The World of the Soul
 

Ima (mother): When does the soul enter the body? Is it be-
fore birth?

Galia: It enters the body at the moment the child
is formed.

Ima: Do souls sleep at night?
Galia: No.

Ima: Does the soul get old?

Galia: No.

Ima: Do souls ever get ill?

Galia: There are soul diseases. These are spiritual diseases
of the mind and heart for which one needs tikun (rectification).

Ima: Can the souls of tzaddikim (righteous people) in Gan Eden (Heaven-Paradise) get ill?

Galia: No.

Ima: What makes a soul more wise or less wise?

Galia: What makes his soul wise is if he is a servant of
Hashem; then his soul will be healthy and whole and ca-
pable of enjoying the holy light. If he is a tzaddik (righteous) and a servant of Hashem in this world, then he will get to a wonderful place in the next world.

Ima: What's this holy light? Are you allowed to say?

Galia: Hashem. (The Almighty - God)


Ima: Galia, how and why does my having done teshuva (returned - repented) help you?

Galia: Because our souls are linked and therefore, if you
are not whole then I am not whole.

Ima: After death does the soul have the same character
that it had when it was alive?

Galia: Sure. Ima, the soul does not have senses like a liv-
ing person, but it feels everything and knows everything
and sees and hears everything.

Ima: Do you have freedom of thought? Can you think and
do what you want?

Galia: I am a person too. I have a certain intelligence, and
with that intelligence, I have free choice. But it's not wide-
ranging. It's not possible for me to know what I want, be-
cause Heaven decides what I may know and say and
nothing depends on me. The soul tells the body what to do,
but the body is limited and cannot do what the soul tells it
because it is material and the soul is spiritual. All the same,
souls do not have the ability to make independent deci-
sions. Everything is dictated to it by Heaven. I am like a
soul bound to the will of Heaven.

Ima; Do you communicate with other souls?

Galia: I am never alone. Sometimes I communicate with
children even if they are far off. The soul is not limited by
distance at all.

Ima: Is the soul alone by itself in Heaven?

Galia: No. It's together with angels.

Ima: When a man comes to this world and completes his
tikun (rectification), does he become a tzaddik?
 

Galia: Ima, it's not like that. Even if he completes his
tilcun, he is not exactly a tzaddik, but a soul which has con-
summated itself. There are souls which have consummated
themselves, but aren't tzaddikim.

Ima: Where will they be in Heaven?

Galia: They will get to enter Gan Eden but they will not be
in the area of the tzaddikim. It's all a matter of the zechus
which each soul has.
 

Ima: You said that in the next world, there is only harmony.
There is no loneliness and isolation. But in the next world
you go on living with the same souls who lived in this world,
since in the end, everyone passes on to the next world. So
how do they suddenly change into such good and pleasant
people?

Galia: Ima, you pass on to live with those who are compat-
ible with the particular soul. Every soul lives with the souls
with which they are compatible. This does not always hap-
pen in this world because this world is for a person's tikun.
 

Ima: Does a person also have a mother and father in the
next world or is it only in this world?

Galia: Ima, in the next world, Hashem is the only father
any of us have. Only in this world is there such a thing as
mother and father. There they are not one's mother and fa-
ther. There they are souls like all of us and there is no dif-
ference. It is just the opposite. Sometimes, the child is
made up of a bigger soul than his father.
 

The Soul and Its Tikun (rectification)
 

Ima: If Heaven tells the soul what it's expected to do in this
world to fulfill its purpose here, and the soul wants to go
ahead and do it, but the body doesn't listen to it  how can
it achieve its tikun, if the body doesn't listen to it?

Galia: Ima, the soul can fulfill its mission because it ma-
nipulates the body. Even if it doesn't control it physically, it
directs its thoughts towards its tikun. Everything comes
from the brain, and the brain tells the body what to do, and
then the body does it. That's how the soul controls the
body and tells it what to do.
 

Ima: What about the brain of a person with mental in-
competence? His brain does not tell its body anything, be-
cause it does not have enough intelligence to tell the body
anything.

Galia: Ima, then its tikun is achieved mainly through its
suffering.

Ima: Galia, is your soul more sensitive that that of a per-
son who is unaware of his soul? Could it be that you've got
a very sensitive soul? You cry when you hear sad things.
Are all souls so sensitive like that?

Galia: Ima, my soul is more sensitive than that of a normal
person and there are other souls like mine which are more
sensitive.

Ima: Is it good to be sensitive or not? Don't sensitive peo-
ple just get hurt?

Galia: Ima, it is good only in Heaven, after life. Then the
spiritually sensitive souls are bigger receptors for experi-
encing the pleasures of the eternal and unlimited. They are
big receptacles for all the divine bounty which awaits us in
our eternal life.

Ima: Who tells you what to say?

Galia: Ima, a bas kol, the voice of Heaven, tells me what
to tell you.
 

Ima: Galia, I wanted to tell you that after I asked someone
for an apology, she rang me up on her own initiative, and
this made me very happy because that's a sign that there is
room for forgiveness in people's hearts.

Galia: I am very happy, Ima. It's forbidden for a person
to have someone who hasn't forgiven him for something,
because in Heaven, he will be put on trial over this. If
everybody forgave him in this world, he is not tried for
this. It's easier for the soul in the court of Heaven when
everyone has forgiven him. Otherwise it suffers a great
deal in Heaven.

Ima: All in all, you live in this world seventy or eighty years.
Could it be that everything you do here is eternal? It seems
to me that life is very short in comparison with all the lim-
itless shefa which you get afterwards for eternity.

Galia: Correct, Ima. This is the kindness which Hashem
shows us and we don't grasp how this short life gives us the
opportunity to have eternal joy.
 

Ima: Is the soul of a dead person allowed to see its relatives
who are alive in this world and assist them? Does it know
what's happening in their lives?
 

Galia: The soul of someone who died can see and find out
everything about its relatives. If it has the zechus (merit), it can help them. It depends on the zechuyos (merits) of the particular soul. But it is not allowed to communicate with them. Sometimes it gets permission to appear in a dream.
 

Ima: What in fact is the yetzer hatov - the good will and
the yetzer hora - the evil will? Could it be that the soul is
made up of two forces, good and evil, and it has to over-
come the evil and act in accordance with the good?
 

Galia: Ima, these are in fact powerful spiritual forces which
everyone has, and during his life, he has to subdue and
overcome the evil in favor of the good. These two forces
vie with each constantly, until the person succeeds in sub-
duing evil or succumbing to it. Obviously, the preferred ob-
jective is to overcome it.
 

Ima: How do you explain the fact that you love all the
Jewish people so much and worry about them as much as
you do?
 

Galia: Ima, I am part of the collective soul of the Jewish people and that is the explanation of my love for the people. If there is something wrong with a part of the body, it affects the whole body. I am part of the soul of the Jewish people and if something has gone wrong, then I am in pain.
 

Ima: How does it come to be that a certain person starts
to think about the world around him and discover the light
and the truth and do teshuva, while it happens to someone
else at a different age and time, if at all? How is it that one
person has the zechus (merit) to do teshuva while someone else doesn't?
 

Galia: That is a zechus which that particular soul has, be it
zechus avos or a zechus from a previous life. For some the
zechus is realized in this world.

Ima: I heard a certain rabbi on the radio who said that a
man comes to this world with the form and appearance
necessary for him to complete his tikun (rectification) in this world.
What's your opinion?

Galia: Ima, a person comes to the world in the form he
needs for the tikun that he has to achieve. He is equipped
and supplied appropriately for his tikun, so he can achieve
it without the hindrance of being disadvantaged. Whether
or not he completes that tikun is entirely up to him.

Ima: Once you told me that you came as a gilgul (reincarnation) to this world just because of me, to get me to do teshuua. If you didn't have to get me to do teshuua, would you not have come in a gilgul?

Galia: I came to the world as a gilgul only because of you,
because I really wanted to get you to do teshuua. I could
have been rectified in Heaven and in Gehinom; I did not
have to come here. But I knew I would succeed with you.
So I was happy to come, and in doing so, in your zechus,
I have succeeded in adding to my zechuyos. That really
gives me delirious pleasure because I have a zechus in
everything you do. Someone who gets a person to do
teshuva gets all his zechuyos too. The souls here rectify
the sum total of the collective and while at the same time
rectifying its own individual soul.

Ima: When the soul gets to Heaven, does it recognize all
its family members who have lived hundreds, even thou-
sands, of years ago?

Galia: Ima, the soul recognizes everyone. The souls recog-
nize everyone from every generation. It's no problem.
Every soul in Heaven identifies everyone and is happy to
meet them.
 

Ima: What happens when a man with the spiritual ability
of a tzaddik comes to the world and goes down a spiritual
level instead of increasing his spiritual level during his life-
time? When he gets to Heaven, do they give him another
opportunity to come here to this world and make good of
the situation in order for him to go up a level again or does
he stay on his low level?
 

Galia: Ima, he can't come back every time. He will then
forever remain at the last level he was at, here in this world.
There is no one who knows whether he will come back to
this world or not. Everyone has to make a maximum effort
as though it's his last time here, because it's possible that it
is his last time here. In Heaven, no one is deprived of any-
thing. It's just painful for the souls who could have done
much more in this world and make do with only a little.

Ima: Galia, you tell me that I succeeded because my sources are in Torah, mitzvos (comandments) and ma'asim tovim (good deeds). That reminds me that Torah, mitzvos and ma'asim tovim is exactly what you came to rectify in this gilgul (reincarnation), because you didn't give your children a proper education in those things. Therefore
since I, due to you, fulfill these mitzvos, is it therefore now
reckoned as though you gave your children a proper edu-
cation in Torah, mitzvos and ma'asim touim?

Galia: My dear mother, that's very true. That's exactly
what my tikun is, that you got to do mitzuos and ma'asim
touim  that which I had failed to impart to my children
in my last gilgul.

Ima: Galia, I don't know how you educated the rest of your
children, but my father, zichrono levracha  who was your
son in your last gilgul, was a tzaddik, honest and decent,
and you yourself said he is in Gan Eden. So in what way
did you not bring up your children properly? Or is it that
they are just strict with tzaddikim?

Galia: Ima, both those views are correct. Hashem is truth
and His judgment is perfect truth and justice. But tzaddikim
are submitted to very exacting judgment based on their ca-
pability because tzadikim have much higher capabilities
than other people.

Ima: What are you allowed to say about your other half?
 

[In Kabala, every soul is divided into two halves and the
halves are sent to the world where they may reunite as
man and wife. Ultimately, they reunite in the next world.]
 

Galia: My other half is waiting for me in Heaven. Ima, no
one lives for eternity and at a certain time I will return to
my place of permanence. There my soul won't feel the
heaviness of material substance. It is there that I will be re-
joined with my other half.
 

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