The Difficult Life Of A Kabbalist

Question: How can a Kabbalist constantly be in high spirits despite any problems?

Answer: I will share my experience with you. I am very busy, and I try to keep myself busy all the time. I get up early, sometimes at midnight. From 3 to 6 o’clock in the morning I give a Kabbalah lesson and after the lesson I go for a walk with my wife, have breakfast, and sleep for an hour.

When I get up, I go over materials on the computer. Then there is video filming from 10-11 am, and this continues until the evening with breaks and meetings in between. In addition, I have to write articles, manage my blog, and prepare presentations. I also have my own studies of Talmud Eser Sefirot by Baal HaSulam and other books, and sometimes I go through other sources.

I definitely watch the latest news some commentaries. I like to watch programs about nature from time to time. My schedule is totally full.

Question: Do you ever feel sad? Do you ever cry?

Answer: As strange as it may sound, I am a human being too. I have feelings, thoughts, weaknesses, and achievements, etc.

I am connected to many people throughout the world and I am concerned about the fate of the world, although I feel it as something incidental, as a means to discover the upper world.

I have the same feelings you have, don’t think I am a doll.  You cannot see what goes on inside me.

At first I also wondered about my teacher until I became close to him and realized what was hidden behind the external indifference or cheerfulness.

Kabbalists experience very sharp ascents and descents; they have very strong periods, very emotional times, periods of detachment, tearing away from the world and from people. Such emptiness of the universe is revealed before them, which no ordinary person can feel.

This means that there are moments in which one feels despair, becomes depressed as if you are detached from life—for a Kabbalist all this s a billion times stronger and deeper than for an ordinary person. However, he has the right tools to help him cope with these states, but he still has them and feels them.

A Kabbalist’s egoism is much greater than an ordinary person’s. It is written, “He who is greater than his friend, his desire is even greater,” which means that the greater a person is, the greater his egoism is. In fact, a Kabbalist is a great man with great shortcomings, but, at the same time, with accordingly great advantages, which means that he has everything.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 6/9/16