I have strong hopes that you will understand what the spiritual stimulator that we want to build is. The group is something extremely vague, unknown, and elusive; it’s as if it is hanging in the air somewhere. Meanwhile, the stimulator is a very tangible place on the Internet where questions, answers, aspirations, goals, and clarifications are concentrated. You can think of it as a third party. For the time being, this kind of attitude toward the group, the soul, the spiritual world, and the Creator is more understandable to us.

The spiritual world is revealed in our connection, in the network that connects us. This is why we have to build this space on the Internet so that it will connect us. Think that it’s a connection between us, and give more strength to it every time. Everyone can enjoy great impressions and inspiration by taking part in it because it is less obscure and a more tangible environment that one can actually “touch.”

Today people live on the Internet and reveal the whole world of senses and a new dimension there instead of in our material life. If we attain the state in which the group influences and awakens us through this stimulator, then we won’t miss a single moment in spiritual advancement.

It may be that a person’s entire life is just one moment which can remain unfinished. This is because a moment begins from Above and is finished by us below. The Creator awakens a person and he has to react. If he responds to the proposition of getting closer, then the moment is finished and the next one begins.

Life is composed of such moments; they make up our advancement and determine how much we will achieve during this life-cycle. However, if the person does not respond, a moment never finishes…Seize the moment!

From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/13/10, Baal HaSulam’s Letter 18

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Our entire life is a spell, a great deceit. The egoistic desire constantly manipulates us, forcing us to work for it. Meanwhile, we are in love with this impure desire of ours and actually desire to be deceived by it.

It lies to us about the end of our path, promising us pleasure and Light when we get there. And along the way it seems like we do receive some kind of pleasure. Even though we don’t have anything besides empty promises, we enjoy them. We think about what we are about to gain and start to feel as if we already have it in the present. We receive sparks of pleasure and they give us hope.

However, there is no Light behind these sparks because the Light does not descend beneath the Parsa, the boundary that separates the World of Atzilut. The Light shines for us from there and awakens these sparks, making us feel hopeful that we will receive the Light. And this goes on throughout our entire lives.

Even though we are always disillusioned and never see any Light, just the sparks, we have no other choice but to keep looking for them in order to feel pleasure. We hope to enjoy ourselves by gaining a little more money, fame, power, knowledge, food, and sex. And thus, we are always on the path, with all our hopes aimed at the future. But the moment the Light is supposed to come to the spark, it does not come and everything immediately disappears.

This constitutes the work of the egoistic desire: to attract us with promises of pleasure, making us constantly desire it and always being on the path, thinking that we are enjoying ourselves. But we never reach the actual pleasure. We only reach disappointment and everything disappears.

In the material world a person’s entire life is based on hopes for the future and he supposes that this is happiness. He believes that all kinds of egoistic pleasures are waiting for him up ahead and tries not to think about the darkness and death that await him.

However, today humanity has developed to a level where it begins to understand that egoistic promises are groundless. But in that case, what are we to do? After all, we can no longer keep living just on hope! We no longer believe in socialism or a beautiful future where everyone will be happy.

As a result, depression and disillusionment are becoming very common; yet, we have to keep living somehow. As a result, people start to lie to themselves even more. They deliberately enter a drunken stupor in order to force themselves to believe. All the mass media channels work for this sake; it is a universal spell that is kept up by society.

This will continue until the lie reaches the breaking point, beyond which it will no longer be possible to keep going.

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We don’t feel that our whole life is subject to a single course of affairs. The Creator purposely confuses us, as though the world has no Source or Goal, so that out of despair from their absence, we will rejoice from the revelation of Kabbalah, which is the method of the revelation of the Creator.

In order to reveal the Creator it is necessary to attribute everything that happens to Him alone and to correct our qualities in order to become similar to Him. If I strive to see only Him and none else behind everything that comes to me – all the blows and pleasures, then from this confusion, I will begin to build a system of connections of desires and thoughts, which are similar to the Creator’s.

Besides this, I need to see only goodness in all of His various and contradictory actions. If I believe Kabbalists in that they perceive the Creator as a single and benevolent source, I strive to correct my qualities in such a way that I perceive Him the same way.

If I tune myself like a violin, which, after being tuned, begins to play the right melody, then I will feel the Creator and He and I together will play on me. We will merge into one melody and one instrument.

(From the First Lesson of the North American Congress  10.16.09)

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It is written: “No bread, no Torah.” This means that our life here, in this world, precedes everything. Before I do anything else, I have to secure my existence on the corporeal level.

Therefore, a person has to work and do everything that is necessary in this life, without turning away from it. The science of Kabbalah considers this condition mandatory for one’s correction on a higher level.

I have to take care of everything that is necessary for my normal existence. This is a very important condition in the science of Kabbalah, and it differentiates it from all other spiritual methods, which try to disconnect a person from this life.

The science of Kabbalah says the opposite: it is precisely while you are living this life, where you work, study, and give birth to children, that you must reach the general balance with Nature. And under no circumstances should you run away from this world.
(From Part 3 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson)

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What is the result of all our material development, which people value so highly? What have we achieved with all of our hard work, our “Egyptian labor with clay and bricks,” as one Kabbalistic text says about the Egyptian slavery, the exile from spirituality? The result is that we are now nearing the revelation of the spiritual world and are opening our eyes to the fact that people have been doing absolutely nothing of value in this world! People are doing things that are absolutely unnecessary to anyone! Yes, they invent all sorts of crafty gadgets, but could we really not live without all these things?

The more people develop, the more time they spend on useless activities, and the more they go beyond the bare minimum necessary for life. Today, if we reverted to spending time only on the things that are vitally necessary, most of us would be left with nothing to do. Only five percent of the population would have to work in order to provide all of humanity with the necessities. Alternatively, each one of us could allocate five percent of his time to provide for his livelihood.

All the leftover time would be dedicated to our spiritual development. And why not? You don’t get any benefit from spending all your time on material things. In fact, all you are doing by this is damaging the environment.

There is nothing more for a person to do in this world other than to work on his spiritual correction. Otherwise we would have the problem of what to do with the elderly who need to be provided for.  What would be the point of taking care of them if we believe that only the actively working people are of any benefit?

Indeed, our lives must follow the opposite principle. All we need is to give every person the method for his internal correction, and then there will be a place for everyone. Every person will carry out work for the sake of infinity, because the soul has no age. And it is precisely the elderly who will make some of the biggest corrections.

The more time we spend on “clay and bricks,” the more we advance toward reaching the realization that we are in slavery. And the weight of this realization will make people cry out to the Creator and thus rise to the “human” level. And that is the only benefit that we will get out of all our material development.

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In the News (from Astronomy.com): “Venus Express searching for life — on Earth” Scientists using European Space Agency’s (ESA) Venus Express are trying to observe whether Earth is habitable. Silly, you might think, when we know that Earth is richly stocked with life. In fact, far from being a pointless exercise, Venus Express is paving the way for an exciting new era in astronomy. One thing has become obvious from the study of Earth using Venus Express: determining whether a planet is habitable is not going to be easy. Although the observations may not tell us anything new about Earth, they will allow us to unveil far-off worlds, making them seem more real than simply dots of light.

My Comment: Science is not yet capable of making conclusions about life in the universe. We cannot even detect life on our planet… It’s possible only to determine whether there are certain conditions for life’s existence.

At a certain stage of man’s development, he becomes interested in the existence of life in the cosmos. However, as his attention (desire) grows, he aspires to search for that which is eternal and perfect, something higher than the corporeal, beyond the animate level of life. In other words, he aspires to the spiritual world.

At that point, the question of whether other forms of life are possible in the universe disappears, as it becomes replaced by the aspiration to attain the next level of development – the “human” level.

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A question I received: Please show me practically, using examples from history, how do Reshimot change?

My Answer: The periodical change of our attitude to life is dictated by the changing “genes” in us (Reshimot, which comes from the word Roshem - “recording” in Hebrew). The stages of egoism’s changes are recorded inside each of us from the beginning, when the common soul divided into many souls.

Reshimot are revealed in us in an increasing, consecutive order: 0-1-2-3-4. Therefore, at the beginning stages of their realization in us, the Reshimot brought forth a small egoism in us; and in those lives we were “naïve” – slaves and masters. Then, as more advanced Reshimot surfaced in us, when we were born in the next epochs, we desired to be freer, to be workers, such as vassals or serfs. Women were married off without their permission, and this was considered “correct.” They loved their husbands because their small egoism did not get in the way. This was the accepted norm.

And after that, as more advanced Reshimot were expressed in us, we desired to be “free” workers for hire, employers but not masters. We desired freedom and equality (including for women), and so on.

Reshimot elicit desires in us, and the desires provoke the mind to achieve what we desire. Today we can see nations in whom different Reshimot were expressed in the same epoch, and therefore we don’t live in one cultural zone, but in different cultures and formations. However, globalization is bringing about a quick realization of Reshimot in every person and in everyone together.

In regard to choice:

• marriage (voluntary – through love, or forced – stealing the bride, paying a ransom, marrying by the father’s order, and so on),

• power (coercive – although later accepted and loved, like in Russia until today; by election; or inherited),

• place of residence (being attached to the place, having a residence permit, a passport system, free movement),

• and according to other signs, one can tell which Reshimot were realized in a nation or a civilization.

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In the News (from The Guardian): Eastern Europe is heading for a violent “spring of discontent.” Hit increasingly hard by the financial crisis, countries such as Bulgaria, Romania and the Baltic states face deep political destabilization and social strife. “We are fed up with living in the poorest and most corrupt country,” the Sofia protest organizers said.

My Comment: The only way to calm down the masses is by immediately implementing a new global education. And more than calming this down, this will give them an explanation of how to succeed in the new world; not just of how to survive, but how to turn around all of nature so it will influence us positively. We must set a condition that people will receive benefits only if they study. Like children, we all have to learn about how to live in the new world!

People shouldn’t think that the path to the new life is long, because as soon as we begin acting in agreement with the program of our development, according to Nature, we will feel the positive results in everything, including all our actions, the climate and so on.

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A question I received: I am non Jewish, and I have been studying Kabbalah for several years. I am considering the path of conversion. However, I am trying to find information on the concept of Chasid Omot Olam. All I know is that this is a non Jewish person who lives his life according to the precepts and the cause of spreading Kabbalah. Is this correct? How can I find more information on this concept?

My Answer: There’s no need to convert. You have to correct yourself to “Love your neighbor as yourself,” and today this is required of all people. Nationalities and religions will vanish, and our world will disappear from our perception. The only thing that will remain is the one common soul, united with the Creator in the state of the World of Infinity, just as it was at the beginning of creation. Read the section about the three states in Baal HaSulam’s article, “Introduction to the Book of Zohar.”

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In the News (from The New York Times): “In Effort to Build Support, Obama Details Stimulus Plan” The White House envisions using loan guarantees and other financial support to leverage $100 billion in private sector investment in so-called clean energy projects over three years. The plan would help 8.5 million Americans keep health care coverage by providing workers who lose insurance with tax credits to pay for continuing coverage… The plan would modernize 10,000 schools, improve security at 90 ports and build 1,300 wastewater projects. It would bolster Pell Grants to help seven million students and offer a new tax credit for four million college students. And it would increase food stamp benefits for 30 million Americans and increase Social Security benefits $450 for 7.5 million disabled and elderly people…

In his speech, Mr. Obama said he knew that some worried about the size of his plan, “We won’t just throw money at our problems; we’ll invest in what works.”

My Comment: Investment alone will not work! What’s needed is a gradual change of the social consciousness, making it planetary, global, and integral. It must approach the rule, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” which is the condition of the global world’s existence.

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