An e-mail I received: Dear Dr. Laitman, I think I speak for many when I say that I am overcome by great disappointment. What should I do with it?
Answer: On the last day of the Convention I often heard that many people had hoped to make the breakthrough into the spiritual world at this Convention and now they are overcome by total despair!
I will say it up front: Personally I am astounded by the result of the Convention that just passed. And it’s not because of the record amount of participants or the positive reaction in the press, but because of the inner changes and maturation of every participant and the whole world group. For the first time ever people went through states that they would not be able to go through individually. Extremely important inner discernments took place inside them.
And now about your expectations: If your desire was for true spirituality, for bestowal and love to your neighbor, then you would not experience any despair because you always have the opportunity to bestow and love. No one gives it to you or takes it away.
The first spiritual quality, Bina, is an aspiration to Hafetz Hesed (being above your egoism), the sensation outside of your desire. If you aspired to this, then you wouldn’t care what state you are in at all because everything comes from the Creator and only He decides, according to His plan, what will happen to all of you and to every one of you. Your only reaction to everything should be joy and the desire to be under the power of the Creator, the quality of bestowal. The Machsom is overcome by those who run away from their egoism and agree to any conditions in order to be freed from it, agreeing to take on the condition of “everyone as one” (as one man with one heart or desire) and the mutual guarantee, “one for all and all for one.”
None of us has the power to tear away from one’s egoism. Until now we have talked about it, but were unable to precisely discern it inside us because this is precisely the quality that does not let us get through to spirituality, the quality of bestowal. We are unable to distinguish what it is and where it is inside us. It hides inside us like a snake and we cannot identify it exactly, always confusing it with other qualities.
Just like pain during an illness, only the pain of disappointment helps us to recognize our egoism and to find out that it is not good, but is our evil ruler, Pharaoh. We have to grow so disappointed that we will hate it inside us and desire just one thing – to detach from it. However, in order to come to this state of despair, we must first aspire to it with our entire egoism (Lo Lishma). This is what I talked about before the Convention, that “we are coming out of Egypt.” And everyone was sure that this has to happen. If we did not have this confidence, then we would not be able to become disappointed and discern precisely this evil (Pharaoh) inside us, which does not allow us to ascend to the quality of bestowal.
In order to awaken this evil immediately, I declared at the very beginning of the Convention that we are obliged to attain unity, that all of our work at the Convention must be done by way of deep research of ourselves and our attitude to all of the friends. However, instead of the “revelation of the heavens” that we expected, it immediately brought about a descent, cooling us down. With my entreaty to search for unity and to ascend above us, above one’s “self,” I wanted to show the participants of the Convention that we are not ready for it yet, and as a result of this feeling, the participants entered a trance.
On one hand I was very happy about this state of the “realization of evil.” But on the other hand I started to fear that the group would not be able to come out of this state in such a short time. It’s similar to how a sick person discovers pain and has to understand that it indicates an illness, and then starts treating it with the help of a doctor, the Creator. Besides, 30 to 40% of the Convention participants were people new to Kabbalah and did not understand what is happening to them at all. Therefore, it was decided to stop with one blow to Pharaoh, your egoistic hopes to ascend above them.
However, precisely these processes that we experienced are what prepared us for the passage, one that isn’t egoistic, aspiring to reveal fulfillment, but that desires to reveal the opportunity to bestow, to unite “as one man with one heart,” agreeing to the mutual guarantee. The result of the Convention is the first blow to Pharaoh, our self-love, our egoistic hopes to “break through the Machsom” and receive the Upper World as well as this world inside of us, inside our desires, inside our fulfillment.
Baal HaSulam writes that when a person attains the spiritual boundary, he is convinced that the spiritual world does not belong to him and only then does he break through the Klipa, the boundary, and acquire the quality of bestowal.
The revelation of our unwillingness took place immediately, at my very first lecture, when I said in the beginning that instead of external actions we have to delve inside ourselves, into the connection among us, into the mutual guarantee. Immediately, everything turned to ice! Our egoism came through, but this revelation of evil inside us is also a great attainment that was brought about by none other than our unity (the holiness of day).
Over the course of our Convention we discovered that Pharaoh is inside us and not outside. He received his first blow through the fact that we are disappointed in the results of the Convention. We thought (we being Pharaoh) that we will receive something inside us, but we did not receive anything. This is the first blow to Pharaoh, our egoism. We have discovered that we won’t receive anything inside our egoistic desire.
Now we have a greater ability to tell in which qualities spirituality has to become revealed inside us. We have a better understanding that it won’t happen inside Pharaoh, and about what it means to think about the Upper One. This means not to think about yourself. For now each of us simply shook from impatience: When will the miracle happen so that we will receive everything in this world along with the spiritual world – inside of us?! Now we have a new feeling of the need to separate from the thing that brings us such disappointment, and this is the beginning of rejecting egoism.
We paid a high price for this lesson, but it cost a lot more than that. Precisely the disappointment, the blow to our self-love, our egoism, our hopes to receive, is the greatest acquisition that we could possibly wish for, and I am overcome with joy at seeing egoists who are disappointed.
Now you must only realize what has happened to you. Depending on each person’s preparation, a part of you realizes it mentally, and a part will still experience several more disappointments in your sensations, and then you will realize it. In any case there will be one conclusion: A person will no longer tie himself inseparably to his egoism. Precisely this blow to our unjustified, egoistic hopes will help us to start moving away from it (the Pharaoh)!
It is possible that we will still need to experience more blows, but they will already be going in the same direction that we acquired at this Convention. Perhaps we will be able to go through them not only at Conventions, but inside our daily virtual connection, in the sensation that we have just acquired together. For now let us truly desire just one thing: to reject our egoism, which is the only evil there is, and to ascend from our “selves” into the quality of bestowal.
The Creator has presented this great gift to us! There is none else besides Him! Write to me and ask questions at the lessons. I did not lie to you, but to your egoism.
With love to you,
Dr. Laitman
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Question: I came to the Convention with an enormous desire to break my egoistic shell. I keep having thoughts that I am able to do something right now, yet I am not doing it. I am afraid that this Convention will go by, but nothing will change in me; only impressions will remain. What do I need to do right now, right this minute, right this second, at this precise moment?
