The Morning After The Knowing

I am an educator in Business & Economics. I hold master's and doctorate degrees. Three decades earlier, as a graduate student, while going through a course related to Industrial Psychology, I stumbled upon Factor Analysis. It uses a mathematical technique to quantify emotions such as anger, happiness, etc. Thus, say, for identification as well as measurement of intensity of anger, one may identify telltale factors such as loudness of voice and quickness of speech, reddening of face, unusual use of swear words, flailing of arms, etc. They are all quantifiable and may act as proxy variables regarding this particular emotion. So, I thought about my own community back in the old country, and even here today in the West, that has been able to vastly stave off addictive behavior, depression, suicidal tendencies, etc., yet is unable to follow other don'ts (back in the old country again) such as, not to drive erratically or honk randomly, litter the street wantonly, or rush rather than queue up when seeking a service, etc. So, I was curious why and how is it that my people follow the prohibitions against drinking, gambling, and pre and extra marital relationship, for example, yet fail to follow these other prohibitions? That raised many questions. Mainly, what are the underlying, hidden or overt, spiritual, psychological and social factors or structures that allow this type of sustained, pervasive success over time and space? What receives their voluntary acceptance and cooperation, and guides them so as to be self-corralled? In resolving this puzzle, I realized that maybe I could share this with people of other communities who are being debilitated by addiction of one type or another. As a new citizen, based on my values, I felt I needed to give back something lasting to the host community. Perhaps then my community and I could become true sons and daughters of the soil? Yet my vision was not to seek religious conversion of others, but elucidation of what works, how and why for one faith community. While all of it is emanating from a spiritual domain of a particular variety, it is a part of human heritage. I wanted to be like a doctor who does not care about his patient's faith persuasion. He wants to know about the case history, diagnose the problem and prescribe the best way to recovery. Needlessly to say, I have been questioned by some people of my faith whether individuals who follow my methodology will be successful. After all, they are not only not formally presented the actual faith's identity, much less expected to accept it. Presumably, those who accept the faith have a significantly higher qualitative appreciation. Absent self-selection, all I have is a hollow exercise. Well, all I can do now is to see how the experiment pans out in the long run. Now, fortunately, given the tall order that I have set out for myself and with the very meager resource at my disposal, the advent of the Internet has been Godsend. I was stuck not knowing how to go about until I remembered about China's Ma and his Alibaba - the other Amazon.com. Thus, inspired by yet another eureka moment, I thought, surely I could also try. The service could very well be online, making the service seekers but a click away. So, here I am, and here's Totally Personal Total Choice! View all posts by TPTChoice Team