A question I received: When a person is on the path of spiritual development and is going through the period of concealment, he feels lost and confused. He understands that egoism is evil, but he is unable to part with it. Where can he find the strength to do this?

My Answer: We go through many different states throughout our life, and the states are different for every age group. At every moment in time, all kinds of inner changes take place in us with the speed of atoms spinning inside us, faster and faster. These changes take place inside our desires, on an unconscious level.

For several billion of these inner actions, there’s one instant when a “number shifts” inside us, like in a meter with many cogwheels spinning inside it, when suddenly the meter shifts from “0” to “1.” After that everything spins around inside for a long time again, and then the number jumps from “1” to “2.” This is what happens inside us as well.

This is why we have to allot some time for these actions to transpire. The same thing usually takes place in our regular lives: we often find ourselves in a situation that drags on and on, until it’s suddenly over “by itself.” And when you’re in that situation, you know that you have to change, but you just can’t.

It takes time for things to change. Meanwhile, we have to act as an “ox in a yoke,” since we can’t tell exactly what is happening to us, we don’t understand the actions taking place.

Later on, when a person enters the spiritual world, he begins to understand everything. He acquires new desires of bestowal, and through them, he is able to discern billions of actions in a single instant. This becomes simple, like his body.

However, today the same actions are also taking place inside us, infinitely fast. We have to be patient and wait, meaning that we have to continue along our path. At one point, the present state will reach an end, the “number will shift,” and we will agree to bestow.
(From part 1 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, on Shamati #18)

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

A question I received: The “Preface to the Sulam Commentary” describes a system that is external in relation to man. So how am I supposed to envision that this system is related to me and is inside me?

My Answer: There is no soul inside my animate body. My body does not contain the ten Sefirot of the soul. I only have an initial point, and I have to build the ten Sefirot from it. This point originated from inside my egoistic desires. When I make a connection with the other points in the heart using my egoism, then my ego gives me the material, the desires, and the connection to other people, and this will create the structure of the ten Sefirot inside me.

I will then become the point of Malchut, the tenth Sefira, and my first nine Sefirot will be comprised of my attitude to other people. All the other souls, everything I see in front of me, the entire world, and everything around me are my nine Sefirot (Tet Rishonot). When I connect them to myself with love, with the understanding that we are all one whole, then I rise above my egoism, and if I am able to rise above my Malchut in order to bestow, then I will connect these external qualities of bestowal to myself.

That is when my soul, the complete Partzuf made of ten Sefirot will appear within me. And that is exactly where I will reveal the Creator: inside the desires that I have acquired through bestowal to others.

Everything around me is the structure of my own soul. But after the soul’s breaking and fall into egoism, I started desiring to use these other parts of me egoistically, to receive everything they have. Now I have to go back to bestowing to them. I have to reconnect them to myself through love, and that is how I will reveal the Light of my soul—inside them.

I can never reveal the Light inside myself, in Malchut, because the First Restriction (Tzimtzum Aleph) cannot be revoked. This is why everything depends on me coming out of myself and connecting to the other souls, by feeling their desires as my own. Inside this common desire, I will reveal the Creator.
(From Part 3 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, on the “Preface to the Sulam Commentary”)

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

When egoism flared up in Ancient Babylon and we stopped understanding each other on the level of our internality, this caused the appearance of different spoken languages, because people stopped understanding each other. The different languages came from Ancient Babylon, where every person started to hate the others. You talk, but I don’t want to understand you! Why should I care about you?

This is why you started speaking one language, and I – a different one. Inside, we don’t want to understand each other, and this is the source of the different languages. As soon as we will desire to understand each other, we will suddenly discover that a single language will form: “the language of bestowal.” And then, this will become expressed externally as well, and the whole world will start to speak one language…
(From Part 3 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson)

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

Yesterday I had a conversation with the youth group. A young woman of about twenty years old stood up to ask a question, and you could see by looking at her that she is in a state of despair and feels heavy-hearted. She asked, “What do I do with all of this? Can it really be that every person who advances along this path feels this way?” I replied, “Yes, and even worse…”

A person has to go through the state of total despair in order to realize his inability to advance by means of his own egoism, as he had advanced through life until now. After all, to attain spirituality, a person has to reject his desire to enjoy using the past desires and pleasures. He must decide that the egoistic desire will never let him attain the spiritual fulfillment, contrary to what he thought before.

When his point in the heart first awakened, it was but a continuation of the previous material desires: it wanted to receive pleasure from spirituality in the same was as from corporeality. The person thought, “Wow, now I have a new desire! Who cares if I can’t fulfill it with the earthly things? I’ll soar up to the heavens and find my fulfillment there!” He continued to behave on the path of Kabbalah using the old means. He expected to attain everything on his own, using his own power and pride, using his own “I.”

But as time goes by, he sees that nothing is going right. And because of this, he sinks into despair, just like any person whose plans aren’t being accomplished. Every person has to go through this on the spiritual path. A person has to discern his objectives, intentions, sensations, and most important, his life values. It all depends on the efforts a person puts forth toward advancement: how quickly will he exhaust this list of discernments?

As he goes through all the sensations in the list of his new “I,” he begins to understand that he is not his own Boss, and he won’t win this war with his own strength. Only the Creator can do this, because the person is in the Creator’s hands, in the hands of the Upper Force. It is this Force that does everything, makes him move, places all the obstacles along his path and gives him the strength to overcome them. The Upper Force swings him up and down, over and over again, in order to bring him to a true prayer: to create a true desire within him, without which he can never feel the spiritual world.

I depend on the Creator and work together with Him. I ask, and the Creator does. As soon as we find the common movements among us, we will attain mutual happiness, where my plea and His desire will unite into one whole and we will attain unity.

The Creator throws the end of the rope to a person, and a person has to catch it in order to start advancing.
(From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson)

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

There is no sense in trying to correct anything in our world, as it is a world of consequences, which descend from the spiritual roots. However, if we can somehow affect the upper roots, we will also  be able to change the material world.

The roots cannot be affected by separate individuals. It is only by uniting together that we can achieve a connection with the root, since we do not exist there as individuals. In the roots, we are all united as one system.

Therefore, if we wish to change our reality, we have to unite. When we have this desire, it will draw the Light upon us, which will correct everything here in this world.

We will then truly “correct the world.” But if we try to correct the externality – the external actions, behavior, or religious commandments – then it is pointless, since there is nothing to correct here. All of these all merely an imprint on the inanimate matter of what happens Above.

This is like trying to hit an image that’s projected onto a wall using light, or kissing it and asking for forgiveness. That is what our actions are like, but we think we can change something this way.

Only a person’s inner corrections can influence the material world. This is why we disseminate Kabbalah instead of encouraging people to correct the ecology, the crisis, and finances.

Nevertheless, a person is always more willing to “correct” the material things, especially if he knows that his efforts will be seen and valued by others, or if he can be proud of his own actions, society will support him. In this case, a person is willing to do anything, and this drives him to carry out such actions.

Inner, spiritual work is difficult precisely for this reason: it isn’t valued by the people around us or even by our own egoism. However, the true work occurs only inside a person, and it does not depend on his body or the physical actions he makes.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: What Will We Be Like When We Rise To The Level Of Nature?
Laitman.com Post: A Peek Into The Backstage Of The Show Called “Life”
Spiritual Search: “Equivalence of Form”
Rabash Article: “What are the powers which are needed for work”

Filed under: Spirituality - No Comments →

Why can’t I attain the sensation of spirituality directly? Well, say I am not very knowledgeable in some profession, for example, I don’t know anything about economics. If I start working at a bank, then I will understand the importance of economics. Then, when someone tells me that some stock rose 0.1 percent, this will be a really big deal to me. But right now, I don’t feel anything since I just don’t understand it, even though it may be something really important!

How do we grow? We teach our “will to enjoy” to be more sensitive and to discern the finest of details. We teach ourselves, just like people train dogs or raise a small child. In our world, in the material, egoistic system, this happens directly. The Light acts inside this system as well, but in a concealed manner, and we don’t have to ask the Light to create any special sensations inside us. If, however, besides the material system we want to reveal one more system – the spiritual one, then we cannot develop our sensitivity to it directly, because we don’t feel it at all. We simply cannot increase our own sensitivities in order to start feeling it. We need the Light to build the new sensations inside.

No matter how much I desire spirituality, I cannot attain it directly; I cannot make it “come out of the fog.” In the material system, I already have a desire, even if it is very coarse and undeveloped. All I have to do is develop it by influencing it with a “painful rod” or a “sweet candy.” That is how I develop and refine my sensation. But when it comes to spirituality, I don’t feel it in any way at all. Even my point in the heart is opposite to this system, since this point is the reverse side of holiness. This is why I need the Light so much, because it will carry out my correction from Above and reveal this system to me! This action requires an additional force.

In the material world, however, we don’t need the Creator. In fact, the more people develop and the more they perfect their culture (their feelings) and science (their mind), the less they believe in God and religion. It’s because people reveal that they don’t need an Upper Force. They can accomplish things, understand and feel everything on their own. This is why people delve deeper into the arts and sciences, leaving religion behind. This is natural, because people don’t need the Upper Force for egoistic development.

If, however, we want to develop spiritually, with the help of the science of Kabbalah, then everything happens in the opposite way: we need the Upper Force to create a new desire in us. Initially we don’t have this desire, so we can’t develop it and feel the spiritual system inside it. The point in the heart gives us the only the opportunity of a place to start. But it will have to go through an inverse transformation in order to turn into “a drop of semen.” In the meantime, it is not a drop of semen, but just a black point.

This is why you need the Upper Force through every step of your development, and the way to connect with It is by building yourself. This Force is what sustains your existence in the spiritual world, so if It doesn’t give you the quality you need to reveal this system, you won’t feel it. The Creator is all the spiritual qualities that you have within. He is the spiritual system, the Force that fulfills you. All of this is Him alone.

The more you develop, the more you develop the Creator within you. In Hebrew, the Creator is called “Bo-reh,” which means, “Come and see!” This is what distinguishes one’s development using the science of Kabbalah. You reveal the Upper Force clearly, inside you. You then see that it is a system that governs everything and that you are inside this system and thereby establish a mutual connection with the Master of this system.

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

A question I received: No new system is established in its pure form. In one way or another, it always makes a compromise with the former system, from which it develops. There is simply no other way. Do you agree?

My Answer: Yes and no. We are talking about a completely new level, qualitatively speaking, and therefore it will not develop in the traditional way – egoistically, from smaller to greater. We are talking about a qualitative revolution, which is changing from an attitude of consumption to an attitude of bestowal. People will begin to feel the world by coming out of themselves. They will feel the world beyond themselves. This model is inverse to anything that came before, because it is not built by development on the past.

People will continue to live in the world, along with all of their experiences and culture. However, when people begin to perceive and feel the inner, hidden connections in the world and the inner forms – the forces and souls, then the world will become transparent. The objects and actions of this world will then be seen as inanimate consequences of the Upper Forces, and the Upper Forces, a deeper layer of the world, will be clearly revealed to everyone.

Our current state of crisis is pushing us towards the need to attain this hidden reality, which contains the forces and actions controlling our world. Essentially, the present crisis is but a preparation, making us more able and willing to perceive something cardinally new, due to there not being any other choice.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: We Have To Realize That Egoism Is The Couse Of The Crisis Before Its Too Late
Laitman.com Post: How Will The Society Of The Future Begin
Laitman.com Post: Comfort Can Only Be Achieved By Correcting Egoism
Laitman.com Post: About The Phases Of Complete Correction

Filed under: Perception - No Comments →

A question I received: When a person crosses the Machsom, where does he sense this attainment?

My Answer: Everything is sensed internally. It is similar to how you sense yourself and this world today. You always feel either suffering or pleasure within. This is also how you will sense spirituality.

The method is very simple. You will learn what pleasure and suffering are, how you currently sense them, and how you can begin to interact with them, enjoy them and gain control over them.

After all, our material is the desire to enjoy, and the Creator is the pleasure that’s revealed inside this desire, along with the Source of the desire. This is why there is nothing besides the Kelim, and why you will sense the spiritual world in the same way that you sense the physical world. Don’t think that spirituality is far away or out in space somewhere. In Kabbalah, you are learning precisely about what is currently taking place inside of you, as well as what will take place in the future.

However, there is one big difference in spirituality. Today, I sense my life and my existence inside my small Kli. In fact, it is so small and limited that our lives can’t really be considered real life. Once we expand our Kli, however, we will feel life and existence based upon a new condition: that we want to use our lives as a means to help us pass pleasure on to others, to bestow, to love, and to come out of ourselves. Otherwise, if the Kli remains egoistic, the pleasure is negated within it.

In other words, even now you are filled with Infinite Light. But you neutralize this Light with your egoism, because when the Light of Infinity reaches a desire, it immediately turns off, as though it short-circuits between two opposite ends that have no resistance between them. You have to use your own egoism as that resistance, and then you will feel the pleasure. Otherwise, the pleasure is not sensed and leaves. What we are left with is this minuscule corporeal life, where all we sense is just a spark of Light in order to have something to cling to.

But the pleasure that is ahead of you is billions of times greater. There is no obstacle to getting this pleasure; you only have to expand your Kli. Everything depends on you. All you need is the Kli, but the infinite pleasure is sitting right in front of you.

What does “infinite” mean, and how can the Kli be infinite? When your Kli reaches the size initially intended by the Creator, it will feel unlimited pleasure. This is what an infinite Kli is.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Method Of Infinite Fulfillment
Laitman.com Post: The Recipe For Eternal Pleasure (Advanced)
Laitman.com Post: There’s A Force That Doesn’t Allow Us To Stop Asking And Changing
Spiritual Search: Seventh Talk- “Two Worlds: Our World and the Spiritual”
Lesson on Baal HaSulam Article: “Finding the Creator Within”

Filed under: Spirituality - No Comments →

A question I received: You have said that in our generation, egoism has grown so big that the common soul had to divide into seven billion parts in order to be corrected more easily. Then how is it possible that a war could eliminate a large portion of the population? According to the first point made, one survivor could not handle the egoism of several souls.

My Answer: Because of the suffering they will feel, a small number of souls will be able to make greater efforts. In addition, when people suffer, they are more willing to unite. This is why during periods of suffering, there is no need for a large number of souls, and people die. We, however, confuse the cause with the effect…

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Situation Of Ancient Babylon Will Not Repeat
Laitman.com Post: Why Are There So Many People In The World?
Laitman.com Post: Always With Me
Interview with the Future: “A Mature Approach to Pain”

Filed under: Suffering - No Comments →

Symptoms: America is in agony. All people can think about is healthcare reform.

Medical history: Everything began with the money factor being introduced into the doctor-patient relationship, which threw greed into full gear. Now every player in the health care system is looking to save money. This is how the law of mandatory insurance came about.

The system is tried and tested: the first several thousand dollars must be paid out of one’s own pocket, and then an additional $20-30 for each visit (besides the insurance). Drugs are ridiculously expensive, and doctors are prescribing them by the dozen.

Doctors pay one third of their salary for insurance, in case their patients decide to sue them. And why shouldn’t the patients sue when there’s good money to be had? You don’t even need start up capital to sue a doctor. All you need is a lawyer who will sue and retain 30-50% from the award as his fee. And so the wheels keep turning on this well-oiled machine known as “The Healthcare System.”

Prescription: We must change our relationships with one another. If the pharmaceutical companies were to think about curing people, rather than maximizing profits by pushing drugs, if the insurance companies were to concern themselves with maintaining the public’s health, rather than expanding the business of being sick, if the doctors were to stop being afraid of insurance companies and of their patients, and start treating them according to the accumulated knowledge and experience of their profession, and if the patients were to regain faith in their doctors… well, there simply wouldn’t be any need for reforms!

But in order for that to happen we must recognize the evil and greed of our highly developed egoism. 51 million dollars have already been spent just on advertising for this reform. The greed clouds our vision and prevents us from thinking of our neighbors. But gradually, we will begin to understand that unless we change our attitude to others, we are bringing ourselves closer and closer to our collective demise.

(Sent to me by Dr. A. Angelov, from the Bnei Baruch group in Boston, Massachusetts)

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Three Simple Maneuvers To Cure The Health Care System
Laitman.com Post: How Did Medicine Turn Into A Business?
Kabbalah Today Article: How Can We Stop Medicine from Being a Business?
Bail Yourself Out: “Being Well and Staying Well”

Filed under: Health - No Comments →