Part Two: Phases of Spiritual Evolution

We cannot change our will to receive, which is actually the only thing that the Creator created, but we can and should change the aim of our desire from receiving "for me" to receiving "for the Creator". Thus, the desire to feel pleasure does not change, only the aim...

Naming a person is done in Kabbalah according to that person’s will to receive. For example, if a certain individual has a desire to attain the Creator, feel Him and cling to Him, then that person is named Israel (from the words Yashar El – straight to God), even if still at the beginning of the journey, and unable to see the Creator or where this journey will lead. It is the desire that counts. When one realizes the Creator’s Will, that person is called a "Kabbalist", someone who has attained a certain spiritual degree. For that reason, Kabbalists are also called “One of Attainment”...

It is not enough to love the Creator and want to unite with Him. It is also necessary to hate the evil in you, meaning your own nature – the desire for self-indulgence from which you cannot escape by yourself. You should come to a state where you look inwardly, see the evil within you, and feel constantly tormented by it. You must know how much you are losing, and yet know that you will not be able to liberate yourself from the evil...

The soul is the only thing that He created; it perceives the sensations of sight, sound, touch, smell and taste, through its filters. Behind the filters of the five senses there is "a computer" and "software". The soul translates what it finds outside it into a language we can relate to: pleasure or pain. Thus, it is at the center of the soul in its innermost point where we feel if something is good or bad...

Studying the secrets of the spiritual world leads us to build an inner attitude towards it, which is also expressed in how we relate to our everyday lives. At the end of the process, our lives in this world should be subordinate to spiritual rules. This is the desire of the Creator. The more we are able to leave our egos, the better are our chances of feeling spirituality and liberating ourselves from our corporeal bodies...

In order to start perceiving the spiritual world, we must acquire spiritual attributes. But what does "acquiring spiritual attributes" actually mean? And how can we acquire them? People who discovered the spiritual world tell us that looking from the outside, they see the nature of our world as a manifestation of pure, unadulterated egoism. This means that every thing in our world is based on ego – the inanimate nature, the plants, animals and people. In all the incidents and in every degree there is only one law – total pursuit of self-indulgence according to the intensity of the egoism in each object or creature...

Utilizing my desire in a different way is called “correction”. This is a state where we are completely liberated from it, as though looking at it from the side, not governed by it. For example, we can look at the will to receive as a will to bestow. If I know that you will enjoy my acceptance of your present, I will take it. By accepting your gift, I am inverted from a taker to a giver of delight. In order to return the pleasure to you, I must express great joy when I receive your gift. Thus, my desire doesn’t change, only its implementation...

The society we live in is flooded with perpetual pursuit of beastly (corporeal) pleasures such as: money, glory, and sex. It is impossible to sin in such a state, and it is just as impossible to keep Mitzvot. This is simply not spirituality. However, there is hope in that situation, provided we are willing to restrict the use of these desires, or to better phrase it, direct our desires for spirituality. When that happens, we are admitted into the first degree in the spiritual world, where there is a Light many times stronger than the one shining in our world...

People want to be rewarded for anything they do. Even when working to attain spirituality, we want to be rewarded because we are made of pure egoism and cannot operate any other way. Behind every act, there is always an aim; otherwise our egoism would not permit us to make even a single step! We begin our spiritual work from zero, as if the Creator had shone on us from afar with the illumination of Surrounding Light. This illumination compels us to act and we decide to give up all beauties of this world in favor of a spiritual sensation...

The Creator influences us through various things in our environment. It is our duty to understand that every thing that happens with us is nothing but the Creator approaching us. If we react correctly to this influence, we will begin to understand and feel what it is that the Creator actually wants from us, to the point where we will begin to feel Him. The Creator influences us not only through certain people, but also through the entire reality. The world is built the way it is precisely because it is the best way for the Creator to influence and promote us to the purpose of Creation...

Reality consists of a Creator, or the will to bestow and give pleasure, and a creature, or the will to receive pleasure. There is nothing else in our reality except these two components.

When the will to enjoy is corrected through a spiritual screen that acts against egoism, it is called a Partzuf, which is a spiritual object. When the Partzuf receives pleasure in order to please the Creator, performing Zivug de Hakaa, this act is called a Mitzva, and the Light that enters the Partzuf is called "Torah"...

Will we retain our physical body after the end of correction? Kabbalah never speaks of the physical body because it is simply not a part that needs correction. There are no changes in the body except for its aging. Only the will to receive pleasure needs to be corrected. Our bodies are only flesh; they need sleep, physical pleasures, food and rest...

The starting point and final point are determined by the Creator. But the way from the starting to the final points depends on us. We have the ability to choose which way to reach the purpose of Creation. But even at the starting point we operate under the pressure of our absolute egoism. We are its slaves and are motivated only by egoistic desires. When we change our nature from egoism to altruism, we also become slaves, but this time to an altruistic nature. The freedom of desire is only in the choice of whom to serve...