Should one  follow signs?  I generally do. This was mentioned by Reb Nachman as being a lower level of awareness, but even so it has validity. But one can get too involved in it. When the Dark Side notices one is following signs, then it begins to send signs of its own.
It works better when it is spontaneous--that is when one is not looking, and then out of the blue comes some sign. A friend of mine Moshe, suggested that signs are the result of the higher realms of reality sending messages into this realm.  A lot depend on what god one is following.

Guaranteed income? Who will pay for it? You,

Briefly, the reason is that hypothetical thought experiments  provide a way of mentally isolating a causal, explanatory, or logical factor for examination on its own which normally, in the real world, cannot be isolated, and to do so while still discussing a concrete situation.

 David Hume once came up with this thought experiment: suppose that in the middle of the night, the  money in everyone's wallet, safe, or other stash, suddenly doubled in quantity - so there is twice as much money, but no other changes are made. Would the country then suddenly be enormously better off - would we all be twice as wealthy as we are now? No, in fact we would have exactly the same amount of wealth as we presently do, for there would be exactly the same amount of capital around, and the same availability of labor. (Everyone could then double their prices.) What this shows is that increases in the money supply do not translate to increased wealth; it can also be used to explain why increases in the money supply cause inflation.

Of course, such a scenario is impossible: all our money cannot magically double in quantity. But that is not the point. The reason the thought experiment is useful is that this way of thinking of it enables you to mentally isolate just the one factor desired for consideration: the quantity of money. We imagine just the quantity of money changed and nothing else. In the real world, one cannot do this. In the real world, it is not possible to change the money supply uniformly (i.e. increasing everyone's money, without redistribution) and it is impossible to change the money supply without affecting the economy in some other way at the same time. So I cannot cite a historical case in which nothing but the money supply was altered. This is why thought experiments are useful.

The fact the the big "Trusts" come up with studies saying the opposite is that they have been pro communism for  along time.

In the Torah there is a command to obey and respect one's parents. And in the Shema we find the specific command of learning and teaching Torah to be from father to son. Teachers of Torah get no respect in Torah.

When a  doubt arises in a specific law there is  a command to go to the Sanhedrin to decide how to apply the law. That is; the court of three; and if they do not know, then the local court of 23; and if they do not know, then the supreme court of 71. [That is the authority of parents is basically what they say you must unless it against something else the Torah says. The authority of the Sanhedrin is only in specific cases that come to court because how to apply the law is in doubt.]

Teachers of Torah have  a few things going against them. (1) The prohibition of taking a salary of money in order to teach Torah.  (2) The prohibition of taking a salary of money to learn Torah.
(3) There is no semicha [ordination] ever since the middle of the Talmudic period. (4) Willful lying about all three of the above mentioned items.

But if you look at the general picture of religious abuse it seems to me that the whole problem if really just part of  a larger problem; the fact that the Sitra Achra [Dark Side] uses religious teachers to destroy people's moral values (and sense of reason).
Thus the best idea is to learn Torah at home, along with the few other subjects recommended by the Rambam and the Gra, "the seven wisdoms,"  Physics and Metaphysics. [I mean the Gra said to learn the seven wisdoms and the Rambam wrote that one should learn Physics and Metaphysics.]

How do you find a teacher that will not cause more damage than benefit?

There was a discussion in ancient Athens about if it is worthwhile to train one's children how to fight in armor. Socrates and two distinguished generals and two fathers went to a demonstration of how to do this. One of the generals said that he had seen the fellow doing the demonstration in an actual battle and he had shown himself to be  a perfect coward and incompetent. [See the book of Plato called Laches]

This brings out the more modern question should one send his teach his children to teachers to learn .. meditation? Torah? survival skills? How can one tell what they might pick up?

Even if you have a good idea what to teach your children, how do you pick find competent teachers?
How do you find a teacher that will not cause more damage than benefit?

There is also the trouble of how to avoid criticizing some teacher who very well might be a trickster, but one who still your children get benefit from?
Sometimes one cult is a good way to escape from a worse cult.

  I see this world as a battle ground between good and evil in each area of value. So even if one area of value is good, still the most famous teachers are more than likely to be damaging to that area.

Mainly I am referring here to teachers of Zen and other forms of Eastern religions. My impression is they do not add much good to people's character. But my comments could just as well apply to the religious Jewish world.

I should add that thanks to God I usually was guided in such a way as I almost always had great teachers. Beverly Hills High School, then Shar Yashuv in Rav Freifeld's yeshiva and then the Mir in NY. the best ones were Mr Smart the music teacher. Naphtali Yeagert the rosh yeshiva in Far Rockaway and Reb Shmuel Berenbaum the rosh yeshiva of the Mir.

Lashon Hara/slander

I noticed that when people divorce they often tend to say something negative about their former spouse.This brings up the subject of Lashon Hara [which means saying something critical about someone else].

This subject was very much in the consciousness of most people at the Mir Yeshiva in NY when I was there. It was not a part of the official sessions but there was a grandson of Rav Avigdor Miller  who started a kind of mini-session every day after the morning prayer.
One question that was brought up the was about the law of באפי תלתא in front of three. That is  the law that if lashon hara has been said in front of three people, one can spread it even further because it is already considered to be known publicly. The problem is the person that is asking the question is one of the three. So just tell him "No" and then there will not be three people spreading the lashon hara.

I mentioned to Shimon Buso that often this prohibition is used to protect corrupt people in authority. And he answered me that without learning the Chafetz Chaim, then the whole issue is הפקר a free for all. That is unless people learn the laws about lashon hara then they usually are not even aware that what they say might be lashon hara.
Rav Israel Abuchatziera had only one picture in his home, that of the Chafetz Chaim. No one knows why. But it is possible to speculate that it was a combination of respect along with the reminder to be careful about lashon hara.

On the other hand you are suppose to warn others of possible dangers about fraudsters and crooks and cults. The Na Nach group assumes all religious teachers are fraudsters until proven otherwise. It certainly seems true to me that they have  a good point. [But to me it seems that the real problem is the religious world follows social norms that are opposite to everything the Torah says. What Na Nach say however is true that the main problem starts with the teachers. There seems to be some aspect of the Dark Side that takes over their personalities. The issue was brought up by Reb Nachman who discussed מפורסמים של שקר charismatic evil teachers. But Reb Israel Odessar shortened it to "מפורסם= שקר" once a teachers is famous, then you already know he is false.

Some people in order to lend to their ideas the appearance of divine authority adopt the same device as Zoroaster and Mohammed.
Mani did this having discovered a cave through which there ran a stream of water, he laid up in it a store of provisions, and retired there for a year, giving out that he was on a visit to heaven.  In this retirement he produced his book a work  the ingenuity of which has been greatly praised.

This is common nowadays in the Jewish world. People do not claim to visit heaven physically but they do claim to have gone there in spirit and to bring back their particular configuration of confused ideas. [Instead of trying to nullify the laws of the Torah they make them irrelevant or secondary to their new revelations.]

The particular problem with this is that in the Law of Moses it is stated there will never be  a new Law from God. Sinai was a one time event. [Prophecy is not to bring new teachings nor new interpretations of the Torah]. [Deuteronomy 29:29]

Nowadays it is easier to claim divine revelation since one does not have to go into a cave for a year to do so. But one has to make sure that his disciples are the ones that claim it openly, not himself. It is fairly easy in the West but harder in India where people are used to charlatans and give them tests to see if they are real. In the West all one needs is one or two gullible disciples to get the ball rolling.

Besides all that, a prophecy to add or subtract any commandment in the Torah gives the prophet the category of a false prophet [Deuteronomy 13].

I recall Allan Bloom [in the closing of the American Mind] brought the idea that the social studies departments and humanities at USA universities were mainly postmodern nonsense.

My basic feeling is to go through the basic ABC's from beginning to end. That is to have one session in the Written Law, one session in the Oral Law starting with the Mishna  and getting up to the Avi Ezri of Rav Shach. Then one session in Physics and another in Math. Though the Rambam emphasize both Physics an Metaphysics I would hold off on Metaphysics until I had finished Shas and Physics.

The teachers of Postmodern stuff and PC and pseudo Torah I recommend shooting.



[In short the  major ideas about learning I want to introduce are these (1) דרך גירסה the path of just saying the words in order and then going on with no review until one has finished the book. (2) שיעורין כסדרן sessions in order. That is to have separate sessions  each day in all the major subjects. That is to learn them in order. (3) To learn the Written Law  (the Old Testament), whole Oral Law in order,  the two Talmuds and all the midrashim; Physics, Metaphysics ]