Baal Hasulam, “The Freedom”: “Thus, he has substantially changed for the better from the tendency he had inherited from his forefathers. And sometimes one manages to completely uproot a bad tendency. This is done by habit, which has the ability to become a second nature.“

A habit becomes a second nature and there is a need for prior sensitivity in realizing it. After all, we are talking about special acts that are goal oriented, that change my nature.

This is the way we also behave with children when we let them do the same task over and over again until they suddenly begin to do it by themselves. If you try to stop a child from doing something that he is already used to, you won’t succeed. For him the habit is already associated with pleasure. Before he did it under our pressure, fearing that he would be punished if he didn’t do it, but now he sees the benefit in it, the lack of punishment and even a reward.

Eventually the action that was previously undesirable, now becomes rewarding, and this association is recorded in his brain. Now even if I don’t follow him, he continues to brush his teeth every morning and night even if no one gives him a candy for doing so. The model of the candy is already in his brain and it works successfully.

This is the habit. It isn’t just any habit, but an association that exists in his brain that ties the action with the candy. What is more, if I don’t do what I am used to, it is as if I am punished, although apparently nothing happens.

Our habits are related to smoking, eating, the way we dress and many other different things. They are constantly active, whether we notice them or not.

This is the complex “mechanism” that refers to the desire, in which every action or every thought is tied to a memory of pleasure. This pleasure is eternal, it is recorded and it stays in me in addition to the first factor. Even if it is not revealed at present, but rather in the past, meaning not in the inner Lights, but in the surrounding Lights, I still feel it.

Thus, the habit is created from the mutual cooperation between the Light and the vessel. We either create it by ourselves or receive it from the outside: from our parents or from other people.

Many human actions are based on this schema. Using it we train animals, educate children, and make ourselves used to things…even when we make an acquaintance with someone and have some kind of attitude towards him, we act according to patterns we are used to.

Thus, a habit becomes a second nature. This is one of the lines in the picture.
[63729]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/20/11, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot”

Related Material:
The New Habit
A Good Habit: Desire To Bestow
Cursory Thoughts On Shamati, “What Is The Habit Becomes A Second Nature, In The Work”

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