Freedom starts at the point where I make a decision as to whether I am governed from Above or not, whether the Creator exists or not, and whether I depend on Him 100 percent? If not, then what does freedom mean? If there is no freedom at all and we cannot change anything, then there is nothing to think about. However, if we are capable of autonomous actions, then what are they?

Here is the point at which I begin to clarify why I live, what is the essence of my life, what will happen to me further, and what is the use of my life. In other words, I would like to know if I am managing my own life and whether I can modify anything in it. These questions emerge at a “speaking level” in a human being.

The whole clarification is about whether I can act on my own and contest the Creator (nature) that governs everything there is. Is there a “free” point outside of me that doesn’t belong to nature?

At a regular, animate level of this material life, we cannot change anything, and, therefore, it is so predictable. However, not a single fortune teller knows what will happen in the Upper life, at the “speaking” level, within our connection with the Creator, our freedom. A fortune teller can guess only what might happen at the level of this world, with our physical body.

Below the Machsom (the barrier separating us from spirituality), there exists no freedom of will whatsoever; it subsists only in spirituality. An animal doesn’t possess any freedom of will at all, so why would our physical body be any different? However, the soul exists beyond this level and obeys different forces that are present in another world, another dimension. We can only speak about freedom in relation to the soul.

What kind of freedom can exist in this world if our biological bodies are rigidly governed by pleasure and affliction? Freedom of choice exists only in spirituality in the “middle line.” Don’t waste your energy for material things that are beyond your prime necessities. You won’t get anything worthy from this bodily life, and if you persist in demanding more than you really need, you only make your life more complicated.

However, if you use your vigor to attain spirituality, you will win. This is the law of nature: You have to provide for a normal material existence, but the rest of your energy and intellect has to be devoted to attaining spirituality. That’s where you will find genuine fulfillment.
[23726]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/15/10, “The Freedom”

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The group is the “button” we are constantly clicking on to draw the Light to ourselves. I participate in its life, aspire for unity with the friends, and desire to “dissolve” in them, thereby attracting the Light that Reforms. Essentially, this is my only action: to attract the Light which will implement all the necessary changes.

The situation is simple. There I am, the one who desires to reach the right goal: to become equivalent to the Creator. There is also a means: to demand the Light to affect me and to gradually make all the necessary modifications in me through the group. This is the way we advance.

With every change, I can examine myself: What is “day,” and what is “night” for me? If I am in the “day,” it means that I am being diversely fulfilled; if I am in the “night” or “dark,” it signifies devastation of the mind and heart. This is how it looks in egoistic desires.

Now, we have to stir such changes within ourselves that would allow us to acquire desires to bestow in which we will evaluate “day” and “night” as the Creator does. For the Creator, “day” is bestowal or faith above reason, which contradicts the logic and sensation of the current level.

To reach it, we don’t have to exert superhuman efforts which we are incapable of doing. Rather, we make efforts in the group, in our unification, and summon the force of the Light which descends and does the work.

In fact, all spiritual work is regarded as the “Creator’s work.” He does it, and I must only desire it like a child who grabs a grown-up’s hand and pulls him where he wants to go. If a person understands the essence of this interaction, he feels at ease. With every new step, he utilizes free will in the group and draws the Light that Reforms.
[23688]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/15/10, Shamati #16

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Spirituality is perfection; it knows no change. But I see changes in it. The Creator seems to me distant, near, and different. If I discern everything correctly, then I don’t just study the external side of the events, but rather, I recognize in everything the “Good Who does good,” realizing that “There is none else beside Him” and everything is occurring solely within me.

However, if everything changes in me, I have to perceive these modifications as beneficial to me and understand that in spite of and based specifically on them, I have to be able to hold on to my unfailing attitude to the Creator. Then, it turns out that all my inner changes build within me the image of the Creator and do so inversively, from opposition to myself.

Reshimot (spiritual genes, records) will be constantly changing in me, but above them, by faith above reason, I wish to make a decision that “the Creator is good, does good for the bad and for the good” and that “there is none else beside Him.” It follows that all the changes occurring in me, on the background of my conviction that “there is none else beside Him, the Good Who does good,” paint in me the image of the Creator. In this case, my attitude to this reality is correct. If I recognize the unchanging attitude of the Creator (the Good Who does good) in my every inner change, I thereby correct these changes, completing them.

Yet, unlike the “common people,” I do not annul these transformations as if they don’t exist. Quite the opposite: By accepting and working with them, from all these contradictory forms and changes absent in the Creator, I get to know and understand Him.
[23924]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/17/10, The Zohar

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Question: How do I work on connecting with the friends in the group beyond the work on Kabbalah circulation?

Answer: Circulation has absolutely nothing to do with spiritual connection between us. It is a burden we have accepted as our duty so as to serve the world on the corporeal level. Obviously, it is desirable that dissemination were done solely by our people since they can infuse it with the spiritual spark, but in principle, we can recruit outsiders for it as well.

As to spirituality, it is defined as our unity above the level of egoism or our climbing the spiritual degrees by acting above reason. There is no other possibility. This work is not related to dissemination; it is personal and available to everyone, even if the person lives in Alaska in complete isolation.

True circulation is spreading one’s desire for connection and love in the entire network of connections between the souls.
[23051]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/10/10, “The Matter of Above Reason”

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Question: If I justify the Creator and accept everything as good, how am I going to know whether I have fallen into illusion and self-deception?

Answer: Justifying the Creator is not some unfounded declaration but the result of a whole series of actions. In its concluding stage, I appeal to the Creator with a request, and He fuses links all the details and causes of the previous experiences together.

The picture that I have started to detect amidst the blur and confusion is finally beginning to emerge, and it acquires clarity and interconnection. I reveal myself and the entire world as a group, and I reveal the Creator as the primary source.

And now, having attained this oneness, I see that everything had been done for my benefit and advanced me on the path. Thus, I justify the Creator not forcefully but “according to the results of examination” when I reveal the true status quo.
[#22809]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/7/10, The Writings of Rabash, Article 38

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Question: If the time required for the attainment of the spiritual world is presently being hastened, then how is justice achieved if everybody is doing the same amount of work regarding his own soul?

Answer: This is precisely why everybody awakens to spirituality in their own time, not all at once. Each soul awakens when it is necessary for that particular soul since all of us have previously undergone transformations and have acquired the “past merits” described as “merit of the forefathers.”

The forefathers are our past incarnations that we have already completed and have given us an accumulation of “merits,” an inclination for spirituality that we are able to cultivate further. But it has no relationship to my grandfather leaving me his spiritual wealth. Inheritance can be passed on only in the corporeal world, but spiritual assets do not have a corporeal lineage. “The merit of the forefathers” are my own achievements that I made in the previous incarnations (Gilgulim), which I can now use to continue the evolution of my soul.

We are unable to make common conclusions about the spiritual process that is occurring right now because we do not view the incarnations of all the soul as one collective incarnation, but when it all becomes revealed to you, then you will see that everything is absolutely just. As for now, it is necessary to see the work and the spiritual goal that lie ahead of us with the desired intention in the correct place. Let’s not waste our breath on philosophy.
[22734]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/6/10, “The Love for the Creator and Love for the Created Beings”

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Everything originates in Infinity, in the initial state, and in order for us to attain full correction, we have to meet all conditions set therein. In the state of Infinity, the will to receive is unyielding; it won’t give up one iota of adhesion, unity, or similarity to the Creator.

In Infinity, there is no end or border, nor a detail that would escape His calculation. That is why it is called Infinity. It is not related to a place (desire), quantity or quality of fulfillment, but lies in the unreserved decision of the created being to adhere to the Creator. Accordingly, spiritual degrees of ascension from our world to Infinity are the “degrees of compromise”: to what extent the created being is still refusing to perform a precise calculation for equivalence.

In the initial stage of his work, man looks at everything through the prism of his personal benefit. That is his nature; he was created this way. This period is lengthy and eventually leads to desperation. Likewise, during its entire history, humanity underwent twists and turns of hard life while it chased pleasure, until a line of disappointments has reached critical mass. Having learned from painful experiences, meaning having tasted their bitter outcome, we quit the race because we neither believe that it will bring us satisfaction nor feel it.

Thus, we begin gradually to despise egoistic fulfillment for its bitter effect. Out of despair, we make a new calculation: In altruism, we will experience fulfillment. This is how, affected by the Light, the chain of Reshimot (spiritual genes, reminiscences), which had emerged in the very beginning of our descent from Infinity, gets realized.

Two lines come into play: the direct line from Above downward and the inverse line from below upward. Now, instead of self gratification, a person makes calculations based on his involvement in bestowal. As a result, his reward changes also. It is experienced not in the receiving desires, but in the bestowing ones.

But what is the difference? After all, we are created beings and must feel fulfillment. However, in order to feel it in the same way the Creator does, we have to be equivalent to Him. That is why, from now on, we work on our capacity to receive pleasure from the action itself and not from the final outcome of bestowal.
[22517]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/4/10, “What is the Help that One Should Ask of the Creator”

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Question: When I have a connection with someone in our world, I feel either love or hate, but what happens in a spiritual connection? What does the revelation of the Creator feel like?

Answer: Spiritual phenomena are bestowal. These relationships are reciprocal connections of bonding, love, and mutual inclusion into each other. We build a connection of unity and love between us, and then we reveal the Light that was previously concealed within this connection.

This Light corrects our connections, shapes them, and builds a “place” or a “desire to bestow” out of them. Then we reveal an even greater opportunity to bestow in this “place,” and the main force of the universe, the Creator, becomes revealed in the opportunity to bestow.

But all of this happens in the same place, within our unity, and the Creator becomes clearer each time to the extent of our new property of bestowal and love.
[22036]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/26/10, “600,000 Souls”

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In the material world, everyone has a body with its fulfillments. We are separated from each other by biological bodies, and psychologically, each of us perceives themselves as an individual personality.

In spirituality, everything is constantly changing by going from one state to another; the Light and the vessel are always different. We “clothe” in a certain state and name ourselves in accordance with it as actors who change costumes for new roles. It is as if we are in a science fiction movie where we play a variety of characters.

There is no such notion as a “private, permanent soul” that exists autonomously, climbs the ladder, and preserves its individuality. It’s hard for us to understand how our "self" disappears. For example, it is said in the article “600,000 Souls” that each person who corrects his soul will uncover Malchut to the world and will be named King David.
[21985]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/26/10, "600,000 Souls"

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One’s spiritual search will be successful only if it is done through the connection of the broken Kelim. We are in this world with the worlds of BYA above us. Higher still is Malchut of the World of Atzilut, called "the assembly of Israel." This is the place of unity among those who aspire directly to the Creator. A person must ascend from this world to the worlds of BYA, where the breaking is revealed, and to Malchut of the World of Atzilut, desiring to unite with others as before, in order to reveal the Creator inside the common connection.

Otherwise, it would be impossible to raise our request higher to Zeir Anpin and Bina. There is no other opportunity to do spiritual work. In my current state, I am separated from spirituality and bear no relation to it because I still haven’t revealed the desire in which I can reveal the spiritual world. I must first bring myself to the correct desire. In all of reality there is just the matter of the desire and the form dressed in it. The desire can be material (egoistic) or spiritual.

The spiritual matter relates to bestowal and is expressed in the connection between friends, between those who have sparks of aspiration toward bestowal. First they reveal the broken matter between them, the evil inclination, and then they correct it by the force of the Light that hides inside the broken Kelim, in the broken attitude to one another.

Everything begins only after we find the connection between us. That is the only way we can ascend to the spiritual matter. It is not present in any person separately. It resides in the initial negative connection between us, in the evil inclination which we discover and begin to correct. That is where the spiritual path begins.

[21957]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/26/10, “They Helped Everyone His Friend”

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