Entries in the 'Inner Work' Category

Israel: By Birth Or By Goal

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Which part of the world do the non-Jewish people who study Kabbalah belong to?

Answer: Today they belong to the category of “Israel.”

If before the term “Israel” referred to the actual people, today it refers to those who aspire “straight to the Creator” (Yashar–El), that is, to the spiritual idea. Today it makes no difference any more who your parents were. What’s important is whether you accept the method of correction, whether you have the “point in the heart” (•). According to this point you are called “Israel.” If you don’t have this point, you belong to the part called “the nations.” So it follows today you can belong to “the nations,” and tomorrow you can become “Israel.” Eventually everyone has to reach the goal.

 

 

Whoever has received this spark must disseminate the wisdom of Kabbalah and at the same time take care of their own advancement, the group, and the means necessary for that so that the general pyramid of humanity will not turn upside down and land on its head, thus placing all the harmful parts of “the nations” at the head of the pyramid.

Moreover, Baal HaSulam emphasizes that these categories exist in every person, and today the entire world has to identify and correct them because we are now at the final phase of the correction. This is the reason that today “Israel” are people who yearn for the Creator and not anything else. 
[75737]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/2012 on Holocaust Memorial Day 

Related Material:
Serving The World
The Spiritual Division Of Labor
Bring Your Half Of Infinity

How To Overcome Fear

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: When I leave the group, good feelings remain in my memory. However, when I return to it, a certain fear appears within me that forces me to clarify what I am afraid of.

Answer: You are not sufficiently connected to the group. You don’t have anything to fear if you are small among them. If you are still afraid, you need to make yourself even smaller, up to the point of a fetus within a mother’s womb. Then, you will have nothing to fear.

The entire problem is that you trying to guard yourself, and fears appear along with all kinds of doubts, worries, and so on. To the extent of these fears, doubts, and worries, you need to understand that they are given to you so that you become more deeply integrated in the group. Then these fears, doubts, and worries will disappear. By annulling yourself before the group, you will find yourself within it under its protection. The group becomes a womb for you, as something big within which you exist.
[75502]
From the Vilnius Convention 3/23/12, Lesson 2 

Related Material:
Fear Of Heights
As We Ascend, The Fear Will Defuse
Unshakeable Confidence Is One For All

Endless Life Between Two Seconds

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If the Creator manages all the opposing forces that appear during this time, why is the transition between two degrees so dangerous?

Answer: Our main work is concentrated specifically in the transition between the degrees, not in the fixed state. When I am on a certain degree, I work only in order to delve into these states, to understand and examine them.

In our world, we think that the main thing is the achieved state, not the transition to it. However, in the spiritual world, what matters is the transition, not the state itself.

We remain in a certain state only for the period of time required for us to discover it. It could last for a second, then the transition, again, a state lasting a second and again, the transition. There was a Kabbalist who told his students that he went through 400 ascents and descents in a few minutes’ time.

In the spiritual world, we feel an inverted and different dimension into which we break within the framework of time, movement, and space. It is specifically by this that we penetrate the space between the seconds of our world. In our world, the seconds move directly one after another. Spirituality is found between them because spiritual life takes place specifically in the transitions, not in the states themselves.

A static state is a dead one, and it doesn’t count in spirituality. It exists only in order to complete the degree, which includes in its sub-degrees a great many internal transitions. This is why a person, who is in the spiritual world, is constantly going through changes and has no rest.

The spiritual concepts do not exist within our coordinates of time, movement, and space because in our world, there are no breaks between the seconds, there are no gaps either in time or space. Whereas spirituality indicates that you find an interruption between one second and the next, and penetrate its depth, thus entering the spiritual dimension.
[75516]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/17/2012, Writings of Baal HaSulam 

Related Material:
The Expanding World
A Prayer About A Successful Birth
In Spirituality, Every Moment Is Unique

What Does It Mean To Change The World?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Is it possible for us to change the world right now with sufficient speed and effectiveness?

Answer: To change the world means to explain how it is currently and how it should be. By correcting myself and beginning to be an integral part in this entire space within this system, I thereby change the world. When I explain to the entire world what is happening to it and how we need to change in order to bring the world into balance, I am altering it.

Basically, I am providing explanations so that people would change themselves. There is no coercion in it. I cannot force them, I can’t come up with some new society, stick them in there, and then the world would become better, by no means.

We are at a stage where there can be no other change. Nature has always driven us forward. We thought that we were changing the world, but in reality, we were simply pushed toward happiness with a “stick.” We were always trying to do something, and ultimately, we have come to such a state where we improve the world only by improving ourselves with our awareness, with a rational understanding of nature, and with our connection and balance with it.
[75583]
From KabTV’s “Foundations of the Integral Society” 2/26/12 

Related Material:
Give A Person What He Is Ready For
A Holistic Approach
A Sweet Pill Or A Bitter One? It’s Your Choice

The Spiritual Result

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Why is the spiritual process so physically painful for women? When will we feel the result, after all, the convention does not end, it continues?

Answer: I believe that every person can feel the result to the extent of his desire, to the extent of their constant participation.

We constantly do inner examinations, analyses; it is like we pull and extract newer and newer definitions and sensations from within, which we use to build and form the new sense, called the soul.

It is made from a specific way I combine with others, maybe some more or less pleasant ways, through our different sensations, etc. This is an integral organ. The more active we are in connecting with each other for the purpose of revealing the integrality, the better we will reveal our mutual unity, and to this extent the Creator will manifest in this as a common force according to the law of similarity of qualities.

There is nothing else for us to do but act in this direction. Those who feel it, feel it; those who do not, do not. Today this opportunity is given practically to everyone: both men and women. Try to move more clearly towards it.
[75678]
From the Virtual Lesson 2/26/12

Related Material:
A New Level Of Unity
Due To Women’s Desire
How Can A Woman Taste The Miracle Of Unity?

Invitations To Rise Are Everywhere

Dr. Michael LaitmanA person cannot be corrected until he understands that he must rise to the next level. He must always picture this solution in his mind as if he is not in his current state, but already in the next state having attained the upper level to which he rose by the Reforming Light.

Usually we want to correct our current state. This stops us because we think that the current state has arrived so that we will correct it.

Thus we confuse ourselves because all the states come so that we will rise above them to the next states. There is nothing to correct in the present state. The correction is in rising from the current state upward.

It is very hard to accept this, because this approach does not exist in our world, but this is what happens in spirituality. This is because all the states are given not so that a person will correct them, but so that he will correct himself. It is possible to correct yourself only by rising above every state, which is called advancing by “faith above reason.”

Every time I feel a certain discernment or a wrong and unreal attribute, I see it as an invitation to rise above it. Thus I see that everything that happens to me comes only in order to show me my deficiencies. Their filling and correction takes place on the next level, and never in the current state.

Everything that I see with regard to myself, with regard to this world, with regard to the friends and the Creator, which seem as bad and imperfect, are the discernments of the places above which I should rise and adhere to greater bestowal. This is how I can advance until I reach complete bestowal.
[75600]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/12, Writings of Rabash

Related Material:
Strive and You Will Find!
Tomorrow Starts Today
A Black And White Ladder Upward

Absorbing The Convention Materials

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You said that in the next few days, rather than to engage in dissemination, it is desirable for us to scrutinize the inner point so as to strengthen unity….

Answer: I believe that you should constantly, all your free time, review the materials on mutual guarantee, unity, mutuality, and integrality. Perhaps it’s better to use the processed rather than the original version because the originals are written in a special language that distracts us from experiencing this material in life directly. Maybe you should simply watch the convention one more time.

You should live by this and go through this again and again in order to form the strongest possible Reshimo, meaning memories, feelings, and work with these sensations. You will suddenly discover that we talked about the things that may have slipped your attention there, or you might have heard them in a different context, in a different perspective. You should go over what happened to you there, and do it several times.

I have witnessed many times that people hear very selectively. God help you to get something out of the information that I have put into it, not secretly inside my words, but clearly, verbally. In reality, people don’t catch more than 10-15 percent of what they hear. I personally went every day at least twice over any lesson with Rabash (any lesson! I don’t even mention our conventions), besides the fact that I attended it.

I also made a plan: Why he explains in that particular way, where the beginning and the end are, how he begins a question, how he finishes it, how he proceeds from the beginning to the end, develops a topic, gives additional questions, or sets some unclear tasks in the middle. I tried to “enter” his head, penetrate his approach. As a result, it turned out that due to this mechanical work I began to feel him, started to sense better.

It is necessary. This is what I meant by saying that for now you shouldn’t do anything else. It is you, those who experienced the convention and were inside, who now have to absorb it well.
[75580]
From KabTV’s “Foundations of the Integral Society” 2/26/12

Related Material:
Advancing By Blows
A Game Arranged From Above
Why Are We Going To The Convention?

The Period Of Youthful Growth

Dr. Michael LaitmanOnly due to the Light that Reforms can we reach the correction of “Shovavim” (the sin of youth). Indeed, in the beginning a person is like a small child who doesn’t know what’s happening to him. It’s as if a baby is given gold coins to play with, and he doesn’t understand their true value. He is running from corner to corner, not controlling his actions and not understanding their objective.

However, this is a very good period that can be used effectively for our advancement if we remember it and rely on the environment and the teacher’s advice. It’s in this manner that we’ll be able to save a lot of time because the speed of advancement in this “state of youth” is huge.

This is similar to the rapid development of a baby, in whom very significant changes occur during the very first months of his life. And the more he grows, the slower he changes, until he reaches the age of 10 when one month is not much different for him than another.

That is why the period of youth on the spiritual path of man is a very effective and intense period of development. And the key here is the environment because it has its greatest impact on a person precisely in “childhood,” when he’s ready to absorb everything from the environment, and internal changes occur in him with great speed.

The more a person demands from his environment, and the more powerful the environment influences him and is able to answer all his questions and his need for change, the faster he can advance.
[75596]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/2012, Writings of Baal HaSulam

Related Material:
Surround Yourself With Goodness
Plant Yourself In Fertile Soil And You Will Grow
My Dark Silhouette Against The White Background Of Bestowal

A Prayer About A Successful Birth

Dr. Michael LaitmanWe need certain means in order to go from one state to another. The transition from reception to bestowal occurs as a result of a process of turning, whereby Malchut of the upper one becomes Keter of the lower one. For this reason one should always see how to best utilize this transition.

Most important is the transition. The states are already predetermined, but our work consists of speeding up the transition from one state to another as much as possible.

All states are determined by a link of informational genes called Reshimot, and all the degrees are already established in the process of the descent of the worlds from Above to below. The key is to hasten the transition from one state to another. The hastening occurs when we connect to the means that aid this transition. All of our work is focused on this interval.

A person senses a lapse: He still belongs to the lower level but at times he’s able to ascend to the higher level, and then once again he descends to the lower one. He fluctuates back and forth, as though leaning on a staff that turns into a serpent and then turns back to a staff again. A person has to know how to catch the serpent by the head or by the tail, and what action to make with his “hands” (in the desire to receive) in order to reveal one’s egoistic intention and correct it, meaning to clarify whether your intention is for the sake oneself or for the sake of bestowal.

We must understand that we are tied by external conditions as well. If we are in a transitional state, we are subject to certain danger, like during childbirth. While a fetus is in the womb, it is safe because its mother protects it. After a child is born, he is also safe because his mother will take care of him. However, the transition from one state to another, like the birth itself, is quite dangerous. This is due to the fact that many opposite force are engaged, and the proper combination of these forces allows us to be born, or transition from one state to another.

The difficulty is in the fact that while a person is in a transitional state, he is controlled by the external disturbances and can fall under their influence. Therefore, he must always protect himself from them. If one is surrounded by people that aren’t involved in the inner work and are not interested in anything other than soccer, then they don’t present any danger. However, if they are involved in something that resembles your spiritual work and wish to pull you to their side, they can influence you, especially if they are the majority.

This is particularly dangerous during the transition from one stable and fully realized state to the next state, which pertains to greater bestowal, giving yourself to the society, and connecting with friends. Between these two states a person is in danger, and he needs the realization of the Creator’s greatness, the importance of the study, the teacher, the friends, and the group. Then all of these factors that contribute to his birth will guide him correctly so that he can penetrate the narrow pathway between the levels and be born.
[75507]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/17/2012, Writings of Baal HaSulam

Related Material:
The Expanding World
Self-Sacrifice Above Love And Hate
In The Desert There Is No One To Cry Out To – Only Heaven

Tomorrow Starts Today

Dr. Michael LaitmanTime, motion, and space do not exist. It is we who, in our consciousness, call our perception in some parameters as years or time, while in others as motion and space. According to this we see a certain picture.

However, there are no billions of years outside of us. If you ask whether there was a “yesterday,” it’s necessary to find out what “yesterday” or a thousand years ago means. What does “was” mean? It’s now that I feel these states and call them “yesterday,” “the day before yesterday,” or “tomorrow.” But if we separate this point of “I the perceiver” from this, there will be nothing left.

We concern ourselves only with how to exit this illusion. We are absolutely confused and there is no need to discuss what’s going on. We only need to search how to rise above this material feeling and understanding, and then we’ll sense and understand the truth and be able to judge our state. But while we are still inside of it, we won’t be able to judge; it’s absolutely useless.

We start with this reality because we must correct ourselves while staying in it. By addressing you, I essentially correct myself. There exists some kind of image of you that seems separate and even opposite to me. But in reality, it’s my inseparable part and I have to correct it. I see all my parts as seemingly foreign; this is called the shattering. And as soon as I correct myself, they all get connected.

And even at the very first degree, I will get a correct picture of time, motion, and space because a higher dimension will appear within me. I will start feeling what spiritual qualities mean; to some extent, I will begin to sense what the spiritual qualities, the three spatial coordinates, and time are. I will learn that time is a chain of causes and effects with no intervals that come out of mechanical actions.

A concept of spirituality is in us creating time by ourselves and defining its speed by our corrections. We don’t measure time by rotation of some material planets around each other for days, months, or years. Does the rotation of one cosmic body around the other define the concept of time according to which I live? Do I have to live in accordance with space rocks moving relative to each other?

There is no time in spiritual world. Each and every action happens right after one another: You do an action, cause a pulse, the next action, one more pulse, with no delays between them. We don’t take into consideration how the Earth, the Moon, or the Sun rotate at that time.

The root of the problem is that we don’t yet feel spiritual time. But the moment we enter spirituality even at the very first spiritual degree, we will start perceiving the world in new categories. This won’t be an illusion, but an actual feeling.

In the same way we feel this world around us in our internal perception, we will get an additional picture that will give us new definitions. Until the end of correction, we will be living in two dimensions: in a dimension of this world and in an additional dimension of the spiritual world. After all, until we are fully corrected, some part of the lowest degree of this world will remain in us each time. We will be revealing and extracting from this “Egypt” ever new qualities and correcting them.
[75190]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/11/2012, The Gate of Intentions

Related Material:
The Fundamental Difference Of A New Life
Don’t Be Afraid To Start All Over
Rising Above Corporeal Reality