After the breaking, the sparks fell into the broken vessels and the Light is inside the desire to receive this Light egoistically. It turns out that I am inside of this egoistic desire in the broken vessel, and that means I want to use society and the Creator to receive spiritual fulfillment, but for my own sake!

I want to advance spiritually by gaining more knowledge, more sensations, and by becoming closer to my friends in order to receive something from them. All of this is aimed in the direction of the spiritual goal, but with an egoistic intention. That is how I activate my spiritual desires or broken vessels. I act from the broken heart and it is precisely inside of it that I will find the Creator among all of my egoistic desires.

I have to work with these desires without being scared or embarrassed! I shouldn’t run away from the horror upon discovering that I am entirely aimed at selfish reception, and I shouldn’t be afraid to get dirty by touching my impure desires. This is, incidentally, Kabbalah’s difference from the religious approach. I have to activate these desires without getting scared or ashamed.

Yes, I am broken! And it is precisely from the depth of this breaking that I reveal the fact that I can attain the goal. This is the place of my contact with the Creator. From there I organize my work in relation to society. And this society also seems egoistic to me since it is my common Kli that is broken in relation to me.

Don’t be afraid of any revelations of evil! The most important thing is that the evil is being revealed for the sake of the goal! In that case, it is the point of truth from which I will already be aimed at the goal.

That is how I accelerate my development and acquire a point of contact with the Creator from within my broken desires, from this entire filthy egoism. That is how I advance. And the more “sinners” that become revealed in me, the better. I am very happy about it because through them I will be able to advance even more!

I only wish to have enough strength to endure in the face of suffering so I won’t run away, or so I won’t sit with my hands folded in my lap and eat myself up. Some people become consumed in eating themselves up and don’t think of using these states for the sake of their advancement when so many negative qualities become revealed to them.

The only thing that can help here is endurance, the speed of the changes, and the force of the group, which must influence a person and always awaken him, not letting him remain depressed and empty. Everything depends on how we prepare ourselves and how we help all the others who are in these broken desires.

After all, we all understand what kind of egoism we are in, and we are not afraid because we support one another and try to pull every person out of the swamp. This enables us to advance.

There is still a lot of work ahead of us in order to reveal our common state and the personal state of every person, and to come out of them. However, it is important to underline that these states become revealed to us when a person aspires toward the goal. That is, the goal is never to reveal the evil! My goal is always to try to reveal goodness, bestowal, love, and unification, but on the way there I reveal opposite qualities. To the degree I try to reveal goodness, on the way I reveal all kinds of “sinners” inside of me.

Then I rejoice at their revelation inside of me because in the same direction come prayer and correction, and thus I move forward. The first half of the vessel is the revelation of evil, while the second half is its correction to goodness.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/9/11 on Prayer

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Our entire work is in revealing an inner ability to perceive the true reality where we exist. Reality is permanent and eternal, and the only thing we lack are the senses to recognize, feel, imagine, and reveal it.

But to do this, one needs to possess the proper desires, the spiritual vessels (Kelim), he himself has prepared within. And the preparation happens in two stages: The appeal for the correction of desire, the prayer (MAN), comes first, followed by the reception of Light from Above (MAD), the upper force that comes and corrects us.

We need to sense within both the prayer (MAN) and the response to it (MAD) in all their actions because they specifically build the organs of perception within us that will enable us to reveal the Upper Light, the Creator. This is why it is written: “It is impossible to attain anything without the force of a prayer.” This is because we need to consciously go through this process, with our own desire preceding it.

But the question is where do we get the proper desire for the revelation of the Upper Light, the Creator, an opposite quality that we are absolutely not prepared for? How do we ask for and want something like this?

We already seem to want spiritual development and to search for a way to advance, but in most cases, we discover ourselves to be in absolute darkness and fog, as if we have waken early in the morning and were unable to understand what is happening to us: Where do we come from, what is our purpose, and what we are to think and want? I open the book or listen to the lesson, and nothing responds within. How am I to prepare and direct myself in the right way, at what expense? After all, a prayer must be suffered, it must be my true desire, coming from the very depth of my heart.

And here we need to understand that our entire work consists of preparing the conditions for a fast emergence of Reshimot (informational genes). To do this, one needs to try to create proper conditions for him: organize the study, participate in dissemination, have a connection with the group, receive the influence from the environment. This is because only a strong influence of the environment will help accelerate the emergence of Reshimot from concealment, from the breaking.

When we join an environment like this, we attract the general Light through it, and it begins to influence us, like the ground influences the grain in it. And when this grain feels the ground’s influence on it, it begins to awaken to life.

Our grain is already planted in the ground and all the necessary Reshimot, their entire chain, are implanted in us. Our objective is only to awaken this ground around us so it will start influencing us. The only thing expected of us is to properly and intensely operate, taking advantage of all the opportunities.

It turns out that my prayer is not directed straight at the Creator; it is as if there is no one to pray to since I don’t know who He is. A prayer begins with properly placing oneself under the influence of the given conditions. And once I am in this environment, I, together with everyone else and my aspiration for spiritual development (my Reshimo), turn to the force that influences the “grain” from the “ground,” meaning my Reshimo through the environment.

This is the force that I want to awaken, and my proper prayer is directed towards it. And remember that the Upper Light, the environment, and the Creator are in an immutable state and at rest. A person activates all these means and uses his desire to launch this entire system so it will start working with him. Otherwise, it will remain in a frozen state of anticipation.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/9/2011, What is Prayer?

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Question: Where do the measures of time originate from: seconds, minutes, hours, weeks, and months?

Answer: They originate from astronomy, from the movement of the Earth, the Sun, and the Moon with relation to one another. However, the upper roots lie in Zeir Anpin which is divided into six parts. Twelve Partzufim times two correspond to the 24 hour day. The Book of Zohar writes about this.

Humanity has instinctively established a time scale that corresponds to the spiritual root. Baal HaSulam gives a similar example about a peasant in ancient times who saw a mountain and called it the Mount of Olives. This name has a spiritual meaning, but he simply thought that it would be a good place for growing olive trees. This is the way the spiritual root works in a person.

The same applies to the measures of time. Their origins stem from the revolving of Zeir Anpin and Malchut, from 24 Partzufim, from six Sefirot, where each of them is ten, which corresponds to 60 seconds in one minute and 60 minutes in one hour. The upper system is reflected in our world in the form of the interaction between the Sun, the Moon, and the Earth.

This is also the origin of the division of time into months and years as well as the measures that do not have equivalents in astronomy, like a week, the seventh year, the fiftieth year, and so on. Everything comes from the spiritual world.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/9/11 on Time

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Question: When the authors of The Book of Zohar Rabbi Shimon and his disciples studied together in the cave and later on when there were small Kabbalistic groups, they were very well aware that one depends on the other in thoughts, desires, and intentions. They were the only ones in the world. But today we study along with hundreds of people whom we see on the computer screens and thousands of others whom we don’t know at all….

Answer: I perceive the entire world as parts of my soul. Obviously, I don’t see the world this way, but I should visualize it so and treat it accordingly. And despite the fact that the world is full of rivals, foes, and what have you, all of it is my internal properties. If they were reformed, I would see a perfect world before me, the world of Infinity.

Hence, I have to treat everything around me as sent to me to correct my perception of reality and finally experience myself in the perfect desire filled with the infinite Light. To do so, I am provided with the environment, a relatively small group. And although it may contain a few million folks from around the world, I still must strive to feel all of them since they are my desires, the parts of my soul, which wake up to spiritually.

I can collect them, unite them within into a single force, and with their help, reform the other parts of my soul. After all, the whole world is my single soul. This is the way I should view reality.

Therefore,  Rabbi Shimon’s disciples, students of the Ari, and we perceive reality in a relatively similar way. The world is still the same, as are the attitude and the method. There are differences in terms of technology, a more developed connection between us, and in the global approach to the primary sources and the awakening of the world. But personal work and the attitude remain the same.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/8/2011, “Introduction of The Book of Zohar”

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Question: In the modern chauvinistic society men are typically judged by how wealthy or smart they are, and women are judged by beauty. Which criteria will the society apply when it develops?

Answer: If society will begin to value the spiritual goal, whether it’s out of hopelessness from being in a bad state or due to a timely realization of evil while in a good state, we will see ourselves and others as friends and partners on the path to the goal.

Now I judge every person, object, and state based on how much it can benefit my egoistic existence. Similarly in the future, I will judge everything in our world from the still to the human levels based on how it effects my advancement toward the goal.

If a beauty queen happens to be the most helpful in achieving the goal, I’ll marry her. But if a sales girl from the market happens to be the most helpful, I’ll marry her instead. Everything is determined by the goal.

We have an example of how the Jewish nation conducted itself before the destruction of the Temple, and in the orthodox forms almost until today. Wealth was never an object of respect. A young man was always judged by his knowledge. The one who knew more pages of the Torah by heart was better, and there where no other criteria for judging a person throughout all of history. Girls were judged based on the families they came from and their upbringing.

When it came to choosing a partner, parents made the decisions, not hormones after a chance meeting at a party. Why so? This is in accordance with the spiritual law. From Atik, there comes the Light that prompts Malchut of the world of Atzilut to unite with Zeir Anpin. In other words, the decision comes from above.

It is said that the Creator brings a couple together. And in our world, it’s the parents of the young couple that decide what’s best for them.

It has always been done in this fashion in order to neutralize the influence of external beauty. As Rabash used to say, two people should meet, talk, and make sure that they don’t disgust each other. If they don’t repel one another, this is all that’s needed. Everything else is built on mutual compromises. Then, there will surely be love between them.

Actually, the tradition of parents doing the matchmaking is common among all nations. The young were not asked, the parents used to bring them together.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/8/2011 on Women

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The task of the created being is to move toward new, unexpected, and unknown states by arranging for itself all the necessary conditions to attract the upper force which can transform it. Hence, these actions are regarded as the “miraculous remedy” (Segula).

The acts that the created being must carry out are clearly defined: It has to rouse its own desire, cultivate it, enter the group, and “purchase the friends for himself” by starting to bestow to and lower himself before the group. One needs to get inspired by their exalting the spiritual goal, “make a teacher for himself” to learn from him with the friends, and unify into one integral desire, one vessel (“Kli”), in order to correct the breaking.

The breaking is the place within which we reveal our correction: our reformed state and the upper Light that fills our restored collective vessel. That is, we are dealing with the actions that can be accurately described and practically applied while still remaining in one’s egoistic nature, in a still uncorrected state. This stage exists at each step of the ascent, even at the spiritual degrees.

As to the acts of the upper one, it’s the upper Light (the Light of AB-SAG or the Surrounding Light) which expands to us in the manner we can’t comprehend and affects us without our feeling or being aware of it. We only feel the effects of its work.

This is why there is a gap between the creature’s actions and the Creator’s work in response to the former if they are arranged correctly. That is, there is no cause-and-effect chain on the part of the created being, and we neither understand how the breakthrough occurs nor can foretell it. Hence, this entire work is regarded as the “miraculous remedy.”

But it is all due to the fact that the created being is preparing to receive a new nature that it presently lacks. And hence, we cannot see or feel the forthcoming transformations. That is why this is described as a miracle. However, when a person receives these inner transformations from Above, the entire chain of events he went through becomes clear to him, and now he says about the past: “I labored and I found!”

A find is exactly what Segula, a miraculous force, implicates. We must constantly strive to do whatever we can, as it is written: “Do all that you are able to do” and you will find! This is precisely what determines the gap between my present and future states. I am completely in charge of my current state: I am aware of it, understand it, and organize everything in it: “I do everything I can.” But then I “find” a completely new state that comes as a miracle. After all, I receive a totally new nature that I didn’t expect or predict in advance.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/8/2011 on The Importance of the Study

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Inner Preparation for the WE!
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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “The Donkey Driver,” Item 93
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Explanation of the Article, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Lesson 15
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Freedom,” Lesson 15
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Question: How can it be that a person has been studying for years but still hasn’t attained the prayer, the plea for correction?

Answer: We see that the development of the still, vegetative, and animate levels of nature as well as man took place over billions of years all told. They say that the universe emerged about 15 billion years ago. The earth has existed for about 5 billion years. The first people on earth appeared about 200,000 years ago. And man began his spiritual correction starting with Adam HaRishon, 5770 years ago.

It’s not an accident that these processes span over time. There is a specific order here of the revelation of the breaking and its correction. And looking at this development, we have to understand that it demands a great amount of actions to be made inside of the common Malchut so that inside of it some kind of tangible, significant change would occur.

Therefore, even though we yearn to attain the goal as fast as possible and desire to reveal it now, at this very moment, and to immediately reveal it in all its perfection, nevertheless we have to be very patient. And despite anything, we have to expect the arrival of the Messiah any moment now, meaning the arrival of the general force that will correct us and complete all of the correction.

But the days go by, and every new day that comes, corrections happen inside of us. Day and night unite together and that is how we advance. That is to say, we have to understand that Malchut of the world of Infinity, which we reveal, contains such a multitude of actions that their revelation has to happen gradually, one step after the other.

We are unable to understand and feel all at once the entire depth of the vessel or desire that reveals the Creator. Think of the kind of revelation we are getting ready for—it is the revelation of the Creator! This is a non-human force and might with a great number of shades. This is so grandiose that we don’t even understand what we are talking about. That is why the preparation to this revelation happens inside of us by such small steps.

When these steps will be revealed to us later on, we will see how many of them were there! We think that moment by moment, day by day, or even month by month, there are no changes happening. But later these changes will be revealed in us and we will understand what they really did to us, and generally, what happened over that time!
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/9/11 on Prayer

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After all of his searches, a person reaches a state where he asks for just one thing: the ability to make the right decision. And that means he has reached the right prayer.

The most important thing that we will discover by studying the unification of the forces of reception and bestowal is how the Creator makes decisions while being above them, what He bases His decisions on. We will attain Him by His actions. But by researching everything that happens inside of us under His influence, through this we want to attain His mind, His plan, intentions, and thoughts. This is our entire work.

And to do this all that is necessary is prayer. With our own forces we cannot attain His mind and head, the place where decisions are made and from which all actions come. That is because we are also His actions.

And since a spiritual action is always done “for the sake of bestowal,” we cannot understand how the upper mind could have made that decision. This always happens as a “finding” or miracle, as it is written: “I labored and found”! It is impossible to understand the Creator’s mind directly by observing the combination of two forces: reception and bestowal. This is where the difference lies between the Creator Himself, His decision, and all the actions that follow from His decision.

Therefore, a person who reaches prayer asks for the ability to understand precisely this: the plan and thought of the Creator, who makes the decisions. Similarly, Moses was told, “You will see me from behind, but you will not see My face.” This prayer emerges continuously.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/10/11 on Prayer

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