Question: You say that we need to catch the end of the rope that the Creator throws us. When I was a child I used to dangle a string in front of my dog’s nose and as he would jump to catch it, I would pull it up. So, now it turns out that I’m in a position like that dog.

Answer: It really is so. However, think about Who is playing with you. Isn’t this an honorable game?

If you take into account Who you’re playing with then you should be satisfied. What else do you need? Try to feel that you’re partners with the Owner, or His loyal servant.

You must jump after this string with the intention to bestow pleasure to the Owner. After all, the dog that you played with as a child played with you as well. It received pleasure from playing with you! Try to elevate at least to the level of that dog. I’m totally serious; this is quite difficult.

If you play this way in order to bestow pleasure to the Creator then you will become a human.

You will jump because you have a connection with Him. You will jump and play together with Him; you’ll understand and feel Him. What separates you from the rest of the people who jump after this string their whole lives is that they will remain animals and you will become a human.
[71262]
From the Arava Arvut Convention 2/24/12 Lesson #2, 

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Question: Do we need to add more love from ourselves at each spiritual degree, and if yes, how is this done?

Answer: These degrees are still far away from us, but from the beginning we receive the desires (tools) for this thanks to our rising above our ego and trying to connect with the group, the friends, and to reach mutual guarantee and adhesion.

Thereby we build the vessels that can transcend one’s private calculation. I try to perform a general calculation, attempting to feel how another person can be more important to me than myself. These are already the first steps towards love.

Through these steps, we first of all build within ourselves an ability to love, beginning with the desire to simply feel the other. Afterwards, we want to feel the other like oneself, and then to feel him more than oneself, to begin to live in him, to want to fill him. Thus we reach a state where the Light of Hassidim (Mercy) fills all of our Kli, and thus we reach love.

We begin to receive the desires of the other (AHP) and to work with them so that filling the other will become our only concern. In this way we come to total devotion and absolute love.

When we are in absolute love, we constantly look for what else can be added to it. When we reach a certain degree, the Creator reveals to us more and more empty spaces, that is, higher and higher degrees. But when we reach complete love in the world of Infinity, it seems to us that as a result of complete mutual love and the absence of deficiency, a new dimension will open for us beyond the level of the world of Infinity. This is already the transition beyond the limits of love.

Indeed, according to our understanding and reason, absolute love cannot exist. If there is only white or only black, the creature loses its sensations. This is what happens with a son who feels the absolute love of his father. He has nothing to attain, nothing to work for, there is no empty space that he has to fill if he feels that no action of his, even the worst or the best, will change his father’s attitude towards him.

This is the problem. After all, each time he has to feel some response. In this interaction of bestowal and reception he perceives himself. Otherwise he won’t feel anything. His father, from his endless love, annuls the son. Thus the Creator conceals Himself.

And how it will be in end of correction, this we cannot tell now. Evidently, a new space will be discovered, in which the creature will rise to some kind of higher existence. It will happen after adhesion to the Creator and absolute love, after having felt the Creator fully.
[69643]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/13/2012, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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By creating a network of interconnections, we lead the world; we are becoming the world’s “center of bestowal.” Humanity is experiencing suffering, but is not able to reveal the reason behind it and that is why it does not know how to get rid of it. This is already visible and will be felt more and more. This is why we must as soon as possible explain and tell the people about the reason behind the crisis, about its nature, and how to get out of it.

Without this we cannot say that we are bestowing upon the world. We need to participate in the misfortunes of people with all our strength, to feel their pain and demands more than our own. This is our main purpose. This is what we exist for. That is why it is necessary in the shortest time possible to come out into the world with the explanation of what is going on. The world will not be able to discern the solution on its own. This obliges us to create networks for the preparation of educators, creating content, and so on.

This is our work. Thanks to it we will move forward ourselves, only in dissemination and care for the neighbors.
[71204]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/12, “Questions and Answers”

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We must keep the intention towards unity. This is because the whole benefit is concealed in this precise intention. What we hear at the lessons is not that important. What is important is that during the lessons we can continuously work on the unity of all our friends in the whole world. To the extent of our efforts to unite, we move forward, and this is where all of our benefit lies.

However, if we do not work during the lesson, it can give us a sort of an understanding, move us forward a little bit, but this will not be spiritual development.

This week we are watching the recordings of the lessons from the congress in the Arava. A question arises: During this, can we reach even stronger unity than what we attained there? If not, it would be better to return to the usual routine of the lesson. The answer remains up to you.

The most important thing here is to constantly work on unity. It is not about how much I understand (this is completely unimportant), but it is about how much effort I apply toward unity. Since it is precisely in unity that I will be able to feel what is being talked about.
[71201]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/12, “Questions and Answers”

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We had a special convention in the desert, which had a very strong impact on all of us and gave everyone a sensation of a certain new capacity of desire (Kli), and today it is very important for us to work with this vessel.

Every moment, every day, we will continue to see increasing consequences of this new desire. It will not be lost, forgotten, or disappear like everything else in this life, retreating under the pressure of a new day. On the contrary, what we experience today will help grow everything we have attained there. And we will see our present only from the focus and perspective of the convention, through the prism of the society and unity that we received there.

To realize this in practice, we need to return to the same material, and preferably study it together, with at least ten people. As we return to the same material, we will continue to rouse the memories (Reshimot) of it, and critically analyze them from the point of view of today.

And even though we will be present in the same conversation, it will not be like watching a Hollywood movie or a nostalgic memory. We do not return to the past state; now we want to attract the same deep impression from our past into the present, into our current desires, and experience it all over.

But I do not return into that old picture I had there. I am not concerned with when it happened, where it happened, and who was there: I do not look at any of it now, even though I cherish these memories as a wonderful part of my life. However, now I want to work with all of it and use it for my new state.

Some time has gone by, I have changed; I have left that place and seem to have returned to my old, regular routine. But I want to raise my regular life to that same level. And this is why I return to the same inspired feeling I experienced before, but to raise it to the height of the current burdening (Aviut) of harsher disturbances and concerns.
[71186]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/12, Shamati #25

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A person becomes filled with sacred spiritual sparks, and connection is always sanctity when it is for the sake of the mutual guarantee, adhesion with the Creator.

Now we have slightly moved away from this state because we have to do other things, and we no longer have the tight contact we managed to achieve at the convention through our efforts and help from Above.

And today once again, we need to look for this common thought, the feeling of community so we would maintain and strengthen our connection even though we have returned to various parts of the world.

All our friends around the world need to feel how we keep strengthening our connection from day to day. It should not be something accidental, which appears several times a year from one convention to another. Otherwise, we will not get the desired results.

Therefore, we need less empty talk and more work every single moment on preserving the attained connection. And moreover, we need to turn our aspiration for the past unity into a current, real state. The moment we remember something from the past, our memory should not be nostalgic sadness.

This sadness about the past needs to be felt in the present and lead to a new state of increasing connection between us. And even though my friends are not in a physical contact with me now, I feel our true, inner contact: the same feeling, the same nature, but with an even greater strength than before.

And the main thing that now needs to be added to the connection we had there is our mutual responsibility to keep and continue to increase this connection. This responsibility towards each other is called the mutual guarantee. This way we keep guaranteeing more and more for one another, as if we were signing guarantees for even greater amounts every single day.

We guarantee for one another that we will overcome all the obstacles of time, movement, and space, and of all forgetfulness, that special force that operates in us! We do not need anything else: just to maintain the attained unity in new difficult conditions. And we understand that for this we constantly need to keep increasing its protection and our mutual guarantee, our connection; only this will allow us to rise.

After all, the only difference between all the degrees of ascent is only a more detailed realization of details of every new degree. Every higher degree is greater than the previous one because I consider more elements of bestowal, connection, and mutual guarantee than before. Thus we need to evaluate what we have attained today in relation to yesterday.

It seems to be the same feeling, the same state, the same friends, but I recognize more details and better understand how much I need the mutual guarantee and support, for others to support me, and for me to support them. The increase in the number and significance of all the details is a good sign, which shows that we have really risen.

We need to very precisely distinguish a simple nostalgia from building new advanced states on the foundation of past state.
[71182]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/12, Shamati #25

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Question: What does it mean to “look at the world through the prism of the group?”

Answer: As man approaches spirituality, he discovers the connection between all parts of creation. This is called approaching the revelation of the Creator, after all the Creator is the power which unites, connects, and controls everything you now see.

Essentially, you only add a connection to the image of this world by revealing that everything is in a single net. We begin to see this connection through the connection in the group, which guarantees the beginning of this net for us.

We see the world in this form, noticing the strings that connect all the parts, which depend on one another and are governed by one force, which spins and rouses them through the change in connections between all these elements. The actual elements remain the same: The only thing that changes is the nature of their connection, and this constantly makes the world advance.

This is the essence of all the renewal that happens in the world, which leads to the descent of some and the ascent of others, and thus they interact between them. Everything is predetermined to the very last atom, not to mention people and countries.

Seeing that the entire world is governed by this net already is the correct perception of reality, which appears through perceiving the group as a certain big system, a single organism.

Besides, we begin to see ourselves as an active, operational part of this net of the upper Force, which governs and advances the entire world towards the final goal. We can activate this net and direct it towards a special form of development, depending on our behavior. The more we increase our work with the upper Force, which operates in this net, the nicer we will make the further development of the world, which rests on this net, like in a mother’s arms. This way we improve its future.

And the other way around, the moment we weaken and fail to correlate our movements with the movements that happen in the net, which are directed towards bestowal, the goal, where the entire humanity is directed, by doing this we weaken the upper Force which operates in the net. And then the entire world begins to experience big manifestations of their egoistic nature in their lives where different foreign forces, which are far from the spiritual and bestowal, operate.

Then these cruel forces rise and reinforce themselves in all the elements that are connected by the common net, which leads to sad consequences.

But the actual net and the elements in it do not change. Only these elements are egoistic, while the net is altruistic because this is a higher, spiritual system, the Light, which fills the space between all the parts. This is why everything depends on where we (the parts which exists in this system) connect.

This net has elements which maintain its existence; they are called “forefathers” or the Initial System (Merkeva). They are also called the “36 righteous,” which maintain the world (36 is not a number, but a certain notion in Kabbalah). There are certain preparations inside this net, without which it would not be able to exist, because otherwise, the force of evil and separation would blow up this entire system and break the mutual connections.

This is why there are corrected souls (“forefathers” and all the Kabbalists of all generations) inside this system who hold this world. And we need to try to add our efforts to their work. This is called “becoming ashes beneath the feet of the righteous.”
[71179]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/12, Shamati #25

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Question: How do I check that I strengthen my connection with friends during the lesson?

Answer: First of all, this is most important. Our spiritual gain increases when we constantly strengthen the connection even more than at the last convention in the Arava. You need to add new efforts to what you felt there. The Light that Reforms comes when during the lessons we listen to the story about the spiritual system on a whole and about its structure. However, emotional inspiration is higher during mutual actions of unity. And this is why we need to connect one with the other.

In any case, we have to feel like we are together at the lesson. Even if we hate each other, like the friends from the group of Rabbi Shimon, we nevertheless feel the state of our interconnection.

Question: A certain image might be appearing in me, but how do I turn it into a common asset and reward?

Answer: The group, the system, and my attitude towards my friends, everything must merge into one, into a single image besides which nothing else exists. Until you focus on it, the target will not be in your cross-hairs. However, you must work on strengthening your interconnection even at the expense of comprehending the material. This is the difference between wisdom and acting smartly.
[71197]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/2012, Questions and Answers

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Question: Where does the point of our unity touch the rest of the world? Why is the correct intention not enough? Why do we also need the physical action of dissemination? What mechanism activates the people whom we address?

Answer: We are in the common system consisting of five “layers” of Aviut (the thickness of desire).

Overall, our world belongs to the zero or root degree of Aviut, more precisely, its rudimental part. In the language of Kabbalah this is called the root of the root of the root, or Malchut inside Malchut inside Malchut of the world of Assiya. Its desire is perceived in the form of matter that exists below the speed of light.

The electromagnetic phenomena, gravity, physics and chemistry, biology and zoology, and matter that we perceive and recognize, all of this is essentially desire of the lowest degree, separated from the Light that governs it. From the point of view of the person who attains, there is no Light in this desire.

This is why I work with matter. After all, a person must go by what he sees before him. And before me there is the still, vegetative, animate, and human nature of the material world, which is accessible to my five senses. This is where we start: not just from afar or a neutral point, but from the opposite place.

The matter of desire descends until Malchut of the world of Assiya and continues its journey down, into the egoistic area of the spectrum. 125 degrees of descent apparently are not enough, we fall even further in the five layers of egoism.

And the lowest is not just anyone, it is Israel. It was on the height of bestowal, and this is why it fell to the very bottom. On one hand, Israel is the “smallest of nations,” but on the other, it is “stiff-necked,” meaning the most egoistic. Consequently, it experiences the most ills, is distanced the most, but at the same time is able to use this world better than others.

Then, the Light causes “vibrations” and strongly influences Israel, and it begins to awaken. But coming back is no less easier, especially given the intermixing that took place over thousands of years, which also needs to be considered.

“Why do we need to care about others?” I am being asked. “Why do we need this connection with the world? Would it not be better to take care of ourselves?”

Where have you seen a head in proud loneliness? Why would you need it if not for the benefit of the body? It is written that Israel needs to become “a kingdom of priests” for other nations. They are not able to receive the method of correction on their own, but they will be able to do it through Israel, by being connected with it, through the breaking and the intermixing.

Thus, “Israel” is essentially a calling that obligates establishing connection with others. And this is only possible through contact on the material level of our world, the lowest degree of desire, which we perceive in this form today.
[71193]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/2012, Questions and Answers

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We should be very happy that we have come to the most important work, the most important analysis that exists in all the worlds, even in the spiritual ones. Baal HaSulam writes that there is no happier moment in a person’s life than the moment when he discovers that he is unable to exit his ego and no effort of his own can help him. Then he comes to his first prayer, his first cry for the Creator.

This first cry is birth. An infant cries as soon as he is born into the world. And this means that a person was born.

Let us hope that we will attain this cry and become Human. This is why the effort we make towards it is called birth pangs. And we must be happy that we have come to this. After all, who do these birth pangs reach? We have to be happy and serious at the same time. But joy has to come from the status, the mission. This is where spiritual life begins.

When an infant is born, adults are happy even though he is crying and screaming. Likewise, the Man within us (the one who did all the work and all the analyses) rejoices, and the infant, now being born, is still suffering from the pressure, sadness, and the perception of disturbances. They both must be together.
[71174]
From Lesson 1, The Arava Convention 2/23/2012

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