In The Book of Zohar, it is written: Evoking fear on both sides of love (during the periods of “trials” and the periods of mercy and benevolence) is essential. During the time of mercy and success on His Paths, it is necessary to trepidation awakened before the Creator to avoid committing sins and to prevent our love for Him “cooling down.”

There is no such thing as the fear of punishment. There is no retribution whatsoever. Only to our egoistic desire does it look that we are being punished for our wrongdoings.

Similar to how we egoists relate to each other in this realm, we assume that there is either a reward or a punishment for everything. Our whole life goes by between these two categories and clarifications: “How can I feel better, how can I reward myself? How can I hide from punishments?”

​The ​spiritual path lies above this level. There is no egoistic reckoning whatsoever, neither with the plus nor minus sign. There, it has nothing to do with rewards or retributions. In spirituality, we are the ones who create a scale of spiritual recompenses and paybacks.

When one is given a chance to care about others, it is a reward. If for some reason one is unable to take care of others, one considers it to be a punishment.

The true reality can be attained only when we bring our bodily sensors outside ourselves and begin sensing life not internally, but externally. We have to acknowledge and feel it. That’s why it is said: “You will see your world while you are still alive.” However, moving in this direction becomes possible only if we connect fear with love.

From Baal HaSulam’s and Rabash’s articles and from our own experience, we know that love never comes without fear. Real, spiritual fear cannot occur if it is not accompanied by love.  We shiver because we are scared that our love can weaken or love of those who care about us will diminish. We are in distress, not because we just enjoy being together as two egoists who are delighted to be with each other. Rather, we worry that we won’t let the Creator love us because we don’t please Him by loving our neighbors.

These are mutual sensations. We experience them only at the level of fear. Fear is necessary to make us rise above our egoism and work with it inversely.

… In order to avoid falling to wickedness and diminishing our love for the Creator, we have to connect fear with love.

The same happens on the “other side of love,” at the time of stringent trials when He judges us for our deeds. Awakening of fear before the Creator is essential so that we won’t fall in​to the state of judging ourselves according to egoistic criteria.
[144684]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14, lesson 1

Related Material:
“Fear Must Adhere To Love”
How Can We Be Afraid Of Someone We Love?
Anatomy Of Fear And Love

Filed under: Baal HaSulam, Conventions, Egoism, Group Work, Inner Work, Love, Spiritual Work, The Creator - No Comments →

Baal HaSulam, Letter No 2: I advise you to fear that your love might cool down even though our minds reject this possibility.

When we are in love, it seems to us that it will last forever. However, we know that in this world, everything is temporary. This state of affairs applies to spirituality as well since, there too, we continue climbing the next steps. So, it is natural that current states will disappear there  as well. That’s why there is nothing permanent whatsoever and why any condition will always be replaced with another one, either a bad one with a good one, or a good one with a bad one.

Still, make every possible effort to multiply love. If there is a way to increase love, but one doesn’t take advantage of it, it is considered an “omission.” It’s “as if” one gives a great present to one’s friend: the love that reveals in his friend’s heart at the moment of giving is different from the love that remains in his friend’s heart after the deed of giving is over.

In other words, love gradually vanishes. It “cools down” every day to the extent that it goes away completely and reaches a stage of oblivion. That’s why the recipient of the gift must search for the ways to regard the act of giving as recurrent and new every given day.

That is, we have to constantly renew the sensation of love and never allow our feelings to cool down. Everything happens inside us. To keep this sensation, we don’t necessarily have to receive new gifts each time. This rule also applies to unity among us that has to be instigated on a continual basis.

We have come to a state when each one of us cares for others as if they are our little children, our closest and most beloved ones. Thus, we strive to give them everything they want. If we manage to do so, we will provide others with everything they really need, and the Creator will manifest Himself among us as a result of our similarity to His properties.

Our attitude to each other and His property of absolute bestowal and love will somehow coincide. At least they will reach the first level of similarity of the 125 steps. It is the most important issue for us. We are in a state of a constant readiness and everything is in our hands.

We should persistently beg the Creator to give our friends everything they want, i.e., correction and revelation. Revelation is the property of bestowal and love among us. This is exactly what we mean by the term trepidation: a state of caring about our friends that is similar to taking care of our own children from two sides by judgment and  by love.

On the side of judgment, we should really worry that we will lose a chance as did the ARI’s students when he invited them to Jerusalem to bring the world to a state of correction. At that time, everything supported the upper force to be revealed to them, as the upper force was ready to act in this world and correct it. However, the ARI’s students found excuses not to obey their teacher’s invitation. Some of them didn’t show up because their wives wouldn’t let them go and others were busy.

This explains why we have to maintain the state of trepidation and be concerned that we won’t succeed. In every moment and every minute, we have to clarify how we should treat others and support the general Kli (vessel) in a way that it finally reaches a certain condition that will allow the Creator to reveal Himself to us.

It’s as if we are currently facing the Judge, and as if we are given the last opportunity, or granted the final word. Imagine yourself in this state! Visualize that we are facing judgment and that we have to fill it with mutual love. We will be able to do this only if we ask the Creator to fill the gaps between us.

It’s not us who get closer in our hearts, rather it is the Creator who fills the egoistic emptiness between us with love. When the distance between us is multiplied by love, a connection of tremendous intensity emerges. That is why our closeness happens only due to the Creator filling the ​empty spaces between us. He connects, coordinates, and unites us. That’s why our work is called the Creator’s work (Avodat a-Shem).

We only invite Him to do the work of correcting and strengthening our connection.
[144676]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14

Related Material:
So That You Will Not Forget The Gift Of Love
A War Of Love
Absolute Love Above Fictitious Hate

Filed under: Baal HaSulam, Conventions, Group Work, Love, My Similarity to the Creator, Spiritual Work, The Creator - No Comments →

We need to use the phrase, “There is none else besides Him,” very carefully and not defer to it in all circumstances, justifying ourselves.

Did you attain the One of whom you say, “There is none else besides Him?” No. Yet, you use this expression whenever it is convenient for you. You have no right to use as a maxim what the Kabbalists derived from their Kelim (vessels) of attainment. You do not have them! Yet, you take this concept as a ready-made formula and begin to use it. This is incorrect; you cannot do that!

Everything I say stems from the Kelim I currently exist in. If I have these feelings and attainments inside me, then I proceed from this formula because I am able to operate it, and, if not, then what is the use of my words?

If I am not at this level, then why should I be thinking about it and imagining something? If I am simply studying theoretically, then this is a different matter. However, in practice, working in the group, if I always am going to be saying  “There is none else besides Him,” then I will not grow and will remain a small animal. All religious believers say that.

Question: How does the concept of “There is none else besides Him” link up with the fact that we must put forth our own efforts?

Answer: Prior to starting the work, one does not accept the principle of “There is none else besides Him” and does everything through his own effort.

In Letter #16, Baal HaSulam writes that each day before a person begins work, he needs to say, “If I am not for me, who is for me” and do whatever is necessary to earn his daily bread.

However, in the evening, having finished his work, he says, “There is none else besides Him” because the Creator thought about him in advance, and he earned everything not due to his own efforts, but because this was bound to occur.
[145241]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 6

Related Material:
Pull The String And The Creator Will Be Revealed
The Meaning Of Merging With The Creator
The Rider Leads The Horse To His Destination

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: We always say, “There is none else besides Him,” and use this everywhere like a plug. If, for example, someone hurt or angered me, I react accordingly, but then I remember “Oh, but this came from the Creator. Well, since it’s from Him, then it’s fine.”

How can we come to such a state when I would react to the friend with the same awe as I do toward the Creator, “Oh, but this is my friend!”

Answer: This is incorrect. We cannot reach the Creator, and this is why you say, “Oh okay,” reassuring yourself and agreeing with whatever is happening. This is complacency, as they say, “Opium for the masses.”

In actuality, there needs to be attainment of the perfect absolute. When you truly understand, feel, and attain the Creator, then your agreement with Him will acquire a real force.

Until then, you will continue consoling yourselves with “There is nothing to be done. The Creator is….” As they write in insurance policies, “Struck by lightning; nothing could be done. Who is to blame? It is an outside force.”

Question: Maybe there is a lack of analysis here?

Answer: It is only a lack of attainment! This is not a matter of the mind, but of organs of attainment, the Kelim (vessels). A correct reaction is needed.

First and foremost, we need to demand that it become clear exactly what is going on. Demand, and not simply agree, since, through that, you gloss over everything that He is doing with you. He wants to challenge you to a serious mutual feeling, a clarification, but you pre-emptively agree, “No, no, no need for that; it’s all good.”

Demand clarifications from the Creator!
[145170]
From the Convention in St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 6

Related Material:
The Torah Of Exile And Of The Era Of Redemption
The Creator Is Waiting
How Do We Oblige The Creator To Help Us?

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Comment: I have this feeling that, in our ten, we do not observe the rules of the workshop. If we were to observe them, then the connection would be achieved much faster. I think that, through it, we are just harming the other circles.

Answer: Look at how small children grow, how many falls they take, how many messes they make, and how much they break. We are going through very intense, very serious states.

First of all, we need to thank the Creator for what we are going through. Being unsatisfied and critical is not bad either. However, on the other hand, we need to understand that taking falls, getting bumps, getting back up, crying, and so on, all of this is necessary and natural. Without all that, neither humans nor animals can develop. However, for animals all that happens instinctively, while for us it is through trial and error.

Despite the sages’ advice, the original sources and instructions, a person still does not know what he is doing, what he is getting into, and where he is headed. He simply agrees with everything because he is being pushed toward it from above, getting switched on from within. Gradually, we are beginning to realize more and more what we are dealing with, the states we are going through, both against my nature and along with my nature.

We should not pass over them, for it is worthwhile to try to exit our original nature because going deeper inward is only possible when you are trying to come outside of it, only in the positive direction.

In so doing, one must not delve into their feelings, eat their own flesh, cry on someone’s shoulder, and reveal weakness to oneself and others, and if it might seem to you that you are a person of truth and acting according to your feelings, then you will not be able to move in this direction because it should always be toward the Light.

Therefore, we always should be playing in front of each other, enacting enthusiasm, support, happiness, and fulfillment. Everyone should have a huge smile and ooze vibes of happiness as if we have already received what we desire. We need to be firmly connected to each other and feel that together we are one indivisible whole.

In the Torah it is written that a large number of people came out of Egypt and divided into tens, hundreds, and thousands. If we begin to add up these numbers, we would get a population of many thousands, all interconnected.

Also, division into tens is necessary in order for us to band together in internal work. This is why I am asking: intermix among yourselves. However, most importantly, do so with an open smile and heart.

Each of us is responsible for everyone else. If someone is in a bad mood, has a void in their eyes, and so on, then I am responsible for whatever is happening to him. It means that I am not radiating the joy and energy that should fill everyone. If I am relating to everyone correctly and want to radiate positive energy, then I most certainly will start receiving it from above.

Thus, whatever we might be doing, we are thinking about how to fill everyone else with joy, happiness, confidence, and mutual guarantee.
[145042]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 3

Related Material:
Nine People Oblige The Tenth
Within The Framework Of A Single Thought
Giving Yourself To Others

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

My objective at the St. Petersburg Convention was to ensure that each of us was able to admit to themselves that spirituality is attained in the connection between us, and not in any other place.

If a person wants to attain the spiritual world, he must be thinking of immersing deep inside the network that connects him with the other friends and with all of humanity. Only through this network can we be aimed at the Creator in intentions and actions.

This is why I sought for this to enter your mind and feeling so that you could sense that it is possible and that our unity, to some extent, is already appearing among us.

We are working with desires. They are very similar, very close to one another. Remove yourselves from the external characteristics and personality traits of the friends because when you begin working with a person internally these things hold no meaning.

What can we do so that with any thought about spirituality, each of us will think through the group and not from themselves personally? How can we accustom ourselves to do that? This is our biggest problem.

However, at this convention we already began to realize that spirituality is attained through general interconnection. We, ourselves, create and build the spiritual world. There are no higher worlds. There is one potential force, which is called Atzmuto, the unattainable essence of the Creator. As soon as we create the correct substrate between us, this force instantly will manifest with all of its elements.

Therefore, the most important thing for us is to realize that spirituality exists within, in the connection between us, and from there the Creator is already within reach.
[145047]
From the Convention in St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 5

Related Material:
Become A Kli That Reveals The Upper Light
Losing Oneself In Friends
What Do We Expect Of The Convention In St. Petersburg?

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: In my spiritual work, I am unable to connect the Creator and the group. What should I do?

Answer: Who gave me this group? Who brought me to it, organized everything? Who directs all the people who are sitting in front of me?

In the group of ten, there are nine people besides me, and they are all ready to unite with me. Who is directing them all, who selects them, prepares, and pushes them towards connection with each other? What force does all that if not the Creator? There is no other force. I only need to reveal how He does this, how He guides everyone by the strings, like a puppet-master, and in what manner He gathers us together.

And where am I? Who among us has freedom of will, where is it manifested and in which precise inner motion?

Then I begin to think, to look at the others, and realize that the Creator did everything, and He gave us the opportunity to increase the desire for mutual connection in order to reveal Him, so that from the hidden puppet-master He would turn into an evident one, the one who will fill all the empty spaces between us. Suddenly, with all our strengths, properties, and intentions, with our desires and thoughts, we start to complete each other in a way that arranges a perfect system where everyone fits each other ideally.

Therefore, apart from the possibility for connecting perfectly, for aspiring for unity, everything else is done by the Creator. We only need to show movement toward the ideal connection. And this, too, will be done by Him, but we need to try to remain in aspiration for it.

We do not know, do not understand, and do not feel. We only want for it to happen, with His help.
[144727]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14, Lesson 2

Related Material:
Looking For The Right Dialogue With The Creator
The Point From Which The Creator Approaches Us
The Neutral Zone

Filed under: Conventions, Free Will, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: At the workshops we reached such a connection in our tens that a question arose. What more can be done? What else can we add to this?

Answer: I think that it is impossible for us to come any closer to each other on our own. We have experienced the limit of coming closer on our own and now we need to attract the Creator to this.

We passed through a stage of feeling and understood what it means to be one whole to some degree, and now we need to learn what the upper force is, try to feel it, enter it, and dissolve in it with the entire ten so that it will rule over us. When we totally plunge into it, we will find the connection between us there.

Question: What does it mean to attract the upper force? Is it in thoughts or in actions?

Answer: We, collectively, need to imagine ourselves as existing in the property of complete bestowal that rules over us, envelops us, and governs us. By coming closer to my friend and desiring to become included in him, I prepare myself for the Creator to descend upon me. This needs to be clear in feeling, not in actions.
[145096]
From the Convention in Saint Petersburg 9/21/14, Lesson 5

Related Material:
Everything Is Within The Group Of Ten
Feeling The Common Heart
Looking For The Right Dialogue With The Creator

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: When we try to measure the desire of a friend by ourselves, to enter into him, an oppositional force begins to operate within us. Where does the second, balancing power that will help us “enter the friend” come from? What are we missing?

Answer: An external foreign force is required for us to smash our ego. We see that we are not consolidated in our hearts. It is impossible to scrape the membrane off the heart. This sack full of blood boils and beats within us, measuring every second of life that remains and we cannot do anything about it. What is required is an external force that will connect our hearts.

It is possible to invite it only through the right intention while studying the real Kabbalistic sources by Baal HaSulam and Rabash. So we must constantly try, try, and try to do this. There are no other possibilities.

You must all try together to nullify the iron wall that exists between you. You feel how much it separates between your hearts. So try to break through it!
[145094]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 5

Related Material:
When The Heart Is Silent
Getting Charged Within The Field Of The Creator
The Way To Spiritual Attainment

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: How does one build the desire “to receive for the sake of bestowal” correctly?

Answer: To receive for the sake of bestowal is an incredibly difficult thing and not worth thinking about in the meantime. Our first task is to rise above our ego. And we must use our ego and more “for the sake of bestowal,” this is a very tall order.

Comment: But leaving one’s own nature is no less of a “very tall order.”

Answer: No, it is much lower. Everything begins with a person nullifying himself with regard to the group. Growth and the accumulation of the importance of the goal, the level called Lo Lishma (not for Her name), happens while he is still within the ego but gradually advances towards departing from it.

Departing from the ego is called crossing the Machsom (barrier), a conditional boundary between two worlds, physical and spiritual. Further a person begins to rise in levels of “bestowal for the sake of bestowal,” reaches the fifth, maximal level and only later the level of “reception for the sake of bestowal.”

Question: And if I don’t have a desire to be integrated with others, what happens then?

Answer: Nobody has this desire. But necessity obliges one. If you want to attain the goal of life, you need to go through all of this, and if not, then you will need to go through this against your will. Initially you have no desire to work against the ego, you are an absolutely healthy person. But the importance of the goal obligates you to begin to work against it.
[145086]
From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 5

Related Material:
Our First Spiritual Exercise
The Great Value Of Lo Lishma
Bestowal In Two Phases

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Spiritual Work - No Comments →