Looking at the creation as a whole, in every object, in every part of it, we can recognize a measure of desire: desire to preserve itself, its properties, its state. This pertains to any part of inanimate, vegetative, animal, and human nature. Each one is characterized by a particular degree of desire since desire was the only thing that was created. On our part, we just add to it when we have a chance to work above it.

At the still, vegetative, and animal levels, we live within desire and don’t understand how it can be changed in height, size, and application. On the other hand, a human degree in a person acquires a capacity to comprehend this, start wanting to change, and apply the desire in a different manner, and this ability to modify the application and realization of desire doesn’t let us rest.

We see how people live today: society dictates the size and nature of their desire, and they, like soldiers, strive to carry out the orders they receive. After all, they are given an impression that it’s for their own good. However, those who receive an additional need to work above their nature, above their desire, which is, in fact, nature’s entire material, are deprived of rest. They wish to learn, desire to know how matter, nature, can be employed, how to re-direct and “deploy” oneself so as to achieve something above nature. This is a totally different approach: not to be inside nature, but namely above it.

This is what the science of Kabbalah teaches: to use desire living not in it, but above it in order to keep attaining the upper reality. “Upper” means above desire, above the creation’s matter. We must learn how to govern desire to remain above it without sinking to the bottom, but, rather, going with the waves and using the breath of the wind, the “spirit” breathing over the sea. We need to live by something that lies above these “depths,” to breathe air, inflate sails with the wind and use the water solely to glide over its surface.

That’s what we gradually learn in this study. We learn to use our nature, the matter of desire, to control it from outside of ourselves, to restrict and turn it in the required direction, to verify and modify it, not as our nature dictates, but as we choose. This ability we can obtain with the help of the science of Kabbalah by studying the systems we have to know and as a whole, the system of the worlds, 125 steps of changes, calibration of desire. We figure out how to use it each step of the way in order to achieve something above it.

In addition, above it, we reach the degree of the upper force that created this desire in which all of mankind lives. We use the matter of desire solely to “ascend” over it and form for ourselves a spirit, equivalent to the upper force. This is the spiritual equivalent called “Human” (Adam).

Thereby, we use the matter itself and the force that created it; we construct ourselves from both. This is how a person becomes independent from matter, meaning desire, and from the force, meaning the Creator who created this desire, and gets on his feet on his own. Now, he is comprised of matter and spirit, but in the form he has found by himself and has chosen freely.

This is what our goal is, and we won’t rest until we reach it. That’s how we are made. Some will select this path by necessity, as simple workers. However, they will have to comprehend their task, although not at high degrees, not at the level of the root cause of creation. They will follow us, whereas we won’t be at peace until we attain the equivalence that we are to create on our own, the image of Man, free from both the creation as well as the Creator. From Him, we only learn how to build ourselves in His likeness, but the Creator does not obligate us to it. On the contrary, it is the independent evolution that allows us to realize that His form is the most correct one, the best, most desirable, and profound.

Yet, we do not accept the importance of this form automatically, but rather, work by way of “faith above reason,” become unplugged from the conditions of our material and the upper force, and in this disconnection from everything, attain the value of the property of bestowal which is the highest there is.

These things will unfold in us later on, but for now they already should be giving us a some sense of importance and understanding of the work that requires us to rise constantly above the mundane. We seek pleasure in part from knowledge, habits, and all types of values that have been planted in us. We strive to ascend just as high as possible and enjoy changes, even if it is not very pleasant for our matter.

We simply need to get used to it. Spirituality, or the new form, by way of small actions, time after time, pulls us higher and higher, a little more and then more. And spirituality should be something that we desire.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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If a person intends to bestow upon others without any resistance, not against his will, then it is the same as the whole world does, as is accepted among different beliefs and fanatic religions.

There are many charities that help people in hospitals and in other difficult situations. Their desires are consistent with their actions, and therefore it is called “bestowal” only in action. After all, the action, the intention, and the desire are all in one direction, not meeting any inner resistance. So a person is in high spirits, feeling good about himself since he believes that he receives a reward in this world and in the next world.

We, however, act against our natural desire, and feel the inner resistance since we don’t want to bestow and to love others. First we discover an empty space inside us, and we don’t feel any inclination, attraction, or connection to bestowal. But when we begin to work by rising above all that, we come out into the spiritual space.

This kind of work really bears fruit. It doesn’t dull us like in the fanatic approach since there is a difference between receiving and bestowal. After all, our inner desire is to receive according to our nature, but if we rise above this natural desire and yearn for bestowal, looking for an environment, a society, that will help us build this attribute inside us, then we are obligated to draw the force of the Creator that will help us become bestowers over our egoistic desire.

Therefore, we need an environment that needs the Creator, since otherwise we will not be able to establish bestowal on top of receiving. Then we will be able to build the inner space inside us that will be filled with the Light, and in it we will start feeling and understanding all of the upper spiritual reality.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/22/13, Writings of Rabash 

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Baal HaSulam, Shamati, article 25, “Things that Come from the Heart”: In other words, all the concepts upon which he builds his building, saying one must always follow in the path of the Creator, is founded in the Dvekut with his teacher. Thus, if he loses the foundation, then all the concepts are powerless, since they will now be lacking the foundation.

Hence, one must not rely on one’s own mind, but cleave once more to books and authors, for only that can help him, and no wit and intellect, as they are lifeless.

Question: What is adhesion?

Answer: On the whole, adhesion is when two people have the same desires, the same thoughts, and the same values. In that case they are “adhered” to one another.

The question is how can two people who are so different be adhered? They are different in every sense and do not match in any way. There cannot be perfect adaptation in nature, so can they attain resemblance and become “adhered” to one another?

If each side rises above himself and doesn’t want to use his attributes for himself, but rather gives the other everything that is in him, and the other also wants to rise above his personal interests and to act in favor of the other, then they resemble one another. In what way? In giving, in bestowal, which means that they are “adhered.”

How can this be attained? They cannot do this on their own, the Light is needed here to connect them. This means that in order to be adhered, two people need the Creator between them. It is a kind of a “sandwich” with the Light in the middle, and this is called a spiritual unit. You can also compare it to a small dumbbell.

Question: So how can we draw the Light so that the adhesion will be realized?

Answer: First, each one has to rise above himself and ask himself: “Why should I adhere to someone? What is adhesion? Could it be that I want to connect with others to achieve something in this world, like in socialism? Or do I want it in order to attain the Creator? Who is the Creator?”

In short, in order to reach the simplest action, I have to renew the whole system since there is no halfway in spirituality; everything in it is integral. Just like in a holographic picture where in order to change a small line I need the right scale to change the whole picture.

So every question that we have actually includes everything in it. If you ask what we have to do, the answer is simple—do it all. We need to clarify who the Creator is, what we need this for, what the act of creation is, what freewill is, and what “each one shall help his brother” is, what the group is, etc. Everything should be included in this. We can see this picture in different resolutions, but one way or the other, everything is in it.

Question: Can we rise above our general, “round” desire to receive like in a hot air balloon, and keep this general state between us?

Answer: Each of us is an egoist, and spirituality is what is between us connecting and bringing us together.

What I feel inside me now is called “this world,” and what I feel between us is called “the upper world.”

If you and I are close to one another and differ only by one measure (1), then I feel the Light of Nefesh. If the difference between us is doubled (2), I attain the Light of Ruach between us since now I have overcome a greater distance. On the one hand, our ego grows and separates us, but on the other hand, we adhere to one another despite the ego, and by that attain a greater intensity.

Our mission is to hold on to this state and to constantly return to it, and if you want, you can take it upon yourself. What else do you have to do in this world except for that? Take a decision where your life should flow and whether you want it to flow in the spiritual dimension. I cannot dictate this to you. At the Arava convention I gave you an example of what you should do. If you want to fulfill this, then do it and the results will be according to this fulfillment.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #25

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Question: I think that we proved at the Arava convention that everything is possible. What’s next?

Answer: The problem is this: In this world when I see a goal and it is important in my eyes, I have enough energy and vigor to attain it, but if the goal isn’t obvious or isn’t important, then I have no strength for the work: “Really, why should I work hard?”

In the end, our problem is recognizing the importance of the goal. This importance is deliberately diminished so that we will create new importance each time, so that there will be a new creation for us, a new spiritual world, everything new.

And we, with the friends, need to build this ourselves. They need to tell me how important the spiritual path is even though they themselves don’t feel it. But we are committed to each other, and this is called Arvut (mutual guarantee). This means that we constantly need to tell each other how important it is, as a mother or grandmother tells the same bedtime story to a child.

Tell me, what was so special at our convention? What were your deepest impressions? Was there something tangible there? No. Did you receive something in your hand? No. Do you feel, hear, see, or taste spirituality? No. Actually there was nothing there, simply “you were filled with hot air” like a balloon, and from your swelling, you began to fly upwards. That was your entire convention.

So what is stopping you from doing that now? Why can’t you rise even higher? Specifically now when you feel heaviness and lack of interest, when all kinds of calculations appear to you, and you begin to think in a more “realistic” way—specifically now begin to act.

Question: At the convention, we, as if, banged our heads against the wall in that we tried to attain something impossible until we discovered that it is possible, albeit at a minimal level. And that means that everything is possible.

Answer: Excellent. Now continue. But don’t think that a spiritual sensation was revealed to you to a small degree to give you a solid basis for further steps. The opposite is true, your heart will be burdened, difficulties will be added, you will be forced to forget it, as if it doesn’t exist at all. They will take back from you all the “advance payment,” otherwise it will turn into an egoistic basis for advancement: “It is worthwhile to go forward since it is pleasant and wonderful. I want that kind of life.” This isn’t spiritual anymore, but Klipot (shells). Previously it wasn’t there, and now it appears. It is also, of course, an attainment, but not the one you were waiting for.

In short, continue. It is especially now that we begin to work with spiritual discernments: a little virtue, a little self-annulment, importance… we passed the hardest period, and now each time there will be something real, concrete. You will feel these things, “in your hand,” you will “ taste” them, you will feel them as internal heaviness, as resistance. In a while, you will even begin to measure them.

We passed the hardest stage, where we didn’t know where we were, what is happening, like a baby who just was born and still doesn’t really hear, or see, or respond…. and now begins the new stage.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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Question: At one of the Arava congress workshops there was a question about the point of no return that we have to pass through on the path. How are we supposed to pass through it: individually or together with the entire group?

Answer: As it advances, the united group overcomes all stages of the path. Although everyone may be undergoing a particular state at his level, in fact, we all are going together.

Question: So, is it possible that the group will “drag” me through a certain state?

Answer: The group doesn’t act selectively, choosing him and only him; it “pulls” everyone forward. No one advances alone; our entire way is by the group. No matter how much a person puts in, he still “eats” what the others do. It may be in a lesser degree, but he still moves along with all the others. And hence, everyone passes the Machsom; everyone comes out of Egypt, including the “children,” “women,” “men,” and “elderly.”
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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Question: What is the relationship between quantity and quality of a congress? When there are more of us, how does it reflect on the quality?

Answer: Today, considering what state the world is in and what this puts before us, it is our duty to admit everybody and in this broad audience preserve ourselves as the nucleus. We need both factors together.

We can’t screen out those who don’t attend lessons daily, do not pay maaser, and so on. The congress will not be more powerful because of it. We should be guided by what Nature demonstrates to us. The Creator opens the doors to everyone, although the public is not in a hurry to enter. I hope that in the coming year, people will “digest” and understand the events of the recent years, including the crisis, despair, and all the rest. It takes time: A person reads something, hears about something, and little by little, it settles down in him until he sees how the world becomes “bleaker,” and “dissipates” without more to offer.

I hope that in this year, along with the broadest dissemination, we will be able to accomplish something…
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, Shamati #213

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Question: How do we become a lower Partzuf that annuls itself before the upper one and requests to be created in the spiritual world during the congress?

Answer: Our upper Partzuf is the group and only there does the Creator get revealed. We transform the group into Malchut, the Shechina, while the upper for it is Zeir Anpin, the Creator. We need to induce the state in which our connection with the upper force is revealed.

It’s quite doable and very likely to happen. Illumination from this state will certainly be granted to us, and we are already receiving it, everyone according to one’s degree. But when we truly connect, then instead of a personal illumination, we reveal the Light.

It will also be revealed to each person in the degree that one has achieved unity and exerted oneself. But it will be a clearly defined portion of Light and not some external illumination. I am confident that not only at the men’s but also the women’s congress we can feel such illumination. Our group’s annulment before the upper means that everyone renounces oneself in full force for the sake of unity and inclusion in all the others, and will lose one’s material self there and exist solely under the spiritual influence.

We studied in the article “600,000 Souls” that there is only one soul, everyone attains only it, and plugs into the very same soul. In truth, there is no division and only the force of the shattering is causing us pain right now because we think each of us has his or her own personal soul. We imagine it only because we haven’t reached complete attainment yet and remain in confusion, fog, and loss of awareness. Therefore, at the congress, we wish to plug into this one soul.
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From 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/10/13, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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The most unusual thing in the wisdom of Kabbalah occurs when a beginner hears the message about “love, unity, and mutual inclusion” that are totally contrary to our natural desires. In the beginning, Kabbalah appears to us as a conventional, hard science: “I want to understand the system, study phenomena behind the façade of nature, comprehend the upper force and the principles of Its work, learn the laws of universe, and find the hidden causes of history…” In other words, a person tends to study concrete formulas, and then he discovers that it is all about love.

Is there anybody who seriously addresses this subject? Hollywood? Serious people are sitting in Wall Street, whereas love is the domain for odd fellows and “Bohemians…”

It takes a lot of time to start understanding the message of love. It takes years to have this information “go under the skin” and reach one’s heart. Our egoism is not willing to accept things like love, nor does it allow the message that only through unity we reveal a new reality and that only due to love we rise to our highest state, become more kind-hearted and reveal new worlds. Our material experience doesn’t provide any examples of the above, nor does it prove these statements in any way.

Some people are more prone to accept these ideas; to others, this message is really hard to apprehend. It depends on the readiness of our souls and on the “depth” of the desire (Aviut). It also requires persistence, diligence, and a sense of utter necessity to achieve this state. If both factors, a strong rejection and an overwhelming attraction, force us to stay on our path no matter what, then, even before we reach love, we still discover that everything depends on our qualities. The upper Light influences us and triggers various impressions in us; thus, we begin realizing that our internal changes either shut or open the image of the upper world to us.

Something “clicks” inside us and we begin seeing much more and having keener sensations than ever before. We keep penetrating into the structure of reality; we acquire a clearer and wider understanding of it… Everything depends on our heart. It is the place where we sense and distinguish between everybody and everything that are within the field of our vision and sensations.

Then, the “door” shuts, as if a black cloud descends on our feelings and intellect, and now again, we stop understanding and feeling anything, as if we are walking in a dream and can hardly cope with our responsibilities. Time passes, the door opens again, and then, it shuts again. So gradually we begin realizing that everything depends on the level of openness or closure of our mind and senses.

And then we penetrate deeper into the core of the mechanism that closes and opens the doors. After we go through all these states many times, we realize that the “door” leads us not just somewhere outside us, but to others. When we feel extremely close to them, our eyes and ears open and we advance. When we are farther from them, everything shuts down.

This is the way the Light impacts us, thus gradually forming the connection between our feelings and mind and by building our attitude to our friends, adding more mutual care, deepening sensations and openness to each other, making us familiar with the upper world and the upper state. At this phase, a person realizes that this world is not somewhere in the clouds, nor it is behind the horizon, but rather concretely in our sensations: The more we open ourselves to others, the higher we rise.

Gradually, we approach the “edges” and start distinguishing the details of our desire to receive. We separate it into steps and levels; in view of that, we build the desires next to the mind.

It takes time. We have to include ourselves into the group as much as only we can; literally “throw ourselves” into the group as into the sea; “lose” ourselves in it, dissolve into our friends. Due to this kind of “self-annihilation,” one “soaks” in others and realizes that “it’s not important what we get from this connection and mutual-inclusion. Everything that comes from our friends is the territory of the Creator. Everything that is in me is the territory of the evil inclination, the “angel of death.”

When one realizes this much, the requirement “to love one’s friends” emerges. One feels that he needs them and strives to relate to them as if they were very close to him, as a mother who permanently internally embraces her children in order to protect them from harm.

From this point on, it gets much easier to advance, since one has already built one’s path correctly: One already knows that everything is inside him, inside his sensations, in his attitude to his friends and neighbors who in fact are the parts of his own soul. He understands that instead of seeing externality in the shape of inanimate, vegetative, and animate nature, he has to observe “external” details that are produced by his mind and senses as something that belong to him, but at the same time is separated from him by the “cloud” and “dust” that cover one’s perception of the world. It means that one has to return a clear picture even though there is a confusion created by the evil inclination; he tends to merge with the correct picture of the world and become one unified feeling and intellect.

This is the essence of our work. If we manage to do it, we gradually will ascend the ladder of the worlds. To the degree of our ability to return our “external” parts, we sense them as being filled with the upper Light.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/16/13, “Love of Friends

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Now, after the “Flame in the Desert” convention we will go through many states. We have attained a certain level of connection, unity, detachment from matter, the importance of annulling ourselves before the friends, different inner spiritual discernments that are close to a real spiritual level.

We have no control over the process we are going through, and we advance according to the order of the Lights and vessels. We are between them like between a millstone, and different forces constantly operate on us advancing us towards the goal, according to our understanding, agreement, will, and support of their action.

Eventually, all the work of the “millstone” is only according to our agreement, that can be under the influence and pressure of sufferings, or by the help of the Light that Reforms. We don’t do anything by ourselves; this work is called “God’s work,” but we have to agree with the actions and want it to take place, although it is against our basic nature.

Since this work is against our nature and we feel it as very difficult, against our will, it allows us to become free, to have freewill and to transcend our nature.

Now after our convention, we go through very special states, and we must use them as quickly as possible to rise above them a few steps ahead. Therefore, these days are very important for whoever participated in the convention physically, mentally, and virtually. We now have to process everything we have received in the convention correctly, as much as we can, and to continue our advancement forward quickly.

The processing of the states is in clarifying the importance, who do we attribute it to, is it important that we have somehow discovered the connection with the Creator, with the spiritual space, with self-detachment, with the new space in which we can really live and after which there is an opening, and if I am born there, then I am born in a new reality, in some matrix, in a new dimension; or do I sink into the current of ordinary life and return to my ordinary animal life?

It is very important to rise above our matter, above the desire to receive that actually pulls us “by our feet” back into the abyss of the ego the moment we want to rise a bit. We, however, have to try and rise.

This effort can succeed only if we operate together, like in the convention where we attained a new level only thanks to the connection for which we have received powers from Above and felt that there is something above nature.

This is how we should continue now, so that all the forms of the egoistic desire and the thoughts that cross our mind will immediately be incorporated in the new ascent. Then we will constantly, every minute, rise higher and higher and will not wait until all these awakenings that the Creator is sending us in the form of the “hardening of the heart,” as an addition to the egoistic desire, as strange thoughts, as blurring and fatigue, will add up to a “big account,” and then we would have to go through them through the path of sufferings and different blows.

On the contrary, every moment we have to go on and on and thus “one penny is added to another and they make up a big account.” We shouldn’t wait until these “pennies” accumulate by themselves; it is much more difficult and disrespectful in the eyes of the Creator; in the eyes of the Creator it is respectful when you don’t leave Him.

So while reading The Zohar we have to connect and to think about how to receive help from Above in order not to break away from the great appreciation we feel towards self-annulment, connection, love, self-detachment and adhesion to the Creator.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/21/13, The Zohar

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 141:I am found nowhere but in the Torah. Therefore, keep the Torah and look for Me there, and the Light in it will reform you and you will find Me,” as it is written, “Those that seek Me shall find Me.”

This is what we try to do, striving to connect as one man in one heart, attaining mutual guarantee and “love your neighbor as yourself” by showing our readiness for such a connection during the study. And then in each moment, we reveal how much we are incapable of this, and then again we try, despite everything, to think about unity and connection.

We hope that our study and connection will help us reveal the Creator in order to bring Him pleasure. This becomes the prayer during the study, an action of correction, and it draws us nearer to the goal. If the friends try to connect in the right way, raise their points in the heart above their ego, free from its control, and connect them, which takes place during the lesson, which tells about such states, then in this we attract the Reforming Light. And this is actually our exertion.

There will always be disturbances, more and more. Therefore, we need to strengthen each other, and precisely then, when the despair comes and big obstacles appear in the path, a person is helpless before them, doesn’t know what to do, wants to escape, gets tired and falls, falls asleep or the opposite, becomes angry and cannot bear this state. But precisely these states are the most beneficial for adding one more drop of work, another ounce of effort, by which we attract the Light on us.

One who does not despair and give up is the one who succeeds. Here neither wisdom nor force will help, only patience. Time will do it.

“Time” symbolizes numerous efforts that a person does in each moment, even the smallest ones. These efforts accumulate, connect, and in the end, bring a solution.
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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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