Entries in the 'Inner Work' Category

The Conditions For Breaking Through The Potential Machsom

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Is a Tzimtzum our first activity without which it is impossible to go out into the spiritual world?

Answer: A Tzimtzum (restriction) is the first condition that differentiates this world from the upper world and differentiates an intention in order to receive and an intention in order to bestow.

In this way I go out from a perception of the physical reality I am now, like all of humanity, and break through the Machsom (barrier) that is placed before me in order to begin to feel and live on its other side.

The Tzimtzum determines on which side of the border of the spiritual world I am found. A Machsom is a potential obstacle, a potential level, above which it’s necessary to leap in order to enter into the new dimension, the new world. And it’s possible to do this through a Tzimtzum of desires. A Tzimtzum requires gradual preparation and a great effort with a great need to move towards the perception of a new life, where I only want to be directed from myself outward, beyond my nature.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/29/14, Shamati #141

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The Bottleneck

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can we balance the study, the dissemination, and our ordinary life in the family and at work correctly?

Answer: We always feel pressure in every direction: The family demands that we spend all our time with it, at work, we have to make great efforts in what we do. But we always have to choose what is most important.

Everything depends on importance. There are people who can dedicate more time to the study and to dissemination, and others have less time. There are those who say that nothing depends on them, and others do everything possible for their spiritual development since otherwise their life will come to nothing. One thing depends on another, on the importance of the spiritual development that is established in the group.

We are living in a very special time, and we can see this in the way the world develops and the changes in it, and even by the changes in the climate. So, we have to consider how we make decisions and how much the world depends on us.

If we don’t convey the Light that Reforms to the world, it will be our fault. This is the mission of the Jews, of Israel. Israel means Yashar-El (straight to the Creator), and it is a conductor, an adapter. If we don’t convey the upper Light down to the entire world, we create a problem.

We must be the conductor and even the amplifier of the Light by our good work. Besides, we have to arrange the Light correctly by pouring it to the world through us like through a funnel so that it will be soft and smooth, and at the right angle. Our adaptor is rather complicated, and it has ten Sefirot.

However, if we don’t do all that and don’t adapt the Light correctly, we cannot connect and adapt the created beings, the entire world, to the Creator. First, we have to correct ourselves, and that is the reason that we feel pressure. The world is putting great negative pressure on us in the form of hatred and anti-Semitism.

There is also pressure from Above since we are like a bottleneck through which the Light and the abundance must pour unto those below. Therefore, we are in a special time and can advance seriously and powerfully. However, on the other hand, we also can lose everything.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/03/14, Questions and Answers with Dr. Laitman

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In Neutral Gear

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What changes after crossing the Machsom (barrier)? If I didn’t have an income, does it suddenly appear after the Machsom?

Answer: It doesn’t appear. Nothing changes after the Machsom except for the authority that rules over you. You agree with all that is happening, and this means that you rise to the vessels of bestowal. And so your world becomes the spiritual world.

Question: So why does Baal HaSulam write that after the Machsom the whole world seems good, the sick become healthy, and the poor become rich?

Answer: Baal HaSulam writes about this in the article “The Creator’s Concealment and Revelation.” It’s because I change my properties and that is how I see things. Nothing is changed except for my perception.

I take off my glasses, look around, and see that everything is terribly vague and blurry. After that, I put the glasses on and see a nice, wonderful world. I correct only myself, and through my corrected vision, intellect, and sensation I suddenly see that I am in Malchut of Infinity.

This material world doesn’t exist. Everything is absolutely perfect. And it wasn’t like this before? Certainly it was, only I didn’t see it. The whole world is within me.

But this world with its stores and the need to get bread by the sweat of our brows will remain until the last stage of the end of correction. This is because it’s impossible to correct even the highest level if this world doesn’t exist. For this, there must be a whole Partzuf, from end to end.

Afterwards, this world will disappear since in the entire system, the whole integral correction will be finished and matter will no longer remain in the sensation of this physical level. Even before this, we already begin to lose its Aviut (thickness).

We need this world so that by existing outside of spirituality, outside of the truth, we can enter the true world through our free choice and climb the spiritual ladder. But this world is imaginary, it exists like in a dream only for us to switch, like from neutral gear to the spiritual gear.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/14,Writings of Rabash

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Who Directs The Puppet?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: When a person discovers that he is completely dominated by his desire to receive and that he is simply a puppet that has no free choice, what must he do with this?

Answer: It is revealed to you that your feet and hands are tied and you have no free choice about anything. You cannot even look around.

You have no freedom of movement: not in thought and not in desire. All of your cells, all of your systems, your entire brain and heart are under the control of a foreign force. Only one thought in which you understand your servitude comes to you in particular so that you can escape to freedom, if you want it.

For this you need to accept this control voluntarily. This is the difference between Pharaoh and the Creator. The Creator arranges learning for you so that you will see that all of the desires sent to you are bad until you agree with them. But the moment you agree with them, they become good. In that way you go out from servitude to freedom.

Everything depends upon how you accept the upper governance: like the control of Pharaoh or of the Creator.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/14,Writings of Rabash

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Restriction And The Screen

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I reduce the time? Do I need to renounce my desire to receive completely? Will I then be able to reach bestowal even within half a year?

Answer: I don’t need to renounce my desire to receive, but I see that it harms me. And if I do renounce my egoism, it is not because it brings me suffering.

If I stop smoking because smoking is bad for my health, this indeed doesn’t mean that through this action I will reach bestowal and enter spirituality. If I do this in order to avoid blows, this is not called bestowal and spiritual advancement. Fleeing from blows is not the right action. It is necessary to understand that these are not blows, but mercy, and I need to feel that this is so.

My actions shouldn’t originate from the desire to receive that feels good or bad, but from the desire to bestow that wants to feel what is good or bad for the Creator. I must determine things according to this. This is called a Masach (screen).

A Masach indicates that I am directed towards the Creator and take Him into account, paying no attention to myself at all—I don’t exist! I am directed only towards Him. To make a Tzimtzum (restriction) means that from this moment on, I will not take my desires, thoughts, and inclinations into account, but will use all of this only to bestow to the Creator.

He is the goal. For me, all of His characteristics and desires are my vessel, and I use myself only to fulfill Him. This means that I use all that I have, but evaluate bad and good only relative to Him, within Him.

It’s all about Him. I feel His desires, fulfillments, deficiencies, and problems. After this I consider how I can realize what He lacks. This is just like a mother who is naturally and instinctively devoted to her infant.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/23/14, Writings of Rabash 

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The Missing Half Shekel

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I am ready to realize the advice of the teacher if it is a particular task and it is clear what must be done. But how can I realize the advice to discover spiritual worlds in a connection with the friends? This is not really clear.

Answer: If I am in a group and I have no feeling about it, then this means that I am disconnected from the spiritual world. The spiritual world is a place, a desire to bestow.  The desire to receive is the physical world.

The spiritual world is the place between us, the shared desire that we build together and where we connect. In the center of the connected desires, we discover Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Haya, and Yechida, which are called the Creator, the Keter that is discovered as a result of our effort.

This is what our teacher, the spiritual guide, teaches us, and it is up to us to realize this. How exactly we do this is written in books. If we clarify that we are not ready to realize this, then we scream, pray and ask. In addition to this, there is another possibility, and it is to go out and disseminate. Then we feel that we must return to the group and receive power from the center of the group to continue with dissemination.

And with dissemination we are back to the center of the group for we can bring fulfillment to people only through that. When we work mutually, we constantly go through changes and stages in our deficiencies.

Comment: I understand how to perform physical activities: going out to disseminate, sitting in a lesson. But I don’t know how we attain a connection with friends and how we discover the spiritual world between us.

Answer: To connect with the friends and discover the upper world within the connection, you only need to invest “half shekel,” to do only half of the work. You only need to develop the deficiency, and even that comes from the Light that Reforms. Fulfillment also comes from this Light.

But some kind of action is needed from your side to connect with everyone, in the form of a game, to the degree that you are ready to do so. Go out to disseminate to the wider public and do something for the benefit of the Creator. If it is good to Him, you must at least do half or a quarter of the action and “the Creator will finish it for you.”

Don’t think about the result for it is clear that you are not able to do anything spiritual. The Light does this. But effort is required from your side, not even in relation to the Light but to the collective Kli. And from this, a prayer for the Light will be produced.

There is no other possibility besides dissemination, meaning besides connection within a group and external efforts. When we go out to disseminate, we go out to connect. Rabash writes that “the main thing is unity of the friends because this compensates for all the deficiencies” including the physical deficiencies. Everything will improve if there is unity between us because the upper Light acts and fills all deficiencies. So we go out to connect as many external deficiencies as possible to us.
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From the preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/26/14

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Nobody Holds Us Up In Egypt

Dr. Michael LaitmanBaal HaSulam, Shamati No. 159, “And It Came to Pass in the Course of those Many Days”: The thing is that, indeed, they were very fond of the work in Egypt. This is the meaning of “But mingled themselves with the nations, and learned their works.”

We, ourselves, do not want to exit Egypt. The war is with our inner Pharaoh.

It means that if Israel are under the dominion of a certain nation, that nation controls them and they cannot retire from their dominion. Thus, they tasted sufficient flavor in that work and could not be redeemed.

Egoism reigns over the heart and mind of a person. All the borders could be opened for himhe himself won’t want to exit this slavery. He is devoted to Pharoah more than all Egyptians. After all, the bestowing desires, falling under the rule of egoism, become even more devoted to the ego than the receiving desires.

They don’t want to leave Egypt; they work for Pharaoh with devotion. Egoism has a strong grip over themspecifically them become Pharaoh’s very strong and faithful workers. Indeed, the force given to them for future spiritual work and devotion to the force of bestowal is now faithfully working for the egoistic force.

Nobody holds us up in Egyptwe ourselves do not want to abandon it. We enjoy our life with its spiritual problems even more than a regular person delights in his earthly existence.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/2014, Shamati #159

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The Last Revolution Will Be Internal

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What should I do if it is difficult for me to talk to people, and I don’t know how to convey the method of connection to a person with whom I am talking?

Answer: There cannot be any difficulties because we explain to people how it is possible to get out of the crisis. If such problems didn’t exist in the world, we wouldn’t have the possibility of approaching them. However, from day to day, the world is sinking into greater and greater problems and chaos with formidable speed. Nobody knows what will happen today or tomorrow.

In a situation like this we simply must go out to the world and tell them why this is happening. This is indeed being done deliberately by nature that presses upon us. We are constantly developing under its pressure, and even now, it presses upon us so that we will continue with our development.

This time however, our development shouldn’t happen through all kinds of wars. Against whom can we fight today if all of us are in the same trouble? Nothing will help if we begin to fight each other, for we have nothing to conquer. You want to live in some nation?Go ahead, do it!

Problems that humanity experiences today cannot be solved in an earthly way. We don’t have the tools with which it is possible to correct the situation. This is because we have already used all the means that exist in this world, but we still feel bad. Humanity got confused: if we start a revolution against someone, then we are harming ourselves.

Revolutions don’t help, but only destroy nations as we see from the example of the latest events in the Ukraine or the consequences of the Arab Spring, a wave of turmoil that has passed through the Arab world. We don’t have the tools to benefit our situation. Nature obligates us to move from external actions to internal actions and to change ourselves.

This is precisely what we need to explain and publicize to everyone. Leaving the crisis is possible only through an internal revolution within the person, not through external upheavals. This is our message with which we go out to people. We have a method for changing a person through which he not only attains a serene life in this world, but discovers a completely new, eternal, complete dimension in addition to the one in which he now lives.

This addition will be so meaningful that he, so to speak, will disconnect from this material life and will live entirely in the spiritual world without feeling the life and death of his physical body. He will rise above it in a feeling of eternal existence.

We have to reach a state like this, and obviously, on the way we will solve all the problems, remove all doubts, and answer all questions. This is the only method that makes it possible to leave the crisis that will only expand more and more. I hope everyone will understand as quickly as possible that this is the only way.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/10/14, Talk About Dissemination: Questions and Answers with Dr. Laitman

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The Power Of Ascent Through The Method Of Abraham

congress-ahziv_17Question: If we want to take an example from Abraham, what must we talk about with people?

Answer: Suppose that we organize an institute called “Abraham,” after the name of the approach and the idea, and we begin to disseminate this philosophy, this perception, and goal of life on its behalf. So we must gather a sufficient amount of people to come out of the current modern Babylon just as they came out from ancient Babylon. This means that it’s necessary to reach a particular strength among that part which is detached from the ego and then rise upward.

We require a power that will take us upward. If I have a small balloon filled with helium, it can’t lift me. But if I take a large balloon with a diameter of twenty meters, then it will.

Question: When meeting with people, how do we do this so that this helium balloon will lift their point in the heart?

Answer: It’s simply necessary to publicize this idea among everyone, as Abraham did in his time. Through this, we attract people and they will begin to wake up and to learn from us. There is no obligation for everyone to agree with us. They come, try it—some of them leave and some of them stay.

Question: Is this active or passive dissemination?

Answer: It seems that Abraham disseminated his idea actively since Nimrod, the king of Babylon at that time, expelled him from the city since he couldn’t agree with Abraham.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/10/14, Talk About Dissemination: Questions and Answers with Dr. Laitman

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