The Path To The Group

Dr. Michael LaitmanOur world is built of the desire to receive and controlled by pleasure, which this desire keeps running after. We are constantly tormented either by the absence of pleasure or its beckoning light from the future, which forces us to develop.

When a person more or less realizes what he or she wants, it is regarded as the “developmental gene” (Reshimo), which is the part of desire that somehow sees the future delight and yearns precisely for it. In our world, such development occurs naturally. New desires keep unfolding in us, while against them, there is the Surrounding Light that attracts desires to itself, to pleasure.

Essentially, man is desire that yearns to feel good. And if we suddenly stop feeling pleasure at all, we immediately feel a halt and a lack of energy to move on since that desirable pleasure was precisely the source of energy for us.

Thus, we kept developing, moving forth along the chain of Reshimot that were actualizing in us automatically, without us being aware of it. But this chain is finite, and it has come to an end! And now, it gives way to a very unique, spiritual gene, in which the Reshimo (desire) and the Surrounding Light that illuminates it don’t match and are even opposite to each other.

And it turns out that I don’t see how I can receive this Light that tantalizes me. Something is calling out to me, but I do not know how to reach it because first, I have to become similar to it, to receive an anti-egoistic screen for this Light.

At this point, a person stops in his tracks and can’t move. All he can do is ask: “What do I need this life for, and what do I do next?” as if getting cornered in a dead end. This period can last a long time because any spiritual development requires many internal efforts from us until a person gets used to and becomes receptive to it.

And finally, he still makes a certain change in his life: He arrives at the place where he hears that it is possible to actualize this new desire, in order to reach fulfillment. He doesn’t yet understand how to accomplish it all, but already starts to move ahead along the degrees of understanding: 0-1-2-3-4 that must be walked to the very end, to the last 4th degree, so he may comprehend something from this segment of his development.

And then, there starts another new cycle: 0-1-2-3-4, and so on. And all of this may take many months. But now, while moving along these preliminary stages: 0-1-2-3-4, a person feels that a secret is hidden in this place, which lures him and doesn’t let him leave.

Thus, one gradually gets ready to hear such terms as the “group” and “correction” that must be performed with its help, as well as about the correction of the entire world. It is a rather lengthy process. But the point is that a person finally gets to know that he lacks a new force: equivalence between the nature of his desire and its fulfillment.

Desire must match its fulfillment! It is the desire to receive pleasure, but it must enjoy bestowal, and then it will be fulfilled. After all, fulfillment that is standing before it is the fulfillment in bestowal. And in order to learn to enjoy bestowal, a person is led to the group where he gradually starts to understand where he’s been brought to and what is going on there.

He suddenly understands what all the articles were talking about, which he used to read and discuss without any idea what he was saying, what kind of group he was in, and without any understanding why he was here and how he ended up in it. But now, he can gradually comprehend that the group is, indeed, the place of actualizing his spiritual fulfillment; he realizes that only with its help will he be able to change the type of his fulfillment from reception to bestowal.

If he does so, he will be able to enjoy the Light that will come and fulfill him as much as he expands his desire to enjoy bestowal.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/23/2011 Preparation for the WE! Convention

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