When a person is content to want only what God wants, this makes
God the King. But when a person desires something other than what God desires, this
gives strength to unholy forces. A person must nullify his own will to the
point where he has no will and desire for anything except what God desires,
whether it be that he should have wealth and children or not, God forbid. It
should be the same with everything else he wants. He should desire only what
God desires. This makes God alone the King.
Likutey Moharan I,
177
The Hebrew letters are consonants: without vowels, they cannot be
pronounced but remain like a body without a soul. Without the soul, the body is
unable to move or do anything.
The vowels – the soul that animates the letters –
are formed through yearning and desire, whether for good or bad. The yearning for
evil creates bad vowels, which make the letters join together and interact to
produce bad effects. But if a person yearns to repent, good vowels – good souls
– are created and the letters join and interact to produce good results.
It is not sufficient for a person to feel longing and yearning in
his heart alone. He must express his longing and yearning on his lips. This is
the basis of our prayer service. The yearning in the person’s heart creates
soul and letters in potential, but it is when the person expresses his
desire with his mouth that the soul is produced in actuality. For the
soul comes forth from the mouth, as it says, “My soul came forth through his speaking”
(Song of Songs 5:6).
In order to bring forth your soul from potential to actual
existence, you must express your yearning and longing in words. This is how you
turn your desire into a reality and accomplish what you want, and this is why
it is so important to speak to God every day and articulate your desires and
good intentions with your lips.
Likutey Moharan I,
31
The power
of one sigh
How precious when you sigh out of longing for something holy. The
sigh you emit because you are far from holiness breaks the bond of impurity that
was trapping you. Now you can bind yourself with the cord of holiness. But the
opposite is true when you sigh with desire for something wrongful, God forbid.
One sigh of regret over your sins and great distance from God is
worth more than many fasts and other forms of self-mortification. The sighs you
emit when you desire something holy can actually break the force of your bodily
urges, enabling your soul to draw nearer to your body and communicate to it
something of her own perception of God.
Likutey Moharan I,
109
Thirsty
for God
Thirst is a very great desire. It is wonderful to long, yearn and
thirst for God.
The greater your thirst for water, the greater your pleasure when
you reach water and drink. Therefore the pleasure is caused by the thirst!
The same is true of holy longing and yearning for God and for true
devotion.
This will be the main delight of the world to come, which will be a
time of desire and longing. This is the “desire of all desires”, the level to
which Moses ascended when he left the world. Likewise Abraham paid “four
hundred silver shekels” for his final resting place (Genesis 23:16). The holy Zohar
says these are the four hundred worlds of yearning that the Tzaddikim will
inherit in the future.
They are worlds of yearning because then we will be worthy of true
thirst and yearning for God.
Quenching this thirst will be the main delight of
the future world.
Sichot Haran #259
Human thought has tremendous power. Thought alone can bring about
many things. Even prices in the market rise because of people’s thoughts and
expectations.
When thought is concentrated intensely, it can exert great
influence. All the faculties of the mind, conscious and unconscious, down to
the innermost point, must be focused without distraction on the intended
result.
When many people do this together, their thoughts can actually
force what they are thinking to come about.
The concentrated thought must spell out every step of the desired
result in detail. It is not enough for the thought to be merely overall,
because this is an “incomplete vessel” and may even be deceptive.
Keeping your mind intently focused on your goal can also help you
in studying the Torah. For example, you could focus intently on the thought
that you want to complete all four sections of the Shulchan Aruch. You
could calculate that if you study five pages every day you could complete all
four sections in a single year. Picture in your mind exactly how you will go
about this course of study. Concentrate so strongly that you are literally
obsessed with the thought.
The same approach can also be applied to other studies, such as the
Bible or the Talmud and its commentaries. If your desire is strong and your
concentration sufficiently intense, your plans will be accomplished.
Sichot Haran #62
Taken from The Essential Rabbi Nachman
Published by Azamra Institute, Israel.
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