Question: During the workshops and lessons at the Arava convention was the first time I was awarded with strong hatred for the group. It is difficult to overcome. How can I work with this; is it through work in the intervals between the congresses or work during the congresses? In other words, when we face this at a convention, do we overcome this by means of our work in between the congresses and there must be a constant effort to control oneself?

Answer: The effort should be in place. You need to prepare for falls in advance. There is nothing wrong with them. On the contrary, you need to meet these states with joy, despite the fact that you feel, “How can it be? I don’t want that!” This inner struggle is very good and essential.

In any case, do not try to remove it, do not erase it, but also do not dwell on it inside, do not beat yourself up, but rise above it correctly. It should be understood, in spite of feeling hatred, that the Creator sent it so that I recognize my egoism, how much more it is revealed in me now, and that is why, instead of love and agreement with the group, I feel hatred; I must rise above it and ask the Creator to help me. Don’t try to rise and get out of the pit you fell into by yourself, but ask the Creator to help you get out of it together with Him. Then you will have some contact with Him. This is why He arranged this fall for you.

We need to prepare for falls. Our workshops are especially good preparation for them.
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From the Virtual Lesson 1/20/13

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Question: I think that we proved at the Arava convention that everything is possible. What’s next?

Answer: The problem is this: In this world when I see a goal and it is important in my eyes, I have enough energy and vigor to attain it, but if the goal isn’t obvious or isn’t important, then I have no strength for the work: “Really, why should I work hard?”

In the end, our problem is recognizing the importance of the goal. This importance is deliberately diminished so that we will create new importance each time, so that there will be a new creation for us, a new spiritual world, everything new.

And we, with the friends, need to build this ourselves. They need to tell me how important the spiritual path is even though they themselves don’t feel it. But we are committed to each other, and this is called Arvut (mutual guarantee). This means that we constantly need to tell each other how important it is, as a mother or grandmother tells the same bedtime story to a child.

Tell me, what was so special at our convention? What were your deepest impressions? Was there something tangible there? No. Did you receive something in your hand? No. Do you feel, hear, see, or taste spirituality? No. Actually there was nothing there, simply “you were filled with hot air” like a balloon, and from your swelling, you began to fly upwards. That was your entire convention.

So what is stopping you from doing that now? Why can’t you rise even higher? Specifically now when you feel heaviness and lack of interest, when all kinds of calculations appear to you, and you begin to think in a more “realistic” way—specifically now begin to act.

Question: At the convention, we, as if, banged our heads against the wall in that we tried to attain something impossible until we discovered that it is possible, albeit at a minimal level. And that means that everything is possible.

Answer: Excellent. Now continue. But don’t think that a spiritual sensation was revealed to you to a small degree to give you a solid basis for further steps. The opposite is true, your heart will be burdened, difficulties will be added, you will be forced to forget it, as if it doesn’t exist at all. They will take back from you all the “advance payment,” otherwise it will turn into an egoistic basis for advancement: “It is worthwhile to go forward since it is pleasant and wonderful. I want that kind of life.” This isn’t spiritual anymore, but Klipot (shells). Previously it wasn’t there, and now it appears. It is also, of course, an attainment, but not the one you were waiting for.

In short, continue. It is especially now that we begin to work with spiritual discernments: a little virtue, a little self-annulment, importance… we passed the hardest period, and now each time there will be something real, concrete. You will feel these things, “in your hand,” you will “ taste” them, you will feel them as internal heaviness, as resistance. In a while, you will even begin to measure them.

We passed the hardest stage, where we didn’t know where we were, what is happening, like a baby who just was born and still doesn’t really hear, or see, or respond…. and now begins the new stage.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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Question: At one of the Arava congress workshops there was a question about the point of no return that we have to pass through on the path. How are we supposed to pass through it: individually or together with the entire group?

Answer: As it advances, the united group overcomes all stages of the path. Although everyone may be undergoing a particular state at his level, in fact, we all are going together.

Question: So, is it possible that the group will “drag” me through a certain state?

Answer: The group doesn’t act selectively, choosing him and only him; it “pulls” everyone forward. No one advances alone; our entire way is by the group. No matter how much a person puts in, he still “eats” what the others do. It may be in a lesser degree, but he still moves along with all the others. And hence, everyone passes the Machsom; everyone comes out of Egypt, including the “children,” “women,” “men,” and “elderly.”
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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Question: What is the relationship between quantity and quality of a congress? When there are more of us, how does it reflect on the quality?

Answer: Today, considering what state the world is in and what this puts before us, it is our duty to admit everybody and in this broad audience preserve ourselves as the nucleus. We need both factors together.

We can’t screen out those who don’t attend lessons daily, do not pay maaser, and so on. The congress will not be more powerful because of it. We should be guided by what Nature demonstrates to us. The Creator opens the doors to everyone, although the public is not in a hurry to enter. I hope that in the coming year, people will “digest” and understand the events of the recent years, including the crisis, despair, and all the rest. It takes time: A person reads something, hears about something, and little by little, it settles down in him until he sees how the world becomes “bleaker,” and “dissipates” without more to offer.

I hope that in this year, along with the broadest dissemination, we will be able to accomplish something…
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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Question: How do we become a lower Partzuf that annuls itself before the upper one and requests to be created in the spiritual world during the congress?

Answer: Our upper Partzuf is the group and only there does the Creator get revealed. We transform the group into Malchut, the Shechina, while the upper for it is Zeir Anpin, the Creator. We need to induce the state in which our connection with the upper force is revealed.

It’s quite doable and very likely to happen. Illumination from this state will certainly be granted to us, and we are already receiving it, everyone according to one’s degree. But when we truly connect, then instead of a personal illumination, we reveal the Light.

It will also be revealed to each person in the degree that one has achieved unity and exerted oneself. But it will be a clearly defined portion of Light and not some external illumination. I am confident that not only at the men’s but also the women’s congress we can feel such illumination. Our group’s annulment before the upper means that everyone renounces oneself in full force for the sake of unity and inclusion in all the others, and will lose one’s material self there and exist solely under the spiritual influence.

We studied in the article “600,000 Souls” that there is only one soul, everyone attains only it, and plugs into the very same soul. In truth, there is no division and only the force of the shattering is causing us pain right now because we think each of us has his or her own personal soul. We imagine it only because we haven’t reached complete attainment yet and remain in confusion, fog, and loss of awareness. Therefore, at the congress, we wish to plug into this one soul.
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From 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/10/13, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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Now, after the “Flame in the Desert” convention we will go through many states. We have attained a certain level of connection, unity, detachment from matter, the importance of annulling ourselves before the friends, different inner spiritual discernments that are close to a real spiritual level.

We have no control over the process we are going through, and we advance according to the order of the Lights and vessels. We are between them like between a millstone, and different forces constantly operate on us advancing us towards the goal, according to our understanding, agreement, will, and support of their action.

Eventually, all the work of the “millstone” is only according to our agreement, that can be under the influence and pressure of sufferings, or by the help of the Light that Reforms. We don’t do anything by ourselves; this work is called “God’s work,” but we have to agree with the actions and want it to take place, although it is against our basic nature.

Since this work is against our nature and we feel it as very difficult, against our will, it allows us to become free, to have freewill and to transcend our nature.

Now after our convention, we go through very special states, and we must use them as quickly as possible to rise above them a few steps ahead. Therefore, these days are very important for whoever participated in the convention physically, mentally, and virtually. We now have to process everything we have received in the convention correctly, as much as we can, and to continue our advancement forward quickly.

The processing of the states is in clarifying the importance, who do we attribute it to, is it important that we have somehow discovered the connection with the Creator, with the spiritual space, with self-detachment, with the new space in which we can really live and after which there is an opening, and if I am born there, then I am born in a new reality, in some matrix, in a new dimension; or do I sink into the current of ordinary life and return to my ordinary animal life?

It is very important to rise above our matter, above the desire to receive that actually pulls us “by our feet” back into the abyss of the ego the moment we want to rise a bit. We, however, have to try and rise.

This effort can succeed only if we operate together, like in the convention where we attained a new level only thanks to the connection for which we have received powers from Above and felt that there is something above nature.

This is how we should continue now, so that all the forms of the egoistic desire and the thoughts that cross our mind will immediately be incorporated in the new ascent. Then we will constantly, every minute, rise higher and higher and will not wait until all these awakenings that the Creator is sending us in the form of the “hardening of the heart,” as an addition to the egoistic desire, as strange thoughts, as blurring and fatigue, will add up to a “big account,” and then we would have to go through them through the path of sufferings and different blows.

On the contrary, every moment we have to go on and on and thus “one penny is added to another and they make up a big account.” We shouldn’t wait until these “pennies” accumulate by themselves; it is much more difficult and disrespectful in the eyes of the Creator; in the eyes of the Creator it is respectful when you don’t leave Him.

So while reading The Zohar we have to connect and to think about how to receive help from Above in order not to break away from the great appreciation we feel towards self-annulment, connection, love, self-detachment and adhesion to the Creator.
[98419]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, The Zohar

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Question: What made the great success of the convention that has just ended: the special work during the convention or the preparation for it?

Answer: During the convention we don’t do any work. The convention is not meant for working; it is a “gathering” of all the efforts we made before. We have worked for many years, and the convention is the fruit of our work.

Everyone has received a whole measure from the convention, but it is revealed according to his understanding and his awareness. It is like a small child in our world that is full of different modern devices, machines, etc. but who only sees his few toys. This is what he can perceive in the meantime in his mind and heart; this is what’s important for him.

We have received much more than what each one reveals now. A new and very important level has been revealed, but each one is impressed by it according to his exertion, according to the desires and the thoughts he has developed for this level. Therefore, one perceives it like a two-year-old, another like a four-year-old, a third as a ten-year-old or a fifteen-year-old. There are those among us who have perceived it in its full form, which means that they already feel the complete feeling of the first spiritual vessel that should open up now.

I hope that very soon we will advance towards this revelation and acquire it. The spiritual development is like the corporeal one, and it grows faster according to our advancement. See how slowly humanity is developing, having been in the first state for thousands of years, until it reached to the age of slavery, and then it went on very quickly to feudalism, and even faster to capitalism, and much faster than that to the postindustrial society. The pace of development increases exponentially and more and more changes take place in a shorter time.

The same will happen in our spiritual development, the main thing is to continue! And not to just forget, but to continue this level that we have attained: the same level of clarification, connection, and self-annulment. Just don’t leave what we have attained: hold on to it like a tick, or like a bulldog, and advance further.

Learn from the snake that actually symbolizes our nature in the way it swallows its prey deeper inside it until it swallows it fully. We too have to reach this level, not to leave it, but rather hold on to it very strongly until we swallow all of it.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/13, Shamati #26

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Question: During the convention, we made efforts to be born, but how can we synchronize them with the labor pains that come from Above?

Answer: That is why we are given exercises from Above: There is a time of descent, and a time of ascent; there are times when we get together and when we study. And the most important states are those when we unite with each other: during the lessons, other joint activities, and at the conventions. Now, we add our efforts to the natural labor pains in order to accelerate this process.

And in fact, our actions today speed up our birth both quantitatively and qualitatively. As a result, we begin to understand and better feel where in fact the most crucial point is, where we need to press, what a newborn will be according to our expectations.

A newborn is our next degree, like children going after their parents, that is, our next state. We pass all these states due to the concentration of our efforts, in addition to what is given to us from above.

We do not feel in our work what belongs to the preparation from the Creator’s side and what He does. We apply pressure, trying to annul oneself before everyone else in order to create one heart, one desire, and trying not to interfere. But everything else is done by the Creator. He awakens desires in us and we act, but it is not added to our own account. Only our effort that we apply in order to annul ourselves, our self-sacrifice, is counted.

Such actions are given to us with great difficulty and for a few moments. But nothing more is required; we can acccumulate these moments and very quickly reach the force of bestowal, and feel this force clothed in us. This is called the revelation of the Creator to the created being.
[98410]
From the Arava Convention 1/18/13, Lesson 5 

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Question: During the Arava convention our group received a huge new level. Now we have to cling to it and keep it, and this requires repulsions. But on the other hand, according to the example that Baal HaSulam brings, in order to jump on the table you need to jump above it. So what is the next point “above the table” that we should focus our efforts on?

Answer: This week everyone will go home and we will return to our daily routine. For me, personally, the daily routine is the main thing; the conventions are a result of that routine. Day after day, we will work on ourselves increasingly more strongly, opening what we attained now and getting ready for the new revelation. This is all our work.

The convention itself is not work. We made such great preparations and so we succeeded. Part of that success was the women’s convention. In addition to that, collecting money for our new home and uniting around this problem created a surprisingly powerful force. Of course, we mustn’t forget the congresses in Kharkov and Novosibirsk.

Eventually we see that we have matured. The world is advancing faster downhill while we are rising accordingly. Here we have to keep clear frameworks: attend the daily lessons, read my blog selectively, participate in the workshops, and disseminate.

The main thing is self-examination and self-report: a person must constantly check oneself and one’s connection with the group.

In this context, during the lessons and the workshops, we are expecting new states and increasingly deeper issues. Today during the lesson and the workshop we will already continue what we have started during the Arava convention.

In this type of work, we fill the vessel drop by drop, until we “leap” to the next level, and thus over and over again. Don’t neglect these daily additions that are accumulating “penny by penny.” There is no other way. By that we discover many vessels, desires, internally. Even if it seems that nothing happens, the outcome of these efforts will, in fact, be discovered later on.

It is the same with a child who has to go through different states in the human environment. If he doesn’t have such an environment during the first years of his life, then nothing will help afterward: No matter how much you invest in him, he will never be a human being. The different examples of Mowgli–children prove that. How could that be? The thing is that he did not develop his desires in time.

We are also dealing with things that are essential on the current level of our development, and so we have to dedicate the time to study and to internal changes by trying to value every moment in this work.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/13, Shamati #26

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Question: What is spiritual despair?

Answer: Spirituality is bestowal. There is no such attribute in our world. My job is to locate it from the opposite state. This means, to understand how far I am from that attribute and at the same time to feel how much I need it. If I attain such an understanding, then a strong desire to penetrate this attribute will be stabilized in me, and this desire will turn into my prayer, my request, my demand.

If I really want to attain spirituality, a force comes from Above and reveals this attribute inside me. Then I begin to feel the other part of reality that was concealed from me until now and is now being revealed. Now we are living in only one attribute, receiving, and because of this our lives are so miserable and short, made only of losses that don’t lead to anything good. But when I enter the attribute of bestowal, by annulling myself and overcoming the psychological barrier, ready to give up everything, I move to the other side of this inner psychological barrier (Machsom), and enter the spiritual space that is total bestowal.

It is like a person who stops breathing, and after actually having done that, he feels that he can live without air. Then a new space is revealed to him, a new world. It is just an example, since it cannot be conveyed more accurately, as there is no similar attribute in our world.

We feel despair since there is no way I can attain this attribute by myself. Through the group and the study, I finally come to the decision that I cannot do that, but I have no choice, I must have it. Then I receive this opportunity.
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From the Arava Convention 1/18/13, Lesson 5

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