"Kabbalah can be translated as “receiving”. According to rabbinical tradition, understanding the act of “receiving” and being able to practice it is a sacred art to be perfected over a lifetime.

Receiving means establishing a relationship with the universe in which we live. If we understand “receiving” as a one-sided phenomenon—with the emphasis exclusively on what we are going to get out of this partnership—then we gradually draw away from this relationship of exchange, which ultimately represents life.

All the pain, anguish and anxiety inherent in the “receptive” (i.e., Kabbalistic) life originate in the problems we have with receiving. Like the Dead Sea, we frequently fail to strike a balance between the sweet and salty waters, the yin and the yang. An abnormal situation results, a state of excess in which nothing flows. We cannot empty our vessel of its waters, and so we become progressively filled with a sea of tears."