Learning With a Young Chosson
At the wedding of the future Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rav Meir was asked to talk in learning with the chosson, and left deeply impressed.
A story ofRav Yehuda Meir Shapiro of Lublinהרב יהודה מאיר בן יעקב שמשון שפיראProfile ›
Chassidim relate that on 14 Kislev 5689 (1928), the wedding of the future Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rav Menachem Mendel Schneerson, took place in Warsaw. Among the guests was Rav Meir Shapiro. The Previous Rebbe asked him to speak in Torah with the young chosson, and Rav Meir turned to him with a simple invitation: "Nu, say something."
The chosson spoke for a long hour, quietly and calmly, while Rav Meir listened and now and then added a short remark. When it ended, Rav Meir turned to the Previous Rebbe and said, "The Rebbe of Lubavitch, you have taken a chosson who is a gaon of the world."
The next day Rav Meir came to the hotel where the chosson was staying and gave him a gift, his sefer of responsa Or HaMeir, with a handwritten dedication. The two closed themselves into a side room for several hours, and Rav Meir came out in great excitement. Decades later the Rebbe recalled that he had looked into the sefer then, and that a teshuvah on a certain Rashi had remained in his memory ever since, and he mentioned the learning with Rav Meir again.
Source: Likkutei Sichos, vol. 11, p. 311 (the Rebbe's recollection of Or HaMeir); the wedding conversation as told by Rav Shmuel Zalmanov in Kfar Chabad, issue 358.
Rav Meir was one of the great minds of his generation, yet he gave a young man an hour of quiet, full attention and only then spoke. Today, in one conversation, hold back your own comment until the other person has finished and you have heard the whole thought. Then say one honest, specific thing you noticed in what they said. People remember being truly heard for years afterward, and often it opens a bond that lasts.