Entries in the 'My Similarity to the Creator' Category

The Age Of The Crucial Ascent

Dr. Michael LaitmanBaal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” item 63: Thus, in our generation, although the essence of the souls is the worst, which is why they could not be selected for Kedusha thus far, they are the ones that complete the Partzuf of the world and the Partzuf of the souls with respect to the Kelim, and the work completed only through them…Hence, only after the completion of these lowly souls can the Highest Lights manifest, and not before.

The vessels that belong to the upper third of development (HBD) are very “transparent” and pure. The desires of the second third (HGT) are “thick,” but they still belong to the phases of “smallness” of Ibur and Yenika. The Light of Hochma cannot be revealed in them, and it is only a preparation for all the generations.

We begin to count from the First Man until the period of 6,000 years since there is a correlation between the spiritual roots and the corporeal branches. The large vessels couldn’t be revealed during the first 4,000 years. During the first third of the last 2,000 years, the process also started from the “shattering of the vessels” (the destruction of the Temple), and three-fourths of that period were in exile. It is only since the time of the Ari that the time of redemption began.

Today, we are living in the final phase of the last 2,000 years (NHY) when the vessels have acquired thickness and toughness and have become heavy and bulky under the weight of the growing ego. Of course, we don’t blame anyone for anything. It is simply our nature, and it is very hard and insensitive.

Compared to us, it was very easy to discover the Lights and attain adhesion in the previous vessels in the thickness of the root and the first levels (HBD and HGT). Then, too, of course, a person had to work hard, but, still as Rabash used to say, even in the 19th century there were Jewish people who were ready to devote their lives to revealing the Creator. To adhere to Him, they gladly gave up corporeal pleasures. That period ended with World War I since wars reveal the evil in order to oblige the world to connect more strongly.

Today, everything is different. Offer a person a million dollars or adhesion with the Creator, and he would take the money without any hesitation. In the 20th century, the world advanced so much that it is very hard for us to understand the world of our ancestors. It is hard to imagine previous situations since a very special period has begun, a very hard period of the development of our desire.

However, we also can divide this period, just like all the other periods, into HaVaYaH. Then, we can see that we are at a certain point in our development where many desires and forces are accumulated. What is more, this phase also is divided into several parts, and we begin to see the thickest desires.

Today, besides the Light of Neshama, the Lights of Haya and Yechida also have to be revealed, a phase which is called AHP de Aliyah. The previous generation helps us with the Lights of Nefesh and Ruach that they already have attained, while we, thanks to their support, approach the corrections we have to make at the level of the Light of Neshama, which is not mutually incorporated with the previous generations, but independently.

By working in the world of Beria, we constantly discover the Light of Neshama, while the Lights of Haya and Yechida will be revealed to us only during the ascents, by incorporation. They also are necessary, especially in the current phase. This is a very special addition that requires a totally different kind of work, of to receive in order to bestow.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/5/12, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar

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My Evil Under A 620-Times Magnifying Microscope

Dr. Michael LaitmanAll the events are revealed to a person because of his incomplete perception because of his uncorrected sensations. The world is depicted as incomplete according to a person’s perception and understanding. But we should understand that this imperfection is not in the external world, but in ourselves.

The current global crisis doesn’t develop around us but only in our perception. But the moment we correct ourselves, all the external problems will disappear. It is because the world doesn’t exist in itself, but only in our feelings; it is within us. As soon as we correct our attributes, all the disasters and the problems, the storms and the crises immediately disappear. None of this exists; the upper Light simply fills all of reality…

The difference between truth and lie is only within a person. First by clarifying all the blows that hit him, he should understand that there is a purpose and a reason for them, as it says: ” I am the first,” which means the reason, and “I am the last,” which means the purpose. These blows come so that a person could correct himself and realize that his perception of reality is false.

It operates like a “helpmate.” Since if this evil remained in a person, he would never reveal it. But since the evil is revealed on the outside, it is as if it is against him, and so a person can discern it. Our ego magnifies this evil many times by enabling us to see it in others in its most prominent form.

We look at our evil as if through a magnifying glass and see it 620 times larger. This helps us reveal it and it is called a “helpmate.”

I reveal this evil in others, but I understand that it is the opposite and that it is inside me, and thus I can correct myself. A person has to constantly check himself and whether he has the right perception: He must immediately turn all the evil that he sees on the outside, see it in himself, and correct it.

So when I identify with what is outside myself, I perceive this attribute as good for me. I accept it and am in it by correcting myself. Thanks to it, I can check myself with regards to the group, with regards to others, with regards to the Creator.

It turns out that the perception of the external reality helps me find the evil in me in my internal reflection, and to understand that it isn’t the world that is destroyed, but that it is me who is ruined, since this is how my evil is revealed. It is by correcting myself that I correct the whole world. This is called “judging myself and the whole world to a scale of merit.”

Let’s hope that we will be able to understand and to digest this, to perceive this picture and to convey this correct and healthy approach to the whole world, to all the people. Then, by the correction of man, we can heal all the problems. The first difficulty is to change my approach and instead of correcting the world, we should understand that we should correct ourselves.

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, the whole world we see around us is a reflection of our internal attributes, just like a mirror. But in order to keep it simple, we should explain that a person should correct himself first so that he can later correct the world. This is because a corrupt person builds a corrupt world and a corrected person can build a corrected world.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/2/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Checking By Action

Dr. Michael LaitmanStriving forward towards the goal of creation, we discover destruction inside of ourselves. Conversely, those who do not strive forward do not discover destruction inside of themselves. In exactly the same way, one can reveal the malfunctions in an automobile only if one starts the car and tries to move it. Otherwise, everything seems to be in order. I have not yet found any problems inside of me, and I attribute evil to something else.

That is why only the one who strives towards the goal reveals destruction, only the one who strives towards unity of the group discovers how far away he is from that. Movement towards the good and striving for wellbeing brings us a bad feeling, the realization of evil.

What for? So that on the next level I would cry out asking for help, raise the MAN (prayer). And then I will receive changes, the qualities of bestowal. That is where movement occurs and not in anything else. One must check oneself in this.

So, I have been applying efforts, I was uniting with the group, and I wanted to be together with the friends in order to come out into the spiritual world, to arrive at bestowal, to the Creator. And what did I receive as an answer? The realization of evil: how much I do not want to go to the Creator, do not want to be in the group. I discover my true state; the truth comes out into the light.

If I put down my hands now, then I will miss the opportunity that this revelation presents. The Creator said: “I have created the evil inclination, I have created the Torah as a spice.” It means that now I am starting from the evil inclination, and up until now I carried out work in order to reveal it.

First of all, in order to reveal the evil, I must be connected to the group, the study, the Creator, and other means. As a consequence, the evil inclination has been revealed to me. Afterward, I address an appeal (MAN) for the Torah, spice, for the Light that Reforms concealed inside of it.

In reality, all of that is good. Since if we were to judge it from the point of view of bestowal, then the revelation of the evil is the essence of the good. But when will I attain revelation?

And then, the next state comes to me; I receive the answer of the One above to my appeal—MAD. This answer can be so great, that I will attain group connection and a vessel in which I will reveal the Light. Then the Light and the vessel will become bestowal, which I have attained after numerous similar actions.

This way, on the one hand, receiving, the evil inclination is always characteristic of me, but on the other hand, I get the force of bestowal, the Light.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/29/12, Writings of Rabash

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The Workshop Should Light The Spark Of Life

The Workshop Should Light The Spark Of LifeWe are all connected since one cannot be impressed without the others. Suppose I lack two Sefirot in order to complete the full ten Sefirot, and I am totally closed, feel absolute darkness. If I add the attributes that I need, everything is suddenly revealed and lit up.

It is enough to include one item that is missing in the system and it immediately begins to operate, although it is one of a thousand identical items. If the collective impression reaches the necessary level of connection, it determines our next level, the new height.

At a very high point a large number of desires should connect in greater mutuality, in a great collective impression by the Light. What is this collective impression made of? They are impressed by the connection between them, by their unity and the benefit they receive from this mutual cooperation. Everyone gives life to others: the Light of Ruach.

None of us has this Light; it is created as a result of our connection. It is the Creator (Boreh) that we reveal, this is why we call Him “come and see” (“Boreh“).

Life is created by the connection of dead cells. If they connect correctly, they suddenly come to life. There is a certain force from the inside that spurs them to life, but in itself it is invisible. We discover this upper force only if we “come and see” the Creator between us.

I hope that during the workshops you will begin to discover this inner impression in the connection between you. The words themselves are meaningless; the key is the action of the Light that Reforms. The story itself only inspires to connect, to search but not more than that.

We want to attain the impression by the connection. This excitement is called Light that will flow between us in this correct connection, in a circle. Then this circle will turn into a mechanism that generates the Light, life!

We, being so different from one another, connect into one system, like in an electric schema with a cable, a resistor, a magnet, and a battery that generates voltage in a circuit. If all parts don’t connect with the others, the system doesn’t work. When this chain is connected correctly, it begins to generate the force of life in it. We begin to discover that there is life in it: the Light of NRNHY!

The general Light of NRNHY is the Creator, “come and see,” the upper Sefira, Keter. When we attain life, we attain its source within them, the element of life called the Creator. He is revealed in the system, in the right connection between us.

This is what I expect from the workshops and we will reach that gradually. In the meantime, we tend to forget this and discuss different theoretical things. But with the help of the passages that I read, I want to bring you to the emotional impression. Sometimes I ask a theoretical question, but in any case I expect you to connect. This is the only outcome of the workshop—to what extent we managed to connect by the process we have been through.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/30/12, TES

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An Endless Road

Dr. Michael LaitmanBaal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” item 55: This is because he attains the Lights and degrees of his soul, called NRNHY, according to the measure of the purity of his will to receive. And with each degree he attains, the Lights of that degree assist him in his purification. Thus, he rises in degrees until he achieves the amusements of the final aim in the Thought of Creation.

Question: Is the level of “to receive in order to bestow” meant for every soul?

Answer: Yes and no. It can also be attained indirectly by incorporation, since we are talking about an analog system that is perfect and integral in which everyone is connected to everyone else and the general pattern is in everyone like in a holographic picture.

The whole point is what my role in this picture is: Am I part of the “leg,” of the “head,” the “heart,” or another organ in the general “body”? I will definitely attain everything, but I attain my part in the system actively by operating independently.

I have my own deficiency and also the deficiency I acquire from everyone else. There is myself that stems from my element and there is everyone else. So our attainment is not identical. Everyone attains the whole system as a whole and is in Ein Sof (Infinity), but at the same time everyone “envies” the others since everyone has a different starting point. This also requires work and correction.

Then we rise to such a level, which in the meantime, we know nothing about. The development continues and disappears somewhere. The vessels will have to grow and turn into something that we don’t know…

Question: Why does a person have to attain the thought of creation?

Answer: Because this is the desire of the upper, of the Creator, since the thought of creation is the Creator.

Our words are inaccurate, but we have to use them. It says that there is an unattainable reality called the Creator. He is unattainable, but there is the thought of creation, which means His attitude towards us.

As a result of His thought about us, something was done. He created a desire to receive and did different things with it. But the point is not that we should stay in this desire to receive. The desire and the Light are the only two attributes—receiving and bestowal, which He has chosen in order to eventually raise us above both of them.

This means that we rise not only above receiving, but also above bestowal, because one will not be able to exist without the other. We have to understand His thought of creation and rise even higher to what we cannot speak about today because we don’t know what it is.

This is the way of attainment that leads us to an unknown end. In our desires we cannot even attain anything higher then them, while here we speak about something that is beyond Gmar Tikkun (the end of correction). Still we have to understand that this is where the goals that truly match the Creator are. By clarifying the process we go through, we have to say that His attitude towards us is not below the level He is on and about which we know nothing, since even the roots our branches stem from are not derived from it.

So by knowing this we should also understand where we are today.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/01/12, “Introduction to the Book of Zohar

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A Road Covered By A Shadow Of Bestowal

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe difficulty in our work is a result of the oppositeness of the states between which we have to balance ourselves, on what is called the “middle line.” On the one hand, you should be proud that you are following this road. Otherwise you’ll fall under the influence of the world around you and will become infected by its “viruses”: you’ll start dealing with money, respect, control, knowledge and many other empty goals the world is full of.

On the other hand, the internal work requires modesty and humility towards the group and Creator so that they’ll pass on to you the right values. If a person constantly carries on such a correct clarification—as to what he should be impressed by and what he should ignore, who he should be in contact with and from whom to keep away, he thus chooses the right environment. He builds this environment since it’s not just a group he has come to and in which he exists.

He determines what is important and what is not important in every society he finds himself, and so he builds his environment, as it says, “one chooses a good environment.” The environment doesn’t exist in its ready form, each of us has to clarify this concept and build an environment for himself.

This work is perpetual, not a onetime event in which it is enough to make a decision once and leave it at that. I have to make new decisions at every moment, and I realize that this is the only opportunity I have of free will. It is the only way that I can hasten my advancement while everything else are already the outcomes, which I don’t even touch.

I cannot change anything and if I make efforts I will only spoil my advancement. Not only will I not advance, as I don’t correct the only thing that needs to be corrected, but I also will spoil my attitude toward other things that were supposed to be the result of my good free will, as I treated them as the first main tool.

Besides, I have to clarify my attitude towards pleasure and suffering, since if the Creator is good and benevolent, why does He send me sufferings? Do I feel these sufferings because of my corruption or is it the Creator who treats me so cruelly? What can I attribute to Him, if anything?

A person clarifies these things until he comes to the conclusion that his goal is to attain the force of bestowal, the force of faith, which eventually turns into the force of love. Love is the force of connection by which a person receives the image of the Creator and becomes like Him, which is called to become Adam (human in Hebrew).

The Creator dresses in a person and gives one’s desire to receive the form of bestowal. If this is what a person demands, one reaches such a simple prayer and asks for simple mercy.

But all these actions are revealed together with great confusion and changes of different opposing states until eventually a person ends one’s clarification and it becomes clear that there is nothing but the simple upper Light.

The attribute of bestowal begins to dominate him and it determines the only reality he knows now. All the opposing, conflicting states were given to him only so that he would feel and understand in his mind and heart, having tasted pleasure and sufferings, and attaining the truth and the lie that there is nothing in this world and nothing controls it but the attribute of bestowal.

All the attributes that a person has felt along the way, which are opposite from the attribute of bestowal, were only the shadow of the attribute of bestowal that helped him learn, understand, and acquire it. So eventually he reaches simple mercy, which is the pure attribute of bestowal.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/27/12, Shamati #113

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The Point Of Freedom: The Beginning Of The Soul

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Where is the point from which my freewill begins? What does it include? How do I see the world through it? How do I divide things into important and unimportant, major or trivial, how do I arrange my priorities?

Answer: Freewill begins from a point called the “root of the soul.” This is where the soul begins. So the search for this point is the main thing and we go through it and learn during the preparation period.

The clarification of the point of freewill is possible only when we reach the first level of bestowal, the lowest one. Then we begin to understand what we have to choose and from what. After all, we always choose between two options. If we had to choose between two identical things we wouldn’t be able to choose. It would be hard to make a choice so we won’t decide. We have to find a defect or an advantage in one compared to the other.

So freewill is only possible if I choose the attribute of bestowal instead of the attribute of receiving. If I can tell the difference between these two attributes and decide that I definitely prefer the attribute of bestowal rather than the attribute of receiving, then according to this scale I will already be able to start clarifying what is better and what is worse in every aspect.

This means that first, in order to choose freely, I have to be free of my desire to enjoy and to know what to choose: the attribute of bestowal, and to know that I should choose it at every moment. This determines my level. So every time I choose the attribute of bestowal instead of the attribute of receiving, I advance. This is the only thing I should do.

But the first point of freewill in which we exit exile and become “a free nation in our country,” which means in our desire, free of our ego, appears at the moment a person transcends the Machsom, the barrier to the spiritual world. Until then it’s the time of preparation.

After we transcend the Machsom, we also advance in an “unsown path” that goes through the desert and then we choose the Land of Israel, which means that we want to reach the desire that is aimed straight to the Creator (Yashar El), and is totally in order to bestow. But we still don’t feel benefit and advancement. These are the “forty years of wandering in the desert,” although it seems that it’s possible to cross it on foot in a week, like the Sinai desert. Why should we wander in it for forty years?

This time is essential until a person attains all the discernments inside him and can choose the desire to bestow called “the Land of Israel,” instead of the egoistic desire called “Egypt,” in a state that is called a “desert” for him. In the meantime nothing attracts him to bestowal. After he enters the Land of Israel, he encounters greater problems. After all, the desire to enjoy begins to receive spiritual pleasures there and he has to overcome them so that he can receive in order to bestow.

To sum up, the meaning of freewill is to what extent a person always prefers “faith above reason,” which means the attribute of bestowal over the attribute of receiving.

In corporeality it’s expressed in constantly seeing the revelation of the Creator in every state I go through. After all, He gave me these feelings and He presents to me the world around me. He plays with me from both directions, both from within and from the outside, and leaves me only one point of freewill in order that I correctly stabilize my attitude in the internal world He has imprinted in me towards the external world, so that He can be revealed. Eventually I have to connect myself and the external world in order to reach the one and unique form called “There is none else besides Him.”
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/27/12, Shamati #113 

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From Feeling To Reason, From Pleasure To Truth

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe world is ruled by one force of bestowal. This force is called the Creator since He created the quality opposite to Himself, the desire to enjoy, in order to raise it to His level. In this way, this desire can bring itself to perfection.

That is why all of our work consists of reaching the quality of bestowal. However, we do not disappear into that, but we change the form of our desire, the initial material, to bestowing. It continues to act with all of its fierce strength and power with which it used to think only of itself before and is revealed as an unclean egoistic system, opposite to bestowal, but now this desire corrects itself and the form of its action. Now, instead of receiving, it desires to bestow.

Such a change happens due to the Light that Reforms. However, until such a change happens inside of the desire to enjoy, it absolutely does not understand what is being talked about here since it is completely located in egoistic qualities, meaning in thoughts and desires for oneself.

The change that it undergoes is truly a new birth, similar to how something develops from a drop of seed in which there is nothing besides internal information about a future person, and in the end, it finally turns into an independent personality which thinks, understands, feels, and answers for its deeds. Where does it all come from? Is it simply out of emptiness? However, in exactly the same way, our own spiritual birth happens.

This process is incomprehensible to us and hidden from us. Until we experience serious changes, we completely do not understand how all of that is being realized on matter, how the Light works, how it changes our qualities, and what is left for us from each of the levels from which we have ascended.

Man becomes confused and does not understand where he really is. It is said that the Creator is the first, and He is also the last. So, where is the human in this? Perhaps he is at least in the middle? There is an initial state of the world of infinity, and there is a final state, the return back to Infinity, and we are on the path somewhere in the middle between the former and the latter.

In addition, what can we add from ourselves to the Creator’s actions, with whom everything begins and ends? We only can speed up our development to show that we want to move toward being similar to the Creator and to not to be pushed from behind by suffering.

The Creator has created a desire to enjoy inside of me that feels the good and the bad in relation to itself, and, now, with the help of these good and bad feelings, He can control me! However, if I am controlled only by my pleasant and unpleasant feelings, then I am acting like an animal. If I want to move forward to that same goal through my own efforts, then I need to feel its importance, to receive the strength for development, acting against my nature.

I must rise above the egoistic perception of good and bad toward the perception of truth and falsehood, and consider them as the good and the bad. These forces must pull me forward, having replaced pleasure and suffering with themselves, by which I am being pushed from behind. This is called the level of a human, not an animal.

That is only possible to achieve by the means of an environment that instills into me such values, such an importance of truth and falsehood that provide the strength for my development. However, in order for that to happen, I must listen to the environment, meaning that all of my work on the attainment of the Creator and toward reaching the goal of creation—to rise from the natural feeling of good and bad toward reason, from the animal level toward the human level, from the perception of pleasure and suffering toward the perception of truth and falsehood—all of that is work with the environment.

My goal is to find an environment that has these goals and values, and to be impressed by it. Thanks to that, I will receive the strength to develop as a human and not as an animal since an animal moves only because it sees a sack of grain in front of it or if it receives blows from behind. However, a human considers pleasure and suffering to be the approaching or distancing of the quality of bestowal, the truth and the falsehood.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/27/12, Shamati #13, “The Eighteenth Prayer”

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Open The Gates Of Bestowal

Dr. Michael LaitmanBaal HaSulam, Letter 38: In former times, an attainment of the Creator had to be preceded by all seven external sciences and horrible self-torture. And despite all of that, a few have found favor in the eyes of the Creator. However, since we have received the teachings of the Ari and the services of Baal Shem Tov, it is truly equally available to everyone and the above mentioned preparatory stages are no longer necessary.

We don’t know how and to what extent a time of the material world corresponds to a spiritual time, the processes of descent and subsequent ascent when the vessels, the desires, begin to gather into one whole. But of course, the closer we get to completion, the more people are able to open the gates of holiness, the gates of bestowal. They resort to the help from ancestors who thoroughly explored the spiritual system, established themselves and fixed connections in it. So, step by step, going in circles one after another, generations ascend the steps of the wide staircase. Each of them goes farther, and some people make generations ascend a few steps in a row. This is a complicated process.

At the current stage, the thrust towards disclosure of the Creator embraces the whole masses. However, we must understand the immutability of spiritual laws. The Creator doesn’t sacrifice them, and thus, we also need to comply with the terms of ascent, albeit at a different level, according to the current state. Here comes the mutual guarantee, rejection of egoism, and striving in the right line in order to rise above the left line in unity and cohesion, thus trying to build a model of the higher world to the extent we are able to understand it. So we’ll move forward.

Baal HaSulam brings an example of a king who needs to move his treasury from one place to the other. All of his subjects are egoists; they wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation and certainly would steal any amount of money exceeding their ability to resist. Therefore, the king gives a penny to everyone, which doesn’t make sense to steal because royal prestige in their eyes is more valuable. Thus they move the treasure without losing it.

And we are the same. Though it is not the most worthy “fact of our biography,” nevertheless it is a fact. Let’s hope we will be able to bring our penny, and first of all, recognize it as a start. The majority of our work is dedicated to that—to figure out what our goal is and what it means to “find favor in the eyes of the Creator,” which means bestowing to Him, and how to come to such a request, raising it above all the others. After all, by overcoming them, we create a longing for the Creator and build His image.

All of that is done by many ministers of the King who carry pieces of His treasury through many intermediate stages like circuits, from one state to the other. In fact, it is a great way to go if we accept it as a precept of the King. After all, He enjoys every little step we take, each state, as parents enjoy seeing their children’s efforts.

It is necessary to stay on the course, but to remember about the King’s joy and to try to please Him at each stage, here and now, even in the smallest detail, on the lowest level. Indeed, there is nothing low in His eyes. He sends me all the states. And if I somehow try bringing pleasure to Him, that is enough.

That’s why people going in the right direction on the path always feel joy and ascent. We need to check ourselves: Where do descents should come from if everything is arranged from above? The Creator creates each state, and only one thing depends on me: to respond with understanding and feeling or at least with the awareness of the Creator standing behind the current circumstances. Then I can assert myself in giving to Him every second.

In fact, there are no despicable and unpleasant states in our work, if I take them internally from the hands of the Creator who teaches me. Just like the slave, from another parable by Baal HaSulam, who fought a war against the king’s minister who deliberately presented himself in different enemy disguises. Here we have the same story, and most importantly, do not forget that all our states at every moment in life come from the Creator. If we attain this level, then we will be able to perceive what is happening and react to it properly.

Let’s try to unite with the spirit of our ancestors: Ari, Rabash, Baal HaSulam, and others. Let’s not forget about that and help each other in devoting every moment to the service of the Creator.

It is possible. You are already capable of many things. You’ve made some great steps, and now the question is in something else—in pride. Of course, it comes from the Creator as well, and yet, how do we not indulge in it?
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From a Conversation During the Meal Commemorating the Death of the Ari 7/25/12

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A Light That Is Brought Closer By The Group’s Telescope

Dr. Michael LaitmanIt is important to clarify exactly how we can change our desire to receive under the influence of the Light so that we will not waste our powers in vain. All we can do is to hasten the pace of our development by using the environment as a magnifying glass that brings the influence of the Light closer to us. This is actually the only thing we can do and the only thing we need.

By starting to work in a group, we learn to focus this telescope: We bring together all the rays of the Light that Reforms so that they will go exactly through the center of the group and will be focused exactly on our desire to receive. Then the desire to receive will be changed by the Light that Reforms.

We want to learn how this is done: how this ray of Light that goes through the magnifying glass grows, concentrates and is intensified, and then falls on the desire to receive and puts it through four phases. Then we will see how changes begin to take place in the desire to receive and how it becomes the opposite of what it was initially. A person begins to live not inside himself, but to rise above his desire, above the restriction and the Masach (screen) towards the Returning Light, towards bestowal, instead of receiving, and thus reaches correction.

This work in hastening the development of our desire by the Light that Reforms actually provides us with the power to understand and to attain the whole system. Although it is only the hastening of a process, it is in it that we discover all the means and all the details of creation and the process of its development. It is because in every stage that we go through, we have to orient the group differently.

So the focus through this magnifying glass constantly changes and becomes the opposite of what it was before, depending on the new external and internal conditions. We are constantly changing the influence of the group on us, and we change it with regard to the Light, with regard to the Creator. Eventually we build a new system inside us, above our desire to receive. The group becomes my world. Instead of a tiny point of desire, I receive a whole world, the enormous system of the world of Ein Sof (Infinity).

It is thanks to the desire we have that we begin to attain this system called the “group,” an infinite system in its finite form, and thus receive the means that raises us above our desire to receive.

The whole level of bestowal is called “self-sacrifice.” It means that a person has totally detached himself from his desire to receive, which means that he “sacrifices himself.” Of course, the whole correction is done by the Light, and we only have to adjust and to focus its influence on us through the environment, to connect these three components like a gun sight, so that they are all arranged in one straight line.

Then we will have no more doubts that we have to get close to the Light’s nature and so we imagine the society this way and want the Light to influence us through it. Eventually all these components become one whole.

The level of love is revealed after the level of self-sacrifice. Then a person understands what the goal of creation called “to do good to His created beings” means.

We gradually rise by keeping a certain condition and thanks to this we discover a little more understanding as to the Creator’s intention regarding the creation. Thus we advance: First there is the correction of the vessels by the Light that Reforms and then we attain the thought of creation.
[84030]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/26/12, Shamati #219

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