Learning to Raise a new Spark into Holiness

What an exciting convention we experienced together - here's a clip of what happened in Europe.

Today we want to talk to you about what we're taking with us after the convention. How can we maintain what we experienced - hold it in our heart and continue to work with it.

We were happy to see all of you so active all over the world. And we want to continue the convention in an ascent.

So we're all in an ascent here. The name of the game is not to tell the friends our true state because if we're in a descent it can bring down the friends.

It was incredible to see how each friend felt that their convention was the absolute best convention out of all the other regions.

It was the first time we had a proper convention in India, and our friends also gathered in China and Africa.

So how do we continue in an ascent once the convention is over? And not let anything bring us down?

We're starting a new stage in our studies today - we're expecting to see you on our Arvut system at 4pm today. We'll be studying the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah.

One of the most important things we can do after a convention is to dive into the sources. We chose some excerpts that are especially good for this.

"In every beginning, a person must renew their acceptance of the Kingdom of Heaven, as yesterday's state of faith in the Creator is not enough. Therefore, every act of accepting the Kingdom of Heaven is considered new discernments—meaning one takes a portion of the vacant space that was empty of the Kingdom of Heaven, enters that empty space, and fills it with the Kingdom of Heaven. Thus, one clarifies something new that did not exist before taking that empty place and filling it with the Kingdom of Heaven. This is called raising a new spark into Holiness, until through numerous ascents, one continuously raises sparks from the vacant space into Holiness.

It follows that from every single descent, one reaches a new beginning and raises new sparks."

— Rabash, Article 6, "What Are the Herdmen of Abram's Cattle and the Herdmen of Lot's Cattle in the Work" (1991)

In Kabbalah a descent means being further from the Creator, and that the next stage will be an ascent to correction. Because we can't correct anything unless we acknowledge that it's bad. Just as in our world you can't fix something unless we recognize the illness. When we know what's making us sick we're happy because then we know which doctor to go to.

Each time I advance I discover a new layer of my ego - the process involved revelation of the evil, acknowledgment and then turning to the Creator for help. You can't just ask for help in general. We need to know why this thing is bad and truly feel it. This is why each time we correct something more layers are revealed. The entire wisdom of Kabbalah is about a person correcting their entire ego-centric attitude we have inside us. The new layer of our will to receive that is revealed each time is called revelation of evil. Which means that each time we sort of refresh, and start the process all over again. And in the wisdom of Kabbalah we try to shorten the time between states. We can't change the situations themselves, but we can accelerate the pace of this process of correction.

Ultimately we understand that each revelation is a thicker part of our ego. Since we're experienced after a descent we know that an ascent is coming - and that will only come from the Creator. This is why we become needy of the Creator. Just as we look for Him when we're sick or have a problem. In the same way when we have a burst of ego we need to turn to the Creator and that's exactly what he's waiting for. Each time I need Him as the force that will correct me and I need to express my gratitude to Him for correcting me.