I thought to mention that getting the right kind of orientation right away in the morning seems like a good idea to me. So to start the day with one of the classical books of Ethics like Obligations of the Heart [חובות לבבות] or any other of the books of Musar seems important to me. [That is the Mesilat Yesharim, Gates of Repentance, Ways of the Righteous etc.]
This is what I try to do myself in order to get my mind set straight right at the beginning of the day.

F Major  [V53 in nwc]

A Major  [V54 nwc]

V-55 G Minor  [V55]

Making people religious amounts to making them wicked

In the religious world there is nothing so highly valued as making other people religious. The trouble with that is that making others religious usually amounts to making them wicked. They abandon the good lessons they learned from their parents  and lose all respect for their parents and teachers and accept some idiot as their idol. [You do not need me to notice this. It is a famous and well known fact. No one becomes religious and gains in good character. These are two polar opposites.]

They will have to spend a life time doing "תשובה על תשובה" repenting on their repentance.

[On the other hand there are parents who do not deserve respect. ]

That is to say there is a hierarchy of values in Torah. Making people religious means ignoring what is essential in Torah and making up new values which are contrary to Torah and pretending as if that is authentic Torah.
The basic problem is the result of the religious world being essentially black, dark and in the total control of the Sitra Achra.

[It is a  good thing to be מזכה את הרבים--bring merit to the many--but to make people religious brings sin to the many, not merit.]
Just to be clear: One is suppose to keep Torah, but that has nothing to do with the religious world except in so far as if you do everything the exact opposite of them, you are on the right track.

Litvak Yeshiva World

One of the great things about the Litvak Yeshiva world is the emphasis on  a  few basic points. Not to speak lashon hara, to be very careful about monetary issues--to never touch that which does not belong to you, and above all --to learn Torah which is in itself the highest commandment and brings one to fulfill all the rest of the commandments.
Add to this the musar ideal of Rav Israel Slanter of trying to gain Fear of God and good traits, and you have  a very potent combination.

The system does not however work for just anyone. And I myself have encountered people, not just on the Litvak path, but even founders of famous kollels that leave a lot to be desired when it comes to being decent people.

My reaction to this is to try an concentrate on areas where I know I need to repent. I figure that in spite of everything, what ever I or anyone has suffered must be connected in some way to my own faults.
And finding my own faults was easy. It was easy to identify areas that I messed up.  This is brought in the words of the sages when a person sees problems coming on him, he should check out his own deeds. If he finds nothing he should know it is from Bitul Torah.[Bitul Torah is a sin. It means not learning Torah when you can.]

But nowadays it is hard to go through the entire Oral and Written Law as one is required. We live in the fast food age. To go through even one Tosphot thoroughly is like eating raw steak. You have to chew and chew until you get something. But learning Rav Shach's Avi Ezri is like going to Mconald's. You get the same calories and even more with the least amount of effort.

Can God create something that is not God?

I rarely have a chance to write so just a quick question --Can God create something that is not God?
I would say of course. That is the whole point of the Torah as Saadia Gaon and the Rambam make clear. So to me it seems the signature of the Gra on letter of excommunication was justified even if it had been about this one point. All the more so that time has shown the Gra to be 100% correct anyway.

For that reason it makes sense to avoid the religious world which ignores the Gra. Because they ignore the  Gra they have been basically taken over by the Sitra Achra.

[Rav Nahman I consider to be a separate issue and in fact he noted the exact same problems that the Gra was referring to. You can see hints of his in all his books but even more openly in the "השמטות"[left out parts] of Rav Shmuel Horwitz that was published by the Na Nach group. [I mean that he found original early editions of the חיי מוהר''ן  that contained Rav Nahman's views that later people decided were not politically correct.]

Since the religious world nowadays is insane the best thing to do is to learn Torah at home.[The main point of the religious world is to make a show of their religiosity in order to get money from secular Jews as the Obligations of the Heart חובות לבבות points out


[In any case the fact of Creation Ex Nihilo is stated openly in all books of the Rishonim.  But why argue with the Sitra Achra [dark side]anyway? Those that know the truth, already know.]

Repeating every paragraph twice helps to learn.

I have found that repeating every paragraph twice helps me to learn. I discovered this in my first year in Shar Yashuv yeshiva in NY. I had heard of the idea of just saying the words and going on but also in Shar Yashuv the idea of review was emphasized by Rav Freifled an his son Motti. So I arrived on this compromise. This idea also helped me later in the Mir where in depth learning was emphasized but i felt i needed to make progress. [That was in learning Gemara Hulin, Ketuboth and Yevamot.]]

This also helped me when I began to learn Physics and Mathematics.


[I have gone back and forth on this over time but this idea of doing a small amount of review and then going on seems to work best for me.]


[For some time in University I did this kind of review because I needed to pass the tests. But later I began just to say the words and go on. Nowadays I am thinking this method of minimal review makes the most sense for me. ]

[The way I originally learned Gemara was with the Soncino English-- paragraph by paragraph-with the Aramaic then English and then Aramaic. [But even then I was doing Tosphot and Maharsha] That is how I as doing Gemara in NY.  That is to say in the Mir people were way above my level. But still for some reason Rav Shmuel Berenbaum felt I could learn well enough to accept me. In any case I found that repeating each section of Gemara twice was good for me to be able to make progress but also to get the basic idea.

Later when learning with David Bronson, I saw his way of sticking on every single word of Tosphot until he would understand. And then I started seeing the same kind of learning that Rav Naftai Yeagger was doing in Far Rockaway--totally different than the path of the Mir and Rav Haim of Brisk. At that point I started this thing of reviewing each page of Gemara a whole lot of times and that is how I started writing those two books of chidushim [news ideas] on Gemara

The Musar Movement of Rav Israel Salanter

The only way that I know of to correct my own faults is to find a place in the books of Ethics (Musar) which discuss that particular fault and to say it to myself every day when I get up in the morning. This has some relation to the Musar Movement of Rav Israel Salanter in which he said that the only way to correct one's faults is by learning Musar. But I found that for me the only thing that seems effective is to do it right away in the morning.

There are faults that I have no idea how to correct, but this method seems to be the most effective for the few that I know about.

For example: In the Madragat HaAdam of the school of Navardok it is brought the statement of the Gra about trust in God. In the Nefesh HaHaim of rav Haim from Voloshin is brought a few statements about accepting the yoke of Torah an another one about judging people on the scales of merit.

I try to say them every day. But still I am aware they might be be that relevant to other faults I have of things I really need to correct. But I figure at it is a start.