Rabbi Simon Jacobson on memory training and more in Cleveland, Gimmel Tammuz 5784

[Music] all and there were different tell that they were actually five certain time we actually have five version sometimes of the same [Music] and later years so there were five people who essentially would write down all the for the afterwards actually wrote most contrast to wrote almost everything was a pric writer wrote hundreds and hundreds of pages published some same thing though they said my M but they usually wrote most of what they said and me there are some exceptions but they left tremendous amount of writing this goes to was the that actually went back like Al besides a few letters I mean letters and some most of his T is oral meaning you spoke it and therefore you needed people to write it down so so the weekday ones were recorded that was easier in a certain way cuz everything was uh saved the recordings it was recorded from day one yeah even though interestingly for the first 10 years or eight years the re really didn't allow them to use recording even did not let them use recordings later they found out there's a recording of everything butel told me many times that they had to write for memory even I was recording Mar recordings but they were recorded officially but um there's a lot of interesting they go back and check their accuracy you can now now they have of course and they're accurate but they're sometimes missing things because not everything was was remembered but they're very accurate in content um there's even you know there's a lot of stories about how recordings when they they didn't understand something so they asked the Reit to listen to a recording but then after 1958 5960 I think that's when the Reb basically changed that they could just use the recordings now mind you writing a recording wasn't easy because you still have to organize it in a structured way U but then shabas and of course there no recordings and no and no notes so here the Kazar came very very prominent so from the day one you know R Khan was a b he came he was on the boat when the pr passed away from Israel he's coming from Israel and he um um the re home to stay here and he became ultimately the the main so I wasn't around I wasn't even born yet so those years he wrote he both remembered and wrote the faans but as the years rolled on became harder and harder it's very hard to keep writing so in the mid 50s early 60s there were different B different different periods that would help either right or the and that's and that's how so the process actual process was like this re would speak I'm talking about shabas now the re would speak and um the whoever was in each period I I I became more involved in the mid6 mid 7s 75 76 is when I started really getting involved so um so and the few people who were able to remember um would obviously do I'll talk later about the process but I mean the way to remember but after shabas they would come together a small group was called Kar 770 and they would review it like maybe 20 30 people would participate maybe more so there was the main reviewers Rabel whoever was his assistant at the time and then people would pipe in you know this one remember this this one remember that this one said it was said earlier said later and then someone would write it all down take notes and then began the process of um writing it down which meant it took a few good few days researching the ideas and then writing it in a full version in most cases or many cases the re did not edit it um some he did edit and even if it's called so it's a version essentially it's the full version of the without the Reb's edits or if the Reb edited it then you have the edits you have't edited there are some that were not edited but the Reb answered questions so there sections of it that were edited by the re not the complete so usually took a good 3 4 days to have the full version so let's say by Wednesday or Thursday it was finished people looked it over it was annotated and usually by Thursday Friday it was Ry those days everything was typed there were no word processors and there were no printer you know it was all typed and then the final version was typed and usually came out Thursday or Friday and then distributed to whoever wanted to get it by mail and that became like the that's how it built unfortunately because it was really done not not officially there are many faans that were lost there are todays we don't know what the re said because the people remembered it never wrote it down there's even faans oddly we don't even know what the name of the miner was like that we know more than my the ALB he said in 1962 63 There are few shab I don't know what the name of the matter I'm sure some one day it'll be discovered maybe if someone left in a diary why were they not written down why they weren't written it was because there was no formal organization it was like Rabel if Rabel was not in a good mood or was not feeling well no it was hard to write and maintain it week after week was a very big challenge um I mean I'm not criticizing I know I know how hard it was later in my years but as the years rolled on more and more bam got involved they wanted to make sure that everything was preserved I would say after um late 60s and 70s in my time already 70 475 there was no fa that was not recorded you see like in ter a lot of the early years there's a lot of well slowly they found because remember people did write personal notes people wrote letters to their families things they heard so you could piece together a lot of them look like when you read through the a lot of them are are like some of them are very much yeah PC and I came on board more or less 7576 at that point it was already more of an organized but it was still B you know b b they're very reliable till until they're not you know and then they get married and once they start dating forget about um you know then they get married and there was always like this period between when one B got married they need a new one to take over and it was never there were no formal transitions remember this was a labor of love it wasn't like whole organization ra raising money actually when I got married in 83 so I was the first one that stayed on after marriage you know we got a guy we got barl Weiss in La he uh he basically paid my salary it was minimal it was like a toal Sal like $250 a week but it was enough for me to to live and um and I continued and that's when it became much more established we started raising money and then that subscriptions remember also this is full length in Yiddish or he is limited how many subscribers are you going to have already a few thousand was maximum you know you didn't have um tens of thousands um but that was the the process then in 1982 you know the PC came out the first PC um actually was a Commodore it wasn't yet uh IBM so we got then 1983 we got the first computers our organization cuz we it wasn't as a gimmick it was like needed a word processor change saved a lot of time because you didn't have to retype things remember typew written if let's say you miss a paragraph what do you do you have to retype it or you have to paste and cut and and it was white out I don't ask it was a nightmare and when the word process came out we literally saved the day of retyping because everything was Consolidated remember I still have in my office that old computer it's like a green screen everything's built in you have a commodor sitting in your office it was called a Northstar wild it actually works you can Boot It Up has big five and a half inch discs I say like a museum piece I four kilobytes of memory at five Meg and it cost $5,000 by the way just one computer and 5,000 for print for wasn't even laser printer it was a that Matrix printer you know it shoots ink for reference that's what they use in ers is that what they serve and then we had a we had to then design Hebrew fonts it was a it was a $20,000 was to get two computers a printer and and design Hebrew fonts and it was but it saved time saved the day and then uh I remember when we grew with the technology I remember when the first fax machine came out in around 85 and that that changed things dramatically by the way because the first time you could send a document that through mail until then if you're living in Cleveland you want to know what the Reb said shabas only way was by phone so you call someone they told you what you know but how much can they say by phone and the document had to wait till it got here by mail so that could be like a week and a half after the fa and Reber had ready another fa facts made immediately possible to fax a document so I remember before there was broadcast facts we would sit someone in the office we started creating a short version of the faan Saturday night so it was right away available but because there was no broadcast someone actually had a sit and feed Page by Page first to we did it in the order of the largest kabad communi kabad was first London was second uh you know each and by the time let's say Sunday night came about around 150 cities got the faxes of this you're saying it took a while to get to Nori yeah still didn't get there W all we know that's why they're so behind Okay um don't know what the re said 30 years ago like the time capsules you know um but we grew technology and the rebba we kept the Reb always a breasted of everything going on and some things even changeed people don't realize once re knew that his message was getting out quickly the rebba started speaking more International that he had not spoken before let's say spoke on shabas about he knew I mean by phone it can get to Israel but in writing once the Reb knew was in writing right away you could see there were things he said that were like I remember once he spoke about the children going them bringing them to the Kil so a lot of these things he wouldn't give directives like that and if I bring in shabas because till it would get there would be after the Yum you know but so there was subtle shifts and um technology I remember I remember I have you ever heard of a BBS a for websites there was a thing called a Bolton board system oh yeah so.org y from cleveland.org um huh d o RS a was he he s my office because he would take we were then creating a short version in Hebrew and Yiddish and English and all kinds of languages and he would put it on a BBS a BBS was an electronic board system basically a bon board system you post a electronic document and people called in and they were able to retrieve it it's not it was it was so primitive compared to today but it was then I remember he used to share with me he say someone in Alaska responded so he was like on top of it and then in '94 interesting right after giml toas is when the internet became public I mean it was already internet for universities and others but 94 I remember because when I wrote to a meaning for life I remember cin told me you got to put an email out address in there I said what's an email address I promise you says electronic mail I said I have enough male I don't need more male he said to me it's the it's the future the wave of the future and so we did it I just did it because he but then I remember there was a comput serve Prodigy and America online I remember we chose um Prodigy because it sounds the best America Online became the most popular one then was you know dialup modems you know PE with a screech like that very slow slow and everything evolved I remember I I I I mean I loved it because I saw technology as being a tool to quick and speed up the distribution and the and the production so for us it was always a uh I think if you look up the record books you'll find is the first one to use broadcast facts in a uh in a public way really yeah because remember companies were not using anything until they saw the develop we actually needed it because people wanted get for bring like a regular company why do they need broadcast facts right they didn't need it yet they didn't know they didn't know what once once it was developed it became with great tool I us was the opposite like we were using anything that would help um spread it and it was really amazing I remember uh the late late 80s we would have like 20 guys sitting Saturday night and Sunday translating into Italian into Persian and you name it Dutch German Russian the of the Reb um and uh I was getting out there this was all pre- internet you know but but bring of the Reb there was not we had no there was no such thing as a smartphone you I I wonder what would have been been by I bringing smartphones you know bringing in the middle of the um obviously FBR would have been then they would broadcast what we called a hookup you know they were video broadcast but it was like television on television what gem did that's where Gem became you know today it's a whole in world I remember when Google first started and then when YouTube was revolutionary big time because until YouTube any video you made cost tremendous amount of money for storage and YouTube just made everybody you know you can put thousands of videos that are completely free I mean people don't realize the value of that they did that now they made plenty of money on it don't worry they didn't lose anything huh that was way later like way post no yeah the you is what is it 19 200 I don't know 20 years 25 years yeah but also everything was slow it didn't like all began bandwidth was much narrower and stuff it changed and uh that was the process so our job was basically from the time the re spoke to document that and publish it and thank God we did the did we did the job you know as far as the actual process which is probably more fascinating so I'll share with you two main tips if I may um you know how do you remember hours and hours of so obviously there's a natural gift that's for sure but there are methods there are methods um I actually started writing an outline for a book called secrets of the mind that I learned from the years I did K because remember there's no one in the world today that is memorizing why would anyone memorize everything is technology shabas is only by us so thing is a recorded a word today that said that people have to memorize but for us remember everybody was in for a thousand years because you couldn't write down all the oral Torah people don't realize that so you all have je inside of you your great grandparents were memorizing until wrot down Mish um so the question is huh they were able to write notes yeah they wrote the rambam said they wrote like they but was tablet didn't have the paper no it wasn't exactly right um but it was B that's t b they memorized they memorized tremendous amounts sacares once said when they first started writing down tablets we talk about etching in you know Stone he said it's the downfall of civilization because people are going to stop using their minds they're going to write everything down this is all before the printing press it wasn't yeah Je when Amazon Amazon gave out the Kindle everyone said Kindle what do you mean he said technology is whatever is invented after you were born so uh bottom line is when the printing press came out everyone thought that's a downfall and when so bottom line is the Reb always believe you use everything and you use your mind to go further with it so the process I suppos to be very brief I mean I've spoken about it many times people think memory is part of the is a is a is a part of is a essentially part of the intellect those if you have a good mind you remember well it's not necessarily the case you'll see people are very smart they don't remember well the people who remember not that smart um so look at who remembers best as a group children the stories you heard songs you know even even learning a language try to teach a 20-year-old ABC from scratch they won't have the patience you know they'll say how do I make money from this already you know or whatever it is children are like a dry sponge their minds absorb everything we adults already have like wet sponges their mind is already developed you have ideas you have perspectives you have opinions you have prejudices you know you have preconceived notions for good or for bad so so who absorbs best a dry sponge so the truth is memory is not about intellect because children have much more less mature excuse me much less mature Minds than adults it's about B in the language of listening to empty your mind and just absorb what's being heard what's being said now I don't want to use the trick question here a lot of people if I asked you how many of you are good listeners I used to try this on different groups it's a trick question because anyone that is a good listener will never say I'm a good listener you know why because you can't say you're a good listener you have to ask your wife if you're a good listener or or your friends how do you know you're a good listener you may think you're a great listener and I remember once I was talking and I said the guy said I'm a great listener and his wife says what you don't not listen to anything you're like completely you know clueless so so listening is the art of B putting aside your thoughts and ideas and hearing something someone else is saying even if you don't like what they're saying even if you disagree with so for us the challenge was could you empty your mind of all your intelligence and just listen to the re like a child absorbing like a dry sponge that is extremely difficult to do especially if you learn it especially if you're smart because the smarter you are the more your mind wants to process the ideas so what I always say is there's like two wheels in the brain is the first wheel is the wheel that absorbs and the second wheel that processes information so I can tell you without question when I was to hear the speak if he speak about an idea that I was familiar with I never remembered as well as an idea I never heard before because as soon as I understood the idea oh I said oh I I know that and you start processing and says oh with that I can answer a question and by the time you really are getting back to the Reby you're busy with your own mind understanding like what what you all doing right now you're all processing you're listening a little but you're mostly processing that's how it is I mean I know I'm Str I know how to so it's very difficult to just listen without processing this is the strange counterintuitive fact the less you understand the better you remember does not make sense right you s trained or you no I trained myself I realize that's the way to go there was no training either you know you I learned it on my own and that was it interesting because I remember like today I remember it so well repeat the whole because the re spoke that idea that I never heard before and the Reb never spoke about it before so when you're speaking everything I heard with you and that's the dry sponge as soon as it's an idea you already know much more difficult listening was smart yeah it's also really emptying yourself total concentration and I can tell you it's transformative because it teaches you how to empathize more you listen to people you hear things that others won't hear because you don't let your mind get in the way you're sitting with someone and having a disagreement tell me how why is it I'm not talking about I'm not getting personalizing or making them fight so if you disagree with someone it's very hard for you to hear their argument because you disagree with them and your mind your ego gets in the way and you're and you're so confident that you know understand you're not open another approach but I can tell you even in like business meetings or brainstorming the healthiest thing is someone brings up an idea even if you're confident it's a great idea it's always good to stretch the idea and say what happens if we did the opposite they'll say why are you doing that because that's how you that's how you really challenge an idea and you come away with the best conclusion so even if it's a great idea it's always good to challenge it and hear a counterargument and that's so you see the gamor is like that look at the gamor someone says something right away the other guy says how do you know and he brings a different proof and he brings in this case and then that case and there's a an exception etc etc so that process this doesn't mean we didn't process he processed later so the real job was to like empty yourself and just be like a clay R it's called like an empty container as much as possible and I can't you can't know not process anything you have to understand a little but not to the point where the Reb would speak and say oh that's so gak it answers a question I had yesterday or it'll help me tomorrow with my speech that's all beautiful but it's not going to help you be a that I could tell you that's good for you using the material and that's most people did you heard the re and say oh I can use this in whatever I need it for the process of remembering however would be very compromised if if you start applying it no you have to listen to it completely unaffected by anything once you get it down on paper today I process a lot you know I learn it I learned things that I myself wrote down now I can process but but but at the time so that's number one I can give you an exercise if you like if you want to guarantee 20% increase in your memory how do you like that you want you want a trick of a trade yeah here's here's the exercise listen to this take any book any safer open it up to any page you like page or two pages the goal is is to read it as many times as you like no time limit and then close the book and write on down on a piece of paper not word for word the flow of the ideas just Express what you just read okay I've done this with at least 5,000 people not in one shot you know small groups of 40 over the years and always the same results it's it's amazing okay so before we start the exercise I tell people so tell me guess give an estimate how well are you going to do if let's say 100% means 100% perfect replic replica of the ideas or zero% is like nothing so most people say around 75 80% that's what most people say which makes sense nobody ever gets 75 80% the first time um and we start the exercise you see right away the guys that think they're the smartest in the room they do it very quickly and they sit down with their hands like this like waiting patiently for the for the slower Minds you know that they think are slower and um and after 15 minutes everybody's pretty much finished I ask everybody pass the book and the notes you wrote to your neighbor and let them evaluate it as I said the evaluation is usually 70% best the interesting is the people who did it fastest and were most like thought they were the smartest are the ones that get the lowest scores to the point there were people who wrote on paper things that contradict what it says in the book that they were supposed to contradict not just they didn't get it and I said to them how'd you do that they said I didn't agree with it I said but that wasn't exercise he didn't even hear what I said he didn't even listen to my instructions doesn't matter whether you agreed it's not about agreeing this is about conveying what it says there it doesn't matter maybe you don't agree with anything who cares didn't instructions they didn't have right they didn't have the B even and I explained what B is and the second time around everybody's scores are 20% better you know why because they've been humbled everybody thinks they're smarter than they think than they really are and they think they'll remember better than they really do and then when you realize n like if you were asked to goaz tonight what I said the last few hours even if you enjoyed it and you liked it and so on I guarantee you it you won't be able to retain not because you didn't hear it not because you didn't appreciate it because it didn't you didn't own it you did not absorb it you heard me speak it but if you wrote notes for example or you reviewed it in your mind like I spoke about before it would be different so we're overconfident usually when it comes to things like this you understand that's why you ever hear you ever hear a talk you really like it and you come home you say you going to tell your wife or you're going to tell some friends and then you start opening your mouth and say I heard something great tell me tell me and you can't even find words so like what's what happened you delusional it wasn't delusional you did hear it you did understand it you never absorbed it's not yours you heard what the person were speaking he understood so so this act exercise is critical because it teaches you it humbles you you realize you're not as good as you think you are and that itself makes you better next time you listen closer so the second time around nobody takes 15 minutes it's at least a half hour everybody takes more time because why why not you have this you have that you're more patient and a lot of it is impatience a little arrogance a little ego and that's the key remembering well and listening well is a real exercise and true ble mean in a good way because it's like you're you're allowing another person to speak you're allowing them to space to speak and and they have it's respect also it's respect now in our case obviously it was the re and we valued what he had to say and we wanted to hear it well you know today A lot of times people come over to me and they tell me something and I'm daydreaming you know and they say Do you hear what I said you know I don't want to tell them so I say can you rephrase it you know can you really meant I didn't listen and then they say they say you're able to remember five hours of the rebish for brain you can't remember five minutes of mind so I don't want to be the one that breaks it on them but they're not I don't hear any history unfolding of what they have to say you know so it's not like that important for me to remember but the Reb spoke it was like mha coming down from and and you're hearing it once if you someone told you in a half hour from now there's going to be the secrets of Life revealed and you can't take notes and no recordings trust me you're going to your adrenaline will go up you'll remember a lot better so that's tip number one tip number two was creating a mental math which was very very hard to do you know let's say someone's driving you somewhere you want to memorize there's no GPS you want to memorize you know where do you make a right where you make a left so what you do is you make look a mental map you say you know by the third corner you make a right by the gas station you make a left and then a right and then a left you know or you go straight for a while and then you have some Landmark or you signpost that you make same thing when the re would speak what I would do is right after the talk when they were singing andan I would review and I actually number real numbers I would say there other spoke 65 points and I would make like you know here these points were straightforward then by Point number five have a Veer to the right so to speak by you know going off on a tangent or I don't mean a negative way but like in a different point and you make a map and then I would go over it again and again and again and sometimes I remembered I remember 65 points but I only can recreate like 40 with the other 25 but at least I knew there were gaps and that way you it helps another thing you have to remember is that you don't remember what was said you remember what you remember what was said you see the difference because memory begins to fade immediately So the faster you make a review and the more you make reviews you're essentially remembering what you remember what you remember what you remember so from the time the reab spoke on shabas till shabas was over I probably went over it five six times and the more you go over it the better it's like a copy of a copy of a copy that's how the mind works because if you let's hear it let's say say 5 hours ago and then you try to recreate it 5 hours later you're going to miss a lot but if you recreate it like say a half hour later and then another half hour later another hour later you get much more you get a bigger picture so there's a lot of work involved let's put it this way don't take it for granted it's not like you just you know people thought just stand I listen to re and I'm like a machine I take recorder no it's constant effort and if you let go one second you know you listen you lose the train of thought the hardest part was often the end of a brain because the mind gets tired because this is exertion I mean it's real ex this is like you know you're really working harder you're constantly working on focusing absorbing like a sponge and then at the end at the end of the F brain and you know you really have to put a lot more effort because you you don't feel physically tired but the mind is like like you know it's been really taxed and was Harden um and uh I remember some brain very difficult was the hardest one because it was very noisy the was like chaos because remember before you know people go on they come back and they're singing and half drunk the rather speaking and people didn't know is our braining going on our cers began I mean it was like the woman show was such annoyed they didn't know what they thought there was dancing going on and the was speaking so like a chicken market and you could the noise was so loud that it was hard to hear I had to move very close I stood like across the river so generally I still 20 ft away but by I would move like literally two three feet in the field re was up on the platform I would move closer I remember Rabel Khan some sometimes point to me and said can't here that didn't make it easier because then I had more pressure you know it was what should I say it was unbelievable it was hard like you can't imagine how difficult it was but it was unbelievable it was like the best of the best you know even Marathon R Runners of best marathon runners ask them last five miles you think it's easy very hard as good as they are because you know you get the it's hard to to keep it up but it was uh I know I think about it now it was like I I it's still a miracle in my mind that we did it still can't believe it you know but we did it people ask me if I can do it nowadays I could if I have to if I feel it's an important thing I'll do it it's it's a m it's a training of knowing how to put aside your thoughts and just getting in listening mode um and uh yeah what should I say could you do it at the same level today as you were able to do back then you think or is it yeah I could I I was once interviewing someone R La actually and I remember I forgot to take a tape recorder and I didn't have not but I just and I turned it on and later he said to me how you remember all you could it's it's obviously the rebba was very compelling Reb was very you know the Reb so it made it much more urgent so yeah I could do it what was the key for back to back to back for bringans to remembering the order and cuz if you're if you're if you're if you're remembering what you remember then you had to write away after the talk they're singing you had to do make that CU if you didn't do that later you'd like know when did he say it not and you could never be overconfident the key was never sometimes I would listen I say oh that's an easy and I said no no no don't say that I'm tell true in life in general you know when you get too too comfortable how many people were doing it at the same time very few could do this on this level Rabel was excellent how many were you that you were able to compare like three four maybe maximum why didn't you have a CL a lot of people helped us you know there were people like he said slug up you say they'll tell you what you said wrong but to do it was not that easy and people over been ask why don't you split it up why don't you this one do half hour this doesn't work that way you have somebody come in as a closer for the last hour no no no no this not no let me put it this way if you can't remember half hour you can't remember five hours you can't remember five you can't remember half hour there nothing to do with it's not remember also the mind is not a hard dis it's not a hard drive we run out of memory you know that's not ever an issue it's about Focus consci to me a big factor was I felt really that if I don't remember it will be lost forever I I had that like feeling so that creates a certain sense you know you're just your adrenaline Tak adrenaline is a big factor here adrenaline is a tremendous factor and it motivated you to do better rather than to get panic man than yeah yeah for sure for sure I felt that for sure I remember end CU that's I wrote since I was writing I knew if I don't really put my energy later is going to be murdered because I'm going to not be able to recreate it and that's like a you know that was like a nightmare scenario it was a challenge it was I mean also you feel like you're making history you're part of History here you're writing down something that will be for I'm like now I look at fa I feel proud I I was part of um you know documenting it forever you look at and say oh I could can you tell like in the way is written published that oh I was part of this one or not of course I know everyone I of course you never forget that it's your handiwork it's like you know it's like a there was a whole train after also there a publish like a every [Laughter] BR take one look oh says yeah that's mine that's the what what what he called I think HEB is a mo and Crites they call the H method you know he sticks they say they s he sticks a hay grow older only have a hay was this was you brown me then you're really in trouble you remember if it was he or Heber cut they call the Heber cut speciically ass no it was clear that anyone was a wanted the document the said told me that the first M bani and the second M they didn't know whether the Reb would write like the other rab did so he actually wanted they all wanted the Reit to right so he didn't write it down so the re asked him what happened why don't you write down the is that how it is that how it started so so he said to the Reb the Reb's going to write it down so the Reb said no why don't you write so he said well the first mare was too complex the second one we said he was like giving excuses and the Reb looked at him he said are you are you all right like did you drink like you know who are you talking to like he was trying to trying to give the Reb excuses said said are you right are you drunk you drink too much you know so realized stopped playing games and he went and wrote it down was like he the re was too complex this said it's funny I know zav had some some involvement in there does in the publishing or also no he was in publishing and Kazar side he was a good writer so he wrote well and he helped R A lot it was a real I was you know now I go back yeah I feel like I don't take it for granted but but now you know you talk about it so which years were the gaps of where we don't have the early 60s 63 64 that's Bale stopped yeah he stopped writing and you know he began writing some of them and didn't continue and no one was really part of his team so no one knew later they found someone found after he passed away they found in one of his jackets they found notes from a bring from 1960 or something so those are accepted those are yeah and and then there were others that wrote like letters back to home so they have they have they've been able to piece together a lot more they found a lot of stuff not everything um but but a lot there's more there's more man they're always they're continuously publishing yeah because there are people that you know the guys like some people didn't want to publicize what they they wrote for themselves didn't feel but today they take it and they try to recreate it it's a yeah fascinating Journey fascinating should I say it's part of it I uh always be part of this history galic I love sharing it I did a thing I don't know if you saw it with Morty dinman they did for bring for one for sure he went he asked me like good three hours gred me about all this you know the whole process it's it's online somewhere oh nice very interesting uh long discussion on the process of all this I mean I covered some of it here but there's always more no it's it's some people I know people anyone interested is fascinating fascinating to the whole process people also don't know behind the scenes how it all you know what was done and how it was done and the re edits okay that that's a whole other world I remember we were so excited when we would get the Reb's edits and we'd study them you know the words the Reb was like a surgeon like with a scalpel you know it's like learning from a master every word new say I learned so many rules in writing and communication the re's like for example sometimes he wanted it to be gray not black or white he wanted to be more ambiguous different thing you know you learn the art of real communication not everything has to be spelled out some things and in general the very a style it was a style the positivity remember the re never would use the word evil or was always now these things are not they're not they're not they're very significant it's a way of thinking you know you don't think in terms of Good and Evil the re never liked the word like in English you say let's say shabas is not just a day of pleasure it's also a day of Joy so that's common not only only or the re would always change it and said addition to he didn't like using not even though not tell me the difference in English between not only and in addition to it's not right it's not putting down it's not putting down so the not was never the re didn't like the word not on anything that was like like to say MOA was not just a teacher he was also a leader you say in addition to being a teacher he was a leader you know things like that and it affects you know how you communicate it's a it's it's it's not just stylistic it's a lot of things like that Reb's edits were tremendous I still you could I can you could do a whole course on it edits he a real editor remember was a real editor you know you could see in the margins he was a publisher he knew how to edit something and you learn a lot you ever get a heads up they ever tell you what in any form what he was going to talk about sometimes he would write to us that he's going to talk about this more chus like we would ask a question and the re would say that he's going to discuss the next sh so we knew he was going to talk about it no there was no heads UPS would that make it harder or easier or harder to to remember though if you knew it was coming no no just I mean we like you know we do sometimes the Rashi that he was going to talk about he announced it and I would prepare by reading the public or because he left you he let no he told Wildman there was a man that the re would say before in the morning shabas morning he would say what rash's going to discuss and we also I prepared by reading the of that week know the more you read of the the Pasha of that week the more better off your yeah you never knew where he's going to go but but would go but you know it's like you had more you know material sometimes it was tremendously helpful sometimes it was not it all depend there's no rules do you have any it was all spontaneous mean bottom lines we were just receiving it like the first uh there was no we didn't have any heads up but the more more when you have experience you know how to listen to the better you know you start seeing them talk about something you you you know how to tune in properly like the first time someone hear the re the first time in their lives they would have to get used to the style I knew the re style you know so that helps tremendously and you got better over the years I got a lot better especially in writing the writing style got better you know you become a better writer what you saying any Theory why the re didn't write Farm like the other ream or I practic Theory not was time he could he could deliver a lot more through speaking than through writing and he was and that's a fact you have thousands thousands of hours that writing I mean not of the time that's my most basic yeah and um and that took you five days to to cover right yeah yeah also I think also I feel sometimes it was also for us like you know I I'm a writer today I'm a speaker because I did it had the re written it all I would never have developed my own writing like this way you know we absorbed the rebba and we're able to write it so we became teachers as a result those that did it so that could have been maybe part of it training us like you know you know causing but who knows exactly I it's a combination the re did write begin writing the Reb's writing style was a lot harder the other RAB like Reb A's writing style is very very flowing very easy to read it's deep stuff but it's easy he has a good signal you know the Reb's writing style is very difficult very condensed you know it can take you hours to figure out a line Reb rashab also easy T is a little harder writing style you know don't talk about the rebber style but but his writing is is very diff his speaking is on the contrary speaking is the opposite very understandable would expand and elaborate and explain but writing was always tougher and help also the re was in excellent order the people there was the you know used when the re was talking was very easy to to stop and listen and say oh I you know I hear what's happening here yeah they say the Reb's father also was a big aor a big speaker who speak for hours but his father also wrote beautifully well the other as good an order asba or they're saying there wasn't there weren't was a tremendous speaker yeah people who heard him he very schach very warm the rebba was not such a dramatic speaker the rebba was more of a clear very Qui but but like as tell the story was like you know the re was not that emotional I mean the times he was but was far more um technical in the way like wasn't as as um charismatic in his speaking you had work hard to understand the re did not make it easy it's not like you know like some speakers they jokes and humor the re was very serious and this stuff you know didn't speak more English what spoke more English it's not his language I mean again speak but why for whom he spoke his language why all the speak in yish they didn't speak in Russian they yish is the language that they they're comfortable with and it's the language of t for Generations that's the language of and the reue people can translate English which we did we did it yeah we did it right away yeah and free translation NE the translators never got paid beautiful we had more of that I I I don't feel anything lacking in that s okay see recording at all D records things for Prosperity yeah one day Prosperity what do you need for it's all recorded no it's fast angle I say the journey I should do it if I had more time I could you take some of the Reb's manuscripts and you can see the whole history how it developed I have actually the Reb's breakfast even sometimes food on the page was eating one don't tell any about it that CU they're going to come and try to try office cuz that's what they're looking for yeah so um we have the Reb would it very interesting shabas sometimes he would read through he didn't write so he would fold the page where he wanted to make an really so he had Pages that's where Cam got it from there's the ones that a shabas he read them and made a fold and then after where got it from and he he could see wherever there's the fold it was very interesting the re wrote in pencil mostly like realated to his pencil because grow is erase and there was a few in pen usually blue pen but green red I have a feel like that did the colors have different meanings when no not maybe in spiritual worlds and practically probably was the pen that was on his table that's fair you know the story of the pencil with the rebba the rebba you know everything he wrote was very he never wrote he wran in back of envelopes on the corner of pages he never want them to waste you're rarely going to see they writes on a blank page it's usually on the back of an envelope or something so um so also the pencil the Reb would use a pencil until it was a nu the secretary RAB Rin his name was um could not stand that the was struggling writing with a pencil like this so one day he just took he just confiscated all those little NS no nothing to be found he also had a sense of humor the re comes to his office he's looking for a pencil none but they all gone so he calls in rash he says or maybe rash was there says what happened to the P start looking with the re they looking looking and then ah it takes out a circus pencil you know big one you know like like for like theot burst out laughing he understood got the message you know those the big ones you know the massive with the bigger RAC yeah you buy for kids like in a carnival in a circus or whatever and the re was laughing and you know then he returned the re he saw the re he just wanted to make the point you don't need I think the even said Gish you know the expression either nothing or all everything all or nothing yeah all or nothing I just heard another story it's not connected but it's very interesting also a sense of humor the B you know would walk the re home right especially later in K so one day they walking and sudden there's a pack of wild dogs on President Street you know there was wild dogs straight dogs and they all got scared BR so like they know what to do but the Rebel's right there anyway the rebel looks at the dogs and the dogs run away so theab turns to the B and says who's protecting home it's a good one right say who's protecting who V that's what said yeah I thought that was a my father told me that back in when it would snow the B would walk the path from 770 to the's house so that you know walking in the snow whatever the take care of that for yeah but some there were times it was very there was I remember very icy in New York you couldn't walk it was like glass you know really icy and there was once who the Reb was walk very to walk they walk closely to the close to the river but I mean he managed but it was a very uh was huge fight I think shabus one morning and M couldn't walk I don't know if you remember those type of streets that's we always know always the coldest day of the year no but I mean you ever walk on these streets when it's like ice and your M can't walk there's no traction a few times walk yeah here too you have that you can have it sure you big snows here when it snows and if you're on the University height side cuz they don't plow anything that's a little bit better than Beachwood how do you really feel cuz they're anti-semites for sure okay I mean that's that's a given it's it's in Ohio after all Beachwood where are we right now Beachwood is Beachwood yeah I believe we're in yeah it's we true so most of the people live you live you live I live in University Heights beach with