Wholeness is a pleasure that is sensed only after there is a hunger for something and a shortage of it. I ate a cookie yesterday and remember how it tasted. I want one today and that desire is experienced as incompleteness. In other words, I remember the pleasure of eating that cookie and I now feel a lack. I can only fulfill that lack to the extent of the incompleteness I feel before I devour another cookie today.
Of course, tomorrow I will probably want another cookie. This is because nature has arranged lack and fulfillment, hunger and satisfaction, where they do not occur at the same time. This is the exact situation the Creator has placed our souls in to feel the lack, feel incomplete and thereby crave pleasure. As a result, we learn we most certainly can satisfy a lack or hunger, but we can never get our fill. No matter how many bags of cookies I buy, when the bag of cookies runs out, I will definitely be running to the store to pick up another bag.
The Uniqueness of Spiritual Fulfillment
Luckily, the Creator has a solution for this situation. He wants to delight us, which is why He sends us a very special fulfillment. Our souls try not to spoil that satisfaction by crossing the line and devouring the whole bag. It is only in this way that the soul arrives at completeness. The hunger and desire do not go away—on the contrary. As a result of this special fulfillment, the soul extends more fulfillment from a wholeness that does not fade, an eternal wholeness.
How does this special fulfillment work? I enjoy eating that cookie because prior to ripping open the bag, I feel a hunger, a lack, a sensation of shortage. In other words, I want a cookie. After I eat a few cookies, I no longer want any more because the lack has been fulfilled. But in the spiritual, the Creator gave our souls a great “trick” that prevents it from being satiated, despite the reception of pleasure. The more full our souls feel, the hungrier they grow. That is the perfection of the action of the Creator.
Hell – The Feeling of Disconnection from the Giver
True pleasure, real pleasure, lasts as long as the desire lasts—it is insatiable. But on the spiritual level, when the desire to enjoy receives, it feels shame. You see, the soul does not just sense the pleasure, but also senses the attributes of the Giver. As it senses the Giver, it finds it not only wants the pleasure, but also wishes to relate to the Giver, to be like Him. The moment pleasure is felt from receiving, the pleasure begins to fade. The very act of the soul receiving for itself restricts the pleasure. That is why we cannot attain eternal delight by receiving, because receiving restricts the Light and even extinguishes it, virtually nullifying it.
Kabbalah calls the spiritual sensation of shame “hell.” There is nothing worse than this sensation of shame because it’s the same as being totally opposite from the Creator. The Creator purposely paired receiving with shame. He could have avoided it, but the phenomenon of shame was created specifically for us so we could learn to receive from Him, to delight without shame.
Infinite Pleasure by Staying in Connection with the Creator
To our soul’s dismay, the very act of receiving what it wants most causes the pleasure received to vanish into thin air. But the Creator has provided a wonderful solution. It turns out that the only way for the soul to receive pleasure is to enjoy not the pleasure itself, but rather our contact with the Giver of the pleasure. If the pleasure from contact with the Giver is what you get from Him, then your pleasure will not disappear and will not diminish your desire for pleasure. On the contrary! The more you receive, the more you give, and the more you enjoy. That process lasts indefinitely!!!
Think about the first time you met someone and fell head over heels in love with them. At first, it did not matter what you did or what they did—you simply received pleasure from being with them. Their very presence made you feel wonderful. This is a vague similarity to what is being described.
There is yet another wonderful surprise in the spiritual. The pleasure that we get from feeling the One who gives is infinitely greater than the pleasure we receive when we are just taking for ourselves. This is because the first kind of taking ties us with the Complete Giver, the Eternal One, the Creator.
Our purpose in life is achieving and maintaining this tie to the Creator, and as a result being rewarded with infinite fulfillment.
“How to Achieve Never Ending Fulfillment” is based on the book, Wondrous Wisdom: Everyone’s Guide to the Study of Authentic Kabbalah by Michael R. Kellogg.
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