Opportunities to Become Dependent on the Creator

The fact that we ask the Creator for spiritual perceptions, but do not ask Him to solve the various problems in our daily lives, indicates how weak is our faith in the omnipotence and Omnipresence of the Creator. It also signifies our lack of understanding that all of our problems are sent to us with one purpose only: for us to try to resolve them ourselves.

At the same time, we should ask the Creator to help in resolving them, believing all the while that every problem is sent to us to strengthen our faith in His Oneness. If we truly believe that everything depends upon the Creator, then we must turn to the Creator, but not in the hope that the Creator will resolve our problems.

Instead, we should use these problems as opportunities to become dependent on the Creator.

So as not to deceive ourselves regarding our personal motives, we must, at the same time, struggle with these problems on our own, as others around us do.

Elongating Spiritual Ascents and Avoiding Spiritual Descents

A spiritual decline is sent from Above to allow subsequent spiritual growth. Since it is sent from Above, it comes to us instantaneously, reveals itself in a flash, and thus almost always finds us unprepared.

But the exit from that state, the spiritual ascent, occurs slowly, like a healing from an illness, because we must fully grasp the condition of the decline and must attempt to overcome it by ourselves.

If, during our spiritual ascent, we are able to analyze our own bad qualities, to join the left line with the right one, then we will manage to avoid many spiritual declines, leaping over them, as it were. But only those of us capable of keeping to the right line, that is, capable of justifying the actions of the Creator in spite of egotistical suffering, will stay the course and avoid spiritual declines.

This is reminiscent of the rule outlined in the Bible concerning obligatory war (milhemet mitzva) and voluntary war (milhemet reshut): the obligatory war against egoism, and the voluntary war, if an individual is capable of and desires to exert personal effort.

Reality: That which Necessitates Contact with the Creator

Our internal work on ourselves, on the struggle to overcome egoism, on elevating the Creator above all else, on strengthening our faith in the Creator’s domain, all these we must conceal, just like all other spiritual states we pass through.

Also, we may not advise another with respect to how that other person should act. If we notice the other person exhibiting signs of egoism, that individual must be the one to interpret these signs since there is no one in the world other than the Creator. This implies that all that one sees and feels is the direct result of the Creator desiring that these aspects be seen and felt by the person in question.

All that surrounds us was created solely to make us realize that it is necessary to constantly think about the Creator, to ask the Creator to change the material, the physical, the social, and other conditions of creation.

Replacing Our Nature with a Spiritual One

Each of us possesses an infinite number of deficiencies, all of which stem from our egoism, from the desire to be gratified and to attain comfort under any circumstances. The collection of admonitions (mussar) relates to the way in which we should struggle with each deficiency, and scientifically explains its methods.

Kabbalah, even for beginners, introduces us to the realm of the Higher Spiritual Forces, and allows each of us to understand the difference between ourselves and the spiritual objects. In this way, through oneself, one learns who one is and who one ought to become.

Thus, the need for secular upbringing disappears altogether, especially in light of the fact that it does not yield the desired results. Witnessing in ourselves the struggle between two forces—the egoistic and the spiritual—we gradually force the body to desire a replacement of our own nature with a spiritual one, of our own qualities with those of the Creator, without the external pressure of our mentors.

“An Education to Receive the Creator’s Qualities” is based on the book, Attaining the Worlds Beyond by Dr. Michael Laitman.