Lesson 4. Perception of Reality
The topic we will clarify in this lesson is, without a doubt, one of the most fascinating and challenging subjects in the study of the wisdom of Kabbalah: the perception of reality. But not to worry — this is not a philosophical analysis. On the contrary, by understanding how we perceive reality, we can begin to approach some of life’s most essential questions with clarity, find real solutions, and apply them in a practical and meaningful way.
Lesson Summary:
- According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, the reality outside of us has no form of its own.
- The person perceiving reality is the one who gives it form. In other words, a person creates his or her own image of reality.
- The will to receive is the inner program that governs the mechanism of our perception of reality.
- We see what we want to see.
- To perceive spiritual reality, we must change this inner program — our will to receive.
- According to the Law of Equivalence of Form, in order to perceive spiritual reality we must develop, within the will to receive, a sensitivity to spirituality — in other words, imbue it with something from the attribute of bestowal.
Lesson 4. Perception of Reality
In the lesson we will learn:
- What is reality?
- How do we perceive reality?
- What is spiritual reality?
- With which senses do we perceive spiritual reality?
- We see what we focus on.
- And what we don’t focus on… we don’t see.
- We perceive reality selectively.
- There are many things happening around us that we are completely unaware of.
- Are there things we miss in life?
What are we focusing on that causes us to miss them?
What prevents us from seeing the “big picture”?
How can we expand the way we perceive reality?
According to science:
- The human brain is exposed every moment to 4 billion bits of information, yet we perceive only about 2,000 of them.
- Humans have around 30,000 genes, and we know the function of only about 5% of them.
- We use only 3–5% of our brain’s memory capacity.
- Our hearing range is limited to approximately 16 Hz–20,000 Hz.
Different approaches to the perception of reality:
-
Newton — reality is fixed and unchanging.
- Einstein — reality is relative and depends on the observer’s position and speed.
- Quantum physics — the picture of reality changes depending on the observer.
- The wisdom of Kabbalah…?
The perception of reality according to the wisdom of Kabbalah:
- Our perception of reality is subjective.
- According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, a person creates reality.
"Even though we see everything as being in front of us, every reasonable person knows for certain that all that we see is only in our own brains."
- Baal HaSulam Foreword to The Book of Zohar, p.34
"Take our sense of sight, for example: We see a wide world before us, wondrously filled. But in fact, we see all that only in our own interior. In other words, there is a sort of a photographic machine in our hindbrain, which portrays everything that appears to us and nothing outside of us.
He has made for us there, in our brain, a kind of polished mirror that inverts everything seen there, so we will see it outside our brain, in front of our faces."
- Baal HaSulam Foreword to The Book of Zohar, p.34
"The desire is the “self” of the person."
- Baal HaSulam “Shamati”, article n. 153
"Like a worm that was born inside a radish. It lives there and thinks that the world of the Creator is as bitter, dark, and small as the radish in which it was born.” …
But as soon as it breaks the peel of the radish and peeps out, it says in bewilderment: ‘I thought the whole world was like the radish I was born in, and now I see a grand, beautiful, and wondrous world before me!’”
So, too, are those who are immersed in the shell of the will to receive they were born with […] would try to break the shell of the will to receive in which they were born, and would assume the desire to bestow, their eyes would promptly open to see and attain for themselves all the degrees of wisdom, intelligence, and clear mind that have been prepared for them in the spiritual worlds."
- Baal Haslam. "Introduction to the Book of Zohar, p.40
"All the worlds, upper and lower, are included in man. And also, the whole of reality within those worlds is only for man."
- Baal HaSulam “Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”, p.1