Question: While we go through different forms all the time, how can we keep aspiring to the same unity with the group and the Creator?

Answer: A descent between two adjacent levels gives me a new force of aspiration. For example, yesterday I ate, but today I am hungry again. In the same natural way, I must aspire to unity.

While standing on my current level, I dream of the next one. It is the ideal for me. Then I grow and rise to my ideal. So how can I keep moving on now? I need a desire that corresponds to the new ascent —a desire that is twice as big as the previous one. In other words, in order to ascend one level higher, I have to lose twice as much.

It turns out that I continuously take two steps back and one large step forward. That is because it isn’t enough for me to return with a desire to the previous level; I need to feel a double descent, a double loss. I can acquire this new necessity only from the environment, and only then will I be able to rise to the next level.
[63227]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/15/11, “The Freedom”

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Our development is a result of an unwinding chain of Reshimot (the informational genes). Each Reshimo is a whole world. After all, it is what gives me my perception of the world. Everything I feel now is caused by the Reshimo that awoke in me.

Every second several dozen or more Reshimot are replaced in me, like the frames of film on the reel. Any of its scenes shows me a picture of the world through the five senses, and there is a particular speed for each sense: The frequency at which the scenes change is much higher for vision than for hearing, and the frequency for hearing greatly exceeds the frequency for smell, taste, and touch.

Thus each passing Reshimo includes a great number of personal Reshimot that illustrate the details of my perception. In the end, it is precisely the Reshimo that we feel at every given instant.

Question: Reshimot could be positive and negative. What does it depend on?

Answer: It depends on you, on whether you are ready for the Reshimo that is revealed in you now. After all, it is revealed in your desires. Is the picture that it depicts pleasant to you or to the contrary? Are you prepared? Do you accept that the Creator is “good and does good to the good and the bad”? Have you risen above yourself? Do you accept any turn as a revelation from Above that comes to benefit you?

If so, you’re okay, you’re corrected. In other words, you have risen above the ego with faith above reason and acquired the force of bestowal that exceeds the force of reception. In this case, you rejoice in everything that is revealed to you, realizing that everything is for the best.

The Reshimot switch in you by a chain to the very end of correction, and this chain does not depend on how much you have prepared yourself. It draws out in its own due course. The Reshimot originated from the breaking of  the vessels, when desires to give and desires to receive got intermixed according to their size and thickness, traits and quality and consequently created a multifaceted conglomerate.

However, as a whole, we should accept each “picture” as the next step on the path, a step that is optimal, best, and the only one possible.

Thus a question arises: How do we prepare ourselves to this approach? For this we need a restriction, a screen and the reflected Light. Then a new Reshimo falls into fertile soil, like a baby born in my desire that is already prepared in such a way that everything benefits the newborn. Ideally, precisely like a baby, a Reshimo should be revealed in a vessel that is ready for it.
[63128]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/14/2011, “The Freedom”

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Question: I’m Roman Catholic, and I’m currently teaching myself how to read in Hebrew so I can read the Torah in it’s original language. I feel that it will be very beneficial for my Kabbalah studies. My questions is: Would it hinder or slow down my studies in Kabbalah? Do I need to study Hebrew? I’m just a beginning student.

Answer: It will help you to the extent that we use the definitions in Hebrew, which is necessary. Everything else is according to your desire.

Question: What is preventing the World Kli from connecting? How will we overcome it?

Answer: It’s egoism, and even more than in the case of regular people!

Question: It seems that our only work is to reveal the evil inclination and ask for correction. How can one fight with the feeling of guilt and worthlessness, which is an obstacle in asking for correction? It starts to be unbearable to see each time the bad in oneself.

Answer: All thoughts except for a plea for correction are empty and confusing, and as they arise, one must immediately reject them.
[61829]

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Question: Do I have to constantly worry about the world’s spiritual advancement or should I keep my mind on the group?

Answer: This is the order:

1. I work with the friends;
2. By the love of friends I organize the group;
3. With the group I disseminate;
4. Through dissemination, which helps the masses come closer to the Creator, I please Him.

The group in itself doesn’t please Him; the mass dissemination, which opens up the path to Him for everyone, does. It’s not important that they are distant and don’t understand yet to where this path is leading—if the masses come closer to the Creator at least a little, it brings Him contentment. And that’s the main point.

If you bring a small part of His message to Indonesia or Polynesia, it pleases Him. It is the same way the guest pleases the Host by partaking of the meal the Host has prepared for him.

So, let’s get things right:

First, our goal is to reach adhesion. Adhesion is equivalence of form, bestowal on my part, just like bestowal coming from the Creator. I must reach bestowal, and then I will reach adhesion with the Creator. Bestowal means bringing contentment to Him.

Second, He is pleased when thanks to me, the huge desire to receive that He has created approaches adhesion. My bestowal upon the world has to bring all of it closer to the Creator. How? Through circulation.

Third, in order to do that I must first join a group so that I will have a means, a “commando.” When I have a group, I can disseminate. So it follows that I enter the group and with its help bestow upon the world, circulate, help people come closer to the Creator, and thus please Him. Not one link in the chain is redundant.

In the past, circulation wasn’t part of the chain. One used to sit in a group of Kabbalists, and they would attain the Creator directly. But today it’s impossible because the whole world needs to reach the Creator. In the past, in previous generations, Kabbalists only prepared themselves as a means to advance the world, and now all the efforts are aimed at helping the world. There is no other choice, and Baal HaSulam says this in many places: at the end of “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” the article “The Messiah’s Horn,” and others.

Question: Is the concern about the world a natural result of our work in the group? Or do we have to increase the importance of what we are doing for humanity?

Answer: I—the world—the Creator. We are connected, and I cannot distinguish one from the other. Adhesion means that we are all connected, no matter to what extent. That main thing is that we are together, and I cannot distinguish between the group, the world, and myself.  I simply cannot because if I do, I won’t feel this, won’t reach the revelation, and won’t fulfill the goal. These links don’t exist separately, although today, in our unconscious state, they seem separate.

[62937]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/12/2011, Writings of Rabash

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Question: If everyone sitting at the lesson was to be asked whether he wants fast advancement towards the final, highest point of development, everyone would say: “Yes.” But at the same time I see that we are satisfied with your answers. We come to the lesson with a desire, a need, but we gradually fall into a state of sleep. How can we be constantly active? How can we advance faster?

Answer: You cannot maintain your desire near me. Even though I have a need of my own in relation to you, I exist in the state of perfection and am a higher degree. For this reason, when you connect to me, you also experience perfection, like a child next to an adult. Sometimes he demands something from his elders, but still, as a rule, they give him confidence, a sense of reliability, and he peacefully falls asleep in his parents’ arms.

To tell you the truth, it’s even better for me when you fall asleep. It’s because then more enters you. People “snoozing” during the lesson do not disturb me; they’re not supposed to always be “on fire.” It’s written that “the words of sages are soothing.” And it’s not because sages speak calmly; it’s simply that their wisdom flows like water from one place to another and enters the person in the right way. So don’t worry.

It’s good that sometimes people come to the lesson with fire in their hearts, but when they receive the Light that reforms, a sense of appeasement is better for them.
[62918]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/11/2011, The Zohar

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Question: Why are some friends able to go to the convention and others are not?

Answer: We study everything we need in order to enter the spiritual world. Once we enter this sensation, we will begin to study other levels of attainment of the universe. We will already be in the upper world, like on a tour.

And then we’ll be able to understand where each one of us comes from: This is your spiritual home, your source, this one is mine, and this one is his. We’ll understand how different we are, and at the same time, we will realize why from all of humanity specifically we needed to unite into this collective Kli that represents the entire mankind. This vessel is very diverse but at the same time integrally connected due to our efforts, and this is exactly why all other people on earth can connect to it.

Today we still don’t understand where each one of us comes from, from which spiritual root, and why we connect in this specific way. We don’t know why we exist as we do, men, women, with different personalities and qualities, or why one’s destiny suddenly lands him somewhere North or South, and another one lands in the center of the civilized world, and so on.

Later a person will understand how necessary all of this was. He’ll see that all of his qualities, origin, and distance or closeness to others, absolutely everything comes from his higher spiritual root to the tiniest elements of his physical and spiritual body. And this is why no one will have any questions about why he was created one way and not another. He’ll see that he was placed in the most optimal conditions that enable him to reach his correction, including his presence at the convention or participation in local groups out of lack of another opportunity.

We need to understand that everything comes from the need for our common correction. For this reason let everyone make the most effort in the place and state where the Creator has placed him or her. If we make these efforts, everyone will necessarily receive absolute fulfillment for their soul. They will have no questions, no empty spaces in desires or the possibilities to perceive the upper world.
[62435]
From the Sunday Virtual Lesson Series 11/27/2011

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Question: Does one’s perception of oneself as a separate individual need to disappear?

Answer: We all unite into one team. At first it’s a team where each one of us represents a separate individual, but we all act in coordination, like cogwheels that spin and try to synchronize the common movement. Then this connection becomes adhesion: Certain parts of every one of us join each other’s parts to such an extent that we don’t just wear out as we brush against one another and spin together like separate parts of one mechanism, but this entire mechanism becomes one whole void of any inconsistencies.

The absolutely full interaction between everyone brings us to the point whereby we stop perceiving ourselves as existing separately or even as our collective “we,” but begin to perceive ourselves as one single whole. This transition to one single whole is our goal, and there we begin to perceive the upper force, the Creator.

The world must strive to properly connect all its parts. Global interconnection, world integration, the crisis, and all the problems are obligating us to do this today. This is enough for people without points in the heart to reach an absolutely coordinated interaction between them. This is called “we.”

And “we” with the points in the heart must unite these points. Other people do not have them. But we do, and we must connect our points in the heart so that they will unite into one whole, not into “we,” but into union, “one.” This is our next level. On the level of union into “one,” meaning when we are like one man with one heart, we begin to feel the upper world and the upper force that controls and maintains the entire creation, including our universe and us.

The world consisting of separate egoists will have to unite because it can’t survive any other way. This is nature’s condition, which it sets for our egoistic desires. And when people with a point in the heart wish to rise above their egoistic desires, these points connect into a spiritual vessel.

So it’s as if three degrees exist here: egoistic (separated), egoistic (connected, combined in reciprocity and integration), and spiritual, when everything connects into a single whole.
[62438]
From the Sunday Virtual Lesson Series 11/27/2011

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Question: How do we speed up the clarification that the group is the main means for reaching the goal?

Answer: The difficult part is to feel that we need an internal revolution. The mind, ego, and pride are obscuring a person’s perception, and he is unable to realize that there is something higher than him here in this world. He got used to making decisions about everything in this life with the help of his own mind, feelings, and analysis. He’s not able to accept anything without checking it. This is the behavior of an animal or a fool, but not of a serious person.

However, then we come across things beyond our comprehension. For instance, tell me how a group is stronger than me? And why should I lose my mind and feelings there in order to get newer, more internal ones from it? I don’t know what a more internal mind from a higher dimension is.

Everyone has an internal urge and a rudiment of a spiritual vessel, but between this spark and its connection with other sparks, a huge gap of separation is felt. A person cannot imagine that there is something higher relative to him, where all of the desires unite. And this is precisely what the spiritual world is. It’s where he’ll discover his new life and change his perception of reality, after having passed through this world and connecting to the inside.

In order for a person to gradually change and correct his perception, he has to spend a lot of time under the influence of the surrounding Light that comes from the higher level, the energetic field  located above him. This is a constant, uninterrupted process, during which the Light is working upon us, and this takes years.

We don’t understand the immensity of this process, this evolution that we are going through, how many changes must happen inside of us owing to such special events as conventions or gatherings of friends. Although these affairs seem a bit primitive and not serious to us, and we don’t find any special flavor in them, we still do this again and again until we finally begin to reveal the flavor in it.

The difference is that if I receive this flavor, I’m ready to participate. But if there is no flavor, I am looking for ways to escape. So does it turn out that everything depends on the flavor, and not on whether I can rise above my desire!

Furthermore, my egoistic desire controls everything depending on whether it receives pleasure or not. Then perhaps the fact that my egoistic desire does not feel any flavor is a good sign after all? Maybe this is exactly what I need? I come into the group, and for reasons not under my control, I do things that do not give me any pleasure. And that’s why I can only participate in them with my point in the heart!

If I liked being in the group, uniting with friends, and singing together, then possibly I would have to overcome this feeling because it would simply be that I came for the sake of pleasure. But I am being helped from Above, and the flavor for this is being taken away from me. Now I can sit without any flavor and I must be thankful for this since the Creator has done half of the work for me. This is temporary since later the Creator will give me the flavor, and I’ll have to overcome it in order to sit in the group not for the sake of pleasure, but for the sake of spiritual connection.

All of these stages and states are not simple at all. A person can promise himself that he will never again miss an opportunity, and then just a moment later he can forget it. And even though he remembers that such states are being revealed to him and he knows that he should behave in another way, he is not capable of doing it. This way it is shown to him how this does not depend upon him.

This is how we gradually discover who we are relative to the upper force being revealed in this field.
[61943]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/28/2011, Writings of Rabash

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Question: What does it mean to attract the Light that reforms?

Answer: We can only bring our desire, the need to become corrected, but who will correct it? I can only reveal the breaking, while the remedy can come only from Above, only from the Light. The Light broke our Kli or desire, and it also corrects it. It’s the same Light, the same action, but in its opposite form, which is what I now desire.

It turns out that besides revealing the desire, I don’t need anything. As soon as I reveal a desire, it is called a prayer and all of the evil that I revealed immediately becomes corrected. If I really reveal evil in its final, last form on every phase, then it becomes corrected because there I unequivocally reach the true prayer, a cry, a MAN—and correction definitely comes to me.
[63110]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/14/11, The Zohar

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Question: At the convention we felt life, but now descents are depicting a completely different picture for me. I want to return to the basis, the middle line, to that which I have to rely on. Or should we tread forward blindly until we come out to the Light? Do we have any source of support?

Answer: Besides the group, all other details of perception, qualities, and foundations disappear and do not provide support for a person.

Moreover, by delving into the group, a person also sees that he cannot really rely on the friends’ mutual guarantee either because they are also part of the conditions that bring him to a greater need for support. Gradually he loses firm ground in the group as well, until a person’s searches bring him to the need to reveal the Creator. Only in Him will a person find the true support, the root, and the answer to all his problems, failures, questions, and troubles.

We have to go through many steps on this path, and we begin with what is realistic for us. A person always stops in the place that seems safe to him. And therefore, the best thing is when all the hopes come from him through the group to the Creator, when he understands that the solution, fulfillment, and correct analysis will come only from there. And everything else are intermediate phases.

For example, today our hopes end with the group, “We are together! That’s great! How wonderful my friends are!” We still don’t discover the need for something higher, we still don’t demand a higher force to be revealed in the group more than simply a circle of friends. But this will gradually come.

Question: Baal HaSulam writes about how easy it is to control our desire with two reins: pleasure and pain. Then why is it so difficult for us to direct our desire in the spiritual direction in the group? What are we missing?

Answer: You cannot connect to the friends. Your pleasure lies in suppressing others and holding your ground. But others are also holding their ground, so how can you unite? Envy, passion, and pride—all of these initial qualities separate us from one another.

You suppose that you can unite, but I don’t think so. This is possible only with the help of the Light that reforms, by means of very difficult work. This requires the force of the Torah, the Kabbalistic method.

By uniting, we will reach Malchut of Infinity. Besides unity, there is nothing. Unite the friends in the group and you will get the world of Infinity. Everything begins and ends there.

You think this is simple. You are asking why we aren’t succeeding, what is wrong? But it can’t be any other way because you don’t demand for the Creator to dwell among you. You don’t even see that you are incapable of unity by yourself, and you even suppose that you are capable of it. You still haven’t revealed the truth.

Question: So how can we help each other do this?

Answer: There can be many external actions. The question is: How much do they incite a person to inner effort? This is our problem. So keep trying.

We still don’t have the need to connect ourselves, the group, the world and the Creator into one whole. We have to reveal this need faster since otherwise it will expire and the world will be in trouble.

The Reshimo of Malchut of Infinity, which becomes revealed in the group, is the result of many efforts that we make. And this work has to be done precisely in the group. It is the field where all fruits grow. It contains everything necessary, and our efforts determine how quickly we will be able to connect everything into one. The faster we do this, the easier and more pleasant our path will be.
[63122]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/14/11, “The Freedom”

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