Question: Why is a Kabbalist given the ability to feel two worlds at the same time: the corporeal and the spiritual? Why does he need it?

Answer: Any person has this ability: men, women, regardless of nationality, race, and origin. You just need to develop it within yourself.

People who are drawn to this, develop the quality of bestowal and love within themselves, and as it develops, they begin to feel this quality outside of themselves according to the law of equivalence of form. In this way, they reveal the upper world, the external universe, and feel that they exist in two worlds at the same time.

Question: Then why do we need the five physical sensory organs?

Answer: The physical sensory organs continue to exist until a person fully exits into the general universe, until he develops spiritual senses in himself. When he completely corrects all his egoistic qualities to the quality of bestowal, then his five earthly sensory organs will disappear. They will as if disappear; they will finally be transformed into the quality of bestowal.
[284378]
From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Universal Law” 9/30/09

Related Material:
To Connect Two Worlds In Yourself
Connection Between The Two Worlds
Existing In Two Worlds

Filed under: Perception, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

The work in ascents and descents is given to us from above, from the Creator, who pushes us to this work. Sometimes He reveals a new will to receive to us that was hidden inside and forces us to fall, then He helps us rise and explore our egoism in the upper light, in the will for bestowal.

Ascents and descents alternately reveal increasing egoistic desires and an increasing desire for bestowal so we get to know ourselves and the whole creation. We study our nature compared to the nature of the Creator and get an opportunity to advance toward Him by combining one with the other.

All this comes as a result of ascents and descents. Therefore, a lot of preparation is needed. Patience is needed in order to go through many thousands of ascents and descents until the very end of correction where the highest ascent occurs, preceded by the lowest descent.

The further we advance along the spiritual path toward correction, the deeper the descents and higher the ascents become. The Creator created one against the other for us, and we move forward studying His work as the advantage of light from darkness.

It always happens only in such a contrasting form: the greater the darkness, then the more light is revealed. The time axis that leads us to the end of correction takes us along a sinusoid (sine wave)—from ever greater descents to ever greater ascents where plus and minus always correspond to each other in absolute magnitude.

Therefore, the whole work is comprised of accepting the descents, trying to annul oneself, to bend down, as it is said about King David: “O Lord…You hid Your countenance and I became frightened.” And in fact, it is unpleasant when each time weakness, indifference, and disappointment overcome us in a new way. That is, new forms of lack of desire for spirituality are revealed. But then an ascent comes, gives us more strength, clarifies the past descent, and allows us to justify it.

Therefore, it is necessary to learn one thing from the other. This study does not end until the very end of correction as the advantage of light out of darkness. The more darkness manifests itself in all its forms, the more light and elevation unfolds after it. And thus we get to know the light, the ascent, the Creator, the forms of nearing Him precisely in contrast with the forms of distance and darkness that were in the descent.

It is said about Rabbi Shimon that he felt like just Shimon, a simple merchant in the market, an ordinary person. And then he realized that this descent was so significant that apparently after it, there would be a special, unusually high ascent.

This is how we should try to hold ourselves through the ascents and descents so that these two forms will support each other, because one is impossible without the other.
[284554]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/7/21, “Working in Ascents and Descents”

Related Material:
Falling For The Sake Of Rising
There Is No Room For Downtime Between Ascents And Descents
The Building Blocks Of Light And Darkness

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Maimomides (Rambam) writes that our world is below the axis of time and the spiritual world is above time. Therefore, as we move closer to spirituality, we suddenly begin to feel that one second is a very long time. We can fit many events into the period from the beginning of one second to its end.

In modern technology, devices work at high frequencies and are able to process millions of impulses per second, which they could not do before. The spiritual world is way above modern technology and works at an infinite frequency. Therefore, there are no short moments in spirituality, and every moment there is infinite.
[284559]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/7/21, “Working in Ascents and Descents”

Related Material:
Time And Space According To The Wisdom Of Kabbalah
The Expanding World
A Prayer About A Successful Birth

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Perception, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: Is it possible to teach a person that the team is more important than himself?

Answer: We see this in examples of people who work in special teams—in submarines or with climbers—in general, those who are constantly faced with the question of survival depending on their connection in the team. They hold on to each other so much that they are ready to give their lives if their friends die.

Question: In principle, are we talking about the fact that the whole process of upbringing is a change of an egocentric worldview to an altruistic one, even without going beyond our nature?

Answer: Yes, it is still within the framework of selfishness.

Comment: But we can see that this does not work. No matter how much they tried to educate us in kindergarten and in school.

My Response: They did not work on us properly. A person can be made into such a being who will see his destiny only in serving its collective. This usually works in small, closed groups when a person identifies his existence with the collective so much that if the collective dies, he also dies. He cannot exist without them.
[284435]
From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 6/25/21

Related Material:
New Perception—Collective Consciousness
The Higher Intelligence Of The Group
Shattering For The Sake Of Life

Filed under: Spiritual Work - No Comments →

Question: What misconceptions (beliefs) that affect a person’s life and prevent one from advancing to a higher cognition are characteristic of a modern person?

Answer: We are examining the conceptual apparatus of the world from the point of view of our current consciousness. How can we approach this from the other side? Where is the second part of our consciousness, the opposite one?

Kabbalah immediately begins to investigate the opposite attitude to an object, to an idea, to something that is happening.

It tells a person: currently you are looking at everything from the point of view of your subjective feelings and egoistic concepts, which you received from nature, and you should adopt another point of view, an altruistic one.

Will you be able to elevate yourself to the level where you as if get out of yourself to love your neighbor instead of yourself, to give instead of take, and so on? Change your attitude to the opposite one. What kind of world will you feel then, what solution will you find to this problem?

Then compare these two solutions and see what you get. Perhaps you will find something in between them in which both these approaches, these solutions, will complement each other and lead you to a certain common denominator.
[279311]
From KabTV’s “Together about the Main Thing” 9/2/18

Related Material:
Conditionality Of Consciousness
Two Types Of Cognition
How We Perceive The World

Filed under: Kabbalah Study, Perception, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

In order to rise in the spiritual both states are necessary: ascents and descents. The main thing is not to be in an unconscious state or even worse, in a purely corporeal, animal state. The still, vegetative, and animal degrees belong to our egoistic world, and the speaking degree is determined by our attitude to the Creator.

And this is why it is so important to stay in either a state of ascent or descent. The descent is also important because without it, it is impossible to appreciate the ascents and it is impossible to find new vessels for the next ascent. Therefore, both of these states—light and darkness—are correct, legitimate, and move us forward.

It is advisable to pass through the intermediate, gray states, neither this nor that, as soon as possible and try to be in the state of ascent again. And if there is no ascent, then be in the descent in order to prepare yourself for the ascent. It all should be new in our eyes each and every day. The night is necessary in order to approach the next day.

If we appreciate both of these states, then “darkness will shine like light”; we will feel that darkness comes to us from the reverse side of the same Creator and we will attribute both the ups and downs to Him.

They say my “beloved is like a gazelle.” The Creator seemingly runs away from us; however, He turns His head and face back so that we will yearn for Him and chase after Him. This is why we measure both these states, either a state of coming closer to the Creator or a state of being apart from Him.

We do not notice the point from which we begin to descend and change our attitude to spirituality, the group, the Creator. The fact is that our descent is an ascent to the next degree, only in the reverse form. “One is elevated in sanctity and never lowered.” And that is why we call the fall an ascent of the left line. It is an addition of vessels we did not have before, but they are broken and therefore we feel even more darkness in them than ever before.

And we complain that there is no point in working if it leads to such unpleasant states. Is this really the reward for our work? But what can we do if we need additional vessels to attain the Creator? This is the way of our development: left line, right line, and again left, right.

No one likes being in the left line. But if we are in a group, we will be reminded very quickly that the left line must grow, so that by correcting it, we will reveal the Creator, get closer to Him.
[284512]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/2/21, “Raising Ourselves”

Related Material:
There Is No Room For Downtime Between Ascents And Descents
The Building Blocks Of Light And Darkness
“To Proclaim Your Truth In The Night”

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Spiritual Work - No Comments →

“Zohar for All,”“Ki Tisa,” Item 54: This is why in his generation, the secrets of Torah were revealed. Rabbi Shimon would say, “All the friends who do not love each other cause themselves to stray from the right path.”

This speaks only about people who are yearning to move forward in order to reach the degree of the Creator. They are already engaged in spiritual methodology, reaching the level of love, mutual support, and mutual adhesion in the group, and then they go through the reverse processes.

Then accordingly, greater egoism is revealed, and again they work on it, and again they rise to the degree of mutual bestowal, connection, and love. Like the mechanism in a watch: tick-tock, tick-tock.

The wheel turns step by step: forward-backward, forward-backward. It seems as if it stops, but in fact, this cessation reveals even greater egoism.

Question: Is the fact that they stray their fault because they do not love each other?

Answer: It is not their fault. They just have to reveal all the enormous egoism in themselves that was created by the Creator. However, it is revealed gradually, according to the 125 levels of our ego that exist in each of us.
[284241]
From KabTV’s: “The Power of The Book of Zohar” #21

Related Material:
Spiritual Movement
Efficient Spiritual Movement Can Be Learned From A Steam Engine
A Movement To Attain The Spiritual World

Filed under: Spiritual Work, Zohar - No Comments →

Baal HaSulam, “The Acting Mind”: “I will explain it with an allegory: In every operation in the world, the mind of its operator remains in that operation.”

If we look at a certain action deeply and correctly, we can see the mind that has created and formed it. So, by seeing how it operates, we can understand the purpose and the idea of the one who created it, made it, and processed it.

Question: Can I understand the thought of the expert who did it?

Answer: Yes. You will understand what an expert he is, what he wants to convey to you by it, etc. It can be works of art that have an impact on us in different ways: music, paintings, etc., and it can be different machines, mechanisms, architecture, anything. Anyone who creates something puts a part of himself into it and expresses himself.

“In a table, one can attain the carpenter’s mind and deftness in his craft, whether great or small. This is so because while working, he built it with his mind and the qualities of his mind. And one who observes this operation and considers the mind imprinted in it, during this act, he is attached to the mind that performed it, meaning they actually unite.”

Thus, by action, I can understand the mind, the thought, and the attitude of a person toward what I see as a result of what he has created.

“In truth, there is no distance or cessation between spirituals, even when they are in distinct bodies.” And even when they appear in separate bodies, what is rational in them cannot be described separately.

Even when the Creator has moved away from the object created by Him, all the same, a part of the author remains in this object and lives in it.

“Since what knife can cut the spiritual and leave it separated?” It is impossible to separate it. We see this in everything that happens.

For example, a tragic event took place not long ago—the Notre Dame Cathedral burnt down. It was not completely ruined, but if left in this condition, it will collapse. It is not a problem to rebuild it. There are drawings, there are photographs.

Of course, it will be restored although it is an immense and very expensive undertaking. However. it will not feel like the Notre Dame Cathedral anymore. The truth is, people today will not understand that.

That is, the mind invested then and the mind invested now cannot be compared. Today there are no such architects who assembled those walls and spires. The attitude, the thought, the admiration of the upper force to which they dedicated all that no longer exists. So today, it will simply be a replica of the cathedral.

Question: And will people feel that?

Answer: No. A modern man cannot feel that. But there are people who remember the old Hermitage: the living rooms, the bedrooms, utensils, and all the different objects used by the Tsar. All that is gone now.

Where did it go? Perhaps it was sold. Everything has totally changed! You can feel it. Anyone who has seen and felt it in the past, for him today’s Hermitage is no longer the Hermitage.

Question: Is there a difference between a replica and a reconstruction? Is it possible to feel it directly?

Answer: The original has the spirit of the artist, of the inventor, of the composer himself. It does not exist in the replica. The difference between the original and the replica is like the differences between a living child and a plastic doll.
[249139]
From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 4/21/19

Related Material:
The Creator’s Acting Mind
Attaining The Mind Of The Universe
Man Can Attain The Creator’s Mind

Filed under: Spiritual Work - No Comments →

The Book of Zohar, Ki Tisa, Item 54: All those friends who do not love each other depart the world before their time.

Friends are people who want to unite with each other, but in their joint impulse they discover that instead of connection, they have an inexplicable, unfounded hatred for each other.

And this hatred throws them down from the world where they were united. As a result, they die; they pass from that world to a lower level of existence. They lose their spiritual degree.

The loss of a spiritual degree is called “death” at the degree they were on.

Question: Who are those friends?

Answer: We are talking about people who are beginning to wonder about the meaning of life. This question comes from their serious inner need to feel the real source of life, not because they are bitter in this world or want something, but because they are obliged to understand the meaning of life, its highest goal.

The desire to attain the meaning of existence that appears in a person develops the need to find the root of life, its source. When this desire starts to work, one strives somewhere without knowing why and how. The person is drawn somewhere, and thus, one is brought to a Kabbalistic group.

A person begins to learn and adapt to the group. Here he is  told that there is a goal in life: to reach a spiritual degree above our world, above time, movement, place, space, in general, above everything that exists in the material world. The goal is to enter another dimension.

It is possible. But only when a person has, not the quality of reception like in this world, but the quality of bestowal, the opposite of the one we are in now.

We are all egoists, we want to receive for ourselves, absorb all and everything in ourselves.

The next level of the universe, the opposite of us, operates on the system of bestowal, not reception. Therefore, we do not relate to it in any way. It is beyond our senses because they are all based on reception, and the next world is based on the quality of bestowal.

People who are already in the spiritual world with their feelings describe it as a higher, boundless, infinite, perfect world. How do we get into this world hidden from us? To do this, we must unite in a group and, according to a certain method, start to develop the quality of bestowal and love in ourselves, to “Love Thy Friend as Thyself.”
[284119]
From KabTV’s “The Power of The Book of Zohar” #21

Related Material:
Who Are You, My Friends?
A Dual Reality
How To Fulfill The Desires Of Others?

Filed under: Spiritual Work, Zohar - No Comments →

“Love your neighbor as yourself” is an ancient biblical slogan, a call with which in principle everyone agrees, but no one knows how to implement it.

Although we love to say it sometimes, we understand that in our world these are just beautiful words. But in the spiritual world, this is an indispensable rule under which you either exist or you do not.

Those friends who have united into one whole have found the right contact for bestowal and love among themselves. They have reached the highest spiritual level and feel the source of all forces, the source of creation. They have reached a supernatural level of existence and they remain in an eternal flow of information and energy, beyond time and space, and suddenly reveal the next layer of egoism that was previously hidden from them.

Instead of love and bestowal, they again begin to feed each other with egoistic attitudes, criticism, and rejection. At that time, they fall from the level that they had reached to the earthly level as if they dropped from the sky, and they again look at everyone in an absolutely egoistic way.

As it often happens during the lesson: you gleam with your friends as if you are already in bestowal and love with them, everything is so good, and then this state disappears and ordinary life begins. But with Kabbalists, of course, this is more sudden because the difference is between spiritual reality and earthly reality. And for ordinary people, it is still a little far-fetched.

Question: So what can be done?

Answer: Rise again, work on that egoism with which you found yourself under, and then work on it again and rise up. After you rise, you find even greater love, even greater bestowal, even greater connection, an even higher supernatural level, and then fall again. And it will happen 125 times.

Question: Are you talking about the reincarnation of souls?

Answer: You may call it the reincarnation of souls. Every time you fall there and rise back, it is called “life and death,” “life and death.”

Question: And inside this corporeal life we now exist in now, we study and want to unite and rise, is it the same story taking place?

Answer: If in this life a person has not reached a single spiritual level and has not even aspired to it, then how can it be considered at all? After all, he did not rise above it and did not fall. That is, he did not move.

In spirituality, movement is taken into account only upward and downward, at least on a minimal scale. If this were not the case, how long you lived in your body, that is your life: you drank so much, ate so much, excreted so much, and died. And then, another cycle.

Question: Suppose we want to make a breakthrough in this life, connect, and reveal the lowest spiritual level. Then will egoism unfold again?

Answer: You will either go through several such cycles in this life or there will be another physical birth between them, another body awaiting you. It does not matter, but this will already be a process.

Question: Have we already been through this?

Answer: Yes, we have. Only in such a process in which we practically managed to do nothing, we only carried out a certain preparation. Therefore, today we are already in motion.

Question: Were we friends?

Answer: We were somehow connected with each other and some of us were even friends.

Question: When was it?

Answer: Several hundred years ago.

Question: Where was it?

Answer: It could have taken place in different places on earth. It does not matter. Only spiritual ascents and descents are important, and all earthly conventions are just a theater.
[284165]
From KabTV’s “The Power of The Book of Zohar” #21

Related Material:
Descents And Ascents On The Spiritual Path
There Is No Room For Downtime Between Ascents And Descents
Woven From Ascents And Descents

Filed under: Spiritual Work, Zohar - No Comments →