Question: What should you do if a friend does not elevate you, but humiliates you? After all, there should be mutual relations in the group. It turns out that you invest effort, and he… .

Answer: Let’s suppose that the whole group is in a certain state where it does not awaken or uplift me in any way. In such a case, it is worthwhile to take several people from the group, work only with them, and together with them set an example for everyone else. But without unnecessary words—simply set an example.

If the others want to listen, then also tell them: “We are tired of sitting in the ‘assembly of the frivolous,’ and we have decided that we want to get out of this state. If you want, join us, and if not, then don’t. We can no longer continue like this.”

A person can do this alone, or take several like-minded friends with whom it will be easier. That is all. For this, there is no need to unite into groups; this can be done freely, so that everyone has the opportunity to join.

In any case, one needs somehow to look for a way to break the existing situation. And here, I think, it is not even worth giving advice. Seek advice yourselves, and that itself will be a blessed work.
[360963]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/18/26, Rabash, “What Are ‘Blessing’ and ‘Curse’ in the Work?”

Question: If the desire to receive agrees to perform work, it expects a reward for it. How can it agree to something other than what it anticipates? For in every action—in work with the group or in study—the desire to receive imagines some payment for itself; otherwise, it would not agree to work.

Answer: What kind of reward should we imagine? We cannot choose the reward. It already exists and depends on my Kli (vessel), on the state I am currently in.

What is considered a reward in spirituality? We do not know this and cannot imagine it. You might simply speak words about desiring to receive the intention for the sake of bestowal as your reward, claiming that opportunity of  bringing pleasure to the Creator will be your reward. But how can this be?

What enjoyment will I be able to receive from this? How will I be able to feel that a Kli which is outside me is being filled? We have not the slightest idea about this. We do not know how one enjoys fusion with the Creator. We truly cannot feel such actions within ourselves. Not yet…

Question: But how can one want to change the reward?

Answer: One can want to change the reward only as a result of blows. There is no other solution. But one can pass through them more quickly only if a person is able to endure them. And one can endure them if one turns them from animal sufferings into sufferings of the soul.

For animal sufferings are stretched out over a long time, and only then can you endure them. But this takes a lot of time. If you want to shorten them, you cannot remain in the same plane of animalistic sufferings.

You must rise above it and change the quality of the blows, transfer them from the animalistic realm into the realm of the spiritual. And then one “soul” blow, that is, as it were a spiritual blow, is counted for you as a thousand animalistic blows. In this way you shorten the time. That is, the blows become qualitative, not quantitative.
[360959]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/17/26, Rabash, “What Are Commandments that a Person Tramples with His Feet”

Question: Is a transition to a secular worldview necessary when moving from the inanimate stage (Domem) to the vegetative stage (Tzomeach)?

Answer: No, a person does not have to go from being religious at the still level of holiness (Domem de Kedusha) to being secular, to then arrive to Kabbalah. These stages are completely unrelated to one another. There are examples: the Hasidim and the Mitnagdim. In Judaism today, there is a very deep divide.

There are many people who understand that Judaism is in a deep crisis. Unlike what existed a hundred years ago, today all the values, the entire approach, have collapsed. This is clear to many people who, without being organized into groups, study and even get together in small groups to talk about it. I hear from those who call and inquire that this is indeed happening.

There is nothing you can do about it. We are talking about creation, about development, when a person suddenly begins to feel that something is missing in his books, in his way of studying. He may even study Gemara, thinking in spiritual terms, but suddenly, whether he wants it or not, he is “led away.”

He, like us, is brought to a state where he opens a book he did not want to read before—and suddenly, what opens up before him is not a book, but an entire world. I recognize this reaction in people and hope that this is how it will continue. Baal HaSulam and all the Kabbalists of various generations emerged in precisely this way.

Question: But we are talking about individuals. Shouldn’t this become a widespread phenomenon?

Answer: These are not individuals. We are talking about tens and hundreds of people in each generation. Two or three hundred years ago, there were very large groups of people who had attained spiritual levels. Let us remember the Baal Shem Tov and Kotzk. In the time of the Baal Shem Tov, there were thousands of them. There were thousands in every generation. All these Admorim, up until the twentieth century, possessed spiritual attainment, and the books they wrote were, of course, holy books, since they were all Kabbalists.
[360431]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/12/26, Rabash, “One Should Always Sell Everything He Has and Marry a Wise Disciple’s Daughter”

We observe a constant tendency within ourselves of attempting to bring Torah into the desire to receive. We want to achieve something, gain something, seemingly something spiritual, and we try to do it one way or another through receiving.

Since our point in the heart is still under the control of the egoistic “stony heart” (Lev Ha Even) we do not understand that spirituality and desire to receive are opposite things. Even when the point in the heart shines and shows to us some positive things about spirituality that are outside of our heart, we still do not sense that in reality this goodness is opposite to our heart and we simply want to get it as we usually do.

We do not know about the restriction (Tzimtzum) and we lack a sense the law of equivalence of form; therefore, we experience heaviness when we work to achieve what we want. We want to achieve spirituality inside the desire to receive. This is where heaviness comes from. If we understood that the basis must be the desire to bestow, it would be much easier for us.

A person constantly feels fatigue, confusion, and powerlessness. Why is this path so difficult and so unpleasant for them?

It is written in one of the articles in Shamati that even when a person understands that their annulment before the Creator is inevitable, and desires it, and even when they feel that the point in the heart is opposite to the heart, they begin to feel that the point in the heart (the desire to bestow) cannot have control over their heart without faith, without the sensation of the Creator.

This stems from the simple condition. Spirituality is defined as a situation in which “Israel” (the spiritual state the person dwells in) and the Creator are in the same point of connection, adhesion, and union. Therefore, if a person aspires to spirituality, even if it is merely a desire to bestow, yet it does not take into account to whom they want to bestow, such a state is still not perfect, it is still not spirituality.

Spirituality is the unity of the three factors: Israel, one’s state, and the Creator. Even when we reach the state where we realize that we have to be annulled, we experience heaviness because the general picture lacks the Creator.

This lack, this heaviness, comes through the reforming light that acts like a herald proclaiming that we have no other choice but to attain a sensation of the Creator, His revelation. Only in this way will we be able to somehow change the current state and emerge from it.

Then if these three points converge in my prayer where “I,” within my state, seemingly want to come to the Creator and ask Him to give me the strength to do that (strength known as the power to exit Egypt), and then He reveals Himself.
[359644]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/28/26, Rabash, “What Is the Prohibition to Teach Torah to Idol-Worshippers in the Work?”

Question: We have been hearing about inspiration and importance for many years. If we put this into practice, rather than just talking about it, must we force our advancement?

Answer: We must engage the group in a game through a kind of forced, feigned “advertising.” Everyone here is obliged to play out the importance of the Creator and to lift their friend’s spirits. Do I really care, do I really want it? Yet I am obligated to do it, by force, artificially, and by pretending, rising above my feelings and understanding, rising above my reason.

From this moment on, everyone starts to play the game: the sensation of the Creator is important to us, knowing the Creator is important to us, the greatness of the Creator is important to us. We must not forget about Him or engage in empty chatter that lead away from the goal; this must become a burning topic for everyone. Apart from this, we have nothing in common. And we must do so forcibly, artificially, and by pretending, knowing full well that it is all a lie and a game.

If He is concealed, yet you have to perform actions stemming from the realization of His greatness, how do you go about it? You have no other way but to imagine His properties instead, to the best of your ability, and advance in that direction.

Comment: Everyone can justify such an approach.

My Response: So start playing! From this moment on, we begin to act.

Question: What if I am a bad actor?

Answer: If we all decide to do this, it means we are taking on the “burden of the kingdom of heaven” (Ol Malchut Shamayim). No one wants to, and yet we accept it. That is all.

There are descents and states of despair; this is understandable, but in general, everyone, as Rabash says, “take the leap.” Everyone is advancing, and a friend’s descent, along with my ascent and everything else, counts as a positive. And then time just races forward.
[360910]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/16/26, Rabash, “What Is, ‘Return, O Israel, Unto the Lord Your God,’ in the Work?”

Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 224

What Is Our Addition?

Our addition is “the self.”

Question: A samurai came to a sage and asked him whether hell and heaven really exist.

“Who are you?” asked the sage.

“A samurai,” the warrior.

“You are lying,” said the sage. “You have the face of a beggar.”

The samurai drew his sword. The sage said:

“This is how the gates of hell open.”

The samurai understood and, bowing, put away his sword.

“And that is how the gates of heaven open,” said the sage.

My question is this: Is it possible not to draw the sword in response to any insult? In other words, is it possible to not to go through hell before reaching heaven?

Answer: It is very difficult. I think it is practically impossible.

Comment: So, the whole road to heaven is paved through the hell you go through. That is a serious matter.

My Response: What else can you do? This is how we were created. This is our incomparable egoism.

Question: In principle, it does not forgive anyone; it must immediately respond?

Answer: Yes. The first thought is to draw the sword, because that is how we are. There is no escaping it.

We cannot simply flip a switch so that good would govern us. Because “I created evil,” these are, in a sense, the words of the Creator. “And I created the Torah for its correction.” But initially there is evil.

Question: Why was evil created in the beginning?

Answer: It was so that a person could become aware of his nature from one extreme to the other, from evil to good. To experience both manifestations fully, and then incline toward good. Only then, will good govern the person over evil. But one cannot exist without the other.

Question: So, one way or another, we enter heaven through hell?

Answer: Of course.

Question: Then in what is the wisdom of a person? We say, “A person is wise.”

Answer: It means seeing in advance, without having to go through hell at every step, that you need to act differently. But this is acquired through very great trials and experience.

Question: So the experience of constant hell leads a person to become wiser?

Answer: Of course, like that Japanese sage.

Comment: You often speak of a person becoming resigned. You have even used the words “submission,” “annulment,” and “self-annulment.”

My Response: These are all very complex states that require a journey through hell. I do not believe that a person can overcome themselves in advance without extensive experience. It is impossible.

Question: You are talking about rising above one’s egoism. What does it mean to rise above egoism?

Answer: It means sensing egoism in all its possible manifestations in life, even in nature, and constantly rising above it. Bowing one’s head, that is, reducing one’s egoism, reducing it, belittling it, suppressing it.

Question: If one constantly performs this exercise of suppressing one’s egoism and annulling oneself, will it help?

My Answer: I do not think this exercise is even possible; it is philosophy. It is possible only through gradual training within a suitable society. There must an environment where everyone wants this. They cannot do it, but they want to.

Question: Do they feel that they cannot do it?

Answer: Of course. There must be a recognition of evil. And then, all together, facing one another and helping each other, they can crawl out of that stinking pit.

Question: Please tell me, who does the responsibility for climbing out of there actually fall on? On us?

Answer: On us! Ask, plead, think, speak, and show examples to one another, and thus act. And each one whose egoism is greater, they naturally rise higher. In general, this is the work.

Question: If this work is carried on within a society people who want to transcend their egoism, does it help others?

Answer: It helps others not merely by example. It does not even matter whether they see it or not. Because this is a force of nature, and in this way, it is added to the common equation of nature and first outweighs egoism, and then altruism.

Question: In principle, you are saying that if this group manages to rise above itself, it will begin to lift everyone else along with it?

Answer: Yes. We must act.
[313929]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman,” 6/11/23

Comment: Everything you are talking about concerns both inner and external work. On one hand, these are different things, and on the other hand, they cannot be separated.

My Response: Inner work is my private work, concerning my personal connection with the Creator. External work for the sake of society is directed outside of me, not inward but outward. These two things seem to be different.

How can they be combined? If I do not bestow anything to society, I will not be able to grow. Try sitting with books and you will see how much you deteriorate. Nothing will come of it. Stop all our external activity and you will see what will happen to us in two weeks. For ourselves, we do not need books or films.

You cannot express your desire for spirituality if you do not work in dissemination.

Question: So, essentially, we need to think about how to connect with other souls?

Answer: We do not know yet how to connect with the souls or how to facilitate truly working for them. This is still far from us; we do not yet possess the true intention for the sake of bestowal when all we think about is that others should truly feel good. There is a general task within which we take action, knowing that otherwise things will go badly. In this accessible form, we offer people a way out of the existing situation.

But later, when a person passes the barrier and establishes a connection with other souls and the Creator appears in him, their work takes on a different form: one gradually begins to relate to all souls as parts of their own soul. Thus, by including them within themself, they trigger processes of correction in them thanks to which they receive light into their Kelim. This is what is meant by a person rising upward, approaching the Creator.

Therefore, the rule “love your neighbor as yourself” is the most important. What does the rule (Klal) mean? It is the general (Klali) law through which you attain the purpose of creation.
[359708]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/20/26, Rabash, “The Creator and Israel Went into Exile”

Question: Wherein lies our wisdom, our maturity? I mean, our growing up seems to be that when we give something to another person, we give them not the best and keep the best for ourselves. Why does this happen?

Answer: Because our egoism inevitably turns everything upside down.

Question: Are we aware of this?

Answer: We are aware of it. I even remember this from my own experience. When I was about two years old, I also behaved this way, I would give away the best. But then I felt compelled to spoil it. Someone gave me two postcards and told me to give one of them to my cousin. I didn’t know which one to give because they were both beautiful, colorful, bright, and attractive. I had to do something to one of them. So, I bent a corner, rubbed it a little, and then gave it to her. I was already wiser.

Question: But did you understand that you were deliberately damaging it so that you could give it away without any problem?

Answer: So that I would know which one to give. Otherwise, I couldn’t choose between the two.

Question: Does it become more frightening as we advance?

Answer: Of course!

Question: When does this feeling arise: “What am I doing?! How can I do this?!”

Answer: You have to study a lot and learn from examples. It isn’t simple.

Question: But does this realization come to a person, or might it never come?

Answer: It depends on the person.

Comment: So perhaps it does come, and then he is horrified to discover that he always wants to give others the worst.

My Response: Yes. You see, I still remember this example to this day.

Question: It really enters the heart, apparently.

When a person understands this and feels, “This is what I am like, and I don’t want to live according to this nature,” what should his actions be? Suppose I realize that I always give others the worst.

Answer: If this is already changing within a person, and he begins to become aware of it, then this is already the road toward correction, toward self-examination, and so on. That is already something significant.

Question: So can I tell myself internally that I have already begun along some kind of path?

Answer: Probably, yes. You are already getting closer to self-examination.

Question: I remember you telling us how you were sitting with your teacher, sorting coffee beans. And it was really getting to you that you had to sort every single bean, every single bean.

Suddenly your teacher said to you: “Think this way: You are sorting this particular bean for your teacher, for the coffee your teacher will drink from this bean.” And so on. And this one, for example, is for the friends.

Tell me, at that moment, does this give a person strength? You essentially regarded your teacher almost like a father. Does that give a person strength?

Answer: To be honest, I don’t think I understood it fully at that moment. But in general, of course, it is a great example.

Question: Did your teacher Rabash, live this way?

Answer: He lived this way. I remember when he told me this, I realized that I was completely missing the point.

Question: So when a person finally understands that he is “not missing the point,” does that mean he has come out onto some kind of straight line, onto the path?

Answer: Yes. It is good for a person to reach this state.
[360798]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman,” 8/19/26

There is a rule that one cannot do anything unless he feels pleasure in it. While doing it, work without pleasure is called “labor” (Rabash, “What Are ‘Blessing’ and ‘Curse’ in the Work?”).

If, on the one hand, I would like to do something, but on the other hand I am unable to do it because I do not see any reward for that action, then this is what is called effort.

We can imagine a reward for almost anything, except for that one thing that goes against our nature: the intention to bestow. As long as it is a matter of the intention to receive, whatever it may be, I can always see some benefit in it.

I can convince myself and picture things in such a way that I find at least some foothold and feel that it is worthwhile. But if we are talking about an action for the sake of bestowal, there is no corresponding pleasure in my Kelim; it is not felt in them, and therefore I cannot perform it.

Try to imagine an action in which you give away everything you have, absolutely everything. If you perform it correctly, you will not be able to feel any pleasure from it. You could find pleasure in the honor you receive or in something else, but we are talking about performing the action correctly.

Thus, there is only one action in relation to which we can put ourselves in a situation where we have no fuel with which to perform it. This is what is called effort. Effort is my attempt to perform an action for the sake of bestowal and revealing that I am incapable of doing so. This state itself is called effort.

Question: And I perform it?

Answer: What do you mean, “perform it”? You cannot, you are incapable of performing it. But when you establish for yourself that this is truly the case, this is already called effort.

It is written that the person would not do this if he did not know he would be paid for the effort. So what should he do? He must increase his awareness of the importance of the intention to bestow. But how? Why?

Here a person finds himself in a situation where he has nothing more to do. He discovers his own weakness, seeing that no matter what he resorts to, his own strength, his nature, his awareness, he has no connection whatsoever with the intention to bestow.

However, if at the same time, a person gathers all kinds of impressions from outside himself, hearing from others that the intention is more important than anything else, while he himself does not feel any taste in it and is unable to achieve it, then he has two extreme points, two poles. And from between these two poles comes the prayer, to which he receives an answer.

These two factors are connected to one another: If I work on recognizing the importance of the intention to bestow, then I am shown more and more clearly that I do not have it. At the same time, I should not work in order to discover my inability as quickly as possible. It is impossible to work negatively; that would be self-deception.

You must work toward actually attaining the spiritual action, toward performing it. Then, in contrast to this, you will be shown that you are incapable of doing it. We must always work positively.
[360630]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/18/26, Rabash, “What Are ‘Blessing’ and ‘Curse’ in the Work?”

Comment: During the preparation period, a person feels that the Creator is acting on them in a negative way and they cannot justify Him.

My Response: To bring about spiritual corrections, there is work that depends on me, as it is said: “If I am not myself, then who is for me.” If I sit back and think that I feel so bad about what He did to me, and how I suffer, then I am just eating myself! Nothing will come of it unless I figure out all the details myself.

The problem is that I have to change, not His actions, but my impression of His actions from one extreme to the other, from an uncorrected desire to a corrected one.

You can say, “If I am in an uncorrected desire, then I feel evil, and if I am in a corrected desire, then I feel good based on how He affects me. But I cannot correct the desire myself.”

Yes, you cannot correct it on your own, but you can want your desire to change and acquire the intention to bestow In accordance with this intention, you will feel that He is acting on you for the good. Thus, you have to come to the need for it.

Naturally, He performs action, but you must constantly examine where you are and where you would like to be. This means you must arrive at a state of prayer: what you want to experience from the way He acts on you.

Let us say He is giving me something unpleasant now; I must examine the situation and desire that He do something so that I feel good.

What does it mean to feel good? So I can feel something good from His actions, first of all, within the framework of our world. This is called Lo Lishma (for the sake of oneself).

And then I come to the point where I feel evil from His actions, not because I feel bad, but because through this very sensation, I am cursing Him. Then replace this sensation with a good one, but not so I would feel good. I do not care about that. What matters to me is that I want to bless Him. This is already called Lishma.

That is how a person goes through these things all the time. The whole system is one of self–discovery. A person studies himself. We know that outside the Kli (desire) there is Atzmuto (His essence), but I study who I am, how I receive, get impressed by Atzmuto, and what I would like to feel from His influence, and how much I want to admire Him.

In the end, this is a very simple thing, but we are confused in our desires (Kelim). In fact, there is nothing simpler and more natural.
[359677]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/17/26, Rabash, “Who Needs to Know that a Person Withstood the Test? ”

Question: What one should constantly think about and ask for?

Answer: After all contemplation, a person sees that the only Hisaron (lack, desire) worth worrying about is the desire to realize the greatness of the Creator. Only the realization of His importance, sensing the Creator, the realization of His presence, whatever it may be, the impression received from Him, can change me.

Right now I am a slave to my desire to receive, but I will become a slave to His desire to give and bestow pleasure. A person should work precisely on this Hisaron, that is, strive for the desire for light to come from above and change them.

In short, first there must be an awareness that I want to change, to the extent I am capable of desiring this, and for this I turn to the Creator so that He will change me.

Why should I turn to the Creator? Is it not enough that I want to change and He will simply do it Himself? Change is not my goal in itself. The goal is that by turning to Him with a request, I cling to Him. My transformation, in a sense, is merely a means to that end.

It turns out that we are constantly working on the same Hisaron: how to merge with Him more strongly, cling to Him, and draw closer. From this, I get strength to merge with Him and the need for it. Everything really comes from one source.
[360781]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/24/26, Rabash, “Who Testifies to a Person”

Work without pleasure is called “labor.” That is, the person would not do this if he did not know he would be paid for the effort. (Rabash, Article 27 (1987), “What Are ‘Blessing’ and ‘Curse’ in the Work?”)

Before performing any action, a person always asks: “What will I get out of it?” Peace, money, honor, something that he needs. This can even be seen from the enormous variety of hobbies that exist in the world.

Nothing forces a person to pursue his hobby except pleasure. One person enjoys fishing, catching fish on a hook; another, on the contrary, enjoys feeding fish, and breeding them in an aquarium; a third collects a herbarium of leaves. We find nothing in this for ourselves, whereas for him it is exactly the opposite. And so everyone has his own way. Some collect things that we can understand: money, experiences, honor, knowledge, and so on.

Thus, pleasure can be clothed in the most diverse forms, but it must be there. If I do not see any pleasure, I cannot perform an action. I have to see some pleasure ahead. It may come in a month, at the end of my life, or even after my life is over. Many people are willing to work hard throughout their entire lives so that they will be remembered after their death. We see that human pleasures can even transcend the boundaries of time.

However, the very feeling of the pleasure that lies ahead already belongs to the present. This feeling, when I experience future pleasure now, provides me with the energy and the fuel to perform the action. I look at what will happen to me; I bring that pleasure closer to myself, as though filling my fuel tank with gasoline, and with that I can work.

But if I see absolutely no pleasure ahead, then I have no energy, not a drop of fuel to perform any action. The car stops, and that is it. Sometimes we feel exactly like this: “No matter what, I cannot even move.” Such feelings are given to a person who begins spiritual work.

Then the question arises: Which goal will be important to me? This depends on the surrounding society, where I grew up, what I did, and what kind of education I received. This is how my attitude toward everything is formed, and according to it—as well as, of course, according to my nature—I choose certain goals in life.

Goals are forms of pleasure that I wish to enjoy in the future, while I already enjoy them now through my connection with them.
[360592]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/18/26, Rabash, “What Are ‘Blessing’ and ‘Curse’ in the Work?”

Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 223

What Is the True Picture of the Creator?

We never speak about how things appear from the Creator’s side, what He feels, or what He is. We speak about what the created being feels from Him, or about how the created being imagines the Creator’s state, but not about His state outside the created being. At times we think all sorts of things about a friend that do not truly reflect who he is. We speculate about his thoughts, feelings, and troubles, and when we come a little closer to him, we discover that none of it was true. It was all merely a picture we had drawn in our imagination.

There is the matter of knowing something from within ourselves, from imagining that something is one way or another, and there is the true picture. We never see or know the true picture of the Creator. We can only know the Creator through ourselves, what we think about the Creator, how we understand the Creator, and so on. The truest picture that we are capable of attaining, without our vessels distorting what the Creator wishes us to feel from Him, is the state of final correction. The Host wishes to serve a five-course meal, each course perfect in every respect. We receive it and feel the Host’s attitude toward us through it. Beyond that is beyond our ability.

Related Material:
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 222
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 221
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 220

Question: What does it mean: “The Creator helps a person with a holy soul”

Answer: It means that after a person makes every possible effort, it is revealed to them that it is necessary to perform an action that is beyond human strength, above this world. They discover that what they are striving for, what they are touching, belongs, not to our reality, but to the one that is beyond the Machsom (barrier).

In other words, then it is revealed to them what the Machsom is. It is an inversion, a complete reversal in approach, in thinking, as it is said: “I saw the upside-down world.” Then a person sees that only the upper force, the Creator, can perform this action. By what means? By means of a “holy soul,” that is, by giving them completely different powers, thoughts, and abilities that they did not have before.

This is what is called the new soul—a “holy soul”: instead of the nature directed toward working for the sake of receiving with which He created man, the Creator now gives him a second nature that works for the sake of bestowal. This is the “holy soul,” when a person receives the strength to work for the sake of bestowal.

Question: Is this somehow connected to the group?

Answer: No, here we are talking about the relationship between a person and the Creator. Neither the teacher nor the group has anything to do with it. Both the teacher and the group are merely means for bringing a person into contact with the Creator.

Of course, he must constantly rely on them, be connected with them, but the essence lies in the relationship between the Kli of a person’s soul and the light, that is, the Creator. There is nothing else.
[360668]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/17/26, Rabash, “What Are Commandments that a Person Tramples with His Feet”

Related Material:
Help with the Holy Soul
When The Dawn Comes
Hold on to Every Moment of the Path

Our work before the Machsom and after the Machsom differs each time. After the Machsom, where there are Kelim [vessels, plural of Kli] of bestowal and Kelim of reception, everything is different. After I have attained awareness of the greatness of the Creator, the action itself is already performed differently. Before that, there is nothing to discuss, for I am striving in the wrong direction. First I must direct myself, and only then do I fly there. This must be done before everything else.

I worked with airplanes for several years in the Israeli Air Force. Imagine an airplane sitting on the ground completely unoriented regarding the cardinal directions; the pilot in the cockpit does not know where he is, the directions are unknown to him. He exists within a three-dimensional sphere, knowing nothing about it.

Should he fly? No; in this situation, it is better for him to remain in place because moving even a millimeter could lan him who knows where. So, first of all, he must check the location of the goal toward which he needs to head.

And so we direct ourselves: this is our goal, in the direction of it we now apply effort, and only then do we begin to move.

However, this goal is concealed; the Creator is hidden. I don’t have the slightest notion of similarity of form; it does not attract me; the issue doesn’t even exist for me. The group must provide me with this Hisaron, this need. My point in the heart only feels that something is missing.

The first nine Sefirot must reveal what is lacking in my point in the heart. They must tell Malchut: “This is what you lack.” And these first nine Sefirot, in relation to me, are embodied by the group. Nothing else will help me.

If my friends do not provide me with this, I must seek another group. Either I organize them so that they give me the importance of the goal, or I must leave them and seek another group where the importance of the goal already exists; and if not, then I will bring it there. And the group will hear that this is important and that work must be done on it.
[360764]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/16/26, Rabash, “What Is ‘Return, O Israel, Unto the Lord Your God,’ in the Work?”

Related Material:
A Spiritual Orientation Toward The Creator
The Three Components Of The Ascent
The Flight Path Into The Spiritual

Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 222

What Is the Difference Between Before and After the Barrier?

Before the barrier, a person passes through two principal and very important stages:

1) Double concealment
2) Single concealment

These two stages provide us with all the vessels and discernments, which we later enlarge in spirituality and upon which we dress additional discernments. The transgressions and mistakes that we make on our spiritual path toward the barrier are the actual vessels that we will use later.

The difference between before and after the barrier is not only in these vessels. The point is that before the barrier, when we are in concealment and the Creator is not revealed, we might sometimes feel something in relation to the Creator. Our sensation of the Creator is that of the surrounding light (Ohr Makif) and not of the inner light (Ohr Pnimi), because we still lack a screen (Masach).

After the barrier, we acquire a screen. The acquisition of the first screen is called crossing the barrier, and afterward additional screens are added. Then, according to the strength of our screen, we can receive inner light, which is a clear and tangible sensation of Godliness.

Question: Could the reason for the feeling of heaviness in the work be that a person reveals the Creator as the main active player, and refuses to accept this?

Answer: All the states, from the initial one until the moment of revealing the Creator, are difficult states. A sense of lightness, ascent, strength, confidence, potential, and realization can be felt only from the presence of the Creator.

Only when He appears before you will “our heart rejoice in Him.” Everything that happens before this (no matter in what form) will always be difficult, heavy, and sorrowful. This is intentional, but if a person agrees with these uncorrected states…

Question: But he cannot agree. Does the feeling of heaviness come as a result of a person’s inability to accept that the Creator governs all of reality? And the further a person advances, does it become more difficult for him to accept this?

Answer: I do not know how to express it. In any case, until a person has passed the barrier, it is difficult for him; only each time we feel the heaviness and powerlessness differently. It is impossible to express this in words. We are speaking about a transforming perception; the concepts of heaviness, sorrow, and laziness change.

And nevertheless, it is difficult in the sense that it is difficult to work with anything in the desire to bestow. We feel as though it is difficult for us to work in the will to receive, but in fact we are not speaking about this desire because, if we felt the goal in the will to receive, we would work with full strength. We lack nothing except the sense of the goal.

Each of us at least once in our life experienced enthusiasm in business, or in the pursuit of something interesting or useful, or in attempts to obtain something very necessary. And so it is now. Just show us some worthwhile goal, and we will run after it.

However, this time the goal is in the desire to bestow, the higher degree that reveals its reverse side to us. Therefore this is how we feel it.
[359720]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/28/26, Rabash, “What Is the Prohibition to Teach Torah to Idol-Worshippers in the Work?”

Question: How can I move from regretting my own situation to feeling sorrow for the state of the whole world?

Answer: This is not the right question. Just as sorrow about my own state accumulates in me, so does sorrow about the state of the entire world. It all depends on a person’s inner work. The development of one’s Kli gradually leads to a state where one feels that one’s Kli is not only what is in one’s own belly, but also what is within others.

Just as parents feel dependent on their children, where what ultimately happens to the child also happens to their parents, so too does a person begin to feel like a father toward his children, that what is happening in the whole world, with all of humanity, is essentially what is happening to him.

He perceives this naturally; other people’s desires become joined to his own, and nothing can be done about it. This is how the Kli grows. You can’t artificially start taking an interest in someone else’s affairs. You suddenly remember something about it, then you forget, but that is all artificial, driven by self-benefit.

But a state arrives when you suddenly begin to feel, to some extent, concern for all of humanity, truly as if they were your own children. This happens in accordance with the degree of correction within the desire to receive. And there is no way around it, just as parents cannot free themselves from caring for their children.
[359527]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/23/26, Rabash, “What Is, ‘Anyone Who Mourns for Jerusalem Is Rewarded with Seeing Its Joy,’ in the Work?”

Question: The articles speak a lot about suffering and a sense of heaviness, and a person begins to take this for granted, justifying it by saying that the surrounding light is shining upon him. How can we prevent such an attitude from turning into an escape from the real difficult questions?

Answer: A person begins to experience heaviness and suffering, and they seem to turn into his idol. He begins to worship this state, coming to think that if he suffers, it means that he is superior to all of humanity. After all, humanity suffers from a lack of money, honor, and so on, while he suffers because he has not yet attained spirituality.

If a person wants to remain in this state even for a moment, it means that he is no longer suffering, but is enjoying his suffering, much like a masochist. This is a Klipa (shell, impurity) that has latched onto the person whispering: “Now you are truly working for the Creator. Look at the lofty ideals you are suffering for.”

Every moment of a person’s suffering is directed against the Creator, against the goal of bringing good to His creations. I know from my experience that it is very difficult to get break free from this, and impossible to do so alone. It requires a form of brainwashing by the group. Let your friends constantly tell you that this is wrong.

It is easy for us to lecture one another and to play a role in each others’ eyes is quite simple; the will to receive itself supports such an approach, when I present myself to you as being steadfast in my convictions. However, this does not prevent you from taking everything seriously, so why not make use of this?

We were given a foolish nature whereby another person’s external manifestation makes an impression on us, because outwardly my friend can project whatever outward image he chooses. And so, through his false “external self,” he defines my true “inner self.”

And there is nothing to be done about it—I am simply constructed in such a way that I am susceptible to the impressions made by the actions of the people around me. Just like an infant, who can be frightened by a scary facial expression and amused by laughter. We are exactly the same and no different from an infant in this respect, except that our reactions are not in such an obvious form. It is impossible to leave this state alone.

A person can suffer for years, justifying his suffering by telling himself he is a hero. Why is he a hero? Because he suffers. Some even go to prison and suffer there for all of humanity, feeling that they are special in their suffering. This manifests as a Klipa (shell) at various levels—both in connection with spirituality and outside of it.

After all, the purpose of creation stemming from the Good Who Does Good is to bestow goodness to His creations and for them to exist in goodness. Anything contrary to this, no matter how you justify it, is not suitable.

Even if you observe the most terrible things in the world, if you begin to suffer, it means that you are implicitly justifying what is taking place. You are not justifying the fact that the Creator is the one causing these things—although, of course, that is indeed so—but rather, the very fact that these things are happening to people; consequently your suffering stems from something other than their current state.

Here you may ask, what does meant by “suffering together with society,” as it is written in the books? It means relating to people from the perspective of the Creator and regretting the absence of the Shechina (Divine Presence) among them.

Regret over the exile of the Shechina is a purposeful state that drives a person to help others reach a state of revelation, and not at all to go and weep alongside them. This is completely different from the state toward which our body tries to incline us.
[359712]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/28/26, Rabash, “What Is the Prohibition to Teach Torah to Idol-Worshippers in the Work?”