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Hi Ben,
If you watch Yo-Yo Ma play or take a few lines from Hemingway or a sketch by Picasso, it appears as something I could almost do myself. The greater the expertise of the performer, the more the performance seems as easy and natural as grass growing. Now, hand me the cello, pencil or paintbrush to try. When my senses, instincts, and understanding enter, the problems begin. Until now, we’ve spoken of the actions of the Creator, from Above. We can imagine them, imagine ourselves in these stages. They’re even beautiful to go into as into a movie or musical performance that whisks us far away from our ordinary life, and we live vicariously through this drama. But in reality, it’s very far from our a state. And what we’re entering now, is much closer, but in being closer evokes the messiness and shattering of our state. In short, since it’s closer to realization by me, rather than actions the Creator does in some world of Eyn Sof, for some, it’s too close to actual correction and realization of the purpose of Creation. After all, the ego doesn’t want that.
Hi Peter,
It’s very logical and in the right direction. Is it exactly correct? Exactly correct is what’s written in Rabash and Baal HaSulam. It’s a good exercise to take their articles and rewrite them for oneself, to make them clearer, more understood. Later, we’ll see that we need to gradually change back everything we changed, to how they had it. They wrote the manual for our soul. As we ascend the degrees, which are vastly different, these writings turn out to be universally applicable, true each time in a new way.
But it’s good to think for oneself too, and however you think about it is good if it leads to actions of connection.
1. Yes, the friends are already in Gmar Tikkun, and you with them. But what matters is your perception of it.
2. You’re right, the first step is hearing, then doing. And the inclination is naturally to stay at a more external circle. The ego doesn’t want me to actually internalize it and start connecting my heart to the friends’ hearts.
When I correct myself, there will be no flaws in the environment since my friends are already at the end of correction. Once I accept this, I decide to behave as if they are corrected, and I want to be together with them, in whatever they are, however they are – as if it’s correct – above reason. I don’t try to correct them in any way, nor even check them. Maybe they need to appear that way, for now, for the way that I need to be. To expect any change in them means I had hoped to stay how I am, and that reality, the friends, will change instead of me – then I’m at odds with what’s possible in Creation.
For now:
(1) I immerse in the writings of Kabbalists every chance I get, with the expectation that the Reforming Light will work on me
(2) I try to more deeply sense “There is none else besides Him,” that there is no other force working in reality
(3) I scrutinize my relationship to the group
The quality of Malchut stays as it is. It was created as an absolute Will to Receive. But there are parts of Malchut that, through the Reforming Light, can agree to be under the control of Bina – essentially to be under the Masach [screen]. Because all the Sefirot are incorporated, there are parts of Malchut that nevertheless belong to higher qualities. For example, Keter of Malchut; Hochma of Malchut; Bina of Malchut. The parts whose only correction is their sorting and being left alone are the Lev HaEven [stony heart], Malchut de Malchut. They also don’t change but get left until the Gmar Tikun [final correction] when a special force – rav paalim makabtzil – does an operation upon them that corrects them. I can’t imagine it, but this is what Kabbalists write.
