Here is an inner exercise: We are far from each other in our qualities and thoughts—foreign and different ones; we are separated by everyone’s individual egoism. There are so many of us, and we differ so much from each other in order to reveal the Creator through our connection.

Our differences, distance, and rejection show the distance to the Creator. I see how far I am from the people who study with me, who are my closest people in the world in spirit, purpose, aspiration, and understanding of life. And we are still so far from each other. I am even more distant from all the other people in the world. If I test myself in relation to every person, then this entire cumulative difference will be the distance between me and the Creator.

Now the meaning of the group becomes clearer. This is why we unite between us: We want to be able to achieve some kind of correspondence at least between us and become closer to each other, which means to be closer to the Creator. We aspire to at least overcome the difference between us. We push our egoism away, rise above it, and wish to connect only with our higher thoughts and desires, to become closer to the Creator in one form or another.

This way we begin the journey. And then we will see that there are no people here, there are no individual souls, there is nothing—only a blurry vision, which causes me to see people instead of the Creator. It is as if I am not able to focus; everything is blurry, and instead of one person, I see two, three, or four. And now I see billions of bodies before me. But if I manage to combine them all, I’ll get the Creator.

This is what I need the group for: to start this process one way or another. All our unity exercises must be directed towards the revelation of the Creator! After all, they are a means for revealing Him. There is no meaning in a group on its own, but only from the point of view expressed as: “Israel, the Torah, and the Creator are one.”

Baal HaSulam writes that there was a horrible crime done in the socialist Russia in starting to build an altruistic society and having completely deformed the principle of being one man with one heart, one desire, one purpose. Everyone was together; fair distribution, mutual guarantee, everything was wonderful, except for one thing: They have turned a means for attaining the goal into their goal. And this made them lose big time.

It is the same as focusing and combining blurry images in order to see them themselves, and not what stands behind them. And I will naturally miss because my focus is not on the image concealed behind these illusions, but on the illusions. And this is why Russia has failed.

We cannot allow for this to happen to us, and this is why there must always be three components present: I, the group (the place and the means for revelation), and the Creator, that is, the revelation of the Creator to the created beings.
[62147]
From Lesson 2 at Arava Convention 10/28/2011

Related Material:
Why Are We So Different?
Penetrating The Wall
The Desire That Burns The Stone

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Inner Work, Mutual Guarantee - No Comments →

When I use everything that exists outside of me for my own sake, it is egoistic usage. But when there is a reality outside of me, which aspires to the same goal as me, then the same intentions that exist within me also awaken in my soul, in all the desires that are external to me. And this is why I begin to work with these external desires referred to as friends.

From this we can understand that the group is my soul, the place where I reveal the Creator, my inner fulfillment, the spiritual life. From the entire external reality the Light organizes certain forces for me called the group, which are closest to my point in the heart that exists inside my body, inside my ego. And then I can establish a connection between my point in the heart, confined inside the body, and my soul that exists outside of me.

This is how I begin to acquire these external desires. This is why it is written: “Buy yourself a friend.” I buy my external desires by rejecting my ego, the desires to enjoy, making gifts, and doing different actions in the group.

This can help us understand the meaning of internal work, when I make an effort against my egoistic desire, inside my point in the heart, so I would connect with my external desires and transfer myself there as much as possible. And I do this until I entirely begin to only be fulfilled inside these external desires, instead of fulfilling my inner, natural, egoistic, desires.

The worlds, including the world of Infinity, the entire universe become revealed to me inside these external desires. But my ego will resist and serve by “help made against” me to show me the desires that are still left outside of me, and it will do it to the very end, until I acquire all the external desires. I will not be able to reveal whatever is around me without my ego awakening inside of me.

There is a universe, and I, my ego, and my point in the heart exist inside it. My closest circle is my group, my friends. And then the rest of the world follows: humanity, the animate, vegetative, and still nature. Or we can treat it as worlds with which I work: Assiya, Yetzira, Beria, Atzilut, and Adam Kadmon.

This makes it clear why I need this entire world, the so-called 99% who personally are unable to help me, and this is why I must simply give to them one-sidedly. The only ones who can help me are the group, given to me by the Creator so that I manage to come out of myself, my boundaries. The main thing is to get out of myself—it is the most difficult thing to do.

This is why it is arranged to have one area in the entire large soul, which would be closest to me, and it is called the group. It helps me come out of myself and start acquiring my soul.

And when I come out of myself, I advance even further, together with the group beyond its boundaries, connecting the entire universe to me and attaining all of nature as one whole. I attain the integrity of nature, its full connection, and thus reveal the upper worlds.

I reveal an even greater Light by attaining a connection with the spiritual forces on lower degrees: “humanity,” “animals,” “plants,” and the “inanimate” where a larger desire to enjoy exists.
[64053]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/16/2011, Writings of Rabash

Related Material:
The Liberators
Blunting The Illusion Of The Breaking
A Soul Is What I Gave Away

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work - No Comments →

Question: The students of Rabbi Shimon hated each other in the beginning of their studies, but still they aspired to achieve unity. With experience, a person learns to view himself objectively, even when he’s in a state of hatred. Is it possible that the hatred could blind a person’s analytical point, or does his objective view always remain?

Answer: This depends on the state. Sometimes the emotions take us over, leaving no room for analysis. This is when we are capable of doing terrible things. And sometimes emotions are balanced by the mind, and I remain in control of the situation only to be amazed at my own emotions. In addition, I could also be aware that the current state is sent to me by the Creator. The upper force is the source of this state, and it is sent to me in order to advance me along the path.

Hence, everything depends on our awareness. How can we activate it today? Can we constantly remember that all of our states come from Above so that we would correctly overcome them and draw benefit from each one of them?

We can attain this state only through mutual responsibility thanks to which we maintain a connection with the environment or the group. If I’m constantly under the influence of my environment and I invest my effort whenever I’m able to, then I can constantly receive from my friends an illumination, the Surrounding Light. The greater our connection, the more Light I receive from them, whereas on my own I have absolutely no chances of achieving anything.

To the extent of my ability I participate in all of the group’s activities. If I don’t have the opportunity to do so, for example, if I wasn’t given the opportunity from Above to go to the convention, then regrettably I remain home with the understanding that this state was given to me by the Creator, and therefore it’s probably the optimal state for my development.

Most importantly, you should use each moment to ensure a proper environment for yourself. After all, what happens in the next moment is concealed from me.

In our world a person makes payments for health insurance, to social security, and other private insurances in order to secure his future. Whatever happened in the past happened, but we are always concerned with what will happen in the future. To the extent of my ability, I have to ensure that the future is better or at least not worst than the present. This means that I must remain in the correct environment and strengthen it if possible.

I have no other options. Unlike in the modern financial system, here we have no concessions: You get exactly what you put in. I invest penny by penny into my environment and receive the Light from it. Essentially, it is the Malchut of the world of Infinity. This is my cash register, and there is no other place for me to invest.

This explains the importance of dissemination. After all, by disseminating you invest into your environment; it is your broader, albeit still potential, environment. These efforts are also accounted for.

Ultimately my work creates “assets” (Zchut) that are registered in my spiritual “bank.” To the extent of my investment, I receive the Light from the group and become more pure (Zach).
[62157]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/30/2011, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose”

Related Material:
An Unbearable Distinction From The Creator
The Egoistic Feast Goes On
What Is More Important: The Speed Or The Depth Of The Analysis?

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work, Q&A - 1 Comment →

My goal is to constantly reveal the extent to which I am unable to connect everything together into “one man with one heart,” and to demand the Torah whose Light reforms. This Light reaches us from the source of AB-SAG (Hochma and Bina together).

After all, we are unable to attain Keter itself, but only through our actions in the Light of Hochma and the Light of Hassidim. And all of this is revealed in ZON: in the broken and divided creature. Thus we correct ourselves each time.

This is why it is said that first of all there will be the correction of the world and only afterwards the final correction. After all, “world” means “muteness” (Elem), “concealment” (Alama), separation. The Light of One, which connects everything together and directs everything from one upper source, first of all carries out the correction and connects everything that I feel in my sensation of reality together.

And then depending on how opposite and scattered these poles are in my perception and depending on how much Light that Reforms I attract, which connects everything above their differences into One, to the extent of this gap between separation and unity, I discover the magnitude of my spiritual vessel or desire.

In this vessel I feel the power of the Light revealed as Nefesh, Ruach, Neshma, Haya, and Yechida. The kind of Light I feel depends on the difference between the broken and separated desires connected by the Light above themselves into one general intention to use themselves for the sake of bestowal.

From this we understand the meaning of “for the sake of bestowal,” which means that I can connect with someone in one action, with one goal. Egotistically, it isn’t possible to act together, with one goal. Indeed, each one wants to act for himself, to fulfill his private desires. Thus, within the ego, the concept of One cannot exist, only the concept of “many.”

If we are speaking of One, which means the connection into a single whole, the return to Him, the revelation of the One (since actually there is none else besides Him, and everything else is the worlds, “concealments”), then this concept exists only outside of the egotistic desire. That is, it exists in the desires of others, in order to connect them all by the intention to bestow together to that One.

From this picture it becomes clear that only through bestowal can we succeed in reaching common actions and reach one result from the numerous actions that aspire to unite together. This is impossible in egoistic reception, but only if we exit our egoism and move outside towards the mutual goal, outside of our personal egoistic interests.
[61871]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/27/2011, Shamati #69

Related Material:
Infinity: The Summit Of Attainment
Understand One Another And Reveal The Creator
From The Light Of Nefesh To Yechida

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work - No Comments →

The Creator in defined by the concept of “One,” as it is said: “One, Unique, and Unified.” This is how He reveals Himself to us. When Kabbalists attain the Light of Infinity, the highest point we can possibly attain, they discover One concept that includes everything without any differences.

In the beginning everything was included into this single concept: all the created beings as one creation. Afterwards, in order to give the created beings a feeling of existence, understanding, and attainment of who they are and who the Creator is and to make them appreciate the complete and eternal state in which they exist, this single concept was divided into numerous individual concepts that are opposite to Him.

This is how the descent from the world of Infinity up to this world occurs, according to the rungs of the ladder, through the five worlds (Adam Kadmon, Atzilut, Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya). Within them, a huge number of changes take place. This descent of the worlds goes on until it reaches our world in which we are completely detached from perfection and even from the feeling of the lack thereof.

But it is especially due to this that we begin to attain unity, the One. It is due to our efforts to correct our view point of the world, our perception of reality through our five senses and above them, as much as we can imagine it to ourselves, and to connect everything to the single One.

We have no other work: only to connect everything together into One concept. Each one connects his perception of the world to One, and everyone connects their perceptions together so that everything merges into One. And this work is applied primarily in the group, with the help of the efforts of the many who want to determine the concept of this One above all the differences between them.
[61878]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/27/2011, Shamati #69

Related Material:
Joining Everything Into One
When The Heart And Mind Unite As One
The Force That Reveals The Spiritual World

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work - No Comments →

Rabash, “Love of Friends” (abridged version): The only way to enter the spiritual world and obtain a new sensation is for a few people to get together who have a small desire to exit their egoism. However, they can’t do it independently without help from outside. Even if they try to get together to connect, they can’t. In order for them to be able to connect, they need the influence of the general Light. Since the Light comes from the One, Unique, and Unified, it unites our desires into a single desire. Each person senses a unified creation where we merge in our desires, and the Light fulfills us.

Each one of them has the potential to reveal the quality of bestowal, but they can’t realize it in action. However, each of them enters the group. If each person who enters the group lowers himself before the group by accepting its conditions, then this group becomes a single body, a single desire.

Do all that’s in our power and redemption will come in an instant from Above, as soon as we exert a certain amount of effort in uniting. The main thing that we are faced with today is the unity of friends. Our only goal is to obtain such unity, effort, and intention between us so that this would attract the Light’s influence, and the Light will complete the work by uniting us. Exert more and more effort in this matter for it will redeem all of your shortcomings. Ultimately, when you all unite, you become similar to the Light.
[62485]
From Sunday Virtual Lesson Series 11/27/2011

Related Material:
The Light That Will Emerge From The Spark
Life-Giving Unity
When You Start Looking For A Group

Filed under: Group Work, Inner Work, Unity - No Comments →

Question: Today we are holding a Unity Day in the World Kli, which includes a special lesson, a seminar, and a friends’ assembly. On this day, how can we maintain the place of unity that we created at the Convention?

Answer: We have to renew this sensation on the background of the new conditions. We have to imagine the net of our interconnection, the state of unity we are in. We have to feel that this unity is working. I want to live it, and this sensation has to become constant for me. By being in it, I want to discern the feeling and the mind in it: how much we unite in feelings and intentions. I want to feel mutual guarantee from within, mutual support among everyone.

When being inside this net, I don’t have to yell to be heard. I demand from it that the friends, whom I imagine as its parts, won’t forget about me. After all, in essence, I am the one who needs help. Therefore, I want to join them, who are already united into one.

And let the Singular one be revealed in our unity, besides whom nothing exists. He created this system, formed and activated it so that in the end, by making our efforts we would reveal Him and reach unity with Him.

These thoughts must occupy a person constantly, until he sees this system with his own eyes.
[64217]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/25/11, “The Freedom”

Related Material:
Back To Unity
Expanding The Point Of Unity
The Birth Of The Point Of Unity

Filed under: Conventions, Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Mutual Guarantee, Q&A, Unity - No Comments →

The first condition based upon which I can become a human is to rise above my desire and begin to observe it from an external point. This way I see this desire from the side, I verify, examine, and clarify it by means of a special analysis from the side of the upper one, the Creator. After all, I always have to attain the advantage of the Light from the darkness, meaning on the contrast of my desire relative to another desire.

It’s for the purpose of giving me this other desire for comparison that this artificial structure exists, called the group, the friends. Relative to them I can verify my desire, and at some point in the future I will be able to do this relative to the Creator Himself.

However, at first I need to rise above my own desire and begin to clarify it, observing from the side, from my point in the heart, which is called faith above reason. This is how I receive the objective, unbiased point inside of my desire—at first one point, but gradually I will be able to make a full restriction.

This does not mean that I am restricting my desires, but rather that I feel separated from them, as if they are losing power over me. This is not a suppression of one desire by another, more beneficial one, but the acquisition of an independent point that really is on the side of the Creator, or at least on the side of the group. If I relate myself to the group, I can see myself from the side and control my desire from above.

The more I get separated from my desire and relate to it as a researcher, the more of a human I become. This is because the desire is on an animate level, and the development of the relationship is higher than this desire, which requires the human level. The whole difference between a human and an animal is in the realization, understanding, the feeling and the mind, which allow one to correctly control one’s desire.

Desire is the matter of creation, and control over it makes me similar to the Creator. This is because I take control out of His hands into mine, and I begin to rule over my desire in accordance to the Creator’s program, uniting with Him and fulfilling His desire.

So it turns out that my desire, consisting of the still, vegetative, and animate levels, thanks to my control takes on the human form. All of these levels are only needed for the sole purpose of supporting the human level, giving them form and existence inside of it, rising and descending together with it.

We need to clarify this with the help of the environment for at first we don’t have any contact with the Creator. And since we are talking about serious scientific research, and not about fantasies, we are given the work in a group through which we are working with the Creator and on our desire.

If I separate from my desire and relate myself to the group, then the group becomes the level of Bina for me, from which I connect with Keter and with Malchut, and thus I control the entire structure of the universe. That is why unity with the group and love towards thy friend are the only means for us to work effectively and consciously, a unique possibility to realize oneself and to reach the goal.
[64056]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/19/2011, Writings of Rabash

Related Material:
An Intermediate Form Between A Person And The Creator
From Love Of Created Beings To Love Of The Creator
A Soul Is What I Gave Away

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work - No Comments →

Question: Why does our analysis eventually become increasingly blurred and vague?

Answer: The point is that you are shattered. It says that the Creator created man simply, but people have made many calculations. After all, the shattering preceded us.

Fundamental questions become “blurred” in your eyes because you don’t pass them through the group. After all, you can clarify things only in the group, in the commonality that you want to solder into a single whole.

There is no other place you can look for answers. You are looking for them in your mind, but your mind is “flat,” superficial. Our job is to connect all the shattered parts into one vessel. This is why I come to the group. For me it is a picture of many parts, and I have to collect them into one.

In other words, the group is the “model” of the Creator. It seems that He is “shooting” at me from every direction, but I have to identify Him as one. Through the whole world, through all the confusion both inside and outside, I only want to see one source. So how can I do that?

I have been given a big world and in it, the group. It seems that there are friends and that we have to make great efforts. But in truth, by developing my attitude towards them, I connect to my personal parts. From total strangers we become one. Thus I correct and build my vessel, and then I understand what “unity” is.

In the convention we somewhat attained this feeling of unity, and this is our great achievement. We felt that above us there is mutual bestowal and love, a reciprocal, single sensation, when we are all connected. This is already the beginning of the spiritual world. After all, spirituality is the dimension in which the level of my equivalence to the Creator is revealed.

So I have to find the answers to the questions that seem so vague in the right place—only in the group.
[63983]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/22/2011, “The Freedom”

Related Material:
A Quiet Attack
Back To Unity
The Path To Goodness: Step by Step

Filed under: Conventions, Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work, Q&A - No Comments →

The Creator puts one’s hand on the good fate and says: “Take it!” He gives a person desire, awakens in him the question about the meaning of life and impressions, and arranges everything for him, bringing him to the place where he can realize himself, that is, to receive answers to his questions.

But the question is: Where is the person himself here? After all, everything is already predetermined by how I am structured, what kind of education I received, and how I was directed until this very moment. If I take a look back on my life, I will see that it was always turning somehow, like some kind of taut spring. And even though I don’t see clearly Who was turning it, nevertheless someone was arranging everything for me: gave me the question about the meaning of life, organized the group that I found, the books.

Everything is already organized from Above, and it’s as if they took me by the ear and brought me to the correct place. So where is my free choice here?

It turns out that free choice begins long after this. After you are brought to the group that is studying the wisdom of Kabbalah, you begin to study, receive impressions, and become overwhelmed with sensations, and it then seems to you that you finally found your place. But actually, you still don’t understand anything, and all of this is not yet what you need to reach.

The place of your free choice is that empty area, that white spot that you need to fill. It is ahead of you, and you still haven’t discovered it. In the meantime, you study and are thrown from state to state without any choice. When a bad state comes, you fall into depression, and when a good state comes, you are happy.

Sometimes you receive understanding because the desire to know everything appears in you; sometimes your feelings arise as the desire to feel awakens in you. And in this way you are taken through all kinds of states together with the group, with the environment. But in the meantime, the current carries you, without any free action of your own.

And thus it continues, until you reach the empty place that you need to recognize and on which you need to concentrate all your attention. This is so since it is specifically in it that you realize yourself. And if you don’t realize your free choice there, nothing will happen.

All that is in the hands of the Creator will definitely come true. But no one can do anything with that empty place without your correct cooperation. And this is what the wisdom of Kabbalah talks about!
[64694]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/20/2011, “Introduction to TES”

Related Material:
The Last Violin In The Orchestra
A Ray Of Light Through The Clouds
The Drifting Button

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Group Work, Inner Work - No Comments →