Welcome to the Torah of Awakening podcast,
Exploring meditation and consciousness in Kabbalah and Hasidism through an integral lens.
I'm your host,
Rabbi Brian Yosef Schachter-Brooks.
In this episode,
We'll explore the ego,
The me that wants,
The me of opinions and stories,
And of course,
The me of stress.
And we'll learn one essential technique for transcending the limits of ego and opening up our potential for inner freedom.
We'll explore this through the lens of the Torah reading,
Parshat Vayakhel,
Shemot,
Exodus 35.
1 through 38.
20.
We'll then move into guided meditation,
Hebrew chanting based on the letter ayin,
And quiet meditation with soft piano music.
If you like,
You can pause the recording at that point to meditate in silence without the piano.
Before we begin,
Please remember that if you enjoy this podcast,
I'd be very grateful for your support by giving a good rating,
Leaving a review,
And joining the Torah of Awakening group so I can let you know about live events here on Insight Timer,
Along with other updates.
And now,
On with the episode.
Enjoy.
This is our opening verse,
Vayakhel Moshe et kol adat b'nei Yisrael.
Moses gathered the whole assembly of the children of Israel,
Vayomer aleihem,
And said to them,
Eylei devarim asher tzivah Adonai la'asot otam.
These are the things that the Divine has commanded you to do.
Sheshet yamim,
Te'asei malacha.
Six days work may be done.
Uvayom ha'shvi'i hiyei lachem kodesh.
But the seventh day shall be sacred for you.
Shabbat shabbaton l'Adonai,
Kol ha'osei vo malacha yumat.
A Sabbath of Sabbaths for the Divine.
Whoever does work on it shall die.
Okay,
What does this mean?
There is another verse that comes later in the Torah,
In which Moses is talking to the people about the original revelation at Sinai when you received the aseret ha'dibrot,
The Ten Commandments.
The verse says,
Anochi omed b'en Adonai uvayneichem.
I stood between the Divine and you.
Devarim,
Deuteronomy 5.
5.
The plain meaning is that Moses acted as an intermediary between the people and God,
But the Magid of Zlochov taught this verse on a deeper level.
He said,
The I stands between us and God.
When you affirm your separate identity with the word I,
I want this,
I don't want that,
I believe this,
I hate that.
A wall stands between you and the Divine.
But for one who offers the I,
There is no barrier.
And this is what the words in Shir HaShirim,
The Song of Songs,
Are referring to.
Ani l'dodi ve'alai t'shukato.
I am my Beloved's and my Beloved's desire is toward me.
Meaning,
When my I is given over to the Beloved,
Then I am reunited with the Beloved.
So what does all this really mean?
The Beloved is another way of saying God.
And the word God points not to a separate entity to be believed in and argued about,
But rather,
Reality becomes God when we enter into this sacred relationship with it.
God is a relational word,
Not an ontological one,
Describing our relationship with reality,
With being,
With the everything.
This is radically transformative and profoundly simple.
In the moment we remember and take to heart that everything is God,
We too are reunited with the Beloved.
Reunited not because God has gone anywhere,
Only because we have become used to it.
It's like walking with a lover,
Hand in hand.
At first you're on fire with love,
But if you keep walking,
At some point you start to think about something else.
Eventually,
You wouldn't even notice you're holding hands.
To be reunited in such a case is to become aware of what is already present.
There's a hint of this in the opening verse of our Parsha,
Sheshet Yamim Te'aseh Malacha,
Six days work shall be done.
It doesn't say six days you shall do work,
That would be Te'aseh,
But rather six days work shall be done,
Te'aseh.
The passive form hints that we shouldn't identify with doing the work,
That we should let go of the I that wants to take credit.
Uvayom ha'shvi'i yiyeh lachem kodesh Shabbat,
Shabbaton,
And the seventh day should be sacred for you,
A Sabbath of Sabbaths.
Interesting,
It doesn't say there should be a Sabbath among the weekdays,
Which of course is what it is,
But rather a Sabbath among Sabbaths,
Meaning even the weekdays should be Sabbaths in a sense.
How is that possible?
We can achieve this to the degree that we can let go of our sense of me doing the work.
This is one example of what it means to offer the I,
But if we are not doing the work,
Who is doing it?
The key is to see that everything is doing everything,
To see the everything as one,
One doer,
And the one includes all the different beings doing their different jobs.
That's why one of the divine names is Elohim,
Which is a plural word.
God is the oneness of the many.
Shabbat,
Shabbaton l'Adonai kol ha'osei voh malacha yumat,
A Sabbath of Sabbaths to the divine,
All who work on it shall die.
On the surface,
It seems to be saying that if a person does work on Shabbat,
They will die or be executed,
But there's a different way to read the verse.
Not whoever does work on it shall die,
But rather whoever does work on it shall die.
In other words,
The doer of the work during the week,
The I that thinks it's the doer should die on Shabbat.
That is its gift and power,
And once you are able to put yourself to death as the doer on Shabbat by refraining from malacha,
From shopping,
From email,
From livelihood work,
And so on,
This also opens the possibility of disidentifying with the doer on weekdays as well.
Then all of life can become like Shabbat in a sense.
That is inner freedom and also a reduction in cortisol levels.
How do you do it?
Whenever you do anything,
You can remind yourself your strength is a gift,
Your intelligence is a gift,
Even the desire to do anything at all is a gift.
It all comes from beyond.
Everything comes into being through an infinite string of efforts from a vast Adat,
An assembly of countless beings,
Hinted in the opening words of the Parsha.
Vayakhel Moshe et kol Adat.
Moses gathered the whole assembly.
Meaning,
We must be like Moses,
Gathering the entire assembly of being before us into a oneness again and again,
Always in this moment.
This practice of seeing the oneness is represented by the letter Ayin,
Which means I,
E-Y-E,
The seeing of which allows us to offer up our I,
As in capital I.
Let's do it right now.
Let's begin with the affirmation for the letter Ayin.
Shifting from being the doer into being the witness.
Not differentiating between what we are perceiving but letting it all in.
Letting it all be perceived as the Adat,
The assembly of being before us in this moment.
I am seeing.
I am perceptive.
I am perception.
I am being the perception,
Seeing,
Of course,
A metaphor for all of the senses,
For what the ears are receiving,
What the body is receiving.
The sense of gravity and support beneath you.
Sense of the flow of the breath.
Sense of the mood,
The tone of emotion,
Of feeling as it's felt in your heart,
Belly,
Torso,
Wherever it is felt.
Let awareness fall inward,
Leaving the world of the mind to relax.
And however this moment is being assembled.
And we sing.
Ha ma'avir sheina me'einai,
Recognizing the gift of sentience,
The gift of consciousness,
Of being the consciousness perceiving and receiving the world within this body.
Utnu ma me'afapai,
The gift of removing slumber from our senses,
Waking up,
Waking up,
Waking up,
Meaning turning our attention to the truth of what is in this moment,
Not trying to make it into something,
Just perceiving what it is.
Preparing for meditation,
Taking care to let your body be in a comfortable alert position,
Unencumbered.
That's important.
If your hands are doing something,
Let them be free.
If you're holding a device for this,
Let it just be set down.
And bringing forth an attitude of generously offering your attention to the divine in the form that it appears,
The form of this moment,
Offering with lecha,
Deep breath in,
Feeling awareness flowing down into your belly,
Permeating your organs all the way down to your feet and toes,
Filling the lower part of your body with consciousness.
Rising up as well,
Chest,
Shoulders and neck,
Arms and hands and fingers,
Feeling that flow of the breath,
A gift,
A loving sustenance of our face,
Facial muscles,
Brain and nervous system,
Bringing little smile to your lips.
Being the loving,
Indwelling presence,
Life in the body and affirming na-se,
Deep breath in,
Right hand to lightly touch your forehead.
As the awareness filling the body shines out into space,
A vast field of consciousness without boundary or border,
And beyond the body,
Beyond thought,
Beyond feeling,
You are this field,
You are this vastness,
V'nishma.
Kissing your fingers,
Relaxing your hands,
Rebono shalom,
Bless our practice today,
Help us in the merit of our gathering,
V'yakel,
And we were gathered.
May we have that awareness to remember moment to moment,
That conscientiousness,
To notice thoughts as the mind gravitates toward them,
As thoughts vie for our attention.
No need to fight with them,
Let them come,
Let them flow,
Let them go,
Returning and anchoring in the tefillah.
And taking the chant on the inside now,
Letting the mind rest in the simple repetition.
As we come into silent meditation,
And closing the meditation,
Bringing your right hand to your heart,
Offering attention from the heart with l'chah,
And bringing left hand to your belly,
Feeling awareness down into the body,
Consciously inhabiting the inner space of the body,
Na'asim,
Say,
Deep breath in,
And bringing right hand to lightly touch your forehead,
Opening to the space around you,
Being the open space of awareness itself,
V'nishma,
V'nishma,
Kissing your fingers,
Relaxing your hands,
As we prepare to move back into our day's activities,
May we be imbued with this,
Knowing ourselves beyond the form,
Beyond the person,
Beyond the ego that wants to take credit,
That wants to be acknowledged.
Instead,
Do the acknowledging,
Acknowledging reality as it appears to us now.
Oseh shalom b'mromav,
Hu ya'aseh,
Shalom aleinu.
Ve'al ko Yisrael,
Ve'al ko Yoshvei Tevel,
Ve'imru,
Amen.
I hope you've enjoyed this learning and practice session.
If you have,
You can help support by giving a good rating,
Leaving a review,
And joining the Torah of Awakening group so I can let you know about live events here on Insight Timer,
Along with other updates.
Until next time,
All blessings.
