Rabash, Article “The Cup of Blessing Must Be Complete”: In the state of Ibur (gestation), the upper level corrects a person. One is like a fetus in its mother’s womb, who completely annuls himself before its mother, doesn’t have an opinion of its own, and “consumes what its mother eats.”

Continuous self-annulment before the upper one, constantly advancing, overcoming internal resistance, allowing the upper one to act as it wants is extremely hard work.

It is really hard to constantly self-annul before the upper one in everything we go through, in any situation we experience. Actually, it is next to impossible. However, one applies tremendous exertions, pushes the limits, breaks down, and nevertheless tries again and again. One ties maximally strengthen oneself by replenishing energy from one’s environment, and thanks to this in particular breaks his heart and screams for help from Above. Then, the upper one helps him to annul himself and enter the state of a fetus.

A fetus state lasts for nine months. Each time greater egoism, the desire to receive, is revealed within a person, which he has to overcome again and again, until this period is over, one is born, and enters the state of Yenika (feeding, drawing of sustenance).

In the feeding state, one is already acquainted with the upper one, but that doesn’t mean that one’s state becomes easier. At this point, a greater egoism is revealed. One has to accept the power of the Creator, His greatness, the upper governance, and the supremacy of the force of bestowal over his even stronger egoistic desires.

All one was expected to do as a fetus was to self-annul. It doesn’t mean that one acts mindlessly or feels nothing. At this stage, one still acknowledges the tastes and thoughts relative to which one is self-annulling. At the stage of feeding, one has to partake in one’s own advancement and growth by making decisions whether or not to accept the sustenance. One has to voluntarily agree that one’s entire life is in “milk” (the Light of Hassadim) and that one doesn’t need anything besides it, thus rejecting the state of Gadlut (greatness). This is what our spiritual advancement is about.

The evolution of a spiritual fetus and later on a newborn child are very intense periods of time. As in this world, a person rapidly grows by transforming from a “zero” into a small baby. Then, during the first two years of breast feeding, one transforms from a newborn baby who knows nothing about spirituality into a two-year-old toddler, who walks, thinks, talks, and interacts with the upper one.

After the feeding period is over, a child continues growing in a form similar to the upper mone. When a child stops self-annulling before the upper one, the school years begin. These are stages of human spiritual growth that all of us are facing without exceptions.
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From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/11/14

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Question: You say that each one has his place in a lesson, even if someone sleeps, it is wonderful.

Answer: I am not saying that it is wonderful, but if a person sleeps, it is a sign that this is his state.

During those 12 years when I was next to my teacher, I had a period of a month and a half when I slept. I was very ashamed to admit this; I tried to create the impression that I was not sleeping. I was in all kinds of intentions, but basically I was sleeping. Sometimes Rabash would push me with his foot: “Well, what?” and I would wake up.

Sometimes it is necessary to go through states like these in order to understand the others better, to be integrated with them. Even for a moment it is necessary to know how to move towards other people. And therefore there are no threatening, terrible states that a Kabbalist would not go through. You must pass through all of the states, still, vegetative, animate, and human, all of the desires, all of the thoughts, that exist in creation.
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From the World Zohar Week “Integral Education Convention”Day Three 2/4/14,Workshop 5

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Question: We are playing with love. But is this a game?

Answer: We actually don’t want to play but to truly feel a feeling like this.

Love is a feeling of mutual integration where I take your desires and agree to fulfill them and you take mine and agree to fulfill them.

We need to understand that our soul is in the others, and therefore this love is essentially egoistic in regard to your true self but not in regard to who you now seem as you.

Question: Suppose that I am ready to nullify myself in regard to the others, but that “imp” that sits inside me follows along with everything and I cannot do anything with it.

Answer: It is very good that you feel this.

Question: But it is some kind of opposition and I need to extinguish the imp.

Answer: In no way, no! We must live with this opposition! We need to love it!

If dark and light were not simultaneous, then we would not attain anything. The Kli is opposite the Light and we need to integrate them with the help of the Masach. It is a terrible inverse, contrast, not like in our world, but between complete hatred and complete love. We cannot even imagine what terrible oppositions we ascend on the cone to the world of Infinity.

And this small imp will grow into a gigantic King Kong, but in essence it is completely equal to the Creator, only it is His backside.

And we must be between both of them because you don’t belong to the characteristics of the Creator; you are not the Creator, and you don’t want to belong to the object that is His opposite, the ego. In that you build yourself between them, you are found simultaneously with two characteristics and rise to such a level that you transform, become seemingly higher than the Creator since you attain Him within the darkness.

Question: Suppose there are completely neutral people in the group, and I don’t react to them at all. And there are those who provoke an intense reaction within me; I simply boil. In which case is this good?

Answer: None of us is like each other. Everyone has different thoughts and feelings. Therefore it is necessary to tolerate everyone. If a person is not against the group, if he agrees to our general rules, tries to follow them, but goes the opposite way all the time, then it is necessary to treat him well. This is because he is not intentionally trying to damage the group. It is not from a bad intention, and we must tolerate him.
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From the World Zohar Week “Integral Education Convention” Day Three 2/4/14, Workshop 5

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Question: How can we accelerate the development of the desire? We are told that we should unite and we even understand it but we still don’t want to.

Answer: The desire is developed by the Light that Reforms. If we wait for it, it will be in its time. If you want it to happen sooner, you should draw the Light unto the desire.

Question: But what if a person hears the message but doesn’t have the inner urge to fulfill it yet? What can he do?

Answer: He should still incorporate into the society and then the desire will come. The society will affect him by the Light and he will want to act.

Problems in the corporeal world are also solved in a similar manner, depending on which society the person is in. One way or another, the environment draws the Light, whether it is in a good direction or not. A person doesn’t wake up by himself and doesn’t lift a finger without the Light. So the question is which environment, which society, is he in, which means what kind of Light shines on him.

If we want to advance by the path of I shall hasten it and not by the path of in its time, we have no choice but to spur on and to summon the Light, then the desire will change and we will finally want to unite.

This is our mission and we should not grieve, brag, or hope for a miracle; we need to yearn and be drawn to the Light, nothing else.

If a person intends to overcome all the obstacles by his own powers, it is worse than stupidity. A person has to overcome himself in order to draw the Light, but not directly: I work in a group, in the right environment, carrying out different ancillary actions, and by this indirect maneuver, I feel the desire and with it I am drawn to the Light once again, and then it comes to me again.

It’s necessary to perform these cycles several times; after all, we cannot do anything by ourselves.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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From Rabash, Article “The Concept of the Yenika and Ibur”: This is called Ibur (impregnation) that he nullifies himself completely. But even though his heart tells him that only now does he agree with the nullification phase, afterwards he has regrets; about this we say, “Don’t be concerned about tomorrow!” And tomorrow is not exactly the day after today, rather today and tomorrow can be in the present.

What is important is what happens at each and every moment. And what will happen later is unknown to us. But our decision now will determine what will happen. Even though this is not certain because nobody knows the formula of how events will develop in the axis of time.

Therefore at each and every moment a person must only be concerned about the present moment because correction is not made in the past or the future, but only in the present. The main thing for correction is to adhere to the present moment.

And this is as the sages said: “Everyone who has something he can eat today but says, ‘what will I eat tomorrow?’ Well, this is a lack of faith” (Midrash Tanchuma, BeShlach 20).
[128071]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/14/14, Writings of Rabash

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Question: What should I do if I want to control the friends and I see the same desire in others? How do I channel this desire for the benefit of the goal and the group?

Answer: If you want to be like a father and mother towards the friends, then you are concerned about them all the time like children. Please, take control of them as you would with little ones, but only on condition that you act solely for the benefit of the little ones, that their desires, needs, and shortcomings are what determine your thoughts, deeds, and desires.

They are your head, and you are doing what they want. This is called being Aba ve Ima. Please, take control!
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 02.14.14, Writings of Rabash

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Preparation for the Lesson

The Book of Zohar — Selected Excerpts

Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”  

Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”   

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Writings of Rabash, “And The Children Racketed Within Her”: The beginning of the work is called Ibur (conception) when a person begins to work following the path of the truth. When he passes by the openings of the Torah, the phase of Jacob in a person awakens and wants to follow the path of the Torah, and when he passes the openings of idol worship, the phase of Esau awakens to come out.

And we should explain this that since a person is incorporated of vessel of receiving on the part of nature, which is called self-love, which is the evil inclination, and, at the same time, he is incorporated of the point in the heart, which is his good inclination, when he enters the work of in order to bestow. This is the phase of Ibur, stemming from the Hebrew word transgression (Avera), and so he experiences ascents and descents and is not stable and is affected by the environment and has no power to overcome it.

As a result, when he passes by an environment which engages in idol worship, which means self-love, and the phase of self-love in him awakens to come out from concealment to revelation and to dominate the body, then he has no power to do anything but what concerns his desire to receive.

When he passes by an environment that engages in actions of in order to bestow, the phase of Jacob in him awakens to come out from concealment to revelation and the actions of in order to bestow dominate the body.

And, thus, over and over again, and this continues day after day in the work, and whoever works more diligently may experience these states every hour, and feel that the states change.

All the ascents and descents that we go through are given to us so that we will recognize that we totally depend on the Creator’s work which affects us. Therefore, our work is called God’s work. He is the only one who operates, and that is the main revelation that we attain from the beginning of our spiritual path to the end.

As we ascend up to the world of Infinity, we are convinced that there is one force and that there is nothing but that, and that He is good and benevolent. Only this force operates in all of creation, which means in all our desires that depict our reality.

We must be prepared to discover that there is only the one upper force of love that dominates everything around us, and that it isn’t me or any other factors. My attempts to clarify this means that I raise a prayer, MAN. Thus, I discover that I am really under His total domination. There is only one force which operates inside me or on the outside, and which fills my whole world. Discovering this for the first time means reaching the first spiritual level called Ibur.

At first, I discover this passively in the state of Ibur, but later when I grow and I am born in the spiritual world, I become active. This doesn’t just mean to be under the influence of the environment, but to attribute everything to one force in order to discover the attribute of Jacob inside me, the attribute of bestowal, and to escape the influence of the egoistic environment which is the attribute of Esau. After I am born, I actually begin to work with the desires that are revealed in me and use them in order to reveal the Creator, the one force that operates in all of reality.

It turns out that it is the Creator who prepares every state for me and who involves me in it. Then, it turns out that not only does He arrange all the states for me, but He also Him determines my reaction to them. This means that He manages not only my externality, but also my internality, “Thou hast hemmed me in behind and before.” Thus, I discover that the Creator is in all my desires, thoughts, decisions, and my responses.

Eventually, it turns out that I have nothing but the one point of perspective from which I previously attributed everything only to my domination, and now I attribute everything to the Creator, as a result of my deep clarification, in all my feelings in the good states and in the bad ones, in my decisions, in establishing the middle line in my internal work. Thus, we attain the shattering from the bottom up and by that, learn about the Creator’s work on us, which has prepared every detail for it.

Thus, we study the HaVaYaH that the Creator created from the bottom up. Thus, we rise to the world of Infinity in order to see, know, and feel the plan of creation that is incorporated in this initial HaVaYaH, and thus are incorporated in it. Inside this HaVaYaH we add our work called Elokim – Malchut, working toether with Bina, and then we are incorporated in the coupling of HaVaYaH Elokim, the Creator and the creation.

All our work is to discover the Creator as the operating force in everything: in preparing all the forces, the connections, in planning how we go through the states, where we must go wrong in order to attain the full depth of creation, the depth of the Creator’s original plan called the plan of creation.

The levels of a person’s spiritual growth – Ibur, Yenika (sucking) and Mochin (mind) are all made only by the attainment of the one upper force and its essence.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/20/14

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The most important thing is for us to strive for the Light, but here we face a few disturbances:

First – We do not realize that everything that happens to us is for our benefit.
Second – We do not realize that everything comes from the Creator.
Third – We do not realize that our reaction is also determined by the Creator.
Fourth – We do not understand that the only thing that we need in our current state is to strive for the Light to change us and that this change can only be in the direction of bestowal.

That is, we must correctly interpret what the Light that Reforms is, what “good” means. If this aspiration is correct and constant, then we will merit drawing the Surrounding Light and will change slightly, reaching a certain similarity to the Creator.

It turns out that we need to meet many conditions so that the Light that Reforms changes us. We go through preparation and thus study the nature of the desire to bestow, revealing how it differs from the desire to receive. Due to this inner work, we clarify our desires and become similar to the Light.

When the Surrounding Light comes, combining all these pre-conditions, the so-called “disturbances,” it gives us the correct form of the vessel in which we become similar to the Creator. Thus, we advance step by step. In the next step, “disturbances” arise again. But since they are repeated each time in the same style, only with new desires, new work and discernments, a person continuously experiences changes.
[128173]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/24/14, Questions and Answers with Dr. Laitman

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The advice from Kabbalists is meant to remind us of the “advantage of Light from the darkness,” that we have the power for this despite the fact that I feel bad in my heart on every level of my advancement, and only during withdrawal will I feel good inside my ego.

So I need to be equipped with the support of the environment. In a bad state when I fall to the domination of the broken desires, the evil inclination, the egoistic intention, I cannot do anything and it is only the environment that operates on me.

This is another outcome of the shattering of the vessels: the division of one vessel into many parts. Now the work can be done in many vessels, in a certain order of one following the other. Thanks to that, I can support others, provide support for myself, and thus advance.

If a person is equipped with the support of the environment, the environment operates on him, especially when he loses his strength. If a person doesn’t prepare the support of the environment, he has nothing to rely or count on. Nothing will help him to awaken, to put the right data into his mind and heart together with the feeling of the shattering. Then he will have nothing but the feeling of the shattering, he will simply fall, cry, or even leave the group and the spiritual path.

In easier states the Creator sends a person a state of double concealment. Then when a person feels bad, he doesn’t remember that it all stems from the Creator, that he should overcome this concealment, and that he totally drowns in the bad feeling. Then he is irritated by everyone and wants to leave everything. But he doesn’t leave yet since he understands that he has no choice and there is nowhere he can escape to. This is called double concealment, but not complete detachment from the Creator yet, since in detachment, a person becomes totally “free” from spirituality.

After the double concealment, a person is somehow brought back if he has invested his strength in the group. Then he is somehow reminded that there is a purpose to life, that it is still worthwhile to work since everything else passes and disappears but this goal, which is eternal, and a person must attain it no matter what, so he returns.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/14

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