Love the Creative Power of the Soul - Chapter 10:
The Ultimate Secret

The Ba'al Shem Tov, the founder of the Chassidic movement, revealed that all spiritual and psychological processes progress through three stages: submission, separation, and sweetening.

We have already established the value and need for "submission" as the means to be open to love, allowing "space" for others to enter our private worlds. "Separation" in this context is the power to manifest love in a flawed, extremely limited world, while sufficiently separating oneself from that finitude so that love's infinity can reveal itself. The expression of "sweetening" is the deeply meaningful "clinging" that takes place when love connects souls together.

This final stage of sweetening further illuminates the "paradox of paradoxes"--an Infinite Creator and a finite Creation. This is the secret of the Holy Temple, of which G-d says "Build me a Sanctuary and I will dwell in their midst" (Exodus 25:8)--"in its midst" is not written but "in their midst," implying "within each and every Jew."

The Kotzker Rebbe, when yet a young boy, was asked "where is G-d found?" and replied, "in every person who lets Him in." Love is the key to let G-d and others in.

Love, due to its infinite nature, has the power to accomplish what Chassidut describes as the foundation of the whole Torah: to elevate the soul above the body till it reaches its ultimate Source, and to simultaneously draw down G-d's Infinite light--through the Jewish People--to the entire world. Love, the "spirit of life," contains the ultimate secret of fulfilling G-d's purpose for Creation and the practical means to accomplish this awe-inspiring task.