Kindle Notes & Highlights
The external awakens the internal.
Our goal, our purpose, and our only reason for being in the world is to transform our desire to receive for ourselves alone into a desire to share—and by doing so, to
become one with the Creator.
When the primordial Vessel shattered into an infinite number of pieces, the fragments became the matter and energy that comprise the physical world. Everything that we see, hear, taste, smell, or even think about is part of the original Vessel. We ourselves are the Vessel, and therefore everything that exists in the physical realm is part of us.
difficulty of transforming our desire to receive into desire to receive in order to share.
free will
A righteous person sees evil not as an
independent phenomenon, but as a powerful testing instrument of the Creator.
We are not the Creator’s puppets. We are partners with the Creator in the great ongoing process of Creation—and we ourselves are the source of all pain and tragedy. Our negative actions, our negative desires, our negative thoughts, bring sorrow into our own lives and into the world.
Unless your destructive behavior is countered and corrected by your own positive action, Kabbalah teaches that pain of some sort will result. That’s the law, and there’s no getting around it.
Pain is an opportunity for us to correct our behavior.
When we come into this world, we are given the exact amount of time that’s necessary to complete our spiritual work.
Unfortunately, most of us don’t use our time very well.
Kabbalah teaches that we will return to this world in many incarnations until we achieve complete transformation.
in Kabbalah, spirit is always the foundation. Everything that happens in the physical world is a reflection of our soul’s progress (or lack of progress) on the path toward oneness with God.
Transforming our desire to receive for ourselves into a desire to share is the hardest task we will
ever attempt.
You must realize and accept how desperately you need the Creator’s help.
In Kabbalah, the truth is rarely what it seems. In fact, the truth is frequently the opposite of what it seems, and the counterintuitive path is often the right one. Our reflexive desire to avoid obstacles and challenges, to say nothing of real hardship, works against our own best interests at the deepest levels of our
being.
1. Know that every day is an opportunity for transformation
When we understand this, it becomes clear that we should treat each day responsibly and with great care. Will we fill it with Light, using the day for sharing and spiritual work? Or will we fill it with negativity,
Albert Einstein said, “God does not play dice with the universe.” Just as what happens in our lives is what needs to happen, what we see in the world is what we need to face.
