Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 107

How Do We Know if We Acted Correctly?

If we do something incorrectly, we simply get stuck. However, if we study, are in the right environment and are generally on the right path, then although we undoubtedly make mistakes in every detail, we do not veer off the course of the work. Why? This is because we are in the right environment, we have access to the correct books and proper guidance, and all that remains for us is to recognize our mistakes in every detail and endure the disappointment. This is how we remember the Creator and realize why we do not progress. We recall that it is not us who act, but the Creator who does everything.

Then, the obstacles and disappointments bring us back to the Creator; they give us a deficiency that compels us to connect with Him. Where can we obtain this deficiency if, from the outset, Pharaoh exists within us? Initially, we think that we will build everything by ourselves and that is enough. For example, we are given a desire to advance in spirituality, but this desire still lacks direction. It is up to us to shape it so that it is directed at bestowal upon the Creator or receiving from Him. What matters most is the connection with the Creator.

We can achieve such a connection only through failures. By entering the work with our own strength, we eventually reach the awareness that “it is not my strength and might that has achieved this.” Then, from disappointment and helplessness, from realizing that we are incapable, we begin to see that there is no point in the work if it includes only us, the individual. We start to understand that our action is merely a beastly effort like that of all humanity, unless the revelation of the Creator is present within it.

This realization returns us to alignment with the Creator. We must turn to the Creator and ask Him to perform the action for us because we have seen that we ourselves cannot do it. This means that if we did not experience disappointment and despair in every single detail of our work, we would not turn to the Creator. Why do we turn to Him? Out of necessity, for the work to be completed.

But all these acts of “not for our own sake” ultimately lead us to the realization that what truly matters to us is the connection with the Creator, not the actions themselves, not the bricks, nor anything else. Everything else is simply a means since we are built this way to eventually return us to the right intention, to the understanding that we do not need any of those things. All we need is to be connected to the Creator in order to bestow upon Him.

This is a sequence of thoughts, causes and effects, and external demands that gradually become internal. It is a chain that develops within us and takes us from a state where we want to place brick upon brick, but are unable to. Then we become frustrated with ourselves and recognize that our true concern is the Creator. We first become angry at the Creator for not letting us place brick upon brick, but later we begin to realize that placing bricks is not the goal. Instead, we must be connected to the Creator. The emphasis, the center of gravity, gradually shifts from ourselves to the Creator.

As this process unfolds, the importance of the connection with the Creator grows, and the connection is no longer about the brick but about Him alone. Then, we are not connected to the Creator for our own sake but in order to bestow upon Him. There are many details to examine in this, but by engaging with each and every detail in the corporeal world, we ultimately scan through all aspects from one end to the other.

Thus, it is written: “A righteous person falls seven times and rises.” Every step forward involves a moment of failure, regret, the recognition of evil, and correction. This is how we were made. We need to go through every single detail.

We do not determine these states. We do not know when a new desire will arise, how it will become scrutinized, or what needs to be done for that to happen. When we fully immerse ourselves in a desire, we cannot act as a philosopher looking at the big picture and “wandering” between different states of consciousness. What matters is the overall movement that we maintain, as it is written, “Whatever your hand finds to do with your strength, that do.”

The general effort we invest is what brings about this unfolding sequence of events, the transition from state to state, until we reach the completion of our scrutiny and correction, and attain the intention to bestow. That is the goal. Everything we have experienced up to this moment has been nothing more than a means to reach the point of unity with the Creator.

When we complete this recognition, we are once again given the opportunity to place “brick upon brick.” Once again, we begin placing bricks without the Creator’s presence. We rush forward and act with our own strength, thinking we are doing something great, that we are engaged in construction.

This can happen in any action in this world, from the most beastly to the most spiritual, even in spreading the wisdom of Kabbalah or giving an important lecture, where we think that we are about to make a great effort. We become immersed in the action itself and forget the required outcome of the action: the strengthening of our connection with the Shechina.

Related Material:
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 106
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 105
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 104

Filed under: Talks about the Steps of the Ladder | Add Comment →