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Hi Ludumo, great question!
No, we don’t need to forget our dreams or fight with our desires. We only need to work on making the desire for spirituality the most important thing. Then naturally the rest of our desires will fall into place. For example, it’s like with an artist that is so involved in his art, that he fulfills all the rest of his desires out of necessity so he can quickly return to his passion. Same with us, when spirituality is the most important desire, then we will be able to properly relate to all the rest of our corporeal desires in a balanced way.
Regarding the first two desires you mentioned, keep in mind that Kabbalists are not monks, they don’t eliminate their desire or disconnect themselves from the corporeal life to live on some mountain top. Rather, Kabbalists continue to live on the level of this world throughout the entire spiritual ladder. So they continue to live in the normal way: to work in their profession, to take care of their family, health, etc.
As for the 3rd desire, this is actually directly connected to a person’s spiritual work. We’ll learn in the upcoming lesson on the perception of reality that everything outside of me is nothing more than a reflection of my own uncorrected egoistic state. As long as I’m not corrected, I will see in front of me a bad world, wars, suffering, starvation, etc. And when I correct myself, the external world will appear corrected as well. It’s like I have these dirty glasses through which I see the whole world as dirty. The moment I clean my own glasses, I’ll look at the same world, but now it’s clean and perfect. In other words, we don’t need to become humanitarians or make any corrections in the external world, we only need to correct ourselves, and then we’ll see this correction reflected in the world.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: http://laitman.com/2014/04/in-neutral-gear/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Michael,
1. Our nature is egoistic. By default, it’s impossible for ANYTHING good to come out of it. So we don’t need to focus on doing any good actions. We need to focus on correcting this egoistic nature. Furthermore, we cannot just correct our own nature, it’s only the force of the light that can make this change. Essentially all of our work boils down to extracting more and more of this light, especially during the Kabbalistic studies, and it does all the rest.
See my reply below to Micha for more details.
2. No. Although we say that there are these two paths (suffering or light), in truth we don’t really advance on the path of suffering. It’s like a child that needs to go to school. Pressuring and punishing him is not the same as educating him. So after all of the pressures and punishments we put on him, he will still have to go to school and get his education. In other words, the path of suffering is only there to pressure us to return to the path of light.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/05/we-wont-follow-the-path-of-suffering-forever/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Paul,
The forces of nature are not what causes us suffering. We suffer because of our egoistic nature, which puts us out of balance with the forces of nature.
Regarding pain, we’re egoists and avoiding pain is one of the major motivating forces for us. If we were to completely get rid of that force, then we would have no drive to continue our development. This is similar to how there are people born without pain receptors. They can be bleeding or standing in a fire, causing great damage to their body without even knowing about it. In other words, pain is an important indicator that we cannot live without. As long as we remain within our egoistic nature, sufferings and pain will always be there to motivate us to come out of our ego. But once we correct the ego, we will no longer need problems and suffering in order to push us to develop because we ourselves will generate the force for our development.
As for choosing the path of light, we need to keep in mind that this is not a one time choice. Rather every moment we have the opportunity place ourselves on the path of light. Ideally we would like to be on the path of light all the time, but in practice, our egoism constantly grows and throws us back into the path of suffering. At which point we have to choose the path of light again. So we’re as if taking the middle path between the two, as if ping ponging between the two paths.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2011/01/lets-go-with-the-light/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Mark,
Yes, that is correct. The entire Torah, including the book of Job, was written by Kabbalists. Keep in mind that these books are written entirely in a type of code called the language of roots and branches. Meaning that it uses words of our world to describe spiritual phenomena. As such, not a single word in these books is speaking about history or our world.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details:Â https://laitman.com/2016/05/dispelling-myths-about-kabbalah-part-4/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Micha, good question!
Our nature is the desire to receive. This is our operating system. Just like a PC cannot just change it’s own operating system to run as a Mac, we too cannot just change our own nature. We need outside help to make this change. This help comes to us from the force of the light. Our work essentially boils down to extracting more and more of this light, especially during the Kabbalistic studies, and it makes all of the changes and corrections on us.
So the most practical action that you can do towards performing this “transformation” is to set aside some time to regularly return to the source of the light, meaning to the Kabbalistic sources, videos, lessons, etc. This will help you throughout your entire spiritual development.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2013/02/sunbathing-in-the-rays-of-the-reforming-light/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Judit, great questions!
613 is the number of corrections that need to be placed over the spiritual desire. This number is further divided into 248 desires of bestowing in order to bestow and 365 desires that operate on receiving in order to bestow. We’ll learn about this in detail in the more advanced lessons on KabU that deal with the structure of the upper worlds.
Keep in mind that these are 613 spiritual desires that we don’t yet have. Similar to how a single cell in a body only has some basic desires. But when that cell is part of a greater body, it reveals there higher desires which are impossible for the individual cell to have: desires for money, honor, power, etc. Same with us, until we integrate with the general body of Adam HaRishon, we don’t reveal or understand these 613 spiritual desires.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2008/12/all-you-need-to-know-about-the-613-desires/
Regarding the order of corrections, there is a certain order but in practice, we don’t work according to some pre-made list, but simply with whatever is being awakened in the moment.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/09/compliance-with-the-613-mitzvot-commandments/
Albert @ KabU
