Question: Why is it so difficult to work on recognizing the greatness of a friend? It is easier to recognize someone from the outside as great, whereas here, it takes years of effort.

Answer: Any external society imposes demands on people according to which it demonstrates care for its members and educates them. Within humanity, there are many types of societies. We can also include specific institutions like the department of education, the government, the police, various mutual aid associations, social organizations, schools, and kindergartens; all of these serve as an environment for the individual.

The question is how demanding this environment is of a person. Our group does not demand enough from each one. Therefore, a person does not feel that if the requirements are not met, this will cause him harm: that he will be ashamed, and his self-esteem will be hurt. He finds all sorts of excuses for himself in order not to do what the group, in essence, sets as its goal.

It defines a mandatory standard to be implemented, but does not sufficiently insist on it in the demands it places on each of its members. And then it fades out, like a small fire, without providing a strong impulse for advancement.

I have to know that if I do not do this and that, I will not be able to live with my friends; they will shame me and treat me in such a way that I will feel harmed by it. We need to use those qualities that are truly very important to us so that a person can fight with himself.

Comment: But a person has been investing effort in a friend for years and does not succeed as much as he does in the outside world.

My Response: You are saying that our work in the outside society is much more effective than it is here in the group.

There, outside, you work with your Kelim, which do not change. When you work in relation to the external society, they remain constant. Here, however, changes are constantly taking place in your vessels. Time after time, you reveal more and more how materialistic you are, how deeply you are immersed in your own egoism, and how little you care about the group.

Everything in you changes in order to advance you in this. You feel like you are constantly experiencing failures. But these are not failures. It is simply that more and more of what is called the “hardening of the heart” is added to you. There is no way around it.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/9/26, Rabash, “Go Forth from Your Land”

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