Question: When we try to hold on to the thought about what’s important, we are distracted again and again by other matters. How frequently should these entrances and exits change?

Answer: Once one of Rabbi Zusha’s students told him that he had experienced several ascents and descents that morning; in reply, Rabbi Zusha said that he had experienced close to 400 ascents and descents in a few minutes time.

Apparently it is impossible to measure this variable, since on the whole spirituality is above the range of the frequency of the entrances and exits, of the ascents and descents, in an infinite frequency. There are also higher frequencies in our world, for example, in computers, radios, laser technology, etc. Spirituality is much higher than that.

So when does a person connect to the infinite frequency? When he begins to perceive the ascents and descents as one whole. In that case they become a kind of “even voltage”: There are no “peaks” and no “holes,” everything is incorporated in a common direction.

Only in our world, the plus is associated with the positive direction, and the minus with the negative one. According to such an approach even the plus doesn’t lead to anything good.

But when I perceive such darkness as light, the descent as an ascent, when I realize that everything comes from one source and only in order to lead us forward, then I am equally happy about the ascents and the descents. I am even happier about the descents since by them I see that I am advancing. An ascent can stem from different reasons, like for example from the bribery of my ego. A descent, however, will surely be beneficial since Pharaoh is bringing me closer to the Creator.

I should immediately rejoice when the descent comes although there are moments of the hardening of the heart and confusion that I cannot even tell apart. But the moment I notice that I am detached, disconnected, from spirituality, the moment I realize that I have been “thrown away” for perhaps a quarter of an hour already, half a minute, or even a second, I am happy. After all, I have recognized the problem. It was created from Above, but I have reached its essence and I am glad about that since I am sure that I have acquired a new depth and that I “sanctify” it now.

So it turns out that I don’t move along a shattered road that is twisted and thorny, but along a wonderful road. It is actually so. Eventually, we should change only our perspective of the world. In this new picture, to the extent that we accept what is happening, we discover the system of leadership and Providence, the managing force, and then, suddenly, the perfection opens up before us…
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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 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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The desire of Malchut of Ein Sof (Infinity) is initially divided into five parts because that’s the way it was created, from the root phase was born phase one, then the second, third, and fourth. Phase four, in turn, is also divided into parts. This phase is already the desire of the created being that feels that he exists and that he is standing before someone whom he wants or doesn’t want to resemble, to receive or not to receive from.

These five phases already exist within the desire itself. Before phase four there were all the attributes, the phases of the Direct Light, and in phase four, it is already a desire. When this desire corrects itself after the shattering, it also has to go through five phases of correction. It is impossible to correct something half way or one fourth of the way; it has to be a whole level each time.

Like in physics, there is no material that is smaller than a quantum, a photon, a fundamental particle. We measure the quantity of matter and energy according to these elementary particles; it is a manifestation of desire. Therefore, our prayer must be a whole prayer: not that we should be helped with a half, a quarter, or even 99% of a prayer. Only when it is finally stabilized is here the leap to the next level, to the next attribute, to a value, to a new quality, that did not exist before. This means that a totally new attribute appears 100% in comparison to what existed in 99.99%. This is the difference between incremental, discrete advancement and integral advancement in a circle.

In that case, all the attributes connect and become a whole attribute. Therefore, it is called a whole desire. It is whole not because it has just grown to 100%, but because of its quality. It becomes round, completely permeated with that attribute, and otherwise it cannot be perceived by the mind or the heart. This desire of 100% cannot enter something that is foreign because it is so round and perfect that it is absolute wholeness.

Until we reach such a whole desire, we will not be able to understand this and will not receive this spiritual revelation.

Even later, on all the other levels, we encounter the same law. “There is no small amount in spirituality”; rather, there must be a whole desire. But if a person sees that he hasn’t attained a whole desire yet, he must pray and when his prayer, the deficiency and the demand to attain a whole desire is finally clarified, he will receive a whole desire from Above and in it the revelation of the Creator.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/13

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If I experience a real descent, within my bones, for more than one moment, then it is a sign that I didn’t make the correct effort! I must fall to the bottom for a moment, like Rabbi Shimon who changed from a great sage person to a simple market vendor. But this descent should not last more than a moment; this is enough. And then, I need to start using the connection with the environment, mutual guarantee, and all the means that I prepared in advance.

At the time of descent, when I have fallen to the bottom of the sine wave, I cannot do anything, I become dead. From this hole, the stores I accumulated in the batteries of the group need to pull me out. But the moment that I exit a bit from the deepest descent, from the dead state, from the “ bottom,” I must ascend by myself, as much as I am able to participate on my own in this work.

If I ascended by one or two millimeters from the lowest state, then to this extent I am able to scream. If I rise three millimeters, then I can already yell even louder, etc. I am not allowed to wait for time to pass by itself! I must try to rise, no matter how difficult and futile it may seem. It is specifically here at the bottom of the sine wave, at the exit of the descent, that I must invest the most efforts. It will show that I truly long for the goal.

The main effort is in clarification, self-analysis: what for, why, what is the goal, who can help me, where is the Light that Reforms, how I can use that Light? I’m not going to pull myself out of the descent. I know that “a prisoner cannot liberate himself from prison”. Only the Light can help me, and I look for it.

The problem is that we try to correct ourselves by ourselves. It should be clear that this is impossible. But if I know that the Light can do this and that It operates according to my efforts, according to my equivalence of form towards Him, then I begin to work with it mutually, like partners. I only need to prepare myself each time, so that the Light will operate on me, and it acts. And again I prepare myself, and again it acts.

And in this way we alternately work together and I already have a common language with Him, understanding, and closeness even though we are opposite to each other. I do something and also He does something in response. In this way we begin to understand each other and connect.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/7/13, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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Question: If I am on a lower level, where will I find the deficiency to rise to the upper level?

Answer: True, for the time being you are on a lower level and cannot desire the upper level, but you play as if you want to rise, and by that you summon the Reforming Light.

There is a connection between the levels: If you want to be on a higher level than you are now, the Light comes to you from that upper level and it isn’t imaginary anymore but real, and it influences you from a distance by bringing you closer to it. Thus you advance. This is called your prayer, MAN.

There is an upper Partzuf and a lower Partzuf. The lower cannot rise to the level of the upper, but it performs different actions as if showing that it wants to become like the upper. This desire is feigned, but it is called a prayer. It’s a lie and hypocrisy, but I want to rise!

The upper Light, MAD, comes in response to my prayer. Although I am below, I am answered according to the gap between my hypocritical lie and some real desire for the upper; this is the gap between the desired and the actual. In fact, it isn’t real, but I still want some change.

The actual comes from the heart and what we desire comes from the point in the heart. If the point in the heart has awoken in a person, then there is a dichotomy. The greater the gap (Delta – ∆) between the heart and the point in the heart, the stronger the MAN, and thus it summons a greater effect from Above, MAD.

The lower has to attain such a false feeling, as if the connection with the upper is more important for him than the filling. In order to do that there is the environment around me that influences me from all sides. The more correctly I place myself in the environment, this Delta (∆), I basically define the Delta in my prayer between the heart and the point in the heart.

The first impression is made by my action in the group (1) and this brings me to the second Delta (∆) between the desire of the heart and the point in the heart (2). This is what determines the intensity of my prayer, MAN (3), upon which comes a stronger Light from Above (4).
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/10/13, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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The breaking was necessary because without it we would just hang in the same state, in the middle between egoism and sanctity, neither here nor there. And while tied to a single state, one is not able to change anything. In order to walk, it is necessary to keep moving the feet so that one is far from the other; there has to be a difference between two states. In that case, we shift from the state we perceive as undesirable and bad to a better one.

In other words, I keep moving from a poor state to a good state. It is similar to walking: the foot that was in the front remains behind now, while I put the other foot forward to make a step further. And then I make one more step, and yet another one, alternating the feet, each time leaving behind what used to be ahead.

I don’t place the other foot next to the first, adding to the same state; I keep putting it further ahead. The same rule applies in the spiritual world. The negative I had I turn into plus, and therefore descent always promotes ascent.

I always have three states: the middle, the previous, and the future one.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/1/13, The Study of the Ten Sefirot 

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Preparation to the Lesson

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Writings of Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “Article 7”

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The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Shlah Leha,” Item 83, Lesson 8

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 3, Part 9, Item 120, Lesson 21

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Question: In the past humanity somehow regulated the evil it encountered, but today it seems that the evil has been set loose.

Answer: We have advanced and developed in a constant ascent; our ego grew over the years until it has become “round.” We have always known what to do with it, and how to balance it. Time after time it pushed us forward to new achievements. We have always managed with it: We built, invented, and added something. The deficiency pushed us forward and we reached a filling. If we couldn’t attain it directly we had revolutions.

The generations have changed; there was a time of slavery, and feudalism, the Middle Ages passed, and capitalism came along, and eventually we have reached the last phase, communism. In a “round” state” there can be nothing but mutual connections based on mutual guarantee.

We have to say here that it’s the Creator who evokes the deficiency each time, and by that, the created being receives the power and the mind to fulfill the deficiency. The changing of eras and special moments are typified by revolutions, since such transitions are only possible by troubles, by dramatic changes.

So today, in our current state, we have to act according to the new leadership. All the old approaches and methods will not work today since they were all good up to the moment that we began to become “round.” Now we will receive blows since we aren’t adjusting ourselves to what is happening around us.

These are not anyone’s insinuations, but the natural process of events: If you don’t adjust to the external conditions, you cannot blame anyone for the outcome. For example, what’s the point in blaming others if you went out on a cold winter day without warm clothes? In the same way, we are entering a new world now without having adjusted ourselves to it.

It has been scientifically proven that in the new era we need a greater degree of unity, connection, and cooperation. But we remain the way we were and so we are not adapted to the new reality, to the force of the leadership that has closed us in a “round” system. For over a hundred years scientists and experts have been writing about that, so who is to blame if we don’t listen?

The cost of our not adapting to the changed conditions will be global bankruptcy, systematic collapse, and perhaps even world war. How can it be otherwise if we stubbornly refuse to adjust ourselves to the unity and the connection that the new state requires? We are like the person who has killed his parents and is asking the court for mercy because he is an orphan.

So the time has come to adapt ourselves to the global world, which will continue to “round up” even more. It’s impossible to go on living as in the past, the only way today is unity and connection, according to the world that is becoming one before our eyes.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/21/12, “The Peace”

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The desire to receive does not disappear; it isn’t born, doesn’t develop, and doesn’t change; it is only concealed or revealed to the extent that it can be used. The concealment of the desire and its revelation are determined according to the steps of the spiritual ladder.

The whole system is already arranged and built from the top down: As the levels descend downward, they conceal another part of the desire to receive in it. Its use is concealed from us, since we cannot use it correctly.

To prevent the created beings from making mistakes as they ascend from the bottom up, the desires are gradually revealed to them, only the part of the desire with which they can work correctly. The whole spiritual ladder is a mark on the scale of how much of your desire can be revealed to you so that you can use it, so that you will be able to overcome it and will you want to correct it, and will not lose your head and want to fill it at any cost.

If you were to immediately reveal a strong desire, you would only think of its egoistic fulfillment. If you were given a very high position, for example, you were in charge of all the radio stations and TV channels, then we would not see you in class. You would say that you have more important things to do, that you had to take care of the world.

Therefore, you are not given this position but something much simpler. Everything depends on how much you can really worry and care about the world and, of course, according to what suits the world and whether its time has come. If we could advance more by ourselves, we could give the world more since it is ready for that. It is already open. We could bestow upon it more and bring it closer to us and together with it we could rise to a higher level.

The world is the lower level, and we are the intermediate level, and above us there is an even higher level, the Creator. We have to awaken the world so that the world will awaken us. This means that we have to bestow upon it and to spread the message everywhere possible. Then the world will begin to awaken us, and we will be able to rise to the upper and perform the spiritual action for the world.

Everything is already in its place, and it is called an inner circle, an external circle, and an even more external one. The problem is only in us.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/10/13, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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All our work, our whole way and every part of it, every state, is divided into two parts: what a person does by himself and what is done to him according to his desire. I have to know that the goal of creation is the attainment of the attribute of bestowal, equivalence of form with the Creator, by using all my powers. I don’t know what all the desires are, all the 125 degrees, since it is all still concealed from me. But my goal is to do everything in my power, to use everything that I have, like a child with all his might trying to attain a desired goal.

This is how I have to act in every moment, aspiring to reach the force of bestowal. After having tried to do it by myself with the group, by preparing and annulling myself, by asking the friends for help, “making yourself a Rav and buying yourself a friend,” after all these actions, I am convinced that I am totally helpless. My teacher Rabash used to say: “Now you see that you are a rag just like me.”

Eventually, a person has no hope to change anything for the better and to correct himself by his own powers. He must be convinced that this is so by his experience. After all, although he has heard many times that he doesn’t correct himself and that the Light has to do that, for the time being these words are meaningless for him.

In order to demand the correction from the Light, he must first try to do it by himself, as much as he can. After all, unless you despair of your own powers, all your requests will be only a lie. You are simply lazy and don’t want to bother. If you have done everything in your power and have been convinced that the goal is unattainable, then thanks to the efforts you have made, you acquire the strong desire to truly attain the attribute of bestowal.

Because you have made all these efforts and have not attained anything, you despair of your own powers and your abilities. Therefore, there are two components now: a desire to attain the goal, a clear intention, since you have done your best and have not attained anything; and, having acquired a great desire, you are simply “exploding” with the desire to attain the goal.

These are two opposite concepts, as often happens in spirituality. If they connect into one concept, in the pure desire to attain the attribute of bestowal and nothing but that, a prayer bursts out in you.

It simply happens because that’s the way we are built. All these levels are already inside us, all the Reshimot (spiritual genes). We don’t need to draw or to build them, the moment I try to attain bestowal, the right desire is created in me, which eventually raises the prayer.

I raise MAN, consisting of the Reshimot of Hitlabshut and the Reshimot of Aviut, from the great desire to attain the goal and the despair of attaining it by my own powers. Besides I am also confident that the Creator can do that for me, that He must and will do it! After all, I see that according to the sequence of events that I go through, everything is arranged as if that’s the only thing He wants and that He is only waiting for my right request, which means for the correctly formed desire, for the true prayer, for MAN.

MAN means Mei Nukvin (female waters), which means two basic attributes that are connected correctly. Then in response to this need for bestowal, to the disappointment from my powers and the hope for correction, the upper Light comes and brings me the attribute of bestowal, and in this Reshimo the first spiritual picture is revealed to me. The power of the Light that is dressed in the Reshimo corrects, connects, and builds it, and I already find myself in the attribute of bestowal.

It is my first spiritual level in which the general network and the connection between everyone is clear. I see that the Light operates behind the scenes, the force of bestowal that must evoke the force of reception, and the states that are opposite from it, so that I will feel how much I lack it, and demand it. Then I go through the same states that I have experienced now on the first level over and over again.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/16/13, Writings of Rabash 

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