HAVING THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE RAIN (MB)

Topic: Personal Transformation |

In the portion Ha’azinu, Moses says, “My teachings, my Light, should come down like the rain.” Through this request, Moses is teaching us what our spiritual work should look like. When we wake up in the morning and make the morning connection, when we read the Zohar, when we do any action of sharing, we are committed both to the work and the consciousness around it. But what do we want our mindset to be as we are making these connections, and how can they be the most powerful?

Moses says to us on this Shabbat, “What sustains life in this world if, without rain, without that water, there will be no vegetation, there will be no fruit, there will be no life? Rain is one of the most important givers of life to the entire universe, to the entire world. And the rain creates growth and creates food.” This is an amazing thing he is telling us. The rain gives us life. The rain makes things grow. Without the rain, everything would die.

As Rav Berg would often speak about, we know that everything has a consciousness, so what is the rain thinking, and why is it important to know its consciousness? Because it is this consciousness of the rain which allows it to sustain the entire world. Everything the Creator is, we can be. Everything the rain is, we can be. Can you imagine that every single one of us has within us the Light to sustain the entire world? Think about that for a moment; it is the truth. Every single one of us has that Light of the Creator within us, and anything the Creator is, we are.

If every single one of has within us the Light that can sustain this entire world, why do we not sustain it? Or, at least, why is there a great distance between what we are actually doing and our sustaining the entire world with our Light?

The consciousness the rain has is giving it the ability, strength, and power to sustain the entire world. The only reason the rain is able to sustain the entire world is because as it is falling to this world, it has no thought of pleasure for itself. It could think, "It is so nice to be floating here in space,” or, “It is so nice to rest here on the grass." There are many selfish thoughts that the rain can develop as it is coming down. But the rain fights that selfishness, and because of that, is able to grow and sustain the entire world.

Moses tells us on this Shabbat - and this is the Shabbat when he is giving us the most important messages and consciousness, because he is about to leave this world - that if we want our work, connections, study, prayers, meditations, and actions of sharing to really sustain and bring great Light to this world, we have to make sure that we do not involve our own personal pleasure in that process.

This does not mean we cannot enjoy things, because that is an important part of life. But separate from that is what we are doing to bring Light. For example, say we are going to a movie and are not going there to bring Light, so we enjoy it. But if we are doing something to bring Light, if we are doing something to sustain the world, then we need to completely remove our pleasure from it in whatever way we can. And to the degree that we can remove our pleasure from it completely is to the degree it is able to sustain and bring tremendous Light into this world and make this world grow.

Moses, in this portion, begs that his words be like the rain. Even Moses, at 120 years old, after 40 years of leadership, still had to fight the selfish innate nature we all have to also enjoy what we are doing while we are sharing and trying to reveal Light. And Moses asked the Creator to give him the strength and consciousness to do that. Our consciousness should be like the rain, where there is simply the thought to sustain this world, to bring Light into this world, where our only consciousness is that the Creator wants us to reveal this Light and that people of this world have goodness. When we have the consciousness that our connections and actions which try to reveal Light are not part of our own pleasure, then, and only then, do those connections and actions sustain the world. It is a teaching Moses gives us on this Shabbat.

As we start this new year committed both to more work and more consciousness, this is an important teaching. We want our connection, study, prayers, meditations, and actions of sharing to truly be able to sustain this world and bring tremendous Light. Because there is no reason why every single one of us cannot, with our own personal spiritual work, sustain a great part of this world. But the only way to do that is if we listen to Moses on this Shabbat. We ask that our work in this year be like the rain, and that we have the consciousness of the rain. If we are able to fight for that consciousness in every single action, then it will act like the rain, sustain this world, and bring great Light into this world.