This seems paradoxical, but if we look at this world from the spiritual world, there is nothing more natural than the connection of everything into one whole and with the Creator. This is a single, stable system that is found in harmony, in permanent balance, in an ideal state, where everything in it is found in interaction, fulfilling the others and being fulfilled by the others. This system becomes an absolutely healthy body, physically and mentally.

Information, matter, energy, perception, consciousness, all this exists in absolute harmony. Therefore this system is eternal: There is no concept of time, there are no changes. In other words, there is eternal life and events take place with regularity specifically to reveal the infinite depth of this connection.

The connection itself is permanent, the system is permanent, and the Light is found at absolute rest and fills the entire creation. We are found in it in constant motion from the smallest fulfillment to the largest. And the most important ecstasy is in the perception of the harmony and wholeness of this system, and this is what is called perception of the Creator.

Therefore our world is comprehended from there as a small, ugly world, which exists without choice, because the Creator obliges it to exist even though a creature seems so despicable that it has no right to exist. This creature exists specifically for this, that by denying his depravity, he will rise and attain eternity and wholeness. Yet it’s difficult to do this because we don’t see anything against this depravity.

But if we were to see this, we would lose free choice, and with all our strength we would run only there, no matter what. We would slam with our whole body into a wall, a barrier that separates between us, just to get there or to disappear.

For this we were given the concealment so that from ourselves we would build the model of the world to which we aspire, with a link between us, with our relationship with one another, to ourselves, in the relationship of our general group to all of humanity, to the still, vegetative, and animate nature.

We crave it in this world, imagining it as a kingdom, like in a children’s game, and try to create it among us, in spite of all the things that are given to us here. We want to enter this seemingly unnatural, imaginary state; if we understand how far this is from our present existence, we see this is contrary to all logic, to our nature, which is to say, our intelligence; this needs to be something absolutely different.

And continually humanity tries to understand how, in spite of it all, it is possible to do something, but in the end something worse results. The ego still crushes us and shows us that we have perhaps achieved what we wanted, until we discover the significance of all that is happening: For what does existence like this need to be?

You see, if we look from the side, our existence seems depraved and absolutely lacking in meaning and purpose. It follows that people exist without a choice, captive, where they suffer and flee from this suffering all the time, encounter more suffering and again flee. And all this is only to begin to imagine another existence, something that is truly worth it, for which it is worthwhile to live, and not regret the fact that you are alive.

When we imagine this state, we gradually begin to feel that apparently it truly exists; otherwise, how would we imagine it? And this state apparently exists not only hypothetically but truly. However, it wants us to truly aspire to it. I must aspire to it in a form where I will feel myself inwardly and emotionally within it. And then I begin to feel some kind of help, inspiration, and illumination. I begin to see that there is a purpose to all this.

Precisely like this, Adam discovered this system 5773 years ago. From that day, we run our Kabbalistic calendar, from that moment when Adam HaRishon (first man) discovered the Creator in our world. And after that began the transfer of knowledge from generation to generation; more people began to be included in this who also felt a lack of meaning in their existence.

But that same problem always remained: How can I develop another world, a correct and true world within my small and threatening world? People stood facing that problem all the time. It’s necessary to create an image, to play with this system, to play in the true world.

We always forget this, and this will continue until we create together a state like this, a link like this, a system of relationships like this, which will be just about identical to the higher world and it will only be required to realize it clearly, and this will be done through a stroke of the Upper Light. But until we do all that we can in order to be in such a state as this, we will not reach it. The moment that we do everything in order to create this other world within our gloom, it will appear immediately. The Light will make it true and we will discover ourselves within it.

We understand that there is no choice but to reach true and clear unity and to create the conditions, the contact, the mutual relationships like these, that will be just about equal to the higher system, full of love and bestowal, mutual inclusion, understanding, support, and responsibility. And the link needs to be like this, that the person, as a separate entity, disappears. He doesn’t exist, and cannot exist.
[114616]
From the St. Petersburg Convention “Day Three” 7/14/13, Lesson 6

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Baal HaSulam, “A Handmaid That Is Heir to Her Mistress:” Hence, the worlds have been divided into internality and externality, where each world contains illuminations suitable to operate in slow development. And these are called “the internality of the world.”

The system we are in is divided into internality and externality. This division relates to the Lights and the vessels, both to the direct and to the opposite correlation between them depending on if we speak about the corrected vessels or the corrupt ones.

Accordingly, we should understand what it means for us after the preparation in the spiritual system and the creation of the corporeal system. It is actually also a spiritual system, but we perceive it as the current fictitious world. I discover that I exist in a certain reality with people and the still, vegetative, and animate nature  around me. It is as if everyone lives on his own here, moving around independently, operating and influencing others. After I reveal all that, I must attribute myself, together with the whole picture that is depicted inside me to one cause, to one source, to one goal, to a simple reality in which there is none else besides Him, and that He is good and benevolent. The point that is created as “something from nothing” remains in me only in order to determine that everything else is Him.

We must connect everything that is outside that point to the perception of the upper, the Creator. This is our work, and everyone who feels that he has a point in the heart—”something from nothing” and who feels different from the eminent—participates in it.

The work is divided into two parts:

1. Strengthening the point in the heart by connecting the points that can be connected to it for the sake of the spiritual goal. These are the members of the group, my friends along the spiritual path, who actually are parts of my soul, of my point in the heart.
2. In addition, there are other parts that are not directly connected to this goal. They don’t feel “something from nothing,” but rather, “something from something,” and they don’t ask complicated questions that stem from the point in the heart, from the opposite form. They live their lives and don’t feel any deficiency but that. I also need to connect them to my work according to the type and size of the desires that are revealed inside them.

Eventually, I connect all of reality: the whole desire to receive that is before me—that is at my disposal, inside me, no matter how you put it—to the attribute of bestowal and love called the Creator. It seems that I correct the world, but in fact, I fulfill my private correction. This is because there is nothing in the world but one man and one Creator. A person is the point of “something from nothing” that operates in order to bring it back to “something from something,” everything that seems separate from it.
[114668]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/15/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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When we disseminate we reach different organizations, prisons, etc., and we organize roundtables where we discover different problems in the network of connections. It is the correction of the network of connections and nothing more than that. We discover the place of the shattering and its intensity and ask for its corrections and not for anything for our own private desires. Our prayers are not for a particular person but are about the connection between people, and therefore it is called a “prayer of many.”

It is impossible to ask for one individual; you will not be heard this way. After all, a vessel is formed between two people. Two people is the minimal amount; the desire to create the right connection between two is a spiritual vessel.

I cannot pray to the Creator to do good to me. I must ask for someone else, for the well being of another. If I pray for him, it means that I correct my connection with him. Then it goes through me, and I if I am totally focused on him, I reach spiritual revelation. The person I asked for will feel good since he will get rid of his problems and I will feel good because of the revelation of the Creator.

I become GE and therefore my fulfillment is in my intention, which serves as the actual filling. The other person is AHP and his fulfillment is in the revelation of the Light.

The only important thing is the network of our connections. In our world it seems that the actual components of the crystal network are important, that people are actually those who bear the desires. This isn’t true; the spiritual desire is actually the connection between them. This is what we have to focus on.

So when we connect with the public, the connection with a person is the most important thing. This is what we have to explain to them eventually, one way or another, so that they will understand that if the connections between us are good and corrected, we will be filled and feel abundance between us. No matter how he attains this, a person will feel good. Everything he wants will be fulfilled. Later his desires will change from a desire for corporeal fillings to desires that are increasingly more spiritual.
[114734]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/15/13

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Question: Lately, we are witness to Europe and Russia beginning to connect. Also, here in the convention, we truly are feeling this. How can we connect all of our sparks together?

Answer: Understandably, that would be remarkable. If this were possible, then this would be the materialization of our dream. The dream would have become reality. Then, all of our friends would be able to rise above their mentality, above the historical separation, above the contradictions and even above the hatred, and the main thing, above the Babylonian repulsion, above the difference in languages. If they were ready to rise above “Ancient Babylon” that now is being revealed more and more among us, then there would not be any more need to change anything.

Why is the global crisis happening? It indicates to us the pre-Babylonian civilization that existed in Babylon before the general separation: the division, the disagreements, and people stopped understanding each other. In general, this is not talking about languages, not about philology, but about the disappearance of mutual understanding between people.

What is this global world? The global world is being revealed as a system that existed before the Babylonian separation. This system was divided and now is connecting again, and motility called a “crisis” is taking place.

In ancient Babylon, the crisis advanced from a state of wholeness to a shattered state, and with us, after three thousand five hundred years, the movement is from the shattered state to the whole state. The world is returning to itself to its source.

If our groups were able to connect with the help of various mechanisms (helping mechanisms, virtual and more), then without a doubt, this would be remarkable. However, for the Europeans, it is very difficult to reach connection—very difficult! Europe is the most sensitive place with a rich history and a multitude of painful issues, with general, mutual hatred, whereas if we could rise above all this… This is extremely difficult. It is necessary to go through huge “pitfalls.”

I very much hope that the Americans will become an example because our students, our friends from the Education Center, are together with us. They have good organizers faithful to us. As of this moment, they are working together with the friends on the gradual connection, on the approach toward us.

If this truly will begin to be realized, we will feel an intense spiritual push forward. Perhaps this will become an example to Europe, and then they will also begin to depart gradually from the crisis.

Throughout history, it happened that in places where the Kabbalists once lived, the economy, the trade, and the culture always prospered. However, the moment that they were expelled from the country, everything died. Therefore, I hope very much that, first of all, this will lead these nations to prosper.

However, the most important thing is that this is the very core of correction, when we, or at least those who are engaged in the science of integral connection, will be able to realize it together. And in the nations of Europe and in a number of states in the United States, people are learning alone or in solitary groups who don’t want to connect.

Do you think that this can be realized in a different way? People still don’t hear, but I hope that they will hear. We need to write about this subject more clearly, more openly, so that everyone will see where this leads. Do not wait until they guess it is the correction of the world. The connection between our groups is the correction of the world.
[114543]
From the St. Petersburg Convention “Day Three” 7/14/13, Lesson 5

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Question: I recognize the secret of dissemination and it is very simple. It is up to us to radiate happiness as a result of the connection between us. People will be specifically attracted to this, not to the suffering that pushes them away, but will be attracted to the happiness that we must disseminate. How do we maintain the dissemination of happiness all the time?

Answer: I will tell you what I did. I was sitting, writing books. I worked on the archive that was left to me from Rabash. It is up to each one to feel his mission. I reached Rabash when he was 75. I didn’t know how many years were left for him to live, but I knew that it was up to me to get as much as possible from him, and if I were not to get it, then all the knowledge that he had, everything, would go down the drain. I had the feeling that I was obliged to absorb and to record everything on audio tapes, to write everything down that he had. It could be that this was conceit or even audacity, but this held me.

I did not aspire to be number one after him. Even now, I don’t feel that way, I don’t like this very much since this only makes life complicated. I felt that I was obliged to receive, to drink from this well to the end, so that this knowledge would not disappear. Instead, it would be disseminated to everyone. This was the feeling of my mission. This really held me.

More than this, I have nothing to add. Do what Rabash wrote: connection, the happiness of the goal, a feeling of need and of having been chosen for a great and difficult mission.

Think about it. What is it to be parents? On the one hand, you are happy to see them developing, growing, and on the other hand, you are very concerned about them. Certainly, you want them to grow to be more successful, but what if this is not so? How disappointed and frustrated would you be? And much more so than with your own lack of success.

That is to say, your concern is in others. They give us an example of natural love on the animate, most primitive level. If, as a reaction, they also love you, then this love for you is much stronger, and the sorrow, the suffering of the loved one, is much more terrible and tragic, than your personal suffering, for love amplifies all sensations 620 times.

Therefore, if we would have a feeling of love between us, then the world simply would “explode with jealousy” because of our happiness. Therefore, the entire secret is always to return to love. So, if we relate this way to humanity, they suddenly will feel what kind of people we are and what is happening between us. However, even now, when they see us together, they wonder about the meaning of the strange “superhuman” relationships that there are between us.
[114540]
From the St. Petersburg Convention “Day Three” 7/14/13, Lesson 5

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Question: The end of the exile should signify the end of all our suffering, so why do we reach total emptiness and bankruptcy?

Answer: We all know that the exile begins from the seven years of satiety and there are the seven years of lack that end in the darkness in Egypt, in terrible plaques. Who receives these blows? It’s my body, my “Pharaoh.” This is called bankruptcy when, while in my last ten Sefirot in the last ten plagues, I feel total despair which totally detaches me from my desire to receive.

Then I am ready to come out of Egypt, to escape from there. This is bankruptcy, since when I came to Egypt there was food and life there and it was good, you could find everything you wanted there! At first Egypt was like the land of Israel to the sons of Joseph, the land of milk and honey; Joseph was the ruler of Egypt and all the Egyptians worked for the Jews, for the children of Israel.

I am in a state in which the ego provides me with different pleasures; I am glad that I have found the wisdom of Kabbalah, meaning that I have found a means to receive the upper pleasure and to succeed in life. Before I had nothing and now I hope to receive everything in this world and all the upper worlds and to conquer everything. This is what a person who comes here to study feels; it’s as if he has found a great treasure that can fill all his desires to receive. It isn’t by chance that it is called the wisdom of Kabbalah (the wisdom of “reception” in Hebrew).

But when I gradually advance and participate in the collective work, I feel as if the seven years of lack and bankruptcy have begun. Where is the promised pleasure? Where is the attainment, the understanding, the feelings, the control? There is nothing! A person deteriorates more and more. So we see that “a thousand enter a room to learn and only one comes out,” the one who can bear it all.

The others flee since there are other pleasures on the outside. But now we see that there is nothing on the outside either, so everyone will eventually return. We are ready and glad to receive everyone. It’s clear that a person flees since the seven years of famine have begun. After all, he doesn’t understand that he has to receive the new world in new vessels, and if he hasn’t prepared these vessels, then what can he feel?

The seven years of famine come to an end in final bankruptcy, in the ten plagues of Egypt, when I don’t see that I succeed in anything. I despair because of the powerlessness I feel in all the ten forms of my relationships with the world: in education, in health, in security, in economics, in finance, in the desires for food, sex, and family.

There is nothing I can revive my soul with; all the sources of pleasure have dried up. Then I come to the conclusion that I have to flee from my egoistic desire and to leave the system that forces me to think only about how to fill myself. After all, there is no way anything can enter my mouth according to this method, I need to find a new method.

Then I escape from Egypt, cross the Red Sea, which is inner feelings, my understanding, and my consciousness. I escape from my ego, draw away from it; I am scared and in the dark, but I already understand that there is nothing I can do in Egypt anymore…then help comes from above and takes me out of there, but I am prepared for it.

Then, from the phase of Mt. Sinai onward, I begin to take on another form. This is the path we have to go through now with the whole world. Everything we have done before was just the preparation, meaning the correction of a small part of the desire: GE, Israel. Now we have to do the same thing with the whole world.

The whole world will have to go through and is already going through the same state that Israel experienced with the exile in Egypt. The whole world gradually goes down to Egypt. The seven fat years of prosperity of the American dream when everyone thought that all humanity will develop, conquer space, and cross every border are over. Now we are gradually folding all our programs and don’t want anything anymore. This is called the “seven years of famine.”

The ten plagues of Egypt that will hit the world are approaching and we already see the beginning of an ecological disaster. Then there will be problems with oil and gas supply and with viruses and plagues if we don’t succeed in softening these attacks. The blows will come no matter what, but we can soften them by approaching them ourselves. If we operate knowingly, consciously, we can indeed soften them.
[113967]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/02/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Baal HaSulam writes that even though a person has a yearning for the Creator, for understanding of meaning, the source of life, and connection with it, he cannot himself be conscious of the Creator as long as a spirit has not descended upon him from above, as long as Light has not descended upon him.

In the meantime we feel this as a source of inspiration, insight, fulfillment, and elevation. If the person feels a revelation from above, only then can he begin to hear what the sages are talking about in their books. And together with this, when he sees what they are truly talking about, he begins to believe them.

Faith means that a person is connected to their words through his inner sensations. Which is to say, he already lives in this and begins to feel, understand, sense, and be aware that always in all of his states, in absolutely everything, he is managed from above. And there is nothing in his life that was not sent from above and he reacted from below, all of his reactions also descended from above. Thus it was conducted through a variety of states that caused various sensations.

It is as if he did something, went somewhere, he ran around, something succeeded for him, something didn’t, and so forth. His inner efforts, moral feelings, physical actions, sufferings, and successes, he was simply passed through these states to create within him the possibility of feeling more and more subtle states that bring him to feel who manages them, for what goal they were sent, and so forth.

A person begins to feel that he has absolutely no freedom in anything and all of his actions are realized according to the movements of the Creator (the Light), and he is completely dependent on them. If they give him a great portion of consciousness like this, then he dissolves into it, and if they give him a small portion, then he is left with the awareness that this is what is happening.

But if he is found somewhere in the middle, then he is thrown into a divided state and doesn’t understand how he must act. At every moment he either condemns the Creator or agrees with Him and that is how it is all the time. They give him a feeling of complete inability to remain in a state like this.

It is as if he is cut in two and doesn’t know what to do with this life. Suddenly he is thrown into criticism and condemnation in the analysis of what is happening with him, his relatives, and friends. For example, he substitutes one of his relatives that drives him crazy, and he condemns the higher management, reproaching himself for his past, as though he is refusing to agree that in the past the Creator operated him.

Conversely, he agrees and understands that all this is done with the help of the Creator and only in order to sharpen his senses, so that with these feelings he can understand and feel the higher guidance.

These states pass through him for some time, gradually coming back and cooling, going to the “right line” or the “left line.” When he is inclined to the left, he begins to feel as if the past depended on him and he admonishes himself because of all of his problems, or because he cannot justify this, since this is done by the Creator.

And the opposite, when he is found in the “right line” with full awareness that all this is done from above, then what is left for him? Where is he in this whole process? Does free choice exist? In a state like this it surely doesn’t exist: not in action, not in intention, not in results, not in anything.

That is the way it happens until he is completely cleansed. Which is to say, all of his observations and all of his doubts pass through some kind of inner work until he reaches the conclusion that there exists a very subtle system here of cooperation between him and the Creator, the Creator yearns for him and vice versa.

Now it is necessary to strengthen this mutual yearning until it reaches its full amount. The moment that this happens, the person will begin to discover true cooperation with the Creator.
[114249]
From the St. Petersburg Convention “Day Three” 7/14/13, Lesson 5

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Question: Yesterday the Israeli Finance Ministry announced a cut in pensions of 10%. The economic situation is becoming more severe…

Answer: Since the day before yesterday we have not attracted the Light that Reforms which would correct our state to the same degree; instead of lowering 10% from the pension they would have added 10%. We are to blame because only we have free choice. If we had carried out a correction yesterday, today we would not hear about this.

What do you want from the government? The politicians and the government officials base themselves on facts: Here is the budget, here are the expenses, including the “hidden” manipulations, and this is what is left for the pension. And what will you do here?

Stop dreaming about a “fair budget.” We cannot come to them with claims. They are only arguing about where to get what’s missing. And understandably, they don’t collect taxes from the big tycoons and corporations. There is no nation in the world where they deprive the rich, rather the opposite, they only add more and more to them.

The authorities act according to their egoistic calculation and continue in the same way. Ten percent of the pension is nothing compared to what is standing ahead of us.

If you want changes, only the Light that Reforms can bring them. Therefore, understand—everything depends on you.

Behind the scenes the higher force acts and we are prepared to change its influence on us from negative to positive. It sends us the evil only so we will be “caught” in it, obligating it to be linked to us and correct us.

We need the Creator and until we understand this it is as if we are left in the hands of blind fate.
[114658]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/14/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Question: How is it possible to maintain the intention “for the sake of the friend” most of the time and the intention “for my sake” only for a little time?

Answer: We are found in the world of Assiya, the world of action, because we don’t have the right intention and we can awaken it only by means of action, by way of all kinds of movements in matter. Therefore it is written, “Hearts are drawn after deeds.”

Friends in the group need to feel your aspiration, you must give them an example. After all, when you show them your aspiration, the importance of the goal, you try in all kinds of forms, even shrewd ones to awaken the friends as if playing with them and unintentionally showing them your excitement; this also helps you somewhat. But the greatest help is dissemination.

It is written: “I learned much from my teachers, and from my friends even more than from my teachers, and from my  students, most of all.” (Masechet Ta’anit 7a). My teachers, this is the highest level, from them it is possible to learn only when you are found like an embryo (Ubar) in regard to them, and in the fetal state you can acquire only the Surrounding Light.

You enter into them, cling to the walls of the uterus and remain in this state for nine months. This is called the “fetus,” which is to say, totally unconscious development.

Within the fetus it is as if emotion develops, but the fetus itself doesn’t feel anything. It reacts, yet this is not its reaction, rather the reaction of the body in regard to what is higher, in regard to the teacher. In a form like this each one is found within the teacher like a fetus.

Relative to the friend, you are on the same level and the only action between you is connection. So interaction like this cannot be carried out with what is higher or with what is lower, because the coupling, the connection, can only be if someone is equal. This is to say, the forms of the desires, the intentions of the friends complete each other as in a puzzle.

The third level is when you teach. Then the Light descends on you because there is a group of students in front of you (a Kli), they open their mouths like chicks and you must feed them.

In this circumstance you draw the Surrounding Light onto yourself (not even you, rather them). Therefore it is written, “From my students I learned most of all.” Why most of all? – Because in the first case you receive the Surrounding Light (Ohr Makif), in the second case, you complete each other, which is to say Hassadim plus Hochma—a small illumination of perfection.

In the third case, you truly receive a great Light that the students attract through their desires, unconsciously, incorrectly, it doesn’t matter which, and this Light passes through you.

If we didn’t internalize this and would run to the world to disseminate, we would get tremendous results. And it doesn’t matter what is disseminated: integral education or the wisdom of Kabbalah. What difference does it make? The main thing is that in any case you must teach them what they want if they truly want this. Therefore, if we teach, disseminate, serve, bring connection, which is what we aspire to ourselves, then we get a positive result.

So what does the wisdom of Kabbalah exist for? To discover the Creator within connection. Therefore they do the same thing. So it is written that all the people who don’t feel the Creator will lift upon their shoulders those who have the “point in the heart” and will bring them to the mountain of the Creator, which is to say, they will elevate them. They will push, compel us, perhaps harshly, perhaps softly, so that we will be elevated and will provide them with the knowledge, the fulfillment that they require.
[114293]
From the St. Petersburg Convention “Day Three” 7/14/13, Lesson 5

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Question: Do I have to be actively incorporated in the sufferings of others and to suffer too as a result?

Answer: Of course, you have to identify with the sufferings of others as if you actually suffer, which means to be incorporated in others. We shouldn’t fear that we will remain in these corporeal sufferings like society itself. Indeed there is such a risk when we begin to help others that we will drown in their sufferings and become like them. But because we have a rope that connects us to the group, there is nothing to fear.

We must only tighten the connection to the group, and then the lower you descend into the public and penetrate their desires, the higher you will be able to ascend. It says “I dwell among my people,” because when we raise these lowest desires to the Creator through us, we give them the right form for correction.

Then you begin to see that the whole world is one desire, the whole world is you, the lowest corporeal desires that scream in people are your personal desires. It is a very good thing that you perceive them as foreign now as long as you are not corrected, don’t love everyone as you love yourself, and cannot tie all of reality to one thing.

If you felt these needs as your own, then you wouldn’t be able to worry about them, you wouldn’t be able to relate to them objectively, you would feel too interested in them and wouldn’t be able to rise above these desires, and wouldn’t be able to ask for their correction instead of for the feeling of pleasure.

If you put yourself in the shoes of these people and feel their sufferings just as they feel them, then you would focus on the pain like everyone else, or cry out to the Creator so He will save you; you wouldn’t be able to relate to these desires purposefully in order to use them only to bring the Creator contentment, but would only think about yourself.

The division of the general soul into so many parts allows us to work with these desires, as if externally and independently. We can gradually become incorporated in these desires and feel them as if they were our own, but it is only to the extent that we are protected enough by a Masach (screen),  we can be impressed by them as if they are our own but we can ask for the right correction for them.

This means that we shouldn’t ask to get rid of the troubles, but should use them as help in getting closer to the Creator, to bring Him joy. Then we will be able to thank Him for the bad feelings since it is thanks to them that our desire to receive pleasure is spurred towards bestowal.
[114794]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/14/13

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