By coming out of my sensations and trying to be in someone else, I don’t step into his or her egoistic properties, but rather come into contact with what they aren’t yet: with their soul, with their spiritual potential. I don’t fulfill their egoistic, corporeal part, but instead I form in them myself, my spiritual image (Partzuf).

In truth, my soul is all I can fill in the others. A soul does not reside in the person. “A soul” is desire, and desire is not matter; it cannot be weighed on a scale. It is a field, a force, a force of desire that I direct to the others while it links with and remains in them as a record, as information that I enter into them, wishing to fulfill them.

My desire is scattered among all souls, all individual and common desires of people. At first, I am not even aware of it, and only later when I ascend to high spiritual degrees, do I start actively fulfilling them. Thus, such yearning outwardly forms a human soul.

The body dies since it is a mere animate organism which has no substance. What matters is how much of myself I managed to transfer into others with my desires. It is not actions which are required here, neither is it money or forces, but only desires. After all, desire is the greatest force in the world. It is the only thing that makes one person interact with another.

Hence, the friend’s role in the group is defined by what each of them will deposit into the others. Whether I like it or not, what the others plant in me starts influencing me. The global crisis reveals our egoistic interconnection; in the same manner, we are intertwined in our souls.

Generally speaking, a soul is something collective. There is one soul, one human, one Adam. And we, his particles, don’t yet comprehend that we are completely tied to one another, like parts of its spiritual organism, a spiritual system.

Therefore, everybody’s impact on all the others is direct and natural, exposed from one straight to the other. If we understand this, we gain a remarkable opportunity to selectively influence people and each other: pull, push, elevate, and help everybody. If we did employ this principle, we would definitely make a tremendous leap forth.

If each member of the group, man and woman alike, realizes this, then with their inner yearnings they can elevate us all right now. This depends solely on our internal desires, or rather, intention. Intention is an unfulfilled desire which is yet to come true. It is the most powerful force in the universe.

We see with the example of our world: The greater the physical force is, the less tangible it is. Who can feel the force of atomic interaction? And nonetheless, it can produce an explosion of enormous power from two pounds of matter. Intangible waves and emanations play a tremendous role in our life. And the force of thought, the force of desire, is the greatest of all.

Therefore, the key on our path is our intentions: How correctly we can form and connect them with one another. This means that each of us strives to live in the others, step out of oneself, their body, and start sensing the soul.

It is an incredible feeling when a person isn’t tied to their material body. Having stepped out of it, they start treating it as an “animate consort”: a horse, a donkey, a cow, a dog, and so on. They look after their body but absolutely don’t associate themselves with the life inside the “mammal.” They already feel that life goes on outside of them, in the enormous force field of the supreme mind.
[34032]
From Lesson 4 Berlin Convention 1/29/2011

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Question: What is the friend’s role in the integral system?

Answer: The role of the friend is enormous and invaluable. A person ascends to the extent that he or she helps all the others to unify. A person never works for himself directly, but always through the others.

In our world, I always pursue my own goal: I place myself and all the others in order and calculate what is best for me. Even ten people later, the benefit still has to return to me.

In the spiritual world, it isn’t the case. There, I calculate how much I can contribute to others so that it stays in them, not in me. My egoistic “self” eventually dies away, and what I have invested in the others (as I would in the bank, except that it would be to the others’ account rather than mine) remains. In the end, when I rise above my “self,” everything I had invested in the others becomes mine. It is as though I live in them, like a mother who lives in her children whom she takes care of.

The spiritual world is founded on this maternal attribute: on bestowal, love, shifting from oneself outward. As a result, we start experiencing ourselves living in others, and this state is perceived as eternal, complete. It isn’t dictated by my own state of existence, including my body. The body may even die, but “I” already live in other desires, other properties.
[34035]
From Lesson 4 Berlin Convention 1/29/2011

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We live in a fairly confusing world. And people ask themselves about where they live, where they exist. Generally, we did not ask these questions over the course of thousands of years. We thought that the world we live in is this world. This conception is called the “perception of the world according to Newton.”

Then, as we advanced in our study of nature, we discovered that other beings, which are different from humans, perceive the world in other ways: Snakes perceive it in the form of heat spots; dogs perceive it as a cloud of smells; bees perceive it divided into many sectors, and so on. In other words, every being perceives the world in different ways and is guided according to its sensations. And this does not prevent us from existing in one dimension, where we all perceive the world in absolutely different ways.

Then a different paradigm came about. Einstein came and proved that everything is relative: time, space, movement, and there is nothing absolute. In other words, our perception of reality is just our habits, and we could perceive it in a completely different way.

If we were to move at a very fast speed, if we were to orbit around large celestial masses, time and space would become deformed, and we would feel, see, and perceive ourselves in absolutely different ways. This is perception of reality according to Einstein, which is the theory of relativity: Everything is relative to man. The next scientist, Hugh Everett, proved that the world which we perceive in relation to us, that is, which depends on us practically does not exist; we build it in our sensations.

And then the wisdom of Kabbalah appeared, which was concealed for almost 6,000 years, and it was always written in its books that neither we nor the world exist as we perceive it; everything is only relative to our senses. If we were to change our senses, the world would change.

In other words, according to Einstein’s theory there is an observer and the object of observation. According to Hugh Everett’s theory there are an object and an observer, both of which constantly change, and we are able to perceive something average between them. But we can also even perceive on demand, according to our inner qualities. This is what Kabbalah speaks about.

Why do we need all this knowledge? We need it so we could finally understand where we live, the world we exist in. Films like “The Matrix” and “What the Bleep Do We Know!?” appear, which convey assumptions and ideas that the dimension that we perceive through our physical senses is not the dimension we live in.

We have vision, hearing, taste, smell, and touch. We perceive whatever falls within the scope of these five senses. Our image of the world is based on this.

But if we were to begin to disengage these senses, the image of the world would begin to decrease and disappear. In other words, what we perceive is not what actually exists outside of us, but our reactions, our inner influences, the so called “disturbances” to things we do not understand.

But what world would we perceive if we were to free ourselves of our five senses? This is where Kabbalah comes in and tells us how we can rise above these five senses and begin to perceive the world as different, additional. We can begin to perceive nature, the world, the way it exists outside our bodies, outside our five senses, in addition to the world where we now exist in our bodies like any live organism.

We have a rudiment of this perception, the so called “point in the heart.” This is neither a heart nor a point in it. This simply is a name for a rudimentary and dormant sense that we have. We can develop and use it to begin to perceive the world that we can imagine outside of our bodies.

So, Kabbalah speaks about the world that exists in reality outside of us, outside our five senses, outside the flow of information that enters us. This is why it is called “Kabbalah” ( “reception”), a guide to acquiring a real perception of the actual reality.
[33985]
From Public Lecture in Berlin 1/27/2011

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When we listen to environmental news on television and radio, we need to understand that people confuse the cause and the effect and don’t see the purpose. Their objective is to balance everything in order to return to a comfortable state. But Kabbalah’s perspective on this is entirely different.

When we speak about returning the world to a good state, we do not pursue the same objective as the rest of the world. We understand that the external force of Nature specifically created the current situation according to a particular program. Kabbalists foretold this and gave us very precise time frames, even predicting the actual year of occurrences. The Zohar mentions events 1,800 years before they actually took place.

The problem is not the contamination of our environment. How could Kabbalists have such specific knowledge about this? The purpose of the program of Nature is not for us to contaminate or clean something. And this is why it will not help to invest money into anti-pollution measures. It is the same as making new laws against theft and drug use. We know that this does not help. By incarcerating people you separate them from society, but you cannot teach them through this.

And this is why we do not regard natural occurrences as moral warnings, but only as the reason for us to change within in relation to others. We will never be able to do anything good to us or nature by stopping pollution. From the beginning, everything is made this way in order to raise us into the next world, instead of turning us into good egoists in this world.

Here is a serious difference between our attitude towards the occurrences and the attitude of the rest of the world. Even once the world realizes the forthcoming catastrophe, they will only want to go back, “erase the smut” of nature. But we perceive all of this as a reason, a message to correct ourselves, rise above, and create balance between us on the human level, instead of creating balance with the environment.

And this is why a little time is needed to understand what Kabbalah speaks about. We will not be able to explain it to people in a quick and easy manner.
[34006]
From Lesson 2, Berlin Convention 1/28/2011

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Berlin Convention, Lesson 7
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Berlin Convention, Friends Meeting 2
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Berlin Convention Closing Ceremony
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With women everything is assessed by the degree to which they desire to be together and support or surround the male part. Women have to put pressure on the men. This is their character. They must only use it truly correctly, without being embarrassed. Women depend on the men’s group and it depends on them. The men’s group will not move forward without women.

The female inclination is primary while the male inclination is secondary. That is how all of nature is built. If it weren’t for women, men would spend their whole lives playing soccer. Yet the female inclination forces them to create a family, to work, to come home, and arrange something. All of this is the female desire, not the male one. A man does not have any of this. He is like a child his whole life.

That is why women have to get organized the right away and put pressure and influence on the men. And the men have to understand this. We are adults and we have to use our nature, both the female and the male, in order to attain the goal. The goal is attained mutually. It is like the birth of a new baby that belongs to both.

Therefore, you should look at this seriously and mutually. It isn’t a coincidence that we were created precisely this way. We look at everything as an accidental occurrence, but in reality we must collect everything inside of us to the maximum and combine it the right way. Then we will acquire a desire in which the Creator will be revealed. Nothing can be done here without the female inclination.

The world consists of 60% women and they are the most stable half in the world. Similarly, the group is absolutely unstable without the female part. A strong women’s group is the guarantee for a stable men’s part. It is more stable. By acting correctly, it softens and cushions all the problems, all of the swaying of our common ship.

Women have to understand this and clearly carry out their function. Men also have to understand this and give women the appropriate opportunities, as well as value them. Without this, they won’t achieve anything. The male part will immediately “go awry” without the female part. The presence of women suppresses all of the glitches.

Even Abraham was told, “Listen to what Sarah will tell you.” The women’s basis in development is initially the most important. The entire desire that we have to correct is the female desire, which is expressed through a woman. Therefore, you should organize yourselves the right way. Wherever there is a strong female part, you are guaranteed great success.
[33988]
From the lesson in Moscow on 1/16/11, Writings of Rabash

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Berlin Convention, “The Necessity for the Right Environment, Lesson 6
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Question: If the realization of evil occurs due to the lack of unity, then how does a woman experience this realization if she doesn’t do any practical work in uniting? How exactly should she feel unity?

Answer: This is just like within a family. How can you explain the entire family life in detail and what the relationship between the husband and wife means?

A man and a woman are two images that compose all of humanity, and together they have to create the image of a single soul. This is why the group must consist of male and female parts which have to unite with each other in their work and mutual support.

There should never be any insistence if a husband or a wife does not wish to partake in this. There is no coercion is spirituality, therefore, there shouldn’t be any pressure. But in the group the mutual help from both sides should resemble simple family dynamics.

Without women it’s impossible to advance because they are the carriers of natural desire and, therefore, are closer to nature. Without men it’s also impossible to advance since they’re the conductors of this upper energy that’s passed on to the female part. It means that we depend upon each other in our spiritual development just as we do in our corporeal life.

Our connection in the group should be like a connection in the correct family unit, where we complete each other. We already see families in all parts of the world where the wife, the kids, and the husband are all taking part in this process. We’re organizing virtual schools.

I would like for the women to be a lot more active. I don’t understand why the women’s part of the groups suddenly quiets down, becomes less active, and exists along with the men but slightly beneath them. I don’t understand this.

I have many women helping me with translations and with processing the materials. I have more faith in them then I do in men because women are more devoted to their work and they won’t let you down. For this reason the women’s group should be “heard” more.
[33805]
From Lesson 3 in Moscow 1/16/2011

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Question: From the Kabbalists’ point of view, what is the role of religion and other practices in the modern world?

Answer: Religions originated from the concealment of the upper world from us. Everything is concealed from us: the present, the future, what will happen tomorrow, what happened before our life, and what will happen after it. Religion is based on the lack of knowledge, on faith in something.

Kabbalah has nothing to do with it. It is a science. It absolutely does not operate with the notion of faith. It is a method of developing an additional possibility to perceive the world that surrounds us. But at the same time, Kabbalah expresses its opinion on events around the world, the reason for the development of beliefs, convictions, and religions.

In our world there is a total of 3,800 different methods, convictions, beliefs, religious practices, and so on. They appeared because we do not know what is happening and we exist in an unpredictable world. We do not see a connection between us. We do not see the reasons behind the events or what is about to happen to us around the corner. We do not know anything.

This is why people develop a need to somehow find out, or if that’s impossible, then to at least protect themselves, get some kind of insurance, a guarantee, if possible. And here arises the possibility for such religious methods. Essentially, these are psychological practices that provide us with comfort.

Naturally, there will not be a place for religions once we reveal the upper world. And this is why religions usually are not very fond of Kabbalah, the real Kabbalah, which works as a science because it reveals the things that were unknown to people.

But on the other hand, religions are necessary. They have appeared in us and exist in human society so that people would develop, so that they would think that something bigger and higher exists. Religion is a preliminary action, a preparatory stage, to begin to enter the upper world. For this reason, after several thousand years of different religious practices, there comes the time when people develop the need for an actual understanding of the world because nature simply does not leave them any other possibility.

Right now we are entering such a degree of resistance of nature that it will obligate us to attain it. We will find ourselves in such an unpredictable state, where we will not know what will be happening the very next moment. It is impossible to exist this way. We see that we are already destroying the family unit, we do not want to have children. Humanity is already moving towards a state where there will be nothing but drugs to get away from reality.

In other words, we are coming to a state where we must see the entire picture. Only then will we have the energy to have a reason to live, create, exist. Today we do not have a bright tomorrow of this kind. We have come to a level which is followed by nothing else but the revelation of the next degree, the next dimension.
[33810]
From Lesson 3 in Moscow 1/16/2011

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Question: How do we raise the value of the goal in the group, the importance of the morning lessons, assignments, and the interaction of all group members between themselves?

Answer: There isn’t another question or problem except for the one single issue that Rabash describes in all of his articles. Baal HaSulam merely outlined it as he didn’t have such a burning issue regarding the groups. He had with him only five or six individuals.

When I first came to Rabash, he also had six or seven students his age. I was 33 while they were over 70. “How do I advance like this?” I asked him. He replied: “It won’t work for you; you need a group.” So, I started giving lectures, leading discussions, and brought him about 40 young men. Our entire work likes solely in unifying our yearnings for the Creator, towards the revelation of a singular force of Nature. The work is grounded on unification.

Alone, you cannot disclose anything. All you have is a mere point in the heart, which is your desire for the Creator which has been evoked in you. You must place the group between you and the Creator. As a result, it will become that “platform” where you feel the Creator. You cannot experience Him in any other way! Otherwise, this dimension remains empty for you, and you cannot fill it up and feel its fulfillment. Therefore, all our work lies solely in this.

“Quarrels” in the group? It’s very good that you have them. But they should be not for the sake of reconciling and relaxing afterward. They are needed to invite the Creator! It’s the only reason why He instills all the problems between you. Nothing else!

There are “quarrels” of other types, which are not connected with relationships between the friends, but rather with family, children, lesson schedules, group development, and the circulation of Kabbalah. That is another story; it is our regular life.

But our internal relationships, common work in building interconnection that is destined to reveal the force that fills the space between us, this can be done only with His help. This force manifests in two different ways: It either transforms our desires by unifying them and making them common, or it fulfills our collective, transformed desire. But it is still common!
[33819]
From Lesson 2 in Moscow 1/16/2011, “A Prayer of Many”

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