The transcript has been transcribed and edited from English simultaneous interpretation, thus there may be potential semantic inaccuracies within it.

Daily Lesson (Morning) January 18, 2025.

Part 2: Lesson on the Topic of Connecting Lishma.

Reader: We are reading selected excerpts from the sources for the congress on the topic  of “ Connecting Lishma”. We are in excerpt number 3. The study material is on Sviva Tova and Arvut where you can ask questions there preparation for the congress, “ Connecting Lishma”, excerpt 3.

3. Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article No. 20, "Lishma [for Her sake]"

Reading: (00:26) Do not say that if Lishma [for Her sake] is a gift from above, what good is one’s overcoming and efforts, and all the remedies and corrections that he does in order to achieve Lishma, if it depends on the Creator? Our sages said about it, “You are not free to rid yourself of it.” Rather, one must give the awakening from below, and this is considered “prayer.” Yet, there cannot be a real prayer if he does not know first that without prayer it cannot be obtained.

Therefore, the acts and remedies he does in order to obtain Lishma create the corrected Kelim [vessels] in him that want to receive the Lishma. Then, after all the actions and the remedies he can pray in earnest since he saw that all his actions did not help him whatsoever. Only then can he make an honest prayer from the bottom of his heart, and then the Creator hears his prayer and gives him the gift of Lishma.

 M. Laitman: Questions? Questions. Any questions? No questions.

Reader: Should I read again? 

M. Laitman: You want to read again? Read. 

Reader: From Shamati number 20. 

Reading: (02:44) Do not say that if Lishma [for Her sake] is a gift from above, what good is one’s overcoming and efforts, and all the remedies and corrections that he does in order to achieve Lishma, if it depends on the Creator? Our sages said about it, “You are not free to rid yourself of it.” Rather, one must give the awakening from below, and this is considered “prayer.” Yet, there cannot be a real prayer if he does not know first that without prayer it cannot be obtained.

Therefore, the acts and remedies he does in order to obtain Lishma create the corrected Kelim [vessels] in him that want to receive the Lishma. Then, after all the actions and the remedies he can pray in earnest since he saw that all his actions did not help him whatsoever. Only then can he make an honest prayer from the bottom of his heart, and then the Creator hears his prayer and gives him the gift of Lishma.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (04:36) What are the corrected vessels that want to receive the Lishma? 

M. Laitman: To receive in order to bestow.

Student: What are the vessels that want to receive in order to bestow? 

M. Laitman: I don't understand. 

Student: He writes that what a person needs is to want to have corrected vessels to receive the Lishma. So, what are those corrected vessels? 

M. Laitman: The corrected vessels are vessels to receive desires that their intention is already to bestow. 

Student: And what are the vessels that want only to be in bestowal and not receive in order to bestow yet? What are they called? 

M. Laitman: It's desires to receive that want to be only in bestowal. 

Student: In not receiving for themselves, or already in bestowing? 

M. Laitman: Of course not to receive for themselves.

Student: So, what's missing in order to have those corrected vessels that he's talking about? So we will want these vessels. 

M. Laitman: We're lacking vessels to reach such a degree that they don't want, don't want to bestow. 

Student: Vessels that don't want to bestow? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Rather than?

M. Laitman: They want to receive, or not to receive anything.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (07:04) He writes here that he saw that all his actions did not help him. Is this that point of Lo Lishma that Baal HaSulam writes that it's the inversion to Lishma? 

M. Laitman: I don't know. Keep going.

Student: We learned a few days ago that a person comes into work in Lo Lishma, not for her sake. There's a point where he sees that everything he's done was for himself. He did not have the right intention. And then he writes in a different place, Baal HaSulam, that that's the point in Lo Lishma, in not for her sake, from which the prayer can open, and there's the potential to move to Lishma there, to for her sake. Is this systemically, is this how it works? 

M. Laitman: What do you want me to say? 

Student: How do we detect this point in the connection between us? 

M. Laitman: You need to do actions of bestowal as much as possible in the connections between you, and from that, you'll understand if you want this or not.

Student: And the desire, if I want it or not, is this what determines, is this what moves a person? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: Let's say I don't want. There are states when a person doesn't want to be in connection.

M. Laitman: Yes, so you don't want it. 

Student: What does he do then? 

M. Laitman: Nothing. 

Student: Is there a place to overcome here? 

M. Laitman: Yes, that's always.

Student: So, these are the two lines that a person always works with. He identifies something and then he works accordingly in overcoming, or in giving, or inspiring others. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (09:29) I don't even know how to say it, but this thing that, that inner desire that wants to bestow, how can it want to bestow if it's opposite from bestowal? And if I'm to understand what you said to the friend, that he doesn't want to bestow, he doesn't want to want to bestow, so it wants only to receive, to realize the will to receive. It's frightening. To what extent do we realize it? What does it mean to realize the will to receive? 

M. Laitman: To realize, to implement the will to receive.

Student: But it's cruel, it's big, it's strong, it's overbearing. 

M. Laitman: Whatever a person has.

Student: What about a prayer? How do we come to spirituality? 

M. Laitman: Prayer is every moment you'd want. 

Student: How can I want to pray when there's a part of the will to receive there? 

M. Laitman: You feel that when you use it, you won't reach the purpose of creation. 

Student: I understand this in my intellect, in my mind.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: How do I build a vessel that is opposite from this thing, from this inner desire? I want it, I understand it's correct, I understand I feel that there is something else. 

M. Laitman: So, there's a prayer. There's a prayer, pray to receive new vessels. 

Student: But there's a conflict here, praying to receive new vessels with this desire that's only increasing all the time. You can really feel that. The more we engage in connection, and learn, and advance along with it, something else grows that you have to deal with all the time. 

M. Laitman: Yes, and? 

Student: How do we break this war? 

M. Laitman: Ask to be able to overcome with the vessels of bestowal.

Student: Which I don't have. 

M. Laitman: Probably. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (12:38) When we begin to discover that there is less pleasure in receiving than in bestowing, we can begin to work in what he writes, in remedies and actions that we'll want to receive Lishma. Can Lishma close on this? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So, if these vessels are formed because we engage in bestowal, because we see it's still in order to receive, and we want this engagement, this work to be in Lishma, what is the prayer here, what do we pray for here? 

M. Laitman: That a new vessel of Lishma will be revealed. But, there's the work in bestowal it happens right now, in Lo Lishma and then, we feel that it's Lo Lishma, we want it to be Lishma. And he writes that afterwards, once we have the vessels of Lishma, there's a prayer. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: What is the prayer once we already have the vessels of Lishma, and there's a desire to be in Lishma? 

M. Laitman: There are desires that want to work in order to bestow, yes? You activate those desires, and you ask to have an opportunity to receive in order to bestow. 

Student: Once I have a desire, what else do I need? I can only activate a desire. So, what is the prayer? It's not clear.

M. Laitman: To have an opportunity to work with it according to the desire to bestow. 

Student: What's the difference between the desire and the possibility to work with it? 

M. Laitman: Could be that you have a desire, but you cannot know how to work with it.

Student: I only present a desire before the Creator. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So what? I ask him to move aside now and let me work with my desire now? 

M. Laitman: No. 

Student: So it's not clear. Because I can only present this desire, this vessel that developed. 

M. Laitman: That's in you. 

Student: Yes.

M. Laitman: You have a desire to what?

Student: To work in bestowal, in order to bestow, or receiving in order to bestow. 

M. Laitman: Yes, so why don't you want to work with it? 

Student: I cannot work with it. That's what I don't understand. I present a desire, and now I have to ask the Creator to let me work with it. What is this work? 

M. Laitman: Use your desire that was revealed now. 

Student: Meaning, so, from potential to actual? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: And how will it be expressed once I get this power? 

M. Laitman: That you'll be able to work with your desire. 

Student: What will I be able to change in the reality that's revealed before me when I know how to use a desire? 

M. Laitman: What part of reality are you willing to receive when it becomes clothed in you.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (16:49) We just read in the excerpt that Lishma is a gift. If it's a gift, so only prayer can help us. The whole prayer is that we understand, or maybe feel that only He can help us. How to reach a state to agree that only He can help us? 

M. Laitman: Is there an answer? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (17:48) It's from the text, but it's also an answer. He says that only through acts and remedies can he obtain Lishma. So, what are those acts and remedies? 

M. Laitman: You have to search, and find, and present them.

Student: What to search for? 

M. Laitman: Actions and remedies that can express vessels of bestowal on your part. 

Student: Actions are maybe on my behalf and remedies come as a result?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So, what should I do? 

M. Laitman: What the actions tell you.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (19:02) Yesterday you told us that from now on we decide that we perceive coming closer to each other and to the Creator as a pleasure. What is that decision? 

Student: Can you repeat? 

Student: Yes. You told us yesterday that we decide from now on that we perceive coming closer to each other and to the Creator as a pleasure. What is this decision we are having to make? 

M. Laitman: What is this decision we are having to make according to Rav's words yesterday.

Student: About us coming closer to one another and from that to the Creator. That it will be as a pleasure for us. 

M. Laitman: So it will be as a pleasure.

Student: What is that decision? How can we decide to receive this as a pleasure? It sounds like we need to educate our senses, our perception. What is that education, that change we need to make? 

M. Laitman: The change we want to have is for us to perform acts of bestowal on our part toward the Creator in every single situation. And then we will see how it comes, how it reconciles all the disputes.

Student: We also need to tell our body that this is a pleasure. Can we do that? We can tell the body this is pleasure, to give? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

 Student: So, we just demand and decide this is how it shall be. It's a pleasure to give.

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (23:01) Those are the deeds? Actions of bestowal toward the Creator in every state. Those are the deeds we need to do. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So everything that I think is bestowing to the Creator right now, I have to do. I have to exert in it?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: That's where the need for a prayer will come from the depth of the heart. Because I can exert in it, but I need to receive that ability from above. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, everything that seems as bestowal to the Creator is a pleasure. Okay, we can be  mistaken in it, but we have to try more and more, right? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (23:45) From the friend's question, there's like one question in the whole lesson also about the dependency, and how to see our dependency in the others, the others in us. So, the question, I think is, how will we have confidence that what we're doing is right even though we can't see it or it's not in our feeling yet, but that happiness and confidence that we're doing the right thing. How can we get that confidence? Not confidence in order to give up but to have more strength to keep going.

M. Laitman: We’ll keep going. We'll keep going because we have no choice, no choice. And afterwards, because I understand more and more that specifically in this way the thought of creation can come true, can be realized. 

Student: How do you add happiness from no choice? Not from feeling bitterness, but from gratitude and happiness?

M. Laitman: You envelop your situation with the ability to bestow upon the Creator. Bestow upon the Creator adds joy to you and gives you the upper light that is clothed in your effort.

Student: That you have to ask for, or we must supposedly create something for us, that addition? 

M. Laitman: That addition we need to demand.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (26:22) I want to ask about the state of prayer. When a person reaches a prayer from the bottom of the heart. So, after all the deeds didn't help. So, from the side of the Ten, what is that prayer, what do we need between us to give up on, or to add, or is it some inner state? A prayer from the depth of the heart of the Ten.

M. Laitman: We need to check ourselves from which desires are  we turning to the Creator. Are we asking for corrections, for adhesion, are these desires the desires in which the thought of creation is revealed or not? And after we are certain that we can maintain ourselves, then we are happy.

Student: How as an individual, me as a friend and a Ten, while praying or… how not to harm the thought during that, in that moment we're praying. How do I not harm? How do I add?

M. Laitman: I would say through connection. 

Student: I mean, how does it go through me, with that common deficiency? 

M. Laitman: I can't explain. The light is passing through you to others because they want in whatever way to receive the light from the Creator.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (29:49) If I can continue the friends's question. There are like two pictures here. One, I love my children, and I enjoy it, I really enjoy it, and they enjoy getting love from me. So, it's like a natural connection. That's how it's made. On the other hand, in our depiction, we, as people with points in the heart, we want that same state, the degree of the Father and even more. But how to reach this love that we want? Love your friend as yourself. How to reach that degree? 

M. Laitman: We probably have a problem here. We need to think. What within us do we need to change so as to perform actions or operations in which we come closer to the Creator and demand from Him to correct us? 

Student: What point does it start from? Which desire? My desire comes from the environment. Like I said about the parents and the children, there's a desire to love them, and here there is no desire. It only comes from the environment. 

M. Laitman: So, what do we do? 

Student: It's against nature. You can only ask what I can do, or daily deeds, and ask?

M. Laitman: Yes. Correct. You're right. Ask. Ask. It's on the way. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (33:27) After the lesson with you, at 5, we usually study TES for half an hour. Can we study it, let’s say with you, from 4:30 til 5, let’s say?

M. Laitman: It’s possible. Possible.

Student: This lesson, it was felt how necessary our mutual forces have been. There's a deficiency growing between us. So, I want to personally turn to you. Yesterday you were in the Afternoon meal of the community. We were so happy you were with us. We felt your force when you were with us together And we have a meal soon, a special meal. And I'm asking you so much if you could be with us in this meal. We need you there in this period of time. We also feel it in your answers when the friends say how you're directing us higher. I'm asking if you could be with us in this meal. I feel this meal is… so every Shabbat we aim ourselves to this new state. I'll be very happy if you'll be with us.

M. Laitman: When is the meal? 

Reader: Six. Around six

M. Laitman: Today this morning?

Student: We're going to end and there'll be a prayer. 

M. Laitman: Thank you. 

 Question (Petah Tikva Center): (34:54) I’d never think of doing something for the Creator. Naturally, it only comes from studying, from the environment, from learning that that's what you need to do. And the environment affects you, and influences you, and makes you think of it. Does the society also bring us the Lishma? Let's say we're coming to the Congress Lishma, everybody together a big force or do we need this whole experience, and, difficulty, and failure and prayer?

M. Laitman: We need it. All those things are included in the will to receive and they are needed.

Student: That this desire will get some kind of validity in the Congress. We're gonna sit there. There'll be thousands here, people from around the world. 

M. Laitman: You need to be incorporated with the others to receive from them the desire. It's not simple. 

Student: What's the key in this Congress? 

M. Laitman: Connection There's nothing else. Okay? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (36:43) When an opportunity from above comes to bestow, the will to receive doesn't see it in a good way. It's darkness for it. On the other hand, as the friend explained when we get the desire to bestow to the Creator, the desire for something that isn’t in our nature. We try and connect those points as an opportunity from above that comes as darkness and the desire and maybe requests or an ability to bestow on such a state. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't work. I wanted to ask, what does it depend on? To wrap that darkness or in order to extract the light out of it. You described it once to wrap the medicine in a nice wrapping. So, how to focus these feelings between us that these opportunities won't just escape from us and we'll be able to strengthen each other also in the environment to work with these special feelings to really extract the light from that state 

M. Laitman: We'll learn it. It's called pumping out. Pump it. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (38:38) I'll ask the friend’s question, he can't ask. In a group, or in a Ten and in the Nation of Israel sometimes there is lack of agreement. Each one thinks about something else, sees the state differently. How do you solve this lack of agreement in the Nation through Arvut? 

M. Laitman: By wanting to come closer to each other. 

Student: How do you solve a lack of agreement if there still isn't Arvut yet? 

M. Laitman: We have to see how connected we are, because it's impossible to uphold the Torah, to observe the Torah unless by connection to those who study it. 

Student: And what you recommended about the friends from Turkey that they can't get a visa, so you said that we need to pray that they'll come. When is it called that we really had a true prayer for them? 

M. Laitman: When they come. 

Reader: So now let's summarize a lesson in the Tens. We're not getting a focus group. On the one hand it can correct reality, on the other hand it can bring all of reality to that direction, so the effort is on us.