Question: What can make the heart be more sensitive to the Light that Reforms?

Answer: Only the Light that Reforms can make a heart more sensitive. Nothing else operates on the heart or advances it toward correction. The heart is a desire that responds to the Light that influences it.

Even our most corporeal desires to sleep or eat are a result of the influence of the Light that excites the vessels. We are in a sea of Light that is in an infinite frequency of vibration. This is called “absolute rest” with regard to the Creator since all His actions are aimed only at correction and this goal never changes.

Everything is managed according to one plan and therefore, it is called absolute rest since it advances all of creation toward the good and is inclined to your maximum goodness all the time. Thus, we say that the Light is in a state of absolute rest, although it performs endless actions. It constantly fixes and corrects something, but for the Light, it is rest. If you love someone, every opportunity to do something good for your loved one is pure pleasure, and for you, a state of rest. The Creator can give us goodness all the time, and thus He is in a state of absolute rest.

Everything is done by the Light. The Light shakes you and wants you to respond all the time. When you begin to respond to it, you can expect to act together. You will be like a couple, like a horse and his rider, both feeling this internality. You must try to attain such sensitivity.

On our part, we must have a deficiency to resemble the upper, to adhere to Him, and to cooperate with Him. He will operate on you according to your deficiency. He will evoke the deficiency in you, will check your response, and will continue to evoke a new deficiency, and so on. It is up to you to find out how you, with the help of the environment, can develop your sensitivity to what is happening in you.
[109001]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/27/13, The Zohar

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We see already in the ordinary experience of this life that the human being does not change. All the qualities with which he is born remain in him for life, only slightly adjusted depending on his understanding of which ones of them are more useful and which ones are not. In essence, as he was born so he will live and die.

Nothing can change us, and society, too, does not set the goal of changing the human being, knowing that we do not have the means. The change is possible only if a person has special properties that are subject to change, and these properties are not from this world.

These are spiritual properties from which I have just small, informational genes. Besides that, I am given a means for the realization of these genes: the environment through which I can attract the Light to my spiritual genes, which will develop and realize them correctly.

Thus, I will get spiritual properties in addition to my physical body and its sense organs through which I feel myself, the environment, and the entire world, feel that I am alive and exist. Thus, from my spiritual genes, due to the Light that Reforms, I can give birth to my spiritual body and grow it to feel a spiritual environment and spiritual life in it.

This is another, additional upper reality in addition to this world in which I exist now, regardless of my wish. All this development proceeds only by faith above reason because my opinion will always be based on my egoistic interest, and my egoism will never consent to spiritual development.

It is possible only if I raise myself above reason, understanding that there is no choice and society should oblige me through studies and the teacher’s instructions. I finally begin listening to his advice—the Surrounding Light gradually gives me the ability to hear. That is why I already am willing to bow my head, to bend my ego, my corporeal impulses, and begin to work against them.

Then I will have justify to myself: Why do I do this? Mere beautiful talks will not help here. I must develop my desire that draws the Light to itself. That is why I completely depend on the environment that can give me an additional desire. As much as I can bow down and make myself little with respect to the environment—play a child who devotedly listens to adults, restrict and bend my pride—to that extent I will be able to get higher values from them. For their realization, I will need the Light that Reforms, and thereby I will be able to advance.

All that work against one’s own natural, egoistic desire is called actions above reason. For the time being, these are corporeal actions in the group, and then I will begin to act in this way in spirituality.
[109007]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/2/13, Writings of Rabash

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Preparation to the Lesson

Writings of Rabash, “Shlavei HaSulam,” “Mighty Rock of My Salvation“

The Book of Zohar — Introduction, “The Vision of Rabbi Chiya,” Item 57, Lesson 27

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 3, Part 10, “Histaklut Pnimit,” Item 16, Lesson 54

Writings of Baal HaSulam “Peace in the World“

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Question: Why did Baal HaSulam, who was such a great Kabbalist, who could foresee so far ahead how the correction of the world should develop, predict so early about the wisdom of Kabbalah that it should have spread among the people a hundred years ago?

Answer: Back in the days when Baal HaSulam lived it was already possible to correct the world, but he couldn’t foresee when it would actually happen since there is the factor of freewill of the general here. He didn’t know what they would choose!

He said that we received the chance and there is no doubt that we have received a chance, he wasn’t wrong about that! But he couldn’t know whether it would be fulfilled now or not. This means that his assumption was not wrong; he simply couldn’t foresee how the people would behave.
[109267]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/05/13,  Writings of  Baal HaSulam, “A Speech for the Completion of The  Zohar”

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The teacher stands in the front, he sees further ahead and guides the students. But if a student has his own ideas as to his development and the correction of the world, he is already his own teacher. He can remain a student and believe that the teacher is wrong about the direction of the development. He cannot receive the spiritual attainment from his teacher but can only receive theoretical knowledge, wisdom. Thus he doesn’t study Torah which is the means, the instructions of how to attain the attribute of bestowal; studying means being in contact with the upper by performing different actions. It has nothing to do with the mind, as it says, “It isn’t the wise who learns.” A student receives the force of bestowal from his teacher by his connection with him.

The force of bestowal is transmitted by an inner channel, since it isn’t philosophy nor theoretical science. So everyone can receive this force, both the most stupid and the most wise. Its transmission depends only on the necessary actions that each person performs toward the environment, submitting himself, raising his teacher, and connecting to the group so that the whole group connects to the teacher who represents the upper level, thereby receiving the correction from him. This is what happens on every level.

If a student ascends, his teacher also ascends with him, and if a student descends, then his teacher certainly descends with him. This is isn’t the teacher’s real state but how it’s depicted to the student; everything is with regard to the one who attains.

When a person only comes to study, he doesn’t understand all this at first. He has to wait until he begins to listen. It may take a couple of years, but when he finally begins to hear, the group must help him since otherwise it may take decades. The friends must explain to him that it’s impossible to attain spirituality unless it’s transmitted from one person to another and only if there is a connection between them and physical contact, which means that they can see, hear, feel, understand, and somehow impress one another, perform certain actions, be in contact, and be in mutual interaction. This is how it has been arranged for ages, and it cannot change since it’s a replica of the spiritual roots.

The wonder of the last level of this world is where by my corporeal actions I can bring Him contentment as I submit myself, connect to Him, adhere to Him by some corporeal assistance, and by that receive the spiritual revelation from Him. How is this possible? Yet I can make efforts on the level that I can do so since I cannot do anything else. In the meantime I don’t understand what bestowal is, I don’t have the intention of “in order to bestow,” but I can act on the corporeal level and it’s enough for the time being.
[109264]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/05/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam “A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar”

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Question: Do I pass the Light to a friend when I raise his spirit or do I simply make him feel good?

Answer: It depends on your intention. If you do it in order to reach adhesion with the Creator, which means with the attribute of bestowal, and by that bestow upon the friend the greatness of the goal so that he can advance, then you also advance with the attribute of bestowal. If you help someone advance, it’s a sign that the Light passes through you to him.

You don’t have to worry that the friend should bestow upon you in return any more since you have already connected to the goal of attaining the Creator, bestowal, and have helped the friend and this is already bestowal. When you do that, then the Light that Reforms passes through you from the Creator to whom you were connected before. Thus you already perform an act of bestowal, and that is all you have to do. You only have to perform several such actions in order to feel the result: to feel that you have actually acquired the force of bestowal.

It turns out that I can draw the Light for everyone at any given moment, as much as I want to, but I can’t draw it for myself! You cannot draw the Light for yourself, since it comes only as a result of your actions of bestowal. If you don’t perform actions of bestowal with regard to the teacher, the group, and humanity, you cannot draw the Light. Is it possible to draw the Light egoistically?

If you study together and want to reach mutual bestowal, then you will draw the Light, but if you only think about yourself, you will not draw the Light. It will be studying just in order to acquire wisdom and not the study of the Torah, which means drawing the Light that Reforms.

So whenever you smile at a friend you perform an act of bestowal. No one is stopping you from constantly bestowing and you are given a chance to do so every minute! But it is on condition that you understand that you are in prison, locked up in your ego, and you can only connect with the Creator if you become “Israel,” which means that you operate upon others and thus pass on to them the force of correction. Israel are those who push all of creation to the Creator.
[109102]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/04/13, Writings of Rabash

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The group needs to be so strong that it can support a person and help him stand against the different opinions of the entire world, which inevitably reach him by penetrating him from everywhere, by all possible means, even by just being in the air. Therefore, he has to be under the influence of his group 24 hours a day, and it should be at least a bit stronger than the influence of the rest of the world. This is essential in order to nullify the corporeal influence of this world and its corporeal goals.

Besides, the environment has to impress a person with regard to the greatness and the importance of the spiritual goal, as opposed to a person’s own evil inclination. The society should be strong enough for that, and a person should submit himself before it and raise it in order to receive its influence as bestowal. It is only by the power he receives from the environment that he can ascend.

Thus, it is clear what type of work a person must do and how the society should work on him. Otherwise, a person has no chance of ascending since only through the group does he receive the power to rise.
[108800]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/30/13, Writings of Rabash

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Baal HaSulam, “The Peace”: Rabbi Akiva depicts two kinds of people: the first are the “open store” type, which regard this world as an open store without a shopkeeper. He says about them, “The book is open and the hand writes.” Meaning, although they do not see that there is an account, all their actions are nonetheless written in the book, as explained above. This is done by the law of development imprinted in Creation against humanity’s will, where the deeds of the wicked themselves necessarily instigate the good deeds, as we have shown above.

The second type of people is called “those who want to borrow.” They take the shopkeeper into consideration, and when they take something from the store, they only take it as a loan. They promise to pay the shopkeeper the desired price, meaning to attain the goal by it. And he says about them, “All who wish to borrow may come and borrow.”

Question: How can a person check what type he is?

Answer: According to his intention, according to what he wants to get from the study.

First, if I am like the guest who wants to thank the host, I have to imagine the next state. I stand before the “store” or in front of the “table with the refreshments” which is actually the group. In other words, the “table” is the means by which I can receive the presents from the host and also give Him presents. The group is like the table that is set and prepared for me by the host, so that I will taste from what He has prepared for me and thus bestow upon Him. Therefore it says: “everything is prepared for the meal.”

Question: So what is the calculation that I make here?

Answer: There are two options:

• I approach the table without even asking who has set it and I begin to taste the refreshments and fill myself.
• I approach the table but first I ask who the host is and only then take something.

This is how people differ in their attitude towards the refreshments on the table, or even in their attitude towards the host. But still they take everything for themselves. There are those who enjoy the refreshments that the host has prepared for them. For them it isn’t just refreshments but refreshments that were served by the upper force, by the Creator: “How nice of Him to have prepared this whole world for us and also the next world, Heaven…” This is how people use all of creation.

For them the Creator is a source of pleasure that they can enjoy. They want the Creator to protect them and to benefit them. The creation was given to us by the Creator in order to help us resemble Him, yet people see it as a means to enjoy.

This brings up some difficult questions of course: “Why does the Creator send us such sufferings? Perhaps we are guilty of something? Or perhaps the troubles don’t come from Him? Could there be someone else? Perhaps it is just by chance?…”

But there are also other people, and if I belong to them I stand before the table and admit that “there is none else besides Him” and that everything is meant only so that I will try to resemble Him by using my own powers. Then I relate to everything in a perfect manner. I understand that everything depends on me alone and that the troubles are revealed because by that I see that I am not corrected. But if I correct myself everything will be fine.

Question: But how can I know that I have to pay for the merchandise in the “store?”

Answer: If I am already attracted to what is beyond the “store,” if I have the point in the heart, I come to a group, to friends, to a teacher, and the books that tell me everything. It’s because I have a point of truth in which I can understand that there are no coincidences. The starting point of honesty has been revealed in me and I cannot put up with a world that is so “dirty” and lowly. I cannot put up with it internally…

But there are many in whom the seed of honesty has been planted and they still put up with the daily routine as a result of their upbringing, their experience in life and different obligations, and as a result they sink into the swamp they are unable to come out of…. Others who take this world for granted feel that everything is just fine and they only need to find their place under the sun.

We are looking for people who have the point of honesty and who cannot put up with the way that the world is currently. Those who yearn for spirituality belong to this type. Although they lead their lives like everyone else, they are in a constant inner conflict, unable to accept what is going on.
[108394]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/24/13, “The Peace”

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We have received a shattered desire to receive for ourselves so that we will be able to attain the attribute of bestowal. In addition, everyone was given a spark of yearning for the Creator. It’s about people in whom this spark was ignited, while others have no choice and are totally managed by their nature. Only people who have the spark in addition to the shattered desire to receive, yearn to attain the spiritual goal having no choice.

If during the lesson they hear that only by our connection can we receive the powers to fulfill this spark, they advance by the path of the Light, by the path of “I shall hasten it.”  But if they cannot hear, if they cannot be incorporated in the environment that can wake them up and make them more sensitive, they will advance by the path of sufferings, by the path of “in its time.” Then years later, they will feel that this path doesn’t lead to any results since everyone’s minor powers don’t allow them to exit the corporeal level.

It may take a long time to reach this recognition, even 20 to 30 years. Only later is a person forced to do some soul searching and to look truth in the eyes and accept the condition of connecting with others in order to receive their awakening, having no other choice. Then his point in the heart has enough power to fulfill itself.

Only then does he begin to hear and to work on himself, but this doesn’t happen all at once either, but gradually. Still, he advances and has a sense of direction. He understands that he has to accept and to surrender to the conditions Kabbalists speak about and that are the foundations of the Torah: the connection between people and love of others, and not try to escape from it.

People try to escape and to hide from these conditions in different religions and faiths. Every religion claims that people must keep the rituals, the external personal or public actions, such as holidays and customs that characterize it. It’s all meant to hide the truth and not deal with the correction of a person’s ego that brings him to “in order to bestow.”

But the path of sufferings will eventually bring humanity to a dead end and will force people to see that there is no choice and that they have to listen to what the Torah says. Then people will ask how to do that, so we have to prepare the active method of correction for them and to try to shorten their path of sufferings.
[108399]
From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/27/13

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Writings of Rabash, “Shlavei HaSulam,” “What the Torah Being Called ‘The Middle Line’ Means in the Work“

The Book of Zohar — Introduction

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 1, Part 1

Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Peace“

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