The Start Of The Countdown

I feel immense joy in the fact that now most of my students in the world are beginning to understand and feel that the spiritual world is discovered in the connection between us.

Although we have been studying the spiritual system for many years, and in spite of all this, the heart does not want to hear about the shattering of the Kli of the collective soul, its descent and fall into this world, the division into a multitude of people, the expansion of the Kli, the equal distance from the center to the periphery all over the Earth, and the growth of the ego. Generally, this takes a lot of time, and many years pass before the heart understands and reaches the awareness that something is not okay, and it will then respond to problems with connection, with unity.

From the very moment that the person begins to hear this, he enters into the way towards the goal of creation and goes forward at a constantly increasing the rate, amassing experience and gathering the distant, scattered and shattered parts of his soul. He already knows that everything is concentrated only in his group of ten, in a hundred, in a thousand, and that the upper world, the Creator, and the completion and goal of creation are found precisely in this place.

If he automatically turns to the group, no matter what happens, this is a sign that he is standing firmly on his own two feet and is facing the goal correctly. I hope that the results of our convention will become a feeling like this for many who are here and those who are together with us throughout the world.

This is the most difficult starting point of the countdown. Nobody, anywhere was ever was able to attain this. Many have tried to do this through all kinds of conditions for thousands of years, but only individuals succeeded, even though people were ready to sacrifice everything for the sake of this. So a gradual approach, recognition and discovery of the starting point and investment of much effort required subtle and continuous work.

It seems to me that we are seeing its beginning. The sensation that everything begins and ends with contact, connection within the group, that everything is determined there and besides this there is nothing, will show us later how to operate in the world, and how to manage nature through our unification. This is because we are raising MAN, our desire for connection, unity, and correction.

The world will then advance forward towards harmony, unity, happiness, and fulfillment of the law of equivalence of form at the same rate as us. In this transition from  “me,” the yearning for the Creator that I imagine, to the we, where within this we is one single whole within our separated we, the general power of connection called the Creator is discovered.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Two” 9/20/14, Lesson 4

The Secret Of Unity

Rabash, Letter 40: And when one begins to feel the love of his friend, joy and pleasure immediately begin to awaken in him….because he always knew that he was the only one who cared for his own well being. But the minute he discovers that his friend cares for him, it evokes within him immeasurable joy, and he can no longer care for himself, since man can toil only where he feels pleasure. And since he is beginning to feel pleasure in caring for his friend, he naturally cannot think of himself.

We can never satisfy ourselves, even though it seems to us that we are doing everything for the sake of this. Our common general Kli is built such that only what we get from outside can fulfill us and not what each one of us produces. So we need to fulfill each other.

This is the most essential secret of unity, when people begin to feel that they can fulfill each other: each one includes within himself the desires of the others and begins to work on them, and the Light fills everyone. To the degree that each one is integrated in the desire of the other, the Light fills these desires.

The main rule for true elevation in the way of the Creator is a condition of unity amongfriends. And when are the friends united? This is when they gather together and each one humbles himself before the others by seeing the greatness of the friends. Even if someone doesn’t see the friends as great, he must obligate himself to see their greatness. If a person doesn’t see the others as higher than he is, he must examine himself.

In a Kabbalistic group, a person who studies correctly must always see the others as higher than he is. This is not some kind of unique state of elevation, but the normal state of the group.

He is envious of the friends with a good envy; he is drawn after them, takes an example from them. And if there is no envy, this is bad. A person must be afraid that everyone will discover that he is valueless and nothing, and will begin to despise him.

This feeling must be permanent, for it is very helpful for advancement. Everyone must be happy that he is given such a feeling, which is a useful means for advancement. So it is necessary to be concerned that it will be constant: seeing how dedicated the friends are, how they sacrifice themselves by being in much worse situations than you, and at the same time they are investing greater efforts than you do.

From small examples like these are created a yearning from “me” to “we,” because if the friends are higher than I am, I want to be with them, to be included with them, so that I will dissolve in them completely.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Two” 9/20/14, Lesson 4

Under The Power Of Trepidation

Rabash, “ ,” Article 31: It is said: What does the Creator demand from us? – Only trepidation in front of Him.

It means that the Creator (a system of higher nature that has only one force that manifests itself through the system) inputs “something” into our thoughts… i.e., He asks us a question.

There is no other force in the universe except “none else besides Him.” Of course, the Creator would never make a creation that would go against Him; however, He created the thought (against Himself) so that trepidation in front of Him appears…

It is as if a person follows the Creator in his desire to find and reveal Him by scrutinizing in what kinds of interactions between us He can be found.

We cannot imagine how easy it is. Everything is right in front of us, but we look into the distance and don’t see what’s next to us. There is nothing but a psychological barrier. As soon as we switch and get out of ourselves, we begin sensing the Creator in the connections among us.

I move towards others and go outside myself. All of a sudden, it turns out that the natural force that connects, regulates, and holds everything together in the form of a perfect balance exists right here, together with us.

We are the ones who distort the balance and harmony by our egoistic intentions, desires, and relationships. We feel that it is us who are spoiling the balance and harmony. So, it’s clear that the world is something that is created solely by us against the background of perfection.

Attainment is about searching for the Creator using faith above reason. Attainment happens when we find the properties that are beyond this material level, above our earthly considerations and contrary to our logic. All our perceptions stem from the desire to receive for our own sake. That’s why we can’t agree with anything that contradicts this desire.

Conversely, the real world is outside us; it is in our external perception. That’s why faith above reason is a condition to which we all have to eventually arrive through sensing things that happen outside of our natural egoistic needs and aspirations.

Because of the sinner’s question, one has to agree to the power of the Creator over us again and again. This process is called “trepidation.”

The sinner’s question are the constantly arising needs, demands, and thoughts about the ways to please ourselves. It is a permanent movement towards ourselves. It’s when we take care only of ourselves in every possible way and at all levels. Sinners’ questions are given to us on purpose so that after we shake them off, we again start advancing.

And so on without end we fall into egoism by taking care of ourselves in our thoughts and desires. Then, we make efforts and rise again. This process continues until we get tired and refuse to fulfill this job. It goes on until we come to understand that only the environment ​can support us in this process and help us learn how to think of others.

If we stayed in the state of mutual guarantee and maintained the thought about helping each other, not just ourselves, everything would be very good. Why is that so? It’s because we are unable to think of others. We keep falling into desires of our own. However, if we are able to think about others and at the same time ask the Creator to help us, He will extend His help to us since He responds only to ​these kinds of thoughts and prayers because they are similar to His properties.

So, as soon as we begin aspiring to serve others and ask the Creator to grant us assistance, He responds immediately and helps us, since we, the group, and the Creator are on the same wavelength and in one joint movement. If we do it on our own, without the Creator, nothing will ever happen. Even if we are together with the group, it won’t happen. There must be a system of a triangle: Me, the group, and the Creator.

This structure must also be accompanied by trepidation. We have to be careful and watchful so that we won’t turn away from our path or lose the correct direction. Our egoism will tear us apart, split us from the inside and whisper: “Please forget about the Creator and the group. Nothing is wrong with abandoning them! The main thing is to either think of yourself or just about the others without involving the third element.”

At this point, we need tremendous support. The more of us that participate in this movement, the better it is. The general mass of people who secure an absolutely correct advancement is called 600,000 souls.

It is a conditional number that is not even a number, but rather a general advancement that causes the impact of Zeir Anpin on Malchut. Since Zeir Anpin consists of six Sefirotthat influence Malchut, by influencing a point in Malchut with the Light of Hochma, its level multiplies to 600,000.

Thus, by getting support, we really become able to feel trepidation and constantly stay in the state of permanent aspiration to advance.

This explains the meaning of the phrase: “The Creator made everybody fear Him.” Every bad state that one feels is essential to keep one in one’s current condition.   

In other words, if one has not yet climbed the stairs of the Creator’s greatness, one has no chance to overcome oneself. Only when one feels the greatness of the Creator, one’s heart surrenders. It means that one has already ascended the steps of trepidation.

How can one understand that one has reached the state of trepidation, attained the correct level of excitement, and knows how to take care of others? It happens when a person realizes that in his care for others he feels the Creator’s fulfillment. One’s Kli(vessel) becomes corrected only when it receives fulfillment. Until then, we have to continue searching for the fulfillment both in quantity and quality so that our concern, trepidation, and intention will be correctly formulated and will match the level that is above our ego.

For that, we are given the greatness of the group, the importance of our friends, as a means of connection among us, as an exercise tool. It is done solely to feel the Creator’s fulfillment at the end of the process; the gratification inside our ten Sefirot that we can sense only together in the connection between us. When we tie ourselves into this knot, we begin feeling ourselves as a unity inside the unified.

Naturally, one vanishes when one reaches a state of an overall connection. One loses one’s “I-ness.” From one’s individual “I,” one transitions to “we,” from “we” to unity in which “me– we – the Creator” are one whole. It is said: “He and His Name are One.” The Creator is the Light and His name is a Kli (vessel).

So, all these questions and other numerous obstacles bring one to sense the need in the Creator, in His help.

In other words, we are not capable of asking questions and we can’t even make correct mistakes since when we let ourselves go, we commit errors that immediately make us fall. In order to make correct mistakes, we have to aspire forward. It is said: “I created the evil inclination and the Light to correct it.” How does the evil manifest itself? Where can we detect and see it?

It turns out that these words are not about the evil that exists in this material realm and it is not the evil of our relationships with each other. Not a single person in the world knows what the evil made by the Creator is in fact. The wickedness that has to be corrected reveals in us only when we aspire to unity in the right way.

If we aspire to unity and strive to correctly connect in mutual advancement and if by sharing trepidation, we manage to help others not only ourselves, then we begin sensing our egoistic nature, we realize how strongly we are repulsed by it and how extensively we hate, not only each other, but also ourselves. This revelation is so disgusting that we repel it. We stop searching for other internal negative qualities.

At this point, the recognition of evil occurs. The Creator warns us beforehand that it is He who made the evil inclination and that it is us who should reveal it by aspiring to Him. So, we need a special kind of trepidation. We have to make efforts not to shy away from them, and to control, inspect, and check ourselves regularly.

We have to take a close look at whether we subconsciously avoid the revelation of our egoism as something very unpleasant for us. On the contrary, we have to enjoy the process of revelation of the evil inside us since it is an essential stage in our advancement.That’s why we have to be prepared to deal with very unpleasant sensations and enjoy them because they are accompanying our advancement towards the Creator.

At the same time, we should never forget about the Creator’s greatness. We cannot imagine what the upper force is, what, in fact, exists in the universe and not just in the limited picture that we sense now. It is impossible to understand to what extent the picture that dwells in our thoughts and sensations is artificial.

Scientists have already figured out that we are in a dormant state, that we live in illusions and inside a matrix that creates a distorted picture, a dream. Our egoism locks us inside ourselves, which is why we regard everything that happens as if it takes place inside us. Only when we go out and stop sitting in the shell of our own selves do we begin sensing the real world.

Before it happens, it is very difficult to visualize what the upper reality is. It is not at all like our universe, nothing like the solar system, and the Earth or its surface. We just visualize these things as if we are asleep, in our dreams.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14, lesson 1

First – Thanks

Question: If the group is feeling darkness, is it right to use the ego, meaning envy, lust, and honor with respect to unity and connection?

Answer: On every level darkness is called something completely different. Darkness can be a lack of getting something, and it could be a lack of ability to act, that I am powerless, or it could be the opposite: I am grateful for this darkness since I can act with “faith above reason,” and so forth.

Comment: I see that I cannot rise above myself, find a connection with the friends, and feel that a single power manages us. I don’t have anything besides the ego, and I begin to work with its help so that the friends will begin to be included within each other.

Answer: Here, it is necessary for there to be a tremendous prayer of thanks to theCreator that He gives you the opportunity to do something in a state of darkness like this.

This is the first right action. If you, at least, have some kind of opportunity to do something correctly, you must immediately thank the Creator. Then, you will come in contact with Him. It won’t be apparent and clear, but it will be a contact.

You have received the opportunity to turn toward the Creator correctly and to thank Him, so you turn to Him with a request to help the friends, and everything will already be in the chain.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 6

Tears Are An Excess Of Light

Question: We were given an opportunity to be in a good group of ten. During the three days of the convention, we understood how strongly we love each other. Why do we cry when we confess our love toward each other?

Answer: This is a very good feeling. There are a number of articles on this subject in the wisdom of Kabbalah that explain when and why tears of happiness or sadness for friends, for emotions, and everything else are created. A person cannot contain an excess of emotion within himself, and this becomes tears.

In Section 13 of The Study of the Ten Sefirot, it is explained where tears come from, in what manner they are created. Tears represent an excess of Light that comes into a Klithat cannot hold it, and the Light apparently overflows beyond the limits of the Kli.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day Three” 9/21/14, Lesson 6

The Awe That We Feel

Question: Is the connection of fear and love one of awe for the Creator? Or is that a new feeling that, in the meantime, isn’t revealed in our world?

Answer: We are not talking about what is revealed in our world, meaning in the egoistic desires. Since there is nothing in them except for the animal fear for their corporeal existence and love for the pleasures that fill their animal existence.

We are not at all speaking about what is felt in the animal body, but trying to imagine ourselves existing in bestowal where two attributes reign: love and awe. We only think about what is happening outside of us, which means on what directs us externally to others and through them to the Creator, to the attribute of general love and bestowal.

Question: Why don’t we feel that awe you are speaking about?

Answer: That is a sign that you still haven’t gone through the required discernments of your advancement.

When a person is very concerned about something, is shaking and worried, then a feeling appears in him that he is investing strength and is not receiving what he should. And then he begins to think, “What’s the matter? It should turn out, but doesn’t.”

I have been studying so many years, so many years working on myself, doing a lot of disseminating. I have done so much. What haven’t I yet completed? Where have I made mistakes? Why don’t I see some advancement? And it could be that the advancement is that I don’t see it!? But I also need to know that. This means there is a demand that appears to a person, but it appears according to his efforts.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14, Lesson 2

We Must Not Allow Love To Cool Down

Baal HaSulam, Letter No 2: I advise you to fear that your love might cool down even though our minds reject this possibility.

When we are in love, it seems to us that it will last forever. However, we know that in this world, everything is temporary. This state of affairs applies to spirituality as well since, there too, we continue climbing the next steps. So, it is natural that current states will disappear there  as well. That’s why there is nothing permanent whatsoever and why any condition will always be replaced with another one, either a bad one with a good one, or a good one with a bad one.

Still, make every possible effort to multiply love. If there is a way to increase love, but one doesn’t take advantage of it, it is considered an “omission.” It’s “as if” one gives a great present to one’s friend: the love that reveals in his friend’s heart at the moment of giving is different from the love that remains in his friend’s heart after the deed of giving is over.

In other words, love gradually vanishes. It “cools down” every day to the extent that it goes away completely and reaches a stage of oblivion. That’s why the recipient of the gift must search for the ways to regard the act of giving as recurrent and new every given day.

That is, we have to constantly renew the sensation of love and never allow our feelings to cool down. Everything happens inside us. To keep this sensation, we don’t necessarily have to receive new gifts each time. This rule also applies to unity among us that has to be instigated on a continual basis.

We have come to a state when each one of us cares for others as if they are our little children, our closest and most beloved ones. Thus, we strive to give them everything they want. If we manage to do so, we will provide others with everything they really need, and the Creator will manifest Himself among us as a result of our similarity to His properties.

Our attitude to each other and His property of absolute bestowal and love will somehow coincide. At least they will reach the first level of similarity of the 125 steps. It is the most important issue for us. We are in a state of a constant readiness and everything is in our hands.

We should persistently beg the Creator to give our friends everything they want, i.e., correction and revelation. Revelation is the property of bestowal and love among us. This is exactly what we mean by the term trepidation: a state of caring about our friends that is similar to taking care of our own children from two sides by judgment and  by love.

On the side of judgment, we should really worry that we will lose a chance as did the ARI’s students when he invited them to Jerusalem to bring the world to a state of correction. At that time, everything supported the upper force to be revealed to them, as the upper force was ready to act in this world and correct it. However, the ARI’s students found excuses not to obey their teacher’s invitation. Some of them didn’t show up because their wives wouldn’t let them go and others were busy.

This explains why we have to maintain the state of trepidation and be concerned that we won’t succeed. In every moment and every minute, we have to clarify how we should treat others and support the general Kli (vessel) in a way that it finally reaches a certain condition that will allow the Creator to reveal Himself to us.

It’s as if we are currently facing the Judge, and as if we are given the last opportunity, or granted the final word. Imagine yourself in this state! Visualize that we are facing judgment and that we have to fill it with mutual love. We will be able to do this only if we ask the Creator to fill the gaps between us.

It’s not us who get closer in our hearts, rather it is the Creator who fills the egoistic emptiness between us with love. When the distance between us is multiplied by love, a connection of tremendous intensity emerges. That is why our closeness happens only due to the Creator filling the ​empty spaces between us. He connects, coordinates, and unites us. That’s why our work is called the Creator’s work (Avodat a-Shem).

We only invite Him to do the work of correcting and strengthening our connection.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14

Spiritual Fear Cannot Be Without Love

In The Book of Zohar, it is written: Evoking fear on both sides of love (during the periods of “trials” and the periods of mercy and benevolence) is essential. During the time of mercy and success on His Paths, it is necessary to trepidation awakened before the Creator to avoid committing sins and to prevent our love for Him “cooling down.”

There is no such thing as the fear of punishment. There is no retribution whatsoever. Only to our egoistic desire does it look that we are being punished for our wrongdoings.

Similar to how we egoists relate to each other in this realm, we assume that there is either a reward or a punishment for everything. Our whole life goes by between these two categories and clarifications: “How can I feel better, how can I reward myself? How can I hide from punishments?”

​The ​spiritual path lies above this level. There is no egoistic reckoning whatsoever, neither with the plus nor minus sign. There, it has nothing to do with rewards or retributions. In spirituality, we are the ones who create a scale of spiritual recompenses and paybacks.

When one is given a chance to care about others, it is a reward. If for some reason one is unable to take care of others, one considers it to be a punishment.

The true reality can be attained only when we bring our bodily sensors outside ourselves and begin sensing life not internally, but externally. We have to acknowledge and feel it. That’s why it is said: “You will see your world while you are still alive.” However, moving in this direction becomes possible only if we connect fear with love.

From Baal HaSulam’s and Rabash’s articles and from our own experience, we know that love never comes without fear. Real, spiritual fear cannot occur if it is not accompanied by love.  We shiver because we are scared that our love can weaken or love of those who care about us will diminish. We are in distress, not because we just enjoy being together as two egoists who are delighted to be with each other. Rather, we worry that we won’t let the Creator love us because we don’t please Him by loving our neighbors.

These are mutual sensations. We experience them only at the level of fear. Fear is necessary to make us rise above our egoism and work with it inversely.

… In order to avoid falling to wickedness and diminishing our love for the Creator, we have to connect fear with love.

The same happens on the “other side of love,” at the time of stringent trials when He judges us for our deeds. Awakening of fear before the Creator is essential so that we won’t fall in​to the state of judging ourselves according to egoistic criteria.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg “Day One” 9/19/14, lesson 1