Question: Every person wants to be unique and realize the unique root of his soul. That’s why he is frightened by the explanation that he is a mere cogwheel in the common mechanism. He is afraid to lose his individuality in the society.

Answer: But why should you get lost in the society? On the contrary, you can become a righteous one who is regarded as the “salt of the earth”: to bestow to all and pull the entire world forward. Who is stopping you? There is no restriction on bestowal. Please, do bestow!

You are complaining that you are prevented or not permitted to use all the others. Obviously, nobody wants to let you take advantage of them. On the other hand, if you become great not at reception, but at bestowal, nobody will stand in your way.

One can be unique in the positive sense of the word, in bestowal. Why, then, do you insist on being different in the negative form, in egoism? Everybody wants to be special, so, please, do let them. Realize yourself in spirituality.

A person may be frightened by the very look of the linked cogwheels. He imagines being a robot or a screw, but it is a fact of reality, a picture that does exist in Nature. In Nature, nothing can be bad or good; it is simply a fact.

You may agree or disagree with it; it won’t change reality. You will only evoke blows upon yourself if you don’t comply with it. You may claim that you disagree with the law of gravity and deny its existence. Go ahead; we will see later how you will be falling off the roof.

It’s the same case here. We don’t understand how strictly we are connected with each other and we are still trying to do as we please. Everybody is pulling the blanket over their eyes. Later, we witness how everybody suffers, time after time, for thousands of years.

Now, we are entering such a state where our ego has grown to its maximum in all our earthly desires and tied us all to one another all over the globe. Nonetheless, we still don’t wish to admit it and we keep trying to deceive and use each other. However, we don’t understand that by doing so, everyone brings the very same pain onto himself that he brings to others.

We don’t see it, but if it were clearly revealed to me and I got an immediate, reciprocal blow at the moment when I harm someone, I would act like an animal that doesn’t have free will. I would keep swinging between blows and pleasures, working like a machine, if the law of mutual connection affected me openly.

Therefore, this law is concealed in order to give me an opportunity to add to it by using my free will. The law does exist, albeit  hidden, and I can make up for concealment myself as if it were revealed. After all, I wish it to work this way: I want bestowal to be enormous and powerful and prevail over receiving. It may be a law written out in every book, but I wish it to become revealed in practice. This is where my free will lies.

I was given one white spot which means that the Creator is concealed. I can bring Him out of concealment and fill this white spot with His presence. It will be my own presence since I will be exactly like Him. I will come to the place where He is hiding and replace Him. It will be as if He and I are partners, and I pledge that I will do His work for Him where He is hidden.
[30828]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/26/10, “Peace in the World”

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Baal HaSulam, “Peace in the World“: And each and every individual in society is like a wheel that is linked to several other wheels, placed in a machine. And this single wheel has no freedom of movement in and of itself, but continues with the motion of the rest of the wheels in a certain direction, to qualify the machine to perform its general role.

And if there is some breakdown in the wheel, the breakdown is not evaluated relating to the wheel itself, but according to its service and role with respect to the whole machine.

The first step on the path to success is to attain a sensation that we are all connected like cogwheels, having no freedom of motion in relation to each other. I cannot spin unless I make this movement together with everyone else. And if others spin, then I have no possibility of not spinning together with them.

Therefore, only by reaching a mutual agreement can we attain movement that will be desirable to all. If the world reveals this law, it will be nothing short of salvation. And if we reveal this in our group, then we will be able to pass that vision on to the world. This must be the main topic of our dissemination; we have to explain the situation.

However, the most effective form of dissemination is if we reveal this absolute, necessary, and mutual connection between all of us. This must be the main thought for us during events such as Unity Day, which is held by our Kabbalistic groups all over the world.

We are returning to the same picture of interconnected cogwheels where none of them has its own freedom of action. No matter what illusions each one may have about it or how mistaken they can be in their blindness, it is still so.

Therefore, I have to tune into the group in order to understand and feel how dependent and connected I am with others – not having even one free movement – not in my heart nor mind, and not in any of my desires, qualities, thoughts, and plans. Everything that I desire, dream of doing, or do in the end depends on others and I won’t be able to do anything unless I reach a mutual agreement and peace with them.

The realization of the mutual dependence in the group, in society, or in all of humanity is the key to correcting the world and correcting man. However, if I am uncorrected, then on one hand this depends on society because it is the society that has corrupted me. After all, a person is a product of social influence. However, didn’t I choose that society and it is not in my power to influence it?

A person cannot tune out from his society in both the good sense and the bad. Therefore, there is no assessment of a separate person, but only of his free choice, meaning what society he has chosen for his growth.
[30831]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/26/10, “Peace in the World”

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Question: Since I started studying the wisdom of Kabbalah and entered the group, I have been feeling how my desire for sex and other worldly pleasures are growing in me. How do I work with them?

Answer: It is written, “He who is greater than his friend, his desire is greater than him.” During the entire course of our history, we have been developing egoistically; our ego has been constantly growing. In the end, we come to a state when we are utilizing all of the enormous egoism this world contains.

Therefore, people feel despair, fall into depression and abuse drugs; terrorism and other misfortunes expand. We don’t know what to do with our lives anymore. Now, we must leap further with the greater egoism in order to reach the spiritual world and the Creator.

Therefore, people who come to the wisdom of Kabbalah think that now they will be like “angels with wings,” as if wings were the only thing they lack when no worldly pleasures can fill them any longer. However, when a person starts studying, he suddenly discovers more desire for food, sex, traveling, and other corporeal pleasures.

Why is this so? The ego is increasing, and there is nothing we can do about it. Age doesn’t matter. A person can be 80 or 90 years old, and he still begins having desires as a young person would. I don’t want to advertise it or we will turn in a group of oldies. But, in truth, there is no salvation; in a person who studies the wisdom of Kabbalah, all desires must keep growing.

The foundation of all desires is sexual pleasure, the root of which is adhesion of the Light and desire (Kli, vessel), the coupling of the male and female parts of creation. For this reason, a person first experiences an increase in sexual desire to such a high degree as has never happened to him before.

Previously, he was a stable person, and all his desires were in check. However, now, they manifest in such a grotesque form that they start getting in the way of his normal life. All of this is true, and we know that as a person begins studying the wisdom of Kabbalah, all our desires and tendencies get renewed.

What do we do with this? As we may know from the wisdom of Kabbalah, we are prohibited from resisting our desires. Don’t challenge the “evil inclination” directly, as if you are about to battle it as a hero; you won’t win. Just submerge yourself in the studies, the group, and connect with them to the best of your ability so that the Upper Light could affect you more strongly. Only in this manner will you be able to go through this with all the kinds of obstacles surrounding you.

Besides, there is no other choice. All of it is designed to purify the intention and thoughts in order to seek in all of these obstacles the point of bonding with the group since your free will lies solely in it.

You are given such states so that you may forevermore settle in your choice, even on the foundation of all the desires for wealth, sex, family, and other pleasures of the corporeal world. On this ground, bond with the group tighter and realize your only free choice.

You don’t have the power to fight your desires. Don’t be a fool and start a war with them. After all, you are not the one in charge; it isn’t your job. You are given external conditions so that, thereby, you could exercise your free will to a greater extent.

This must be understood while facing any predicament in our life. Act normally in our world; there should be no change in home, family, vacation, and health. However, all your attention should be focused on your only free choice.
[26030]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/5/10, “The Freedom”

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Volume 3, Part 8: Time and place in spirituality signify a renewal of form. Since a Partzuf grows only through a multitude of unions (Zivugim) and transfers of Lights that differ from one another, building it together, they are called "the months of the intrauterine development" or the period of embryonic development, which can last for 7, 9, or 12 months depending on the amount of portions of Light that are necessary to form it.

We study the changes that happen to the will to enjoy and count the number of these changes or renewals, which are called "months" (Hodesh, month, comes from the word Hidush, renewal). There is no time in spirituality. Time is determined by the number of changes that we have gone through, rather than the motion of the hand of a clock or the changes of some external factor. As much as I changed, that is how much time has gone by. This is how time is defined in spirituality.

Therefore, the period of an embryo’s development means that I go through one state after another ("I go through," Over, comes from the word embryo, Ibur). I have to go through a specific amount of changes in order to go from the intrauterine development inside the Upper One to development outside of Him.

Now I am also in the Upper One and He develops me. During this process of development I have absolutely no influence on the changes I undergo. I am forced to change by instincts and forces that I experience as suffering, and thus, I go through these changes against my will.

Then another phase comes: I start to feel that there is some kind of reason behind it, that there is a high need for it, and there is an Upper One who makes all these changes to me, wishing for me to start finding out about the system of governance, the cause and effect order of development, the beginning and goal of the whole path. That is how the whole world is beginning to awaken in our times.

After that we reach the realization that we have to evoke these changes ourselves. From a certain state onward there is no time that the Upper One changes for us, forcing us to develop. Now the Upper One only adds Lights for us, which we perceive as evil. However, this does not enable us to develop, but only to reach the realization that we have to demand development from the Upper One. That is, we must already participate in the development ourselves and demand it.

The Upper One does not force me to do the action itself, but only to request it so I would ask the Upper One to carry it out. My request has to be in the middle. For now this request can be expressed as a cry due to feeling bad.

After that I develop and am required to have this cry come out of the realization of goodness, when I understand that all of this is for my good. Even though I might feel bad in my sensations, I already realize that this is good for my development, because I have to ascend to the next level. Then the Upper One no longer demands a cry from me, but cooperation in development. This is called partnership.

After that we reach a state where the Upper One does not awaken me at all, but I have to search for an opportunity to awaken inside of me, using the environment. I have to awaken the Upper One so He would awaken me, and then agree with His action and tell Him exactly how to do it. It’s as if I understand and choose the best form of action for myself, and then the Upper One does it.

In the end we reach a state where I give the Upper One all the orders. In the beginning of the path He made all the actions upon me, from beginning to end, without my awareness. I did not know who is operating me, what He does, and where I am. But at the end of the path I determine everything from beginning to end, and only use the force of the Upper One.

Our entire path lies in that we acquire increasingly greater independence and self-sufficiency, becoming more and more similar to the Upper One.
[29951]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/16/10, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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The problem is not that we break a person’s character and spoil something in this world. Rather, by disregarding his or her individual properties, we pull certain parts out of the common correction, and without these parts the whole system will not be perfect.

In spirituality, everything has to be perfect. If the entire huge system is missing one little cell, this makes the whole system imperfect. It presupposes a total mutual inclusion, meaning each one in everyone. Each person includes himself into everyone else and contains everyone in him.

This means that even if one is uncorrected, there isn’t one single corrected soul. If one soul is corrupt, this is felt in all the other souls and in the system as a whole. Each defect is accumulative because, being inside one soul, the defect multiplies by spreading onto all the other souls and influences each soul by multiplying due to their mutual inclusion.

That’s why by protecting individual freedom, the Kabbalists are not looking for beautiful relationships between people, but come from the structure of creation, seeing it from beginning to end. Hence, they say that we can’t do as we wish at a given moment, but have to proceed only from the true form, the corrected end state (Gmar Tikkun).

If we have to reach the end of correction, then, today, we have to treat everyone most carefully, considering his personal qualities as our collective property which nothing can replace. We just have to help each other connect with everyone else. This is how relationships should be in society.

Next, each person has to be given the opportunity to develop toward connecting with the rest. He shouldn’t be developed personally, expecting all types of egoistic successes and distinctions. This is what today’s schools are busy doing. They are not educating a person, but just giving a “professional orientation.”

Instead of this, schools need to occupy themselves with educating a person in society in particular. Thanks to this, all his natural capabilities will develop properly in him because all his genes, hormones, and innate qualities exist only for his connection with the rest. All this is directed only toward society and connection.

Otherwise, they would be invisible to us. We see them only because we went through the breaking. That is, each one’s personal qualities are the consequence of the breaking of the collective soul and can be corrected only through connection.

Really, a person has nothing else to do in this world apart from connecting with others. By doing this, he can develop all his personal qualities and natural tendencies in their most optimum form. This guarantees a blossoming of the mind and feelings in their most balanced form.

Furthermore, through a connection with others, he can absorb from them any number of additional qualities, impressions, and feelings, everything he needs. He will be nourished by everyone, by the entire system correctly, and that will enable him to develop harmoniously and perfectly himself.
[29370]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/10/10, “The Freedom”

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Baal HaSulam, “The Freedom”: Know, that this [personal tendencies] is the one true possession of the individual that must not be harmed or altered… Thus, anyone who eradicates a tendency from an individual and uproots it causes the loss of that sublime and wondrous concept from the world, intended to emerge at the end of the chain, for that tendency will never again emerge in any other body.

These are exactly the principles on which the system of education has to be based. Children have to be treated as adults; we shouldn’t try to make them into something we want as if they are dough from which we can form any shape we desire.

A person has to be provided with influence that will let him develop his personal properties. That’s why in education, any suppression is unacceptable.

The Kabbalists write about this, and we have to understand the reason why. The protection of personal freedom is a compulsory law because, at the end of the day, we’re not influencing or correcting any one of us. We’re simply fixing the bonds between us.

We all, me, you, and him, have to connect with each other with the right type of ties. Then, in these ties, we will reveal the Light like in resistors of an electric circuit or in the spiral of a light bulb. The connections that will become revealed between us will be called the spiritual world or the Creator; it’s not going to be each of us individually.

What belongs to me personally does not relate to the spiritual world. Only our bonds are spiritual. That’s why the individual qualities of everyone have to stay. If I spoil any quality in me or in anyone else, the connection between us cannot be absolutely correct anymore because this connection requires a “bridge” from his nature to mine.

That’s why the law of protection of personal freedom is not the requirement of a nice “democracy.” It’s a necessary requirement for reaching correction.

From this, it’s clear how spoiled our system of education is: It imposes continuous pressure on children and manufactures trite individuals according to an adopted standard. The attitude toward rearing and education has to be radically changed.
[29377]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/10/10, “The Freedom”

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Question: Ever since I started studying Kabbalah I feel so small, as if I’m a tiny embryo, and I feel less and less confident as time goes by. Where will I suddenly get real confidence in this single force that controls the entire universe, sets up all the problems for me, and is my only source of support?

Answer: Usually a person finds confidence in religion when he believes that there is a Creator who is good, who will take care of him, and whom he can trust. This worldview sets in deep inside a person and supports him, which is why Kabbalists do not speak out against religion.

However, there comes a time when a new desire awakens in a person and he can no longer be calmed by the blind faith of the past. He develops and outgrows it. Traditional actions are no longer enough for him; he wants to know the Creator!

Ideally, we should have ascended from religion (Dat) to knowledge (Daat) and realized what is written, “Know the Creator.” However, in actuality this is not happening.

In actuality it is only possible to achieve this by connecting with a Kabbalistic group. There is no other means. The group must be the place where you can attain the Creator, the quality of bestowal.

The sensation of insecurity comes only from a lack of the quality of bestowal. As soon as you are ready to bestow, you will feel total confidence and will acquire freedom from yourself! That’s because bestowal is Bina.

Then you will live without any fear and your only worry will be, “When will I attain the deeds of the forefathers through my deeds? When will I be able to bestow to the Creator?” Or in other words, when will I ascend even higher than Bina?
[29641]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/13/10, “A Handmaid that is Heir to Her Mistress”

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I always have to look for the most comfortable means that will help me feel inspired as fast as possible by the importance of the goal. This will enable me to aspire to the “place” or the “drop of unity” where I eventually hope to reveal the Creator. In this regard, everything depends on my current state. Various Reshimot are constantly surfacing in me. As a rule, I start to build the intention from an unconscious, vague, and “dry” state, without a drop of feeling and reason.

Thus, I have to awaken from this “stupor” so I burn up with such a strong desire that if I don’t reveal at this very moment what the Kabbalistic book is telling me about that “death is better” than this life without upper attainment.

We have to look for and use everything that can excite and touch us. Sometimes the group helps, reminding me about unity, mutual guarantee, and responsibility. Sometimes I am inspired by thoughts about the Creator as a wonderful, exalted goal. Sometimes I am excited by the action itself and the work to unite with friends in spite of the disturbances. It is necessary to look for means that will make me have an inextricable spiritual demand while reading the Kabbalistic texts at the lesson.

The approach to these texts has to be balanced. In principle I have reason to complain. On one hand, if I don’t understand anything at all, then I don’t have anything to latch on to. On the other hand, when I start to pay attention to the content, I feed the mind and lose the intention.

That’s why Baal HaSulam writes the following in “Letter 17”: “It’s best for you to hold on to the goal and aspire to the directions of the Host. After all, one who does not know the ways of the Host and the directions of Host, meaning the secrets of the Torah, how will he serve Him? This is the surest guarantee of the middle line out of the three.”

We aspire to understand what we have to to do, asking, “Give us the mind, give us the forces, direct us, explain it to us, show it through example so we would act correctly.” You can demand all of this from the Creator the way a child demands it from an adult. From the child’s end only a desire is necessary, while the adults provide him with all that is necessary. I collect this desire in the group, from my friends. Therein lies my free choice.

From Above I receive everything I need on the spiritual path, besides the demand, which I have to develop on my own. It will come only when I get inspired from the environment by the greatness of the goal. Then the inspiration will break out of the heart and I will aspire to the directions of the Host with all of my strength in order to learn to serve Him.
[29620]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/13/10, The Zohar

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The Upper One is only waiting for a reaction from us. Portions of Light come from the Upper One to the lower one (to every one of us), demanding the right reaction from us in response. The Upper One knows exactly what is happening to the lower one and what state the lower one is in because He forms this state for the lower one.

Of course, the Upper One knows what the lower one is ready to do. He arranged all of the external and inner conditions for the lower one to ensure him free choice, leaving the lower one just one thing that is unclear and unknown to the lower one – the middle third of Tifferet (Klipat Noga). Precisely in this state the lower one has to form the middle line on his own.

If in response to the Upper One’s influence, the lower one correctly builds the middle line, this means he becomes worthy. Then he really shifts himself and the whole world (all of the environment that the Upper One has formed for him at this moment) toward good.

Therefore, the only thing required of the lower one when he feels a lack (Hissaron) is to turn to the Upper One in order to receive the component he lacks in order to shift himself and the whole world to good. The lower one lacks knowledge, sensation, and later the ability to make a decision. He must receive all of this from the Upper One.

The Upper One leaves the lower one Klipat Noga in order for him to desire to turn to Him and receive what he lacks. If the lower one is ready to receive this supplement for Klipat Noga, then he receives it. This is the additional force of bestowal that he acquires on the current degree, which enables him to rise to the next level.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/13/10, The Zohar

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Question: If the lower Partzuf is in the dark, where does it get the strength to rise up and receive the Light?

Answer: Clearly, the lower Partzuf has no strength to rise to the upper Partzuf, but it does receive the desire to do so. A person receives the first awakening from Above, but later he has to realize it on his own. It is written: “The Creator lays a person’s hand on the good fate and says, ‘Choose this.’”

If you don’t, you will be given a second chance although it will happen in a different form. It is taken into consideration what states you are going through, but only in the context of free will. This means that you must respond correctly, or next time the setting presenting a choice will be more “aggressive” and not as favorable.

If the second time you miss what is expected of you, another awakening will occur yet again. After all, the plan of creation must come to fruition. But the settings will be getting tougher and more unpleasant. And so on.

Every time a person doesn’t act on an awakening sent to him from Above, the situation presenting the same choice gets more challenging. If he didn’t accept the properties of mercy (Hassadim) and didn’t use them for correction, then mercy turns into harsh properties of overcoming (Gevurot).

Thus, everything is determined by our responsiveness to what is happening around us.
[28905]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/6/10, “Introduction from The Book of Zohar,” Article “Who Created These”

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