Baal HaSulam, Shamati, #25, “Things That Come From The Heart”: Regarding things that come from the heart, enter the heart. Hence, why do we see that even if things have already entered the heart, one still falls from his degree? Why do we see that even if things do enter a person’s heart he still falls from his spiritual level? We see that even if a person is impressed by what the teacher conveys to him, he still falls from the level on which he received the Torah, the intention and the thoughts of the teacher.

The thing is that when one hears the words of Torah from his teacher, i.e., the wisdom of his teacher, he immediately agrees with his teacher, and resolves to observe the words of his teacher with his heart and soul, because he really wants it to be fulfilled. But afterwards, when he comes out to the world, he sees, covets, and is infected by the multitude of desires roaming the world, that is, to other people’s desires, thoughts, and plans dealing with all sorts of nonsense and not spiritual development in this case, and he and his mind, his heart, and his will are annulled before the majority, that is, those conditions the environment is in.

As long as he has no power to judge the world to a scale of merit, they subdue him. He mingles with their desires…. What does that mean? If I am in a foreign environment, it is the Creator Who plays with me and Who places me there in different external conditions so that I will grow stronger with regard to the inner decisions that I have already made, despite the external influences that appear.

Suppose I am on my way home from the convention now and when I get on the plane I am already under the domination of a foreign environment. Can I remain in the same inner condition that I felt during the three conventions—concentrated, focused on the goal, feeling elated and feeling my friends—when I am under external conditions that pressure me? If I can, it is a state in which I control the outside world; if I can’t, it means that the outside world controls me.

But afterwards, when he comes out to the world, he sees, covets, and is infected by the multitude of desires i.e., society at large, dealing with nonsense, then if he cannot overcome himself, his thoughts, desires, and heart obey the majority.

Overcoming the multitude consists of two parts.

First, when I realize that I am detached from the support of the friends, I myself internally alienate them and keep away from them.

Secondly, I don’t see that everything is managed by the Creator anymore and that the thoughts of the multitude are sent to me on purpose so that I will tighten the connection with the group, with the sources even more than before, and will regard the external effect as the Creator’s game. After all, He sends me “helpers,” guards who want to throw me down the mountain I have been climbing on my way to the Creator, but I keep moving forward, holding on with my teeth in order to stay above the water and in the right direction. No matter what the influence of the environment is, I don’t go along with the current, but rather row towards my goal.

As long as he has no power to judge the world to a scale of merit…

After all, the Creator works for a person through the whole world! If I justify the world because it actually operates in order to help me advance, it means “to judge the world to the scale of merit.”

But if I cannot judge the whole world to the scale of merit, which means to draw it in my direction, realizing that the Creator sends me these obstacles on purpose so that I will advance more strongly; if I cannot connect to my friends and to the goal more strongly, then the world becomes external and the Creator disappears from it. If I forget that He is the one who has arranged everything and think that the world influences me by itself, the Creator disappears from it and I am left under the dominion of this world. … they subdue him. He mingles with their desires, i.e., a person diverts from the goal.

Then, when a person subdues to the desires of the world that surrounds him, he is led like sheep to the slaughter. He has no choice; he is compelled to think, want, crave, and demand everything that the majority demands; that is, he is under the domination of the external society. This is also under the authority of the Creator. He shouldn’t think that anything other than Him operates here. But this is a completely different control, not I shall hasten it (Achishena), but in its time (Beito). He then chooses their alien thoughts and their loathsome lusts and desires, which are alien to the spirit of the Torah. In that state he has no strength to subdue the majority, and goes along with the current, like the rest of the world.

Instead, there is only one counsel then, to cling to his teacher and to the books. This is called “From the mouth of books and from the mouth of authors.” He has to hold on with his teeth to the lessons and to the sources and to choose what is closer to him and what impresses him most strongly. It may be a certain article or a passage from TES, a song, anything. What’s important is that it should strengthen his connection with our society. Only by cleaving to them can he change his mind and will for the better. However, witty arguments will not help him change his mind, but only the remedy of Dvekut (adhesion), for this is a wondrous cure, as the Dvekut reforms him.

Only while one is inside Kedusha (Sanctity) can one argue with oneself and indulge in clever polemics that the mind necessitates that he should always walk on the path of the Creator. But this is all nonsense. However, one should know that even when he is wise and certain that he can already use this wit to defeat the Sitra Achra (other side), one must bear in mind, that all his wit and nice conclusions, the studying and the agreement with the friends, that all this is worthless. This is not an armament that can defeat the war on desire, for all these concepts are but a consequence he has attained after the aforementioned Dvekut.

Everything depends on how strongly a person ties himself to the group. After all, he has to speak to his friends on the phone, to contact them on the Internet, to prepare some material for them, to participate in the daily work. If he doesn’t do that, nothing will help. We are the ones who need the dissemination and not those to whom we disseminate. It compels us to be in constant movement and to improve. This is the only way we can advance!

What I say is based on my personal experience. Unfortunately I can think of 30-40 people who I once brought to Rabash who also engage in Kabbalah to a certain extent now, but you can feel what it means to study Kabbalah without advancement when you speak to them.

In other words, all the concepts upon which he builds his building, saying one must always follow in the path of the Creator, is founded in the Dvekut with his teacher. Thus, if he loses the foundation, then all the concepts are powerless, since they will now be lacking the foundation. Hence, one must not rely on one’s own mind, but cleave once more to books and authors, for only that can help him, and no wit and intellect, as they are lifeless.

In principle, this article says that everything that is sent to us in life is sent to us intentionally by the Creator, and we mustn’t forget it. We have to take advantage of all the obstacles in order to advance and to grow stronger in our advancement.

In fact there are no interferences. All these obstacles and barriers are a springboard. If we overcome them we will advance; if not, it means that we will have to overcome them indirectly. Everything depends on our participation.

The point is that we are not given any obstacles from Above that cannot be overcome. The Upper Light operates in a manner that is adapted to each of us according to our personal circumstances. All the obstacles that we encounter are always adapted to our abilities. It’s the ego that we have to correct on the next level. If a person remembers that, he adheres even more strongly to the advancement towards the Creator, to the teacher, the books, and the group.

Thus, he is not controlled by the external environment, although he is in good relations with it, but internally he is loyal to himself and to the environment. Moreover, gradually and without words, he begins to influence the environment so that it suddenly begins to change.

Let’s keep the connection between us so that the impression of the week we spent united, feeling wholeness between us, and in a wonderful state will only grow stronger! After all, we will each go our own way and each one will receive his own interferences and we have to keep the spirit of mutual guarantee and be committed that nothing will detach us from the group and that we will overcome all the obstacles and feel that we are together as if we have never gone our own ways.

If the interferences don’t pull us in different directions, we will feel the connection between us even more strongly, and this is actually what we need. If we can do that, then there are no words that can describe the level to which we will immediately ascend. We can fulfill our dream within the coming week! If we all, regardless of the distance between us, think about the fact that our friends should remain connected just as they are now, we can be sure that the Messiah will come. The word Messiah stems from the Hebrew word “Moshech,” “to pull,” and the Upper Light is revealed that completes all the corrections, pulling a person out of his ego to full adhesion with the Creator.
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From a lesson in Russian, 2/07/14

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Question: All of our thoughts come from the Creator. How can we be sure that we truly engage in spiritual work, and not in unattainable fantasy?

Answer: At the beginning, when a person is born and raised, he has no free choice. He is born into some family, he is being taught and given certain education that shapes his attitude towards the world and life. This initial program that a person adopts during the first 15 years of his life determines the development of his personality, and he can’t move beyond that.

One may ask: “How can it be? We don’t choose after all.” Indeed, we don’t choose where to be born, when, and in what family—we don’t choose anything. So what can we do with our spiritual development? You have to be at the place where your heart leads you to. But if you came to us, you have to strictly follow everything that you are being told.

How can you be sure that you are on the spiritual path? You can’t. Until the Creator becomes revealed to us, and clearly, not in a mystical way, as some vague inner sensation (which you are still unable to comprehend), until that you can’t be sure in any way. That’s why I can’t appease or support you, but on the contrary, I stir up even more doubts within you. It is said: “Come and see how wonderful the Creator is.”
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From the World Zohar Week “Integral Education Convention,” Day Three, 2/4/2014, Lesson 1

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Question: Where is it possible to find the border between where I need to make personal clarifications myself and when I need to turn to the group to receive help?

Answer: There is no border. It is best to do it in the center of the group. But of course not hammering them with petty questions: which potato to take to peel or which cucumber to buy?

Question: So a group discussion and decision is higher than a private clarification?

Answer: As long as you do not personally put into the collective opinion, then you are accessing the collective wisdom of the group. And afterward, it will pass through and begin to live within you. Then you won’t need to turn anywhere else.

Question: Let’s say that a friend comes up with an idea to come to live in Israel. Can he go to the group with this idea, and whatever the group decides that will be the real criterion?

Answer: First of all, the real point is to make the collective above the personal. These kinds of questions constantly come up. We certainly don’t object to a person moving here, and it doesn’t matter where he is from. But the principle is that he, first of all, needs to ask himself, “Where do I bring the most benefit?”

You know how it used to be in Russia when a person would complete the military academy, he would be asked: “Where do you want to serve, comrade?” and he would answer, “Wherever my homeland sends me.”

If a person is guided specifically according to this condition, according to this standard, to this level, then certainly he is really a valuable friend. But if he wants to move because of the weather or because it will be better for him here, then that is doubtful.

Thus, you need to clarify in your group and in the central group where you are of real benefit and afterward decide if you physically have the possibility to move here. But the main thing is where you will really bring the greater benefit. This is the criterion of truth.
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Question: Sometimes we feel bored, fall asleep during the lesson, or are carried away by foreign thoughts. Why does the Creator prepare things this way? What does He want to show us? How is it possible to keep the same level of intention all the time?

Answer: When you listen to my lessons you should try to feel every word I say to its full depth. Everything is built on your identification with me.

I don’t say anything before I create some images inside me that I then convey verbally to others, hoping that they can hear them and accordingly build that same image inside them. When our images correlate, we start a dialog of inner clarifications of that image: what attributes, merits, and movements are in it.

If you don’t form an inner sensory image inside yourself from what you hear from me, you probably are sitting without your incorporation in me and my incorporation in you. This is the problem. So, after a while, you surely fall asleep, lose contact, and the meaning and feeling of the necessity of this lesson.

There are people who cannot operate this way because they think they know a lot. What’s important for them is to hear me in order to dispute me. I am not offended by them since this attitude is naturally imprinted in them and it is very hard for them to perceive the material correctly. I identify with them, but they should overcome these states because if a student doesn’t form the image that the teacher conveys inside him, he doesn’t learn.

On the other hand, when you have a dialog with your friends, it is certainly easier, simpler, and better for you. Everything between you is built especially on sympathy and empathy. It is much easier for you to communicate with the friends because their language is much simpler than mine.

We try to convey the lessons in the form of workshops. This method helps people feel and connect to the text and the one who wrote it much more deeply.
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Question: What does it mean to hit the ego in the teeth?

Answer: Every word a Kabbalist says stems from his spiritual attainment,

Thirty-two teeth symbolize thirty-two elements which correlate to the thirty-two currents of the Light of Hochma that descend from the mind, from the head of the spiritual Partzuf, go through the hairs and the inner parts of the head, and create the inner part of the mouth and the teeth, including the teeth for grinding food.

The spiritual filling includes water and food: Water is the Light of Hassadim and food is the Light of Hochma. There are thirty-two attributes called teeth that are used to grind the Light of Hochma, which isn’t easy since we have to receive in order to bestow.

It is a whole system by which we understand why we were created the way we are and why the forces of nature integrate in such a way in order to create the ultimate forms, which on our level are fulfilled in the form of a mind, brain, head, and all the other forms of the face. What is more, these forms differ in different peoples and different civilizations.

All this is necessary! And we will discover all this on the way to our correction. There is no point studying the wisdom of Kabbalah artificially since we will not be able to correct ourselves that way.

Thirty-two teeth are thirty-two systems of correction of the upper current of wisdom before it can enter the body in which there are many systems: the trachea, the larynx, the esophagus, etc.

A person should perceive information according to his feeling, not mentally but by his feelings. A small child doesn’t always understand what he is told, but when he grows up he can already perceive and understand this information.

A “blow in the teeth” means that a person doesn’t chew properly, which means that he doesn’t digest the information and he clarifies it in an opposite manner, clarifying everything for his own sake.

There are very clever people, but they turn everything for their own sake, since this is how their mind works. In the end, after many years, this turns out to be a mistake, but in the meantime, they avoid this fact and so nothing can be done with them. Five to ten years may go by before they gradually realize how to clarify things correctly.

So “hitting the teeth” means to annul the option of the wrong clarification of the Light of Hochma in us.
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Question: If I don’t agree with the Creator, then in order to rise above my disagreement I need to overcome it with a great deal of work. What is this work?

Answer: Certainly you don’t agree with Him! After all, new egoistic desires appear in you, a bit greater than before, on a new level and in different styles!

But sometimes it seems to you that you are not such a great egoist, because from the start another characteristic is beginning to be created in you that seems small to you in the beginning. Suppose that you finished growth at the height of some cockroach and you have already become a chick, but you were a big cockroach there, and now you are a little chick. So you grow up turning from an ugly duckling into a white swan, but in spite of it all, you understand that you are sitting in cold water. And after that you become small again, but a fawn. And so on.

In other words, from growth on a previous level, you become small in the next level, meaning that it is a small state in development but it is greater in quality. But you don’t feel this yet and therefore sometimes it seems to you that you are in a descent in comparison to the previous level when you were a big spider and successfully trapped and ate all kinds of flies, and now you are a little snail.

I am saying this seriously! It seems to us that we have descended, but in fact we simply rise in quality. This is because we are consecutively passing through the developmental stages, embryo (Ibur), breastfeeding (Yenika), small (Katnut), and large (Mochin). So there are no descents, only constant changes. And that is how it is with all of humanity.
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Question: Must we agree internally with all the disturbances that come from the external world?

Answer: In general, the first reaction of a person to what is happening in the world is a desire to change everything, to organize the world anew, to change the borders, to make the economy healthy. This is the natural reaction of our ego, meaning ourselves, which is discovered until we suddenly begin to understand that all of this is nonsense!

Where have you seen that a change from one system to another has helped to improve the situation? On the contrary, in the end, it will get worse. At first it seems to us that everything is going well, that apparently we have achieved something and that everything is okay. But as time passes, it turns out that it will be much worse than what had been before. And this is natural because we are not advancing towards correction.

Now what is left for us is only to recognize our uncorrected relationship to the world.

Everything that happens in the world can be corrected only through our approaching the Creator, because everything is derived from Him in order to push us to become closer to Him. We are constantly moving away from the Creator. If we understood that it is necessary to yearn for Him, then we would truly begin to approach something good. But in the end, He pushes us further and further away so that we will reach a full recognition of our ego.

When we begin to correct ourselves somewhat, we advance into our ego like the right and left lines, and we already understand further how to act. A method of how to work with the crisis appears within us and we correct it, that is how through it we approach the Creator. Through this we correct ourselves; we remove and clear away the crisis without touching the economy, education, information, technology, or anything else. This is all nonsense because change and new organization in all of these areas will not ensure anything good in any case.

But the more tightly we approach the Creator, the further He keeps us away from Him, and through this the evil is discovered, and in this way we quickly move all of the evil towards the good. Therefore it is not necessary to aspire to change the world, society, and all areas of life.

All we need to do is to change the person as a foundation for changing the world. This is specifically what we need to learn by ourselves, to explain to humanity, and to teach others.
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Question: I always magnify and elevate the friend. For me he is a means and a help for acquiring life in spirituality. So how can I be envious of him?

Answer: We always see others through the prism of our ego. And so it seems to me that everyone is worse than I am. And if someone is better, here I begin to feel bad and need to balance this somehow, otherwise I will suffer.

In fact, only I exist. All the others are my negative characteristics that are wandering around me. If I were corrected I would not see them, instead I would see the parts of my soul that are connected together with me into one unified whole, I would see the Light. That is how I see all kinds of people. They are all my internal characteristics.

How must I relate to them? As if they are angels.

Question: But that envy that should exist isn’t in me. Am I envious of anyone? I see that everyone is as miserable as I am.

Answer: This is because you see the friends through your ego. In fact they are all perfect! For the Creator created such a perception of the environment for your sake. If you correct yourself, then you will see everyone as perfect! Nobody needs to be corrected, only you.
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If we want to come near the Creator, we have to be equivalent in form to Him. In the place where we reveal the Creator, we will reveal His humbleness, His mercy, His descent to us.

He diminishes, minimizes, annuls, and subdues Himself before us, just as we do before our children when we play with them. We have to lower ourselves before children in order to connect with them, to play with them, and to serve them, although we also maintain all the options as adults.

The point is that if we received a certain portion of feelings of a certain revelation during our convention, some new feelings, it is only thanks to the fact that the Creator descended to us, was revealed before us on lower levels.

We have had great success even thanks to this minimal contact with Him, which brought about some positive changes in us. We don’t feel them yet, but we will feel it as negative changes in the future since this is the way we advance until the full revelation, until a person feels that everything becomes worse and worse, further and further away from spirituality. Unfortunately, many are caught on this hook, feel disappointed and leave.

This is the test of our unselfishness: Why do I want to attain the upper world? Is it in order to feel good or is it in order to really help all humanity ascend and thus delight the Creator? This is why we have to accurately clarify the reason we are on this spiritual path.

When we feel certain changes internally, it means that they occur because the Creator is getting closer to us, which means that He is lowering Himself. The point where we feel His intensified feeling inside us is the place where we reveal His descent, and we only have to exert ourselves so that this descent will not seem too free to us, and that we already know and understand everything. If this nonsense comes to a person’s mind he only loses as a result.

So we mustn’t forget that we have only started to feel what real advancement is at the point that we have attained: in the unity between us and in the collective work on ourselves in order not to be separated.

We must understand that we are constantly being played with, but with a good intention. No one wants us to fail, no one wants to push us downward, even what we call “the guards that are at the top of the King’s mountain,” are not actually trying to push us so that we will roll down. They are trying to hit us qualitatively, so that we will not fall but so we will simply discover the attributes that we still lack at the current point of our ascent.

If the Creator touches us with a certain question it makes us feel that we descend and encounter different problems in life, but it is only so that we will ascend and make the next step. There are actually no descents but rather a gradual revelation of opportunities of the rest of the ascent, and the guards are the Creator’s great helpers.
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In the world there is nothing bad except for our wild stubbornness, which we must correct within us. I would say not to correct even but to use it in the right way.

In a place where we find the Creator we discover His descent to us, and we need to thank Him for this, to embrace this characteristic and to try to go forward together with Him by accepting every disturbance as an invitation to ascend. The main thing in our work is the deed.

Now, when we are scattered throughout the world, we integrate with our groups, mix with those who are not with us, with our work, the study, with all the problems of life that pop up all the time. The main thing is to accept all of this as an invitation, that in spite of all the changes in the surrounding conditions, and to remain in the state that was at the convention. This is our first goal.

You are traveling from here to the airport, boarding the airplane, flying, and landing: your country, the language, the noise, the commotion, all of this is only intended to help you to connect even closer with the friends. Suppose that as of today we have attained a particular level of connection. We cannot attain a greater level. Therefore, we now need to add to it all kinds of disturbances in order to process them afterwards and to become even closer with their help.

It’s not important when our next approach will be, it doesn’t have to be the physical meeting of the next convention. But it will already be enough to discover not the Surrounding Light (Ohr Makif) but the Inner Light (Ohr Pnimi).

What we have attained now is something great. We have truly reached a single whole. We understand each other; we have no need for any further explanations. The gaps have closed with us, shared thoughts have appeared. All this is becoming something unified even emotionally and intellectually on a level that already speaks of an understanding of going forward.

We are together within the group for the Creator. And we are together outside of the group for all of humanity. If you talk with anyone in the world who doesn’t study our system but is involved with Kabbalah, with meditation, with mysticism, with Torah, it’s not important with what, you will discover that none of them have a clear understanding of a method for advancement towards the goal of creation, of the correction, like we have.
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