Question: This comes up all the time that we need to work for the sake of some reward. How is it possible to correct this intention? Which actions must we pass through and how many? How can we really act opposite to this?

Answer: You will gradually change your assessment of the quality of the reward. Essentially you conceive the reward to be—either the state in which you feel yourself to be good, the state when others feel themselves to be good, or  the state where the Creator feels himself to be good due to your deeds.

That is, the reward must be constant. Everything depends on its quality:  What is my reward? If the friends become fulfilled as a result of what I do, this is the reward. Would it be impossible to enjoy this?

I only need to check myself, what is the cause and what is the result? Am I doing good for the friends for my own enjoyment, or do I behave like this because it will be good for them; and because of this I enjoy it? That is, my fulfillment is detachment of the feeling of joy from my Kelim (vessels) and its presence and feeling is in the Kelim of the friends.

Question: Is this a static process or is it possible to run it all the time?

Answer: This is a gradual developmental process of the person within a group. By blindly carrying out everything that the Kabbalists say and write, we can reach this rapidly.

After all, we can never see the next level of our development. Yet the Kabbalists give us advice, how we can make ourselves similar to the next level, become ready for it while being on the level where we are found. How can I be ready for it if I don’t see it and don’t know anything about it? Therefore, they give us advice and recommendations. And without these I would not be able to do anything.

So there is no reason to be alone in the desert to sit there and begin trying to get in touch with the Creator. The method for reaching the upper world was discovered once and we know exactly how this was done: ten generations, ten teachers, ten Kabbalists from Adam to Noah, ten generations from Noah to Abraham, and so on, and so on in a chain.

It cannot be that someone will suddenly discover it in some other form. A person can somehow feel the upper world but not consciously, only temporarily, and then it disappears. I have met people like this. And in order to be found in the spiritual world, clearly, realistically and correctly, and to work with all of our Kelim, which is to say with all the desires and thoughts, we require this method. This already came from Adam so he is considered to be the forefather of all people, all belonging to the level of Adam (Man).
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: If I share my joy and impressions with a friend, how do I know that it does not harm him?

Answer: There are two prohibitions in relations with friends.

The first prohibition is to tell no one about your relationships with the Creator. The only person with whom you can talk about this is your wife if she is constantly with you on the path. With the friends you can talk about anything related to your relationship with the group, studies, and anything else, except your relationship with the Creator.

The second prohibition is in no way, not by word, not by gesture, not by facial expressions,to express any disdain for spiritual work. Do not decrease friends’ desires, but all the time try to awaken and develop their desire towards the goal. Do not provoke any momentary, insignificant descent in them. Be careful not to trigger it even by some gesture: watch constantly for this. In the end you will have to feel yourself in ascent all the time. Otherwise, they will take this degradation from you.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: It says that the “Creator is good and benevolent.” So what do the words “in pain you will bring forth children” mean? What is the meaning of this pain and sorrow?

Answer: Childbirth involves sorrow and pain, and while reading the Torah we are under the impression that the Creator is cruel especially towards women. He says to the woman: “Your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you.” As if these are two opposing forces but are both aimed at the same cause.

Malchut, our desire, yearns for the source of the filling, for Zeir Anpin, for the male part. What is more, it exists in each of us, both in man and in woman. We yearn for the source of the filling and this egoistic filling rules over us and we cannot do anything about it. This is the attitude of the female part towards the male part.

“In pain you will bring forth children,” means that the birth of every new level, of every new feeling, of every attainment, is through the path of sufferings.

Each time a greater ego is revealed in us, so when we go through many states for a long time we begin to see that it is evil and that we must exit it like from Egypt, to pop out like a pit out of a cherry, under the same pressure that a baby successfully comes out of his mother’s womb during childbirth.

But every birth involves pain, since birth is every new level in which two opposing forces are involved, one of them is the inhibiting force of the embryo, since the ego holds on to him and doesn’t let him come out, at the same time the altruistic pushing force, that pushes the fruit out and doesn’t want to keep it inside is also revealed.

The struggle between these two opposing forces creates a transition process called “pain,” “in pain you will bring forth children.” On the whole, all the corporeal phenomena stem from spirituality. Thus we are born on every level.

So we have to approach the spiritual states by understanding that the group is our “womb,” and in it we have to create the two opposing forces. One of them is the egoistic force that sustains us and the other is the altruistic force of rejection that raises us all. By leaving the force that sustains us on the outside we are born only by the force that pushes us and that leads us onwards.

This spiritual process is typical of men, who go through it in every spiritual birth, on every spiritual level, exactly like women.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day One 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: Why were we given such conditions of being thousands of kilometers apart from one another?

Answer: Because you are strong, you are heroes, you are the concealed righteous.

Actually you don’t have to stay in the same place if you can unite with others and there is no way to organize a group where you live. You don’t have to remain in the place where you live at all costs.

I also moved to live near my teacher. Of course in Israeli standards it wasn’t far but qualitatively it was very meaningful since I had to give up my business, my home, everything, since I couldn’t go on differently.

But it happened two years after I had started studying with him. I wanted to move near him immediately but he didn’t let me do so for two years.

Question: How can we choose the group and the conditions correctly?

Answer: You have to move to a place where there is a good group with good reliable guys so you will really be able to dedicate yourself seriously to the spiritual work.

Besides, there should be reasonable conditions for the family there and a place of work. You have to check all this.

I believe that there is no need to take any chances. But if there is no hope of organizing a group in the place where you live, you should move.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: I understand that “there is none else besides Him,” I feel His presence, and understand that it is a game. But why do I feel pain and sufferings, why am I ill?

Answer: A person has to act in the state he is in. Why are you given such states? If you were healthy, beautiful, and everything was fine, you wouldn’t be here yet.

Question: Where is the manual? I want to discover it! I don’t understand the Creator’s language!

Answer: The Creator’s language is nature; it is everything that surrounds you. Start seeing only the Creator in everything that happens.

When your children were small you arranged different games for them; you arranged the toys and tried to keep them busy somehow in different situations, so they would be doing something and keeping busy.

This is exactly what the Creator does with us, just as you thought of what to give your children and what you wanted to bring them to, so does He relate to each of us.

Solve His riddles like a wise child solves what his parents devise: Why did mother arrange the toys this way; why did she give me these pictures, why is she playing this music, why did she turn on the TV on this particular channel, etc.? There is a subtle clue in all this about the response she expects from her child.

So look for the answer to the question: “What is the response that the Creator is expecting of me to each of the states that constantly emerge?” In the question itself, look for the answers in the actual questions. Demand that He give you the answers: “What do You want from me?”

Question: I demand, but He doesn’t listen.

Answer: He doesn’t listen?! You don’t listen, since your ear is actually egoistic, your heart is egoistic; otherwise, you would hear Him.

When you want to hear not for yourself but in order to bring Him joy, you will immediately begin to hear, all your senses will open up. Instead of the five corporeal senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch) the inner senses will open: Keter, Hochma, Bina, Zeir Anpin and Malchut.

But in order to do that I have to constantly worry about: “How does He feel my response? How should I respond so He will be glad? How can I do that? Does it make Him happy? Perhaps I should try it on my friends.”

You will reach the understanding that the Creator has shattered you into a billion parts on purpose, so you will be able to sharpen your senses by hate, anger, love, envy, fear, etc. towards others, and they were all created to sharpen your senses towards Him.

Start focusing yourself on working with the environment this way, in order to later turn to the Creator. But in order to do that you must first love the other: “From the love of others to the love of the Creator.” You can start working with the other, try it and see whether they hear you or not.

Thus, you will gradually attain the recognition of the importance of the group. Otherwise, you will not tune yourself like a musical instrument in order to feel the Creator.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day One 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: How can I correct my ego? What should I do with the pain it causes me?

Answer: Simple, think only about how to do good unto others and rejoice at their joy. This is the only way we can transcend ourselves.

Question: But I am a human being! If I am cut it hurts. How can I think about others if I feel pain now?

Answer: Try to be in him instead of in you despite the pain. Is there any other way?

When you reach the state that you want to be in someone else instead of yourself and to feel only him and even the group, since there everything is “spread out,” and everything is selfless, and you cannot do that, the Creator will help you.

He will come to your aid, since here you are already asking for a change that you cannot perform by yourself. Then He will come and take you to the next level.

It is an anti-egoistic action. In the meantime you are not asking for it yet. When you cry out not because you feel bad in the exile on Egypt, but because you cannot bestow since you are in your ego, you will be awarded with the exit to the upper world!

However, you shouldn’t just hope for this, but act! You should clearly understand what it means to exit the ego, what the revelation of the Creator means, and what spiritual birth means.

If you want to perform anti-egoistic actions, it means that your suffering shouldn’t interest you anymore! You should only be interested in bestowal: “No matter what I feel, I cannot bestow, and that hurts. It hurts!” Then you are allowed to enter the upper world.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day One 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: The time of transition from one level to another depends upon what?

Answer: The time of transition from one level to another depends only on you. Each one of us must have free choice. If I depend on others, I have no free choice.

That is, on the one hand we depend upon each other absolutely, but on the other hand, we don’t depend on anyone at all. I must tell myself that the entire group is found in an ideal state and that everything depends on me alone.

I need to consider this and clarify it in the following manner: “Everyone depends on me. But I also depend upon them. Will I be able to advance if I look at their faces? If they are friendly and inclined to be kind, then yes, and if they are not friendly, then no, so how should I behave?” Which is to say, their states and their influence on me also depends on me; I need to work on them. This is to say, I already depend on them but this depends on the degree that I can influence them myself. And here the opposite connection takes place, which also depends on you.

We can see and be convinced, that on one hand we are completely independent and free people, and on the other hand, are absolutely, mutually connected between us, and on the third hand, we can take from the others any form that we want. This means in fact, that we are always working in the presence of a group that is found in the infinite world, it’s only our ego that portrays them as we are describing them to ourselves now. Solely and only! And therefore, in order to advance, we need to “work” on them, to elevate them in our eyes. And in order to elevate them in our eyes, we must actually work.

During the process of spiritual work all questions will gradually become clearer because in order to clarify every one of them we need to create within us newer and newer sensations all the time, which we didn’t previously experience. Therefore think, clarify these questions, and in the end, they will mix together into one single whole, but this will already be a spiritual state. Then we will feel how much it is closed, complete.
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From the 2^nd Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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Question: Trying to feel the friend’s desire, will I be able to feel specifically that it is his desire and won’t confuse it with anything else?

Answer: I am not interested in the friend’s earthly desires. I am interested in something else since his desire is the same as mine. To achieve the spiritual goal, he needs my support and I need his. I need to think about this support.

I do not have to know his taste, what he likes to eat, drink, see, or hear. Only one thing is clear—his desire is the same as mine. He wants to achieve the same goal as I do: to reveal the upper world, to reveal himself in the eternal perfect state, in the property of bestowal. That is why I understand how I can help him, what I can give him.

If you want to understand him, understand yourself. It’s very simple. There are no excuses. It’s all so natural that you should take this as a basis and begin to act.
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From the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 2

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Question: Can we advance faster without an inner crisis? How could we do that?

Answer: We can go through inner crises at unlimited speed, at least ten crises a minute.

Then, you will see that time expands. Perhaps, you already feel that sometimes a second lasts much longer. It is as if it stretches. You enter it and it has a volume. You actually will feel that.

So, it is possible to go through many states per second, but then again, it is serious internal work in the group. We need the friends to remind us constantly about that. When there is constant mutual support, you enter another dimension.
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From the Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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The topic of the lesson is “How do we reach the love of the Creator from the love of friends.” Our main goal and actually the only one is to reach the love of the Creator, which is the attribute of bestowal. All the other goals are only the basis for attaining the one goal and understanding it.

“Loving the attribute of bestowal” means being constantly in this attribute, wanting and yearning for this love. So how is it possible to yearn for the attribute of bestowal and to love it in the same way that we are currently subconsciously and instinctively attracted to receiving, to feel the filling inside us?

I constantly feel that something is missing. I choose the optimal, most comfortable position automatically; out of all the possible conditions, I choose to receive the maximum pleasure in life that minimizes effort. This is how we are programmed, and so our body and every cell in our body constantly work according to this principle. So how can we reach the same situation but in its opposite form, to receive pleasure from the attribute of bestowal and choose automatically how to do our best and bring Him contentment all the time?

This is possible only if I love someone very much. Then I am constantly focused only on giving him as much as possible. Just like a mother who holds her baby and thinks only about how she can give him more, constantly checking what he needs. We can observe how a mother constantly looks at her child, and all her thoughts are focused only on him. This is the attitude we should have with regard to the attribute of bestowal, to general love.

No matter how much I try to convince myself that the people around me are me, parts of my soul who are intentionally depicted to me as foreign “creatures,” I don’t perceive them as something that I need and that belongs to me. The attribute of bestowal is perceived as an unclear, abstract concept. The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that the attribute of bestowal is formless and is not felt in itself but is revealed only with regard to someone else.

We are the carriers of this attribute! So how can we express it; how can we feel that we enjoy bestowing upon the other and that there is no other pleasure for us?

If I felt pleasure every time I bestowed upon the other, it would be much easier to bestow, then it would be to bestow in order to receive, which means that the ego is disguised, concealed receiving, and nothing would allow me to exit myself. People bestow a great deal in their life in order to receive pleasure. We constantly make a living in order to exchange the fruit of our efforts for pleasure and different fillings and comforts.

But how can I rise above that and bestow in order to bestow so that the actual action will also take place in the other and the pleasure will be felt in others and not in me, not in my ego, not in my desires, as if I have entered the other? Is that possible? No it is impossible! We cannot reach this by our nature, and in order to do so we need the intervention and the cooperation of the upper attribute of bestowal that is external to us and detached from our ego.

The upper force called Creator must help me detach from myself and start feeling the actions, the result and also the filling of the result, which is all external to me. I remain with only my Reshimot (spiritual genes), with the point in the heart. My ego will not be filled anymore and will remain empty. Only the law of the “first restriction” operates on it according to which egoistic desires cannot be filled.

This means that I have to totally give up the desire to feel pleasure inside me and to move on to the feeling of pleasure in others, to turn it to my own. I don’t want to weaken you, but a person is usually scared when he suddenly understands how far this is from our egoistic reality.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day Three 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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