דֶער אַלטעֶר רֶבִּי האָט געזאָגט אוֹיף ר' מׂשֶׁה וִוילעֶנקעֶר: מׂשֶׁה האָט מוׂחִין דְגַדְלוּת, אוּן אִין דִי צעֶן יאָר וואָס עֶר האָט געֶהאָרעֶוועֶט, האָט עֶר אוֹיסְגעֶהאָרעֶוועֶט מוֹחִין רְחָבִים.

דְרַיי יאָר האָט ר' מֹשֶׁה ווִילעֶנקעֶר זִיךְ מֵכִין געֶוועֶן צוּ יְחִידוּת בּאַם אַלטעֶן רֶבִּי'ן, אוּן נאָכדעֶם אִיז עֶר געֶבּלִיבּעֶן זִיבּעֶן יאָר אִין לִיאָזְנאָ אוֹיף בְּרֵיינגעֶן דִי יְחִידוּת אִין עֲבוֹדָה בְּפוֹעַל.

The Alter Rebbe once said of his disciple, R. Moshe Vilenker: “Moshe has mochin degadlus [i.e., an expanded intellectual consciousness].1 In the ten years that he labored [as described below], he developed an expansive mind.”

For three years R. Moshe Vilenker prepared himself for yechidus with the Alter Rebbe, and remained in Liozna seven more years in order to ground that yechidus in actual practice.2

A Pearl to Cherish

Our society is built on instant gratification. Everything happens fast, and results must be immediate. Master thinkers do not operate in this fashion. They act slowly, deliberately, undisturbed that things may take time. As a result, the changes they effect in their lives are far more significant and longer lasting.

The primary tool to achieve this is meditation on Chassidus, both before and during davenen. As the Rebbe Rayatz explains, a chassid proceeds gradually, step by step, from the prolonged and orderly cerebral contemplation3 of a spiritual conceptto its ideal full flowering, at which moment he comes to sense a gefihl — a subtle insight, an intuitive illumination.4 Finally, the Rebbe Rayatz highlights the deliberateness spoken of above: “Poised on the threshold leading from the chamber of understanding to the chamber of gefihl, the moment of transfer from one to the other is characterized in the thinker5 by three states of being — silence, waiting, and hoping.”6