Question: I have been studying Kabbalah for several years now, and this week I will participate in my first convention. How do I prepare my heart and mind for this event?

Answer: We do not have another place, another source, another possibility to receive the spiritual force. The group and studying, conversations, lectures and dissemination—these things are the daily “prose.” Naturally, it also contributes to our unity, however a convention (Kenes) represents something else, a convocation (Kinus) of hearts.

In spirituality, everything correlates with unity, where we draw our strength. Every day we try to speak about it and realize it, we build intentions, have gatherings of friends and special lessons every week; however, these are not the states where it is really possible to receive a big and powerful force that will push us forward like at a convention.

Malchut of the World of Atzilut is called the “gathering of Israel” (Knesset Israel) because it gathers and unites all our desires directed towards the spiritual goal. Essentially, a convention is the building of Malchut of the World of Atzilut, the creation of a corrected, united spiritual vessel. There is no alternative to this.

And this is primarily why I recommend everyone to participate in the convention and to make sure you do not miss it. A person has no other chance to receive the strength for spiritual advancement.

Moreover, based on experience, we know that conventions are followed by not very pleasant times, periods of descent. You need the convention to stock up on strength and gently pass this descent as if it did not exist. It is as if we were leveling the pressure between two poles. We receive the “plus” by gathering together and giving enormous strength to one another, and every one of us receives the “minus” individually after the convention; this negativity divides and separates us. However, I work with it with the help of the common force, which I have received from everyone else, and in the end I correct it.

I do not have another opportunity to correct my minus, my egoism, my “poison” my “angel of death,” my evil inclination. The only thing I can do is become inspired by the common ascent and use it to correct my personal descent. The same happens at the lessons and gatherings of friends; however, conventions are unprecedented chances to draw strength from friends, correct the private evil in you, unite, and support a unified connection with everyone, trying to bestow to them. Thus we advance.

There have been conventions, which were not really followed by descents. But lately we really started “to fall,” and we now understand that there is nothing artificial here. This is necessary for existence; otherwise, we will die spiritually.

The time has come: All our conventions are intended for collecting strength, which later allows us to correct ourselves. I am not going to have fun and enjoy myself, attend lessons and concerts with my friends. No, I need this unity to immediately following this unity, correct my evil inclination, the forces of separation that awaken in me.

This is why it is so important to go to the convention and also very important to maintain a maximum connection between us after it, trying to feel the fight that we are leading. If, after the convention, full of tension and torn by contradictions, I can still evenly pass this stage, keeping the strength I have received from everyone and maintaining myself in the group, if, when I experience a descent, I rise above it, then the “plus” and the “minus” merge into a single whole: The evil inclination—a big egoistic desire—manifests in me, but a screen—the power of unity, which I have acquired—reigns over it.

Let us hope that this is how we use our conventions.
[77442]
From a Lesson in New Jersey 5/09/12, Shamati #25

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Question: If the Creator is revealed between us and not in every person individually, how does each person feel this field of a single force?

Answer: The spiritual is bestowal. Bestowal is something that is revealed outside of every person rather than inside one. Inside of us we can only feel what we feel now: the picture that we call this world.

Therefore, if I wish to reveal something above my corporeal existence, something outside of what happens in my animal body, I need to build a new, different body. This body is called unification between people. Since they also are created from animal bodies, we build a new body between us, which arises between us, and feel our out-of-body reality there. That reality is called the spiritual world or higher reality, since it contains all the forces and qualities, the program of creation, and its goal. Everything is situated there, between us. That field, the upper force, controls us. It’s called Light, Creator, Elokim, and many other names.

Thus we have no choice but to build unity between us. By striving toward this unity, even egoistically, we rouse a certain influence from it onto us and begin to sense it on the degree called Lo Lishma. Then it affects us more and more, and we begin to feel it on the first spiritual degree, and then with greater and greater intensity. The power of our unification determines the power of the Light that Reforms, the sensation of bestowal that is being revealed. However, all of this is revealed between us.

Such is our work. We just need to try to constantly imagine this state in a more authentic and real manner, and adjoin to it everything we know from science, psychology, and the relationships between us. And then you will see how true it is. Suddenly everything will unite.
[77445]
From a Lesson in New Jersey 5/10/12, Shamati

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Question: The Creator made the evil inclination and the good one. It is written, “I created the evil inclination.” So where does the good inclination come from?

Answer: In reality, there is no good inclination. There is just the evil inclination, which was initially created by the Creator. That is why He informs us that He created the evil inclination. But we correct it with the help of the Torah and turn it into the good inclination.

“Inclination” is desire. The desire remains. But “evil” means that I constantly want to receive for my own sake, and then it harms me because I close myself off in this world like a small animal, living out the years I have to live. This is the most miserable kind of life that is possible in reality.

The good inclination means that we try to unite in the group and see that we are incapable of it, and begin to scream in a common prayer. Then the Light that reforms comes and creates unity between us, and inside of that unity the intention to bestow, the Light becomes revealed. Then, instead of the evil inclination, we have the good one, the same desire, but with the intention to unite with the neighbor.
[77693]
From the 3rd seminar at the New Jersey Convention, 5/12/12

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In the News (from Scientific American): “Human populations have faced bottlenecks over time that put them in peril. Evolutionary biologist Mark Pagel believes that humans overcame these forces by banding together in larger groups, which may have propelled their brain capacity to greater heights.

“In Wired for Culture, Pagel proposes that humans learn best through imitation. Aggregating into larger clusters allowed social learning to truly flourish, ultimately leading to the formation of societies, technology and culture.

“Humans are unique among other primates, however, in that they did more than simply pick up the latest spear technology by observing and mimicking their peers. As they developed more complex communication skills, they were able to adapt and pass on these tactics to the next generation.

“Yet this collaborative spirit did not extend to make humans altruistic, Pagel concludes. As a species, we join forces only with those whom we trust and whose actions we anticipate will be similar to our own. In fact, he proposes that thousands of different languages exist in the world because we are inclined to promote trust within our own social circles but confusion among outsiders. Language allowed us to pass along individual cultures as much as it segregated, and even protected, us from different ones.”

My Comment: That’s why today, because of the integrality of the world community, there is a need for a single language and culture. But in any case, unification led to evolutionary development, both quantitative and qualitative.
[77197]

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Question: Is there a difference between watching the convention at home, on the computer monitor, or coming there in person? Does a person get anything additional by being there in person?

Answer: You probably know that in the 18th century it was popular among the wealthy class to buy their own seat or box in the opera or theater. If a person wanted to hear his favorite aria in an opera, he could come for just those 15 minutes, enjoy it, and then go back home. Back then there were no tape recorders or recordings so people had to come there in person to hear a symphony or opera.

Later tape recorders and televisions were invented, so why haven’t theaters closed down to this day? For example, a ticket to an Italian opera performed by a famous singer costs a lot of money. I once went to an opera in London and the cheapest seat at the top of the gallery cost 40 pounds. But people still go there because it is impossible to transfer an impression through the screen.

To get a full impression, you have to be at that place in person. “A place” is a spiritual notion, which also exists in our world.

And this is even truer for a Kabbalistic convention because we get together to unite! And for that it is not enough to see it on the screen or hear it through the microphone. If even a recorded opera does not give you the same impression as a live performance, then it is even more so with the feeling of unity.

The entire purpose of the convention is unity. All the events, seminars and discussions are devoted to this. This is one, single, living process, which cannot be conveyed in any form. For this I am willing to travel to any group, to any point in the world, even though this is quite burdensome for me. But there is no choice; I cannot carry out my mission in any other form and you cannot attain the goal in any other way.

Only if someone lives in a very remote location and has no opportunity to attend, and really cannot (and he will have to prove that to the Creator, not to us), then apparently there is a personal, special calculation with him. But I would not let the opportunity to take part in a convention pass me by for anything.

There is a famous example of a person who lived thousands of years ago in the Negev desert and worked in agriculture, and once a year he travelled by foot to study in Jerusalem. He was only able to stay and study there for one day because the road there was so long that he had to immediately set out to go back so he could return in time to start working in the field. But to this day there is still a special day during the year that was named in his honor (“a student for one day”) when everyone sit and study.

It is impossible to pass energy from one person to another without personal, physical contact, when we are all together. That is why we exist in this world! This world is special because we are all egoists and are therefore able to begin our connection only in this way.

After all, we are not connected with a spiritual connection yet. And therefore, another, lower level has been given to us, called “this world” – an imaginary reality in which our connection is born. And after that it already begins to grow in spirituality.

It is like a flower that does not grow until the grain rots in the earth and a sprout grows out of it, which then grows to become a flower. That is how we must plant the beginning of our connection. And even though we are in the egoistic world, our grain must rot in this egoistic soil and a new sprout will shoot out of it.

However, this preliminary phase, this physical connection between us is necessary, and that is why this entire world exists.

I think that after these words, an explosion should occur and everyone who hasn’t registered yet will rush to register to the convention. If I was a person living in America, I would not stay home.

You can place a television with the biggest screen in front of you, and set up the ideal, most comfortable conditions, take a vacation from work so no one will bother you from watching, but this still won’t give you real contact. You will miss out on the most important thing: the inner sensation, and will see just the external picture.
[77416]
From the lesson on 5/9/12 in America, Shamati

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Initially in the world of Infinity we united as one, like one body all of whose parts are necessary to one another and totally interdependent. After descending from Infinity into our world, we became completely disconnected because all of the space between us was filled by egoism, which pushes us away from one another.

This egoism is constantly growing, and therefore, as history progresses we feel more and more flawed. But there comes a moment when egoism stops growing and reaches satiation. That is why people today are overcome by disillusionment and despair, and depression is becoming the most widespread illness in the world.

Man is losing the meaning of life. Previously he did not ask those kinds of questions since the egoistic desire constantly grew within him and pushed him forward. It deceitfully told him , “You want this, and this and that! You definitely have to get that and become bigger than everyone else!”

But today a time comes when we no longer want anything. And in addition, the general world crisis is unfolding, leaving us with no choice but to search for a way to change the situation and achieve correction, where correction lies in ascending back to the world of Infinity and becoming one man again. Yet this unity is already attained by our own efforts, meaning through work against our egoism, for the sake of unity.

This is the most hateful work to us, and we do not want it. I am willing to do anything but this – anything but to unite with the friends! I feel good by myself, this is comfortable! After all, my entire nature is the will to enjoy, and all I need is to fulfill it. I only want fulfillment.

Every person thinks only about how to make things better for himself at every moment. Our organism and brain works only to keep itself in the most comfortable state. And that is how our entire life goes by. Every person thinks only about how to make things better for himself now and in the future. All of our calculations revolve around this and we are incapable of thinking about anything else. All I care about is my own body. It turns out that I am doomed to a life of a poor, miserable animal that tries to support its body in every possible way so it would live for several decades and then die. But if all of life really comes down to just this, then what’s the point in it?

That is why it is so difficult for us to work against our egoism. There is a great psychological problem here, preventing us from reuniting with others in circumstances where our ego has reached the maximum mark. That is why the science of Kabbalah comes and explains to us how to do this by uniting into a small group.

Through the group we begin to attract this special force to us, which is concealed in nature and is called the Light that reforms. And if we try to extract this concealed force from within, it will surface and do wonders to us. It will correct us completely, will change us so we will be able to connect with others. And then a group will begin to come together among several friends, which will become a mini-model of the corrected humanity in which our unity is realized.

Instead of the previous, negative force of egoism, which separates us in a broken state and has various names (Pharaoh, Haman, Bilam, Balak, and all the “sinners,” meaning forces of disunity), inside of our connection we will begin to reveal the enormous positive force. This is the force of connection which comes to replace the negative force of disunity and is called the Creator. This is the force of bestowal, the force that gave birth to us and unites us. In it we reveal the program of creation and its goal.

That is why we have to unite into a group, since by virtue of that we will feel a higher state – the presence of a higher, concealed force, the Creator who is between us. We just have to reveal Him! Let us hope that we will feel this awakening inside of us during seminars, as a result of our efforts to unite with one another. This can even happen to a person who is at a convention like this for the first time.
[77268]
From the 1st lesson at the Brazil Convention, 5/3/12

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Question: What can we tell people who are still not sure of whether they should sign up for the upcoming convention?

Answer: It is very important to unite on the corporeal level to be able to move on to uniting the souls, in other words, to the correction of the common soul, which broke and separated into billions of pieces. A convention is necessary for a person. If it happens, let us say, once a year in your region, then you must try to participate in it.

It is hard to believe that the Creator would give someone a disturbance a person is not able to overcome when it comes to coming to the convention. After all, there is none else beside Him. Everything comes from the Creator. So can it be that a person’s correction is so hopeless that the Creator will put a hopeless obstacle before him and cut off all the ways? I cannot imagine this.

Simply, the analysis of the situation is entrusted to the person himself. He feels like there are “guards” on his way, who push him away—but this is done only so he would realize how necessary the convention and how important the goal are.

So less indecisiveness. Who knows when the next time will be and whether there will be a next time. I am ready to give you everything. Just come, and we will unite. It is the key to the correction of all the negativity that manifests in us because we are opposite to the Source.

Question: Can friends, who have lost their inspiration and strengths, use the convention to ascend?

Answer: The convention is a place of healing. We all unite physically and virtually—on the plane of this world—to overcome ourselves and attain a real unity. Even if we do not yet understand what it is, we still play pretend like little children.

So, a convention heals and raises the level from the corporeal to the spiritual. A convention generates a force that can heal anything. We need to see the source of energy and information in it, in other words, the manifestation of Light in our world. There is no better illustration of unity in the chronicles of the correction of the world than a convention.

And this is why I recommend everyone to participate in it, and be as friendly and united as possible. You already need to invest into the preparation and establish the closest contact possible with the venue, the theme, and the entire process the convention will take us through. Bring those who deserve it with you, and we will be able to ascend to a spiritual degree. It is like the miracle of the exodus from Egypt—let it also happen here.
[76972]
From the Brazil Convention 5/3/12, Lesson 1, Shamati #8

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The attributes a Kabbalist discovers internally in contrast to the Light make him feel the exile without which it is impossible to reach redemption. Of course, it is impossible to feel redemption, which is the feeling of the attributes of the Creator: bestowal, love, connection, unity, if you haven’t felt the opposite impressions, the state of exile, the opposite selfish attributes.

So it says: “Come to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart.” Pharaoh symbolizes the back of the neck, the direct opposite of the Creator, by which the whole essence of the redemption is revealed to us from the deep darkness of exile.

We should be ready to feel all the bitterness of exile, which is threatening and repulsive, and which deprives us of our powers and obliges us to sigh because of this kind of work. But it is impossible to feel the attribute of bestowal, the Creator, in any other way except by the attributes of the created being himself, which are revealed as “the benefit of the Light from within the darkness.”

A great deal of work and the strong support of the group is needed in order to reach that. By connecting and mutually bestowing upon each other first only externally and then internally, we help one another, as it says: “Each one shall help his friend.”

Helping others isn’t only about spurring and encouraging a little, but rather, it stems from understanding the system. To the extent that each one understands and knows his own ego and in contrast to it has some understanding, a feeling of the Creator’s bestowal, he wakes up by himself, like an integral part of the general system and begins to help others by drawing the Surrounding Light.

If we connect, at least to some extent, even if it is only externally, each one draws even the slightest Reforming Light, thus bestowing upon each other. This is why it is so important to have a good strong connection that will help us rise above our mutual hate, above the repulsion and the distance.

If we take all these problems realistically, we can account for being indifferent and hating each other. But at the same time, like grownups who are experienced with the internal work, we understand that we have to overcome the repulsion and to heal ourselves with the help of the upper Light, that heals all the illnesses of the ego, that can change us and connect us.

Thus we provide one another with the Reforming Light, and this is what helping others means. We forge an alliance among us so that even when a person is in descent, others can help him and pull him out and save him from this state.
[76827]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/26/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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We should try to enact the system that has been offered to us by Kabbalists, the method that possesses the capacity to change the world.

We attempt to implement the Kabbalists’ advice as the only possibility for our beginning to sense our next step, unity, out of this material realm.

At this time, people try to be minimally connected and balanced with integral nature. However, through our unity with others, to the degree of the efforts we apply in order to connect with eternal, global nature and our inspiration to sense it as something tangible between us, we eventually will end up experiencing a genuine sensation of bestowal and love, a warm feeling, a wave that embraces us all.

This force has been concealed from us thus far, but it can appear if we all strive for it. If we possess even a tiny desire to achieve this state that, in fact, already was granted to us, and if we make an effort to unite, we can rest assured that we already possess all the prerequisites that are necessary to achieve unity.

All we must do is to wish to achieve a sensation of unity by utilizing the possibilities that we already have received. Our aspiration should be directed toward viewing and sensing the power that fills the entire universe. Then, we will realize that we are placed inside of the joint Kli (vessel) that is filled with warmth, Light, and bestowal like a fetus in its mother’s womb.
[75720]
From the Vilnius Convention 3/23/12, Lesson 1

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From the lesson dedicated to Israel’s Independence Day

On a day like today, we usually don’t speak about deficiencies, meaning the unfulfilled desires, but we always measure everything with regard to the vessels.

First we have to understand that the term “Israel” symbolizes the intention of “Yashar – El,” (straight to the Creator). We will actually celebrate the real independence day of Israel when we are freed from the domination of our ego, when we unite above self love, when we keep this connection at least on a minimal level, and when it prevails over the separated desire that rages inside us as the evil inclination. Then the power of unity will rule over the power of separation. This is the exodus from exile to independence.

Are we free on the corporeal level? Is our group free in the spiritual world? This is what we should ask ourselves and measure. After all, everything is relative, and as we ascend the spiritual levels, we will discover the powerful size of the separation over and over again, according to the new Reshimot, (reminiscences). Then we will acquire the power of unity with the help of the Reforming Light.

This is the way—the unity and the separation alternately replace each other. So where is our independence? It narrows down to our supervision over the process. Even when we fall and seem to lose our independence under the rule of evil desires, we still know how to rise. Therefore, we are called independent.

Today we are still dominated by our egoistic needs and desires. In this world we are not united as a nation yet, we still reject one another and do not want brotherly love, we don’t accept it as our goal yet, but see it as an option: It is desirable, it’s possible but “there is no rush.” And we feel pain since this fire isn’t burning in us.

We are in a state of exile and not in a state of freedom and independence. After all, independence means that at least we make the efforts to attain it. We have received all the necessary means from Above in order to determine our independence, rising above our ego in general unity. We haven’t attained it yet in order to immediately pass it on to the people and to the world.

All our friends throughout the world need to feel this, both in corporeality and in spirituality, and we must fulfill our mission and reach the independence of the desire to bestow over the desire to receive. This is called “faith above reason.” This is what we are facing.

The uniqueness of our times is in the fact that everything is ready for correction. The world is approaching this and we understand this better and have what it takes. No one is standing in our way, not physically, not morally, and not mentally. We don’t have fierce enemies that stop us from carrying out our mission.

So the problem is only in us. We have to actually feel that we are under the domination of Pharaoh that reigns within us, an alien force, and it alone does not allow us to wage war for independence.

Question: There is a growing need for a change. Everyone understands the reason for all our problems already, we understand that it is all about the environment, about the separation and the lack of mutual trust… how can people reach a common perspective?

Answer: “Love will cover all sins.” This is the whole secret. We don’t correct anything directly, but we simply build our unity above all the problems and the disagreements.

By being in a labyrinth of opposites we will not achieve anything. If you start clarifying this swamp, Egypt will simply “swallow” you, and bury you under its massive pyramids. This is the exile in Egypt from which we will not be able to rise if we work directly with the defects that are revealed among the friends. We mustn’t do it. This is why Pharaoh, the ego, forces us and seems to logically be showing us the problems that need to be solved first. He is saying: “Bravo, keep on dealing with the spiritual advancement, but only in my territory, in the corrupt mutual relations among us.” We mustn’t listen to him!

Leave the ego, you are not correcting it, you want to build a bridge of love over it. Only then will you succeed, in “faith above reason.” After all, spirituality is above corporeality. The Creator has arranged things this way, and so I only have to escape Pharaoh, or in other words, to rise above him. We don’t have to destroy or to correct him. When I begin to build something above him, the “angel of death” will turn into “the holy angel.” This is what Moses is asking for: “Let my people go!”
[76325]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/26/12, “The Israeli Nation (Independence Day)”

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