do it on our own because only by seeing the Creator, by experiencing this reality firsthand, can we be convinced.
The will to receive is very pragmatic. “Show me and that’s it.” “Let me taste it.” Why do the sources write that “Taste and see that the Lord is good”? Why is tasting necessary? Why is seeing not enough? It is because only by tasting do we receive a clear sensory picture of what we have experienced, just as young children and infants experience objects and perceive them through their sense of taste. This is the most reliable sense. That is why infants do not settle for just seeing, but they put everything in their mouths to taste.
Similarly, until we taste the Creator as inner light (Ohr Pnimi), we have no clear knowledge of what He is. That is why we cannot attain true knowledge before the barrier is opened for us, before light enters our vessels.
We must long for the first spiritual state that is closest to us. If we desire all the opportunities given to us from above, if we exhaust all of our possibilities, then we truly enter that state because we have made all the necessary effort.
When does effort come to an end? We do not know this in advance. It depends on the structure of each individual soul. What is the sign that the work is complete? It is when the heavens open. Until then, we must simply continue to act.
The entire Torah, for beginners as well as for those who will later ascend the steps to the end of correction, is contained in the first article of Shamati entitled “There Is None Else Besides Him.” Beyond the barrier, the work assumes a different form. However, the task is always, in every state, to reach the feeling that “There is none else besides Him” regardless of what happens and no matter what will happen.
We must overcome resistance and reach this feeling without disconnecting from the reality of this world. It is unwise to live in an isolated place. We need to live in the whole of reality, through which all kinds of disturbances influence us, engage with us, and through them find “There is none else besides Him.”
If we complete this work, we have finished our work in this world and will encounter other, spiritual disturbances. Through these, we continue to progress, drawing closer and closer to fully realizing “There is none else besides Him.”
What does “There is none else besides Him” mean? It is the absolute knowledge that, in the end, the Creator, ourselves, and the entire path we have traversed—the actions, the disturbances, the uncorrected and corrected desires—are one.
Related Material:
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 112
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 111
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 110
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Question: Why is the desire to receive considered one-tenth of the desire?
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