
Sacrificing Ourselves To Death - Weekly Energy Boost
When we make sacrifices for our careers, our families, our friends, our relationships, and for ourselves, we often create a trade off in the long term that isn't always obvious. Learning when, how and what to sacrifice is the secret to lasting blessings and successes. Original airdate: 3/14/22
Transcript
Good morning,
Everyone.
Good evening,
Good afternoon,
Wherever you are,
And welcome to this week's Weekly Energy Boost.
My name is Ellie Sheva,
And I am here this lovely Monday morning with David,
And we are blessed to have Daniel back with us again.
Daniel is our resident Pisces as well,
And we are talking about another mega Pisces opportunity this week.
This week we're actually coming to the full moon of this month.
It's one of the most powerful weeks of the year,
So much energy,
And so much passive-aggressiveness as well.
Oh,
That's nice.
So we're here to talk about sacrifice.
And what's interesting is that this week,
If you look at what the Kabbalists write about the Zohar,
The Kabbalists write,
Whether it's in the Zohar or any other text,
The focus is on sacrifices,
The ancient kind.
And from the ancient kind,
We can learn a lot about the sacrifices we make in our own lives today.
The Weekly Energy Boost is a seven-day spiritual weather forecast where we look at the wisdom of Kabbalah and glean from it the most powerful and practical tools for our listeners,
Not only to navigate the coming week,
But to navigate situations throughout life.
And this is a very Piscean challenge,
I think.
Not for you guys,
Of course,
Just for me.
The whole idea of sacrifice,
Of being,
I think it's a very Piscean,
Not spiritual Piscean characteristic,
To play the martyr,
To be the people pleaser,
The passive aggressor,
The doing everything for everybody and what have you done for me lately.
And even not having that,
I know you guys weren't here,
Obviously,
I'm sure you listen to the show when you're not here.
Wouldn't miss it for a thing.
Batya Salomon was on a couple of weeks ago and I confessed a super sacrifice story from my early years.
We got a lot of mail and heartfelt messages from people who loved hearing about what a doormat I was.
A lot of mail messages,
Like M-A-L-E.
No,
Mostly female,
If I'll tell the truth.
And one of the things I really loved about the outpouring of responses from everybody is that it was very relatable,
That we do a lot in our lives in the name of sharing,
In the name of helping others,
In the name of doing good.
And what's the cost?
We're literally hollowing ourselves out for what?
And I think that that's,
You know,
Back in the day where,
You know,
Maybe I'm sure that there's people that still do it.
You know,
We go,
We do something,
The truth is we do versions of this all our lives.
We do something wrong.
We talked about this last week as well.
And either we confess it and we feel like,
Okay,
You know,
It's done with,
I finished it,
Or it's not my problem anymore.
I dumped it on someone else.
Or we bury it.
But the truth is this sort of message,
I think in Kabbalah,
Can be very confusing,
Right?
We talk about getting outside of our comfort zone for people,
Getting outside of our comfort zone,
Stretching ourselves,
Doing superhuman feats,
Mind over matter.
We throw out all these great words.
And at the same time,
We also teach nobody should walk all over you.
Nobody should be more,
You shouldn't give your power over to anybody.
And I think that it's in,
Without the right context,
It can be confusing and lead people to make choices that maybe are not the best or the highest choice to make because it's the sharing thing to do.
Right.
And I think that's why intention is really so important.
Where am I coming from?
Because like you said,
It's never black or white.
It's never one way or another.
It's never like,
Okay,
But you told me to share outside my comfort zone and that's what I do.
Yeah.
But based on your tikkun,
Because you don't value yourself enough,
You trying to overcompensate by doing all these things to make you feel good about yourself,
But you actually don't realize that that's coming from a point of lack.
That's coming from a place of insecurity.
And you're doing all this and you're not sensitive to the environment and realize that people are taking advantage of you and that that's coming from a place of lack,
Right?
And anything that's coming from a place of lack,
Even if the action,
The external thing that I do is the most glorious,
The most righteous,
I'm coming from a place of insecurity and lack the result will never be good coming from that place.
You know nothing about this,
Right?
You're just like changing the station.
David has good boundaries.
I yeah,
You know.
Funny story.
Funny story.
Well,
I've learned,
How do I say this?
I haven't formulated this yet.
This is really just on the fly.
Improv.
This is improv.
I think that every person needs to have a starting point of their terms of who they are and what's important to them and stick by them.
I think people confuse sacrifice when they don't understand their terms,
Right?
And I think that,
I think a term that I try to speak to students about that we know is a hundred percent a term that everybody should have and it's one that's given to us by the creator is I deserve to be happy infinitely.
There's no limit to that and I don't have to actually kill myself to get there.
And I think people have both of those reversed.
They think whether they admit it or not,
I don't deserve to be that happy.
A certain amount of happiness,
Yes,
Too much is maybe excessive.
I don't want luxury,
Right?
I just want a necessity,
Which is totally false.
And then the second thing is even for that necessity,
I must die to get it.
I must suffer.
I must die.
I must immerse myself in guilt and fear and shame.
In fact,
Guilt is a great wood for the fire of success and the more guilt I have,
The more successful I can be.
Maybe throw that in the fire and shame,
A little bit of sprinkle some shame on it and I could probably be more successful.
Shame is very combustible.
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
I mean,
Imagine how beautiful this flame can be if I just had a little more shame.
So all of this,
So this way of thinking is what really causes us to do quote unquote sacrifice in the wrong way because we're just feeding the negativity when we do sacrifice on that point of view.
So the starting point needs to be what's your belief system about infinite pleasure and joy and there's no limit to that.
I really want to emphasize no limit to that.
And then it doesn't have to kill you to get there.
You don't have to really sacrifice and only give pressure.
It's not,
It's something very simple.
It's usually in the head.
You've got to just change something in your head and you can open all the gates.
I'm going to ask you a question.
I know you have a lot to say.
Go for it.
I'm sure that you see a lot of people whose self worth is wrapped up in their performance,
Right?
That maybe as children they learned at a very young age that if they have needs,
They're bad or maybe being,
We talked about this a little bit last week,
Being weak is a bad thing so they learn to suck it up and be self-sufficient and independent and they grew up too quickly and therefore they think that they're here to work hard and achieve and accomplish at any cost.
Cost of the self,
Cost of the happiness like David was saying,
Cost of fulfillment.
How do you when you find somebody,
Daniel you just maybe put it into perspective,
Daniel does what we call Tikun healing and brings in a lot of different other modalities and healing methods to help people uproot their belief systems and the repercussions of housing those belief systems for years.
It seems to me like it's that tying self-worth with production,
With action is something that we see in a lot of people.
Yeah.
There are two levels in which it can be addressed.
One is purely on a belief system level like David was talking about.
Another one is a little bit deeper and beautiful to reverse.
Yes.
And to see,
To just acknowledge.
So let's start with the belief system one.
That is usually this belief of I have to suffer,
I have to say it's usually learned somewhere.
It's learned somewhere and through certain events in our life.
So like you were saying,
I usually would take people back and say,
Who taught you that?
Or where did you learn that?
Or where did you first experience that?
And then you have a story behind that.
And from that story was abandoned or I was always made feel not good enough,
Or I came back from school with a certain grade and if it wasn't perfect,
Even if it was perfect could have always be better.
So those experiences usually teaching me something and I adapt a certain belief from those experiences.
And so beliefs as in order to feel good enough,
I have to absolutely kill myself.
I need to do above and beyond.
And if it's not,
Then I'm not worthy.
And so this belief is serving me in a certain way for this period of time.
But then we grow up and we stay with that belief and it's costing us a lot.
Our health,
It's costing us our freedom,
It's costing us our happiness.
And yes,
You're right.
There's a lot of people out there that are walking with one way or another with that type of belief.
The other level that we can look at it,
Which is,
I find it really fascinating and interesting on a deeper level is not so much of a self-worth issue,
But the sacrifice coming from a person or place actually of guilt.
So are you guys okay?
Can we talk about guilt for a little bit?
Do it.
Just make it quick because I need to.
.
.
David is in a rush.
We need to say he's in a rush to get somewhere.
So we'll.
.
.
Rush.
I'm in a rush to go.
.
.
He's willing to sacrifice the show so he can get there on time.
We're not worrying about that.
Don't like to be tardy.
I don't like to be tardy.
So how is guilt related to sacrifice?
You see sometimes,
And I like to talk about family dynamics because this is something that.
.
.
Because they're the blame for everything.
Exactly.
Just kidding.
So sometimes we look at a person and say,
Where is it coming from?
And I ask myself that too.
Sometimes when I meet with people like,
Okay,
God show me,
Show me what's the root cause for that person having that martyr syndrome or that self sacrifice.
Where's it come from?
And sometimes it's not a necessary childhood experience,
But it's someone in their family that can be even generations ago that had a harsh destiny.
That wasn't lucky.
That lost something.
Tremendous pain.
Maybe there was a war.
Maybe they were born with a handicapped in some way or another.
They really had a harsh destiny.
And sometimes it's generations ago,
Sometimes can be among siblings,
Let's say.
And so we're so connected on a soul level to our family and our family members that there's many times an unconscious agreement or out of love,
There's a movement of the soul where the soul fields indebted to sort of like imagine sibling that was born deficiencies or mentally challenged or.
.
.
So the sibling unconsciously fields,
Why them and not me?
So in order to try to balance it out unconsciously,
Of course,
All of it,
It's like,
Okay,
I will that's what the subconscious said.
I will renounce certain pleasure.
I will renounce success.
I will renounce a good marriage.
I will renounce certain blessings that I'm entitled to.
That is my divine right.
But I will make the.
.
.
Like to make it fair?
To make it fair because why them and not me.
And that can be applied on many levels.
There's a terminology for this,
Right?
When somebody dies,
Somebody else does it and they think,
Well,
Why didn't it happen?
Why not me?
Why not guilt?
There it is.
And that is for instance,
There was a study about it too,
For people that their mom died the childbirth and the child survived,
That the child is carrying that guilt that can also express itself as self-sacrifice,
Right?
That they will literally renounce certain things.
Survivors guilt,
Personally,
I worked through this and I came to term,
I realized that I have a certain guilt.
I'm announcing certain things.
I don't allow myself to enjoy certain things.
So I realized that I had this pattern when things are getting really good and then too good and say like,
Oh,
Wait,
Wait,
Wait,
One second.
It's like,
It's too good to be.
.
.
When is the next shoe gonna drop?
And I wasn't able to enjoy.
And making a long story short,
I traced it down actually related to my grandfather who is a Holocaust survivor.
That again,
Without going into all the details,
But I was able to trace it down to that.
And the moment I made that connection,
That many of the guilt that we're carrying or this renouncing certain things,
It's not actually even ours.
We're caring for someone else,
Maybe sometimes a sibling,
Maybe sometimes grandparents,
Right?
That it's actually not ours.
And for me,
Just be able to see it,
Wow,
It's my grandfather's survival guilt.
I was able to drop it to a big degree,
To a big part.
I was able to say,
Okay,
No,
I'm allowed to enjoy.
I'm allowed to have a good life.
I'm allowed to.
But scientifically,
You know which organ guilt affects the most?
I mean,
It's not like spiritual.
It's not a spiritual thing.
It's a scientific thing.
Which organ does it affect the most?
I don't know.
It's the brain.
It's not a joke.
It's just the brain because of the over-processing that occurs when a person feels guilt.
The constant over-processing overload,
Which I guess could lead to a whole host of other things.
I would look into that.
I just remember reading that somewhere.
But I'm sure then that has a trickle-down effect to every other organ in the body.
If I had to take what Daniel said,
Which I love how he's always going,
He doesn't just go into this life.
He doesn't even go into your past life.
He goes right down the lineage.
You should do like a 23andMe spiritual.
That should be part of how we do astrology charts.
You do a 23andMe and you look at it and be like,
Well,
Look.
This is not a sponsored show.
Maybe it should be.
But I was going to say in the corners of what Daniel said about the guilt,
Something that practically I would ask all of us to look at is if you had to break up the categories of your life,
If it's love,
Career,
Health,
Social,
What categories are you not allowing yourself to experience pleasure or you haven't experienced pleasure in a long time?
And to start there because there's obviously some crazy negative beliefs about receiving there.
I know that something that I learned just from dealing with students for many years and I kind of learned like,
Oh,
I want to make sure I don't go through that.
I forgot who said the quote.
Somebody told me that like a chief justice told him this quote and I forgot who it was but he said,
You know,
The secret to spending time with your young children.
You heard this quote?
Okay,
So maybe it's not that prevalent.
The secret to spending time with your young children is to do it when they're young.
That was the quote.
And I think about that every day literally since I heard that because there's this fear that we all need to be aware of that overworking in one area will cause us to not receive pleasure or focus on a different area.
And what we all should aim for that the Creator wants us is to have pleasure in all of the major areas of life.
Sometimes we think now is the time,
This is a belief system,
By sacrificing health I can become a millionaire faster.
I need to sacrifice time with my kids in order to achieve that.
I need to let go of love.
I don't have time for love right now because I need to achieve this.
And this is also another pattern of negative belief systems that has to do with guilt,
Shame,
Whatever you want to call it or just the simple fact of I can't have it all.
I can't receive light.
And so what we're essentially doing is we're saying that the Creator is limited in His ability to shine in every department of my life.
And when we say that the Creator is limited,
This is actually one of the biggest negative actions.
The belief system that the Creator is limited is one of the biggest negative actions a person can do and it's a subconscious one.
So I always try to look where in my life am I not receiving that joy or that pleasure and I know that it's me that's putting it off thinking that I have to put it off for the sake of this other department in my life.
And constantly auditing,
Constantly auditing each one and asking yourself what's blocking me from receiving in that area.
It's also a certain level of self-righteousness,
Right?
So when we're asking what do I get,
How does it serve me,
It makes me look better,
Right?
Because I always like to see like,
Okay,
How is it serving me,
What's causing a person to stick with this self-sacrifice?
Because it doesn't make any sense.
We understand intellectually,
Like you said,
The Creator wants to give me anything,
Everything,
It's unlimited.
Why would I want to limit?
Why do I have this belief of like,
No,
I'll sacrifice all that?
Because it gives me a certain self-righteousness,
Right?
Like,
Oh,
Wow,
Look at me,
Right?
Look at all that I'm doing.
Sometimes the way it's serving us,
It's control.
So if I constantly overgive,
Let's say,
With other people,
I create a scenario where there's an imbalance.
I give more,
They give less.
And so there's always a scenario where that imbalance causing them to owe me.
And then I want to duplicate that everywhere I go is what you're saying,
Because I want to be in control.
That I want to be in control and I want to feel that,
Make other people feel that they owe me.
Or I want to get stuck in the cycle of being the victim and complain,
Because I create this vicious cycle of I overgive,
And then they don't appreciate or they don't give as much back.
So I have now the right to be the victim.
I have now the right to complain.
And that is what gives me energy.
The right,
The right to complain.
I love that.
You have the right to complain.
Sounds silly just saying it.
Do we,
It's so powerful what you said,
I just want to say it again.
How many times do we just subconsciously say,
Well,
You know what?
Now I have the right to complain.
Look at all I've done.
Look at all I've done.
This entitles me,
And I'm using that word on purpose,
I am entitled to complain right now.
And I'm so motivated to actually give you so that I have the right to complain.
I don't want to give that up.
I want to complain whenever I want,
But in order to do that,
I need to.
What's the prize?
The right to complain is the prize.
Therefore I will love you.
I will give you.
I will succeed so that I can complain.
It might not only be the right to complain now that I'm thinking about it,
It might also be the right to criticize.
I do so much for you.
I'm allowed to let you have it every so often.
You deserve it.
It manifests in so many ways.
Some people take,
It's all about taking energy from the person.
I have the right to take something from you now that I've done X,
Y,
And Z.
May I propose something?
Please.
Let me know what you think.
Do you think that that control or that,
Let's call it the right to complain,
Or I'm entitled now to exercise some degree of power over you,
I always think of that,
When I think of people who sacrifice,
I also think they harbor a lot of resentment because there is a part of them that knows it's not right,
That knows it's not balanced,
That knows it's not natural.
When I say natural,
I mean that's not why we were built or how we were built.
We weren't built to do that.
That resentment builds up,
It becomes anger,
And then the complaining and the criticism is unleashed.
I think that one of the biggest dangers of that self-righteous,
Look at all I'm doing,
Blah,
Blah,
Blah,
Is the latent resentment and anger.
People are bitter.
I think maybe that's the way you can diagnose it,
Is if you're not joyously giving,
Like what you said with the intention,
If the intention of the giving and the.
.
.
David,
A few months ago was talking about how when you want something to succeed,
You have to give it everything.
You can't just tap on the door.
You've got to blow the door down with a- That's a Ravashev quote,
Yeah.
When a person does it with the right intention,
It's not draining and it's not no resentment and bitterness comes up,
But when a person bombards something with energy because they have to or because if they don't or all these things we've been talking about,
The result is bitterness and anger.
When you say the right intention,
Because that's the first thing I thought of,
Well,
What is the right intention?
I know in Kabbalah,
I'm afraid to even say it because it sounds,
I don't know,
It doesn't sound universal when I'm going to say it,
But technically speaking,
As we've learned in our deeper studies,
We need to elevate to a place where our intention is that relationship with the creator.
If your intention isn't to draw the light of the creator and have that relationship,
Any other intention will result in resentment.
Now,
We can't just say that to people the first time we're talking to them because they're not going to understand what that means,
So I hesitate in case it's your first time listening to this.
We might throw some- Well,
Let's say the ultimate intention.
The ultimate intention is your relationship with the creator because it's the only thing in this world that will not disappoint you.
It's endless.
People will disappoint you.
It says as soon as you rely on someone,
The creator will ensure that that person disappoints you so that you let go of the need for this person's.
.
.
Your addiction to this person.
Anytime you rest your laurels on something,
If you lean on something,
If you depend on something- Or you're keeping score.
Keeping score,
Well,
You start to suck the energy from that.
The creator actually starts to take energy away because our ultimate purpose,
Everyone in this world regardless of what religion you're in,
Is to rely on the universal force of the creator,
To have a relationship with the creator the way I'm talking to you physically and I see it and I feel it and it makes sense to me.
It should be as real,
The relationship with the creator.
That's what we're talking about in our advanced Kabbalistic studies.
That is the goal.
That is the goal.
When you know that the creator is there and you talk to the creator and you receive communication with the creator as if it's a real person,
You've earned that ability to do that,
Then you're free.
You have complete freedom.
Then you're just giving to the world.
You're not taking from the world anymore because you realize you don't need to.
It's the only way to get out of that cycle because as long as we're attached to people,
We're attached to wanting something back from them,
There will always be this agenda of,
Okay,
What have you done for me lately?
I have given you so much.
Now I'm counting the minutes,
The hours.
Okay,
Or I'm building credit.
So I'm giving so much to you now.
Okay,
I'm doing this now without agenda,
But when the time comes,
When I need you,
I will demand something from you.
And what you were saying,
David,
Is we don't want to rely on any of this.
Actually,
Relationships are only a way to practice our relationship with the creator.
That's what you're saying.
Yeah.
People should know that.
People should know that because they think that the person is the end result.
It's a segue.
Right.
Is there ever a right time or a good reason?
The word sacrifice,
To me,
It's kind of a dirty word.
It's a horrible word.
Is there ever a right time to give something up for the sake of someone or something else?
When you say it that way,
It sounds nicer.
I read something this week that I thought was powerful.
I should look at the clock,
Which is the person,
The more you give into your small desires,
Which we call them your reactive desires,
You go to the bottom of the chain of control in this world.
So who controls this world?
Who controls even people and the financial institution of this world?
It's the people who are in control of their desire.
So the more you feed the small desire,
You sacrifice the big desire.
That's how the Kabbalists say it.
The more you let go of the small desire for the sake of the big desire,
The biggest desire being my relationship with the Creator,
You elevate in the chain in this world,
The lowest being the level of the animal,
Which just takes to live,
To the highest being the human,
Which is the purpose of the human is to have a relationship with the Creator.
And most humans act like animals,
Which is I just want energy now.
I want to be comfortable now.
I'm worried and I'm afraid.
Impulsive.
It's just impulsive.
Whether we admit it or not,
We all kind of are motivated by the fear to just satisfy right now because we're afraid.
But that means we become like animals,
And so we're not really in control of this world.
So things can happen to this person totally out of their control,
And they feel like,
Oh,
I can't do anything about it.
But as you start to let go of the small desires,
One by one,
And we all know what that can mean.
When we hear small desire,
Something comes to your mind.
That is what it is.
And as soon as you let that go,
Gradually you elevate in your power in this world,
Your aura,
Your spiritual aura,
Everything.
You start to control the whole world,
And things come to you,
Blessings come to you,
Finances come to you.
Things start to come to you because now you're in control as opposed to being like an animal and just taking whatever you can and then not having the true blessings from it.
Yeah,
The Kabbalah talks about different levels of the soul,
Right?
So the lowest level of the soul,
The nefesh,
It's also what's called the animalistic desires,
That's what David was talking about.
And that's all metaphor and what we read in ancient writings about like the sacrifice.
We actually,
In our days,
We're talking about sacrificing the animalistic desires,
The smaller desires.
So I want to make sure,
I will do all the good things,
But I want to make sure I get the credit for it.
I'm not going to let go until I get the credit for it and make sure that everybody knows that that's a lower level of desire,
Right?
So when we talk about sacrifice,
Yes,
Those are the things that we're looking for,
Sacrificing these things that I'm not going to get really that much.
They don't matter.
They're not important.
I want to let them go.
Maybe that's a good thing for us to focus on this week is the right things to sacrifice.
The bigger stuff that we talked about in the beginning,
That energetic,
I don't know,
Exchange that we're hoping to get by being so heroic,
So self-righteous,
So amazing,
Superhuman,
To let go of that desire and to also look at the small pleasures that we're stealing,
To use David's words.
This is the week to sacrifice those.
And death actually helps us put things in perspective,
Right?
When we think about death and think about,
Okay,
Think about today is going to be your last day,
It put things in perspective.
You're like,
Wait a second,
What's really important?
What's not important?
Who is going to remember that,
Right?
Who's going to remember that I did this?
What's really important?
And if we put things in perspective like that,
It makes it easier to have that focus and be sharp on,
Okay,
What am I willing to let go of?
And what do I want to really focus on?
So in summary,
The energy.
Take it home,
David.
Take it home and drive this home for people.
In summary,
What we're saying here is this is the week where we receive the support from the universe.
Number one,
To give yourself permission to receive and to know that it is our spiritual birthright to receive in every category all the time the pleasures of life.
Only thing that's stopping us is our grasp on the small pleasures.
That's what sacrifice is.
Don't actually,
At least you have said it,
I think this is what you meant to say and I love it.
Don't try to do too much.
People try to become heroes.
Don't be a hero.
Slow and steady wins the race.
David's actually saying,
At least you have to stop being a hero.
Stop winning,
For God's sake.
Stop crushing it.
You're always crushing it and winning and you just need to slow that down.
Don't try to do too much.
Don't try to overcome too many things.
Start creating a nice base,
A spiritual base by letting go of your small desires,
A little better,
Master those and then you can build on top of that.
If you try to handle crazy addictions and all of a sudden,
All at once,
No,
No,
No,
You're just going to go backwards.
Start with the small things.
Let it go slowly and then build a foundation.
That energy of this week supports us to do that.
Absolutely.
Daniel,
Thank you for being with us again.
Always awesome being here.
All the sacrifices you had to go through to be here with us today.
David,
Thank you for sacrificing your appointment later.
All my small desires to be in the big desire show.
There's one big workshop we did here.
Absolutely.
I think that was a personal thing.
Everybody was just talking to me throughout the whole episode.
Sorry that our thousands of listeners had to hear that this week and have a fabulous one.
We'll be back with a weekly energy boost.
