Build A Foundation of Connection

This is week 6 of a seven-week exploration of the Kabbalah Tree of Life framework. This week we are focused on the sphere of Yesod.

Yesod: A Foundation for Manifesting

The literal translation of Yesod is foundation, but Yesod is about more than a mere physical foundation. Yesod is about foundation in the emotional and spiritual realm: connection, bonding, integration, relationships.

Yesod is seen as a vehicle allowing movement from one thing or condition to another, manifesting the power of connection.

It serves as a transmitter between the sephirot above and the reality below.

Integration

At the sphere of Yesod, we seek to integrate what we’ve received from the spheriot above in order to manifest our ideas and desires in the reality of the earth plane.

Yesod collects and balances the different and opposing energies of Netzach and Hod, which represent our drive to persist through obstacles and our appreciation for what is. It also integrates from Tiferet, which had already collected and weaved together Chesed and Gevurah.

What we integrate at the level of Yesod passes through to the final sphere of Malchut, which is where we achieve sovereignty and manifest on the earthly plane.

Yesod is responsible for the powers of communication, connection and contact with external reality within the soul, unifying the material world of Malkut with the other Sephirot.

Map to the Body

In the body, Yesod maps to the sexual organs, specifically the male organs.

Yesod channels, Malchut receives. The masculine Yesod collects the vital forces of the sephirot above, and transmits these creative and vital energies into the feminine Malchut below.

In turn, it is through Malchut that the earth is able to interact with divinity.

Speech and Sexuality

According to Rabbi Gavriel Goldfeder, Yesod is the realm of both speech and sexuality.

He explains that for the distribution of Yesod to make it to its proper destination, there must be effective communication between the giver and receiver.

The giver awakens in the receiver a desire to receive and the receiver sparks the giver to desire to give.

Practical Application

When we think of foundations in our work, we often think about systems and structures. The invitation at Yesod is to consider our emotional and relational foundations.

Contrary to many popular myths about solopreneurs and the ability to build things alone, nothing lasting gets built alone. We need other people.

Every creation needs a co-creative relationship to bring it into form. Yesod can quite literally speak to reproduction: a sperm and an egg are both required to make a baby. The same principle holds for anything we want to create.

Yesod invites us to focus on collaboration and connection to bring our ideas into form.