Daily Kabbalah Tip

Advice in the daily Kabbalah lesson is recommended, practical tasks for advancing spiritually

The Hater Turns Into Lover

I do not want evils to die; I want to actually use them.

What is "rise above the egotistical desire to receive for oneself alone"?

Man identifies with his ego and to rise above it means to identify with the Creator who works on your ego. If someone hurts your ego, or you take it personally and get hurt, or you feel there is really an egotistical desire (a desire to receive for the self alone) that needs to be corrected, and then instead, you do not get hurt and even identify with the "offender" and thank him for that, this is called that you turn from his hater to his lover.

If I feel the egoistic desire, then I want the ego to feel itself as hurt, because by that I can ask for the correction of the ego and rise above it. When the ego is hurt I can identify with the ego, defend myself, and deal with morality, with the question about what should be changed in my behavior. However, I can also see the qualities in me, to rise above these qualities and remain attached to the Creator.

It is good that the Creator hits me and reveals all sorts of attributes in me. I should use them to rise above them and hold onto them. And if these qualities, these virtues that are revealed in me, would be erased, then I wouldn't be able to rise above them, I couldn't stay attached to the Creator. Precisely because I find bad qualities in me, I am willing to tear myself from them and cling to the Creator. But the quality itself has to remain, because if it didn't, I would have no need to cling to the Creator.

The hater turns into lover. I'm starting to love the worst attributes because they help me to rise above my ego. The bad traits help me build my faith, that is, to reach the force of bestowal over them. I do not want evils to die; I want to actually use them.

-from the Preparation for The Zohar study (minutes 25-30)