There are four levels of development of the desire to receive in spirituality: the still, vegetative, animate and speaking.

The desire acts according to the force that is in it.

If it is a force on the level of the still nature, the desire keeps its structure and resists external forces as much as it can, so that they wouldn’t penetrate it and wouldn’t break it. There are materials that are more or less strong, more or less stable depending on the intensity of the desire of the specific still form. Some materials are very hard to break down, while others are malleable. Another question is which materials are eventually more resistant to external influences, a rubber wheel, for example absorbs the blows despite the external shaking and penetrations, while a stone or iron ring breaks down much faster.

This is how we check our desires according to their internal hardness and not their physical hardness: how do they resist external changes. Even in our world we see the difference between rubber and iron that can resist external changes but breaks down when something penetrates it.

After the level of the still nature there is the vegetative level. Its desire is stronger and greater, and it can resist external influences, sort them out and use the beneficial elements. It checks and sorts out external factors, absorbs what is beneficial and emits what is harmful.

Thus a very complex act of clarification takes place for which the desire of the vegetative has to know its own structure, how and what it exists for, what is beneficial for it, and what is harmful. The vegetative does this clarification instinctively, and by that we can understand how one should operate on the spiritual level of the vegetative.

The desire of the animate level can choose its environment, and so it can move from place to place. It needs a mate to reproduce. Birth is a real creation here, as if the Creator creates a new creation. In spirituality it is indeed so, and unless one acquires the force of Bina it cannot give birth.

The desire on the animate level can take on many forms. In addition to knowing itself, it also knows different phenomena that reveal smaller and bigger desires. Thus the animate level sees its life from one end to another. Animals have offspring and bring them up. On the whole, at this level, there is an instinctive inner program of knowledge of one’s life, even though it is limited and inevitable.

Animals move around and feel where it is good for them and where it is bad. They can choose the environment. The vegetative hardly influences the environment, but only protects itself from pests and to a certain extent opens up to beneficial external conditions such as sunlight, air, moisture, etc. On the other hand, animals choose and change the environment; they move from one place to another, they make themselves a place to live, and reproduce. To a certain extent they feel the other, including their prey, which they also have to understand and feel. They feel the other especially when they gather in flocks, which have a clear order and hierarchy.

These are profound things but they are still fulfilled instinctively.

As for us on the level of the speaking, everything has to be above the desire to receive, above the restriction. We should only understand that a person has to get to know the new world.

In the spiritual world there are 620 desires that operate on every level:

• The still level is ready to resist any changes of its ego, by keeping itself under the Masach (screen), under the protection of the restriction, that is, above all the egoistic desires.
• The vegetative level uses its desire to receive from the egoistic shell of the Klipot with the help of the Light that Reforms, and begins to empty it and clarify what is good for it and what is harmful. It absorbs what is beneficial and emits what is harmful, opening and closing itself, as all its actions are aimed at bestowal, but still operating within the general, with no personal clarification, not giving birth to anything independently. The creatures on the vegetative level remain within the framework of the general desire and change together. In other words, a person can be above his personal egoistic desire, but he cannot “bend” or change society yet, he cannot encompass it and correct it internally.
• The animate level with its desire to receive can exist in the Creator’s world almost limitlessly.
• A human being includes all of the environment inside him, the whole world, and becomes a “righteous that is the foundation of the world.”

Baal HaSulam speaks about it in article 115 in Shamati, which is also called “Still, Vegetative, Animate and Speaking.”
[92475]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/9/12, Shamati #115

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Question: Suppose a person sits and watches himself: “I want some water, then I want something else, and I don’t know what else I want.” Will a simple experiment help him understand that the essence of his desire is to enjoy?

Answer: A person will see that each time new desires emerge in him. He doesn’t know where they come from; first he wants one thing and suddenly another and then something else.

On the other hand, he can program himself, which means to focus himself on certain desires and to remember something that brought him pleasure. In this case such a great desire for that pleasure develops in him that he begins to yearn for it again: “What do I want? Oh, I forgot, there is some ice cream in the fridge,” and he takes out the ice cream or he may remember that he wanted to go somewhere interesting or meet someone interesting, or read some interesting book or see a movie that he prepared to see and so on.

This means that we evoke ourselves when we don’t feel pleasure. We don’t feel the pleasure when we fill ourselves. I am full, which seemingly means that everything is fine, but my life is tasteless. Even when we seemingly have everything, we lack that addition of excitement. We invent new sources of pleasure and incentives, but in fact it is the same ego.
[92030]    
From KabTV’s “Talks with Michael Laitman,” 11/03/12

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Question: Under what conditions can we see that a group exists and that is headed towards the goal?

Answer: A group that is headed towards the goal is a collection of people for whom there is only one goal. They know what it is, they perceive it among them, and feel it. They study together from Kabbalistic sources; they check themselves according to these sources, and work on the connection of their points in the heart, which means that the main thing for them is the connection as they ignore all the other attributes. If a person yearns for unity in order to reveal the Creator, it is enough for him to be my friend even if he can be an unpleasant person in every other aspect; it makes no difference. Gradually we all understand how to adjust ourselves to one another and to get closer.

A group is a collection of people who understand that in order to attain the Creator they have to work on themselves, to study, and to lead a certain lifestyle. They have to meet on a regular basis and to be so strongly connected that it will constantly lead to connection and unity.

If they just rent a place and gather there, it doesn’t mean that they are a group yet, they meet physically, read together, and then go their own way, does that make them a group? According to the wisdom of Kabbalah everything is determined by the internal awakening and not by the physical bodies.

A group refers to the yearning of the points in the heart to become one whole. Only then it is called a “group.” So we still need to work a lot on this.

But when all the people yearn together for one goal, understanding that only by that will they connect above all the differences, they bring out the Creator’s attribute and by that, overcome the shattering—then they become a group.

So it turns out that all our contrasting attributes are in one egoistic desire. It is as if all the egoistic desires that are opposite from ours, that are in contrast to one another, are now in one sack. We restrict our desires, place a Masach (screen) above these attributes and focus our points at the Creator, at equivalence and bestowal.

It turns out that our connected egoistic desires are left below while our intentions to connect and the yearning for the Creator, to resemble Him and to become equal to Him are above them. This is how the soul, which means the one collective Partzuf is created.

The soul is one. There aren’t many souls. There is only one vessel for everyone. If we create it, we suddenly discover that is has already been created! We only try to discover it and by our attempts we suddenly discover that we already exist in it. This is because that one whole creation already exists while the shattering occurred only with regard to our consciousness. When we yearn to advance we ascend above our current feeling.
[92445]
From the Georgia Convention 11/06/12, Lesson 2

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In the News (from Spiegel Online): “Loneliness is a common feature of Western civilization; the number of people living alone is growing; there is a growing segment of households, designed for single people. Moreover, isolation is characteristic of both the elderly and the youth. Family ties become more fragile. Against a background of declining marriage, the number of families whose members have to live separately is increasing.”

My Comment: It seems like a paradox: The city does not gather, but divides people. Thus direct communication is replace by other means of communication. The growing egoism does not tolerate direct communication. This will lead to all sorts of psychological and social problems. But I think that the crisis is developing faster and will force the acceptance of the need to implement integral education everywhere. And it will change the connection between people. The quality of these connections determines our future.
[92564]

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Question: If we are ready to meet several times a week, to read and discuss things, what prevents us from connecting with the friends?

Answer: Your egoism. It will grow every day, and it will find increasingly greater flaws in your friends so that everyday you will look at them with greater aversion.

Question: Won’t I know the reason for this?

Answer: There can be many reasons. Don’t you believe me? In a year from now we will ask you and you will tell us how you are doing.

There are times when people are simply indifferent: You come, study, you seem to be needed, helpful, and then after getting used to this, you simply stop noticing the fiends for a while.

Then as you work with them, you feel criticism towards them; you find bad points in everyone, until it comes to actual repulsion and alienation.

But the real hatred appears when people are seriously working on connection. Then the true ego appears and is revealed very strongly. This is where the actual serious work begins.
[92398]
From the Georgia Convention 11/06/12, Lesson 2

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Question: In our world there are laws that we must abide by. How can I check my intention practically to see whether it is egoistic or whether it is the right intention?

Answer: How can I practically check my intention and advance? You are right, the most important thing is the intention, but you won’t be able to advance by yourself, I don’t know of any person who could study the wisdom of Kabbalah by himself. You will have to connect to us. Without a group, a teacher, friends, and assistance, you will simply waste a lot of time. So for a start, read the material for beginners. But if you are really interested and if you are about how I can change my intention, that is a high level and it already quite serious.

It is simply a waste of efforts and you are confusing yourself by that and will need much more time in order to come out of this confusion. You should connect to us. We are prepared for any situation, in any language, English Georgian, Russian, Hebrew, whichever language you want. Our books are published in 27 languages.
[92297]
From the Georgia Convention 11/5/12, Lesson 1

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Question: We always say that a person is the desire to receive pleasure. But to many people this isn’t clear unless they are studying the wisdom of Kabbalah where it speaks about concepts like the Light, the Creator, and so on.

Answer: Why?! Learn anything: physics, entropy, thermodynamics, and laws such as these. They all say that each body in the process of its development tends to a state of rest. Not only a person but all of nature (still, vegetative, and animate) strive for fulfillment, maximum rest, and abundance. That is the law of nature.

What is “rest”? It’s when all the desires to be filled are at the most comfortable state, which is what any creation aspires toward at any level.

Question: What would you advise so that a person would understand that? Should we maybe have him watch himself during the day?

Answer: You need to give a person a few lessons in psychology and explain it. We teach this in integral education, which explains about the ego being our foundation and explains its principle attributes. We teach how it develops, how it brings us to the crisis, how it brings us to recognize our evil, and to recognize that all of its attributes are egoistic.

The ego is actually our main property. And within it is a collection of our attributes: laziness, desire to reach the goal, jealousy, greed, everything. Both the good attributes and the bad are all egoistic with the purpose of filling itself. In addition to that, animals think only of how to fulfill themselves; however, man receives pleasure also from draining others. This means that he measures himself according to others. With animals this doesn’t exist. In this we are different from them.
[92033]
From KabTV’s “Talks with Michael Laitman,” 11/03/12

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Question: Can any person, including me, rise to the upper level, appealing to His nature? Can I consciously rise to that level or is it only based on my feelings? If we talk about consciousness, does Kabbalah distinguish between reason and mind?

Answer: Kabbalah says that the human essence is composed of desires and thoughts. The desire is the main thing because it is the real matter of the world. The desire spins electrons and molecules, causing connection and disconnection of elements; the desire is everything.

But on the still, vegetative, and animate levels, the desire is carried out instinctively, compulsively. Everything acts like this, including the people who also belong to the animal level.

A person who begins to study Kabbalah tries to rise to the next level of desire, that is, to change from the property of reception to the property of bestowal. Then he begins to use reason, but not the one that exists next to our egoism in order to gain more in every movement, in every case. Animals also have such reason, as does any plant or stone that all the time tries to take the best position relative to the force of gravity or to preserve its structure. We are speaking about the free mind.

Freewill appears only when a person has two opposing forces—to receive and bestow. And new real reason appears between them. It is not the one that is attached to the desire and helps it gain more, calculating its actions, but the reason that arises on the oppositeness of two desires and causes the creation of a middle structure, consisting of both forces, reception and bestowal, the so-called the middle line. A person who has these two forces and builds himself out of them, is actually free and reasonable.
[92244]
From the Georgia Convention 11/05/12, Lesson 1

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Question: In the book Shamati, in the article “The Most Important Thing is to Want Only to Bestow,” it says: “The force of faith is sufficient for one to work in the form of bestowal.” What is faith?

Answer: We don’t know what faith is. It is a kind of force that doesn’t exist in our world. In our world, in all the natural sciences, in physics, chemistry, biology, and other sciences, we discover the forces of the still, vegetative, and animate nature that operate as forces of attraction and rejection.

In the spiritual world we suddenly discover forces that operate oppositely from these forces. Suppose, there is a natural force of rejection that we see in this world, but in spirituality it is the opposite, the force of mutual attraction is formed between these objects, as it says: “Love shall cover all sins.”

We begin to discover this to a certain extent in quantum physics: If we place elementary particles that are equally charged (electrons for example) in the same place, they will begin to reject one another, not only because they have the same charge, but for quantum reasons as well (the force of anti-symmetry); none of them wants to be where the other is.

So what is the force of bestowal? It is a force that is revealed above our nature in a form that is opposite from it, as it says: “I have seen the opposite world.” We can only say that the spiritual world operates according to intentions and not actions. There are no actions there; only what takes place in the intentions is taken into account, since our bodies don’t exist in the spiritual world, but only the desires and the intentions.

Imagine that your desires operate. What terrible things would happen in the world! In a split of a second the world would cease to exist, people would burn one another.

So in order not to find ourselves in such a world, we are all in an imaginary world in which we can perform physical actions as much as we are allowed to. To the extent that a person can operate his desire for the good of others, he ascends above his body and enters the spiritual domain where he acts according to his desire and his intention.

Otherwise, how could it be possible to bring a person into a reality that is totally under the domination of his desire?! After all, he has no control over his own desire and his intention.

So only to the extent that a person to hold his desires and work correctly with his desire and his intention does he enter the spiritual world, is he allowed to enter. It is called “entering the King’s palace after having climbed the mountain,” and there he begins to correct the world, to the extent that he can control himself.
[92082]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/4/12, Shamati #30

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Question: If we watch a dog, we find that its basic needs are food, sleep, and sex. And what motivates man?

Answer: In man, it’s the same thing: food, sex, and family. These are the animal, physical desires. The next level of desires are social, which are created in us under the influence of the surrounding society. It arouses in us additional desires: for wealth, fame (power), and sciences (knowledge). This means that the first three desires are physical and the next three are seemingly spiritual.

Question: Where do the things like confidence in the future for myself and my children come in?

Answer: Everything is included. Absolutely everything!

Everything is included within these kinds of desires: three corporeal desires and three desires that are, seemingly, “spiritual,” which are as if outside of the body of man and are not used directly for bodily pleasures.

Question: Is the desire of not doing anything, to have everyone leave me alone, to not touch me and just disappear, also included here?

Answer: This is what our general desire, egoism, wants.

The desire for peace can be discovered also when you are running around from corner to corner, but specifically it creates in you a sense of peace. Try stopping a child, for him stopping on the spot, on the contrary, brings a state of anxiety, and when he is running around, he enjoys it; it is peace for him. This is to say that rest is felt according to its desire. When it is in balance, in fulfillment, satiated, this is when the desire itself is relaxed.
[92091]
From KabTV’s “Talks with Michael Laitman,” 03/10/12 

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