It seems to go the same way with relationships.  My friends who have lots of really quality relationships also put more time into those although you don’t hear them say that they are not doing so good at them.  I’m not sure if there is a coorolation or if the relationship to money and to relationships are apples and oranges too much.  My hope is that in this blog I am being concerned and taking the time. 

Another study found that people who spent an extra hour a week on the finances tended to have better finances.  This one I think there may be a coorolation with in terms of relationships.  Life pivots on inconcievably subtle moments.  I am just guessing that the person who is doing better is also less depressed and apathetic on a subject and more likely to take the steps neccessary.  With that in mind I also think of the principle of uncertainty that says that when we observe a system the system is changed and that sometimes we can never truly observe it.  When you shine a light on an electron to look at it it moves.  As I blog on this I am curious what the medicognition yeilds  in actuality. 

In summary, as the systems in our lives become increasingly complex to deal with the increasingly complex demand we need to plan plan plan.  Those who have will have more abundantly and those who have not will have less.  In the US we have one of the most complex political systems ever observed on the earth with more lucxuries that bring with them more pitfalls than any humans have known.  This is my opinion.     My intent with this blog is to provide a resourse to facilitate quality thought  on these issues. 

I was at the Indian clinic today for some heart issues I have been having.  I was going to get some follow up on a right bundle branch block that was found on my yearly physical.  The Follow up with a cardiologist is a month out and I have been nervous as hell.  Ironically, this blog is about how we are less and less able to maintain order and peace in our relationships and literally, part of my heart is dead.   The stress of the complexity of dealing with the big picture literally does kill  the heart.  

I was thinking about all the ways that the big picture demands more from us that we are humanly able to handle.  For example, it would’nt kill me to get a job indoors, in a clinic with a little more continuing educaiton and socializing.  I found another spot on my forehead that needs to be biopsied today and I know that in the car the sun is killing me and the traffic is part of the issue with my blood pressure that is killing my heart.  My sister gets upset when things that upset me intern upset my family.  Which only upsets me further for the condescention it portraits.  This in light of the fact that reporting on the bad things for a living doesn’t mean your life isn’t as full of them as the day is long.  

I was telling my nurse that I always thought I would like to die quickly from a heart attack type sudden death but knowing part of your heart has this is different.    Last night I felt this cold chill over me imagining my wife waking up next to a corspe.   One of my high school teachers who I liked and wasn’t that old had a sudden death and her husband just found her cold body next to him.  Honestly, it was kind of a relief when I first got the diagnosis as I always imagine how many ways I might die in humiliation as so many more seem to do now days.  This would be quick, honest and honorable  and I would not ahve the chance to pivot my life in some nuance way down some slippery slope the way lawyers does when they become bad lawyer jokes.  

The down side to knowledge means that you have, as the book of genesis said the knowledge of good and evil.  We are less like the good natured bonobos and more like violent chimps for a reason.  Partly because of choice but largely because of our genetic blueprint.  In the end today I was made to feel better but the cold fact that wee are a part of a bigger current always sits in the back of my mind.  Complacentcy kills and if I am not growing I am dying.  I have felt being the butt of a joke before and know it can happen again. 

When the doctor tells you to stop worrying you have to wonder if the hipocratic oath is completely the best foundation for his work.   I perrcieved him as just a guy earning a living on salary who has been doing it for a long time and has become a little numb and wanting to pacify me.  Maybe he was thinking to first do no harm would me first not to increase the symptom killing my heart with bad news.   I’m not sure how I feel about him ddoing that but I sure as hell wish the news media and american attourneys would take a lesson as they have to sleep in this country we all call home too.  I think they comoditize drama, thus propogating it.  Its human nature to be insecure when you have done the same specialized thing for so long and ahve become dependant on the lifestyle it affords.  

At some point though you need to worry enough to hit the tipping point and get the noise in your tire checked out.   Today Click and Clack were laughing as usual on car talk, and one of them was for once really critisizing the participating listener for not getting the rattle in her wheel fixed as this is the kind of thing that could not only kill you but someone else.  He could’nt believe anyone could live with thhemself for a year with a problem like this.  His brother chided him saying, o yeah, and when are you going to do something about that hair.  Pretty hilarious stuff if you google their picture.  Those guys have it made, I can’t imagine handdling complexity with as much grace.  Only from two mechanic brothers working out of harvard square.  

This is my prescription for the big picture.  We need more guys like Click and Clack not taking themselves so dammbed seriously, laughing their arses off and taking on the bigger issues in a humanistic way.  Another good one is Dave Ramses for finance..  That guy is funny, practical yet still a strait shooter with thoughts that make you mindful of what you need to be.   I have to admit I am not sure how I want to feel about his political views though.  This is toug stuff that has to be thought about though like he said, if you aim at nothing you will hit it easily.  I am getting my stress test and echocardiogram.  I am blogging to help collect my thoughts, revisit them,  vent and not misplace my anxieties as well as rreinforcee inot my long term memory the work that my mind is able to do while doing more mondane things. Maybe like Dave Ramses with his debt crisis I can make the end product that is lemonade from lemons.

I want to start a meetup group on a related topic to the endangered stories theme as well as join on for writing, web page construction etc.    Please email me ideas.  

I am making this point as I was just reading about how we are closer than ever to understanding the coding of our memories. I get excited when reading and congecturing about what could be. A recent study found that when kreb was injected into the amygdala, the emotional center of the brain, of rats with a maze that included shocks they formed emotional reactions of fear and jumped 5 times higher. I want to think that we could manipulate our memories of love to react more in line with our relationship goals.
(Discover Magazine, April 2012).

ABC recently had a cool study on the subject, go to abc.com and look at all shows. The one you want is the oone on how the mind works. One case study demonstrated how when a man was hurt in a car wreck and had no memories of who he or his wife were she, as is common in humans, fell more in love with him. It is very touching and yet again demonstrates another piece of the brain which could potentually be manipulated to help us achieve our relationship goals.

One couple took it upon themselves to have an MRI done before and after a 6 month drive down the pan american highway from Alaska to Chile and see if they were still in love. Three parts of the brain light up with love. There is an emotional attachment portion, a lust portion and a romantic portion which is what we all want to have lit up. I have to admit I doubt mine would actually light up that often. What was interesting was that after seeing pictures of each other right after the wedding during an MRI they both had strong romantic brain activity.

After the trip only the woman had the romantic feelings but she did not drive at all on the trip which I happen to know kills romantic feelings. They were both concerned and made a point to try and spice up their romance a bit and it worked. I want to write a novel in which scientists are able to manipulate the mind for this effect. I can imagine Robin Cook with a dark thriller to remind us how we have to have due process for all these ideas as each new solution brings with it a new problem. Ultimately, I have had this idea for years, the lustier side of me wanting to imagine binding the feelings of lust and creating a culture of free love without the increasing divorce rates. If we could only understand it all better before to see if it would really be worth it.

Today I went to the doctor at a university hospital where I had a limited amount of time to test my ability to know my body and address valid concerns. As I have been scrutinizing my budget lately and been living just at my means I wanted to get this right.

I had a list of issues which I wanted to address and hopefully get addressed better than my regular family practice doctor. I thought I was well armed going into a university hospital where you would expect to get slightly better care. I also had my list of tests offered by the expencive and prestigious Cooper Institute to see if i could get done.

I first spoke with my sister who is always good as a concerned and well informed sounding board. She let me know that there are more and more affordable doctors doing Cooper style physicals. For a moment I felt a pang of guilt that I, had thought of this but had not taken the time to actually call around with my codes to see who would do such a thing. Then I remembereed that I have been doing a decent amount of reading and was making at least a semi-informed choice by going to a university hospital as recommended by Atul Gawande, medical writer for the New York Times.

So the doctor came in and went over my history basically the same as the paperwork you get when you sign in. Quickly I felt like she thought I was a basically healthy young man who saw the glass half empty, because, well she told me that is what she thought. She seemed to rush through the exam and dismissed my Cooper Institute physical checklist saying people often order unnessesary tests. As she wrapped up the exam I was scrambling to remember anything I had not written down and she seemed to be anticipating this and shutting me down.

Fortunately she came back in to tell me something and I was able to remember that I have been experiencing bouts of falling down when I am home alone and overwhelmed by everything on my plate. She did show some concern at this and ordered an ECG real fast which did show that I have right bundle branch block. She ordered a consult with a cardiologist and was gone to her office. I said thanks and she just said, “Bye” with completely flat affect making me wonder what she thought of me. Not that it matters.

She reminds me of the doctor that told a friend of mine that she should take community college courses for her headaches which turned out to be Chiari Malformations. This also reminds me of the salem witch trials and the Texas law enforcmement officials who have put so many people in jail and probably not lost a seconds sleep over it only to be overturned years later by DNA.

This type of stuff is addressed in books like the recent one, Raising the Bar by a Texas attorney. This is what we need to be doing but I still feel less than satisfied that we are actually taking steps dispite our fancy titles and big words. In the US we have 5% of the worlds population but 25 percent of the incarcerated. Land of the Free? Really? I think it is much more just a soundbyte nowadays than was intended by our forefathers who did not foresee our overpopulation issues. We also have the highest divorce rates in the world and are the most letigious country in the world. At what point when we are wrong if ever can we override centuries of hype that we are the best country? I am even sort of scared to post the thought. What does that say?

Overall, as I suggested in my comment on the NPR segment about the book, raising the bar I think the bar has a long way that it needs to be raised. I feel like we need to look at ourself more candidly and be able to ask the hard questions. What if China for its population control does end up being the only country not to default on its loans? Will we still think we are superior then? We imposed big government on native americans in our very creation so are we really that democratic? I hope to get my questions out in the end. http://www.kera.org/2012/04/24/the-lawyers-role-in-society/#dsq-form-area

In the end I feel like we are experiencing an overwhelmed culture in which like the rushed doctor you have to fend for yourself lest their preconcieved ideas and fatigue determine your outcome. What doesn’t kill you just ups your insurance premiums. And as it was said in the classic movie Jaws, we’re gonna need a bigger boat, or planet in this case. At least until we learn to manage our population.

It seems that somehow, deep in our subconscience we are registering and reacting to things in our environment. Maybe the moms are treating their offfspring differently for their attitudes. I have often suspected this of my mom, with all due respect mom if you are reading this. She has all sisters, I have all sisters and my sisters have daughters. It stands to reason that while we enjoy a pretty well balanced ratio of male to female people in the world there is some feedback system going on.

My question is how we can be more sensitive to the long term consequences of these elusive, yet strong influences to what we get out of life. This is especially important when we are trying to avoid turbulence on our lives journey and hoping to achieve continuity. For the Tiger Woods of the world to know if they should be setting such goals would save us immensely in the long run.

In our family the domino effect of one divorce and death of a grandfather seemed especially damaging with far reaching collateral damage which seems to have a compounding interest effect. Once again, maybe the Amish had it right when they decided to separate themselves from even their own neighbors when they decided they had it right. By only being social once a week at church they have ensured that when they are social it is under the guidence of a time proven formula. A good student always respects the fact that they don’t know what they dont know and at least has some idea of what that might be.

In the U.S. we have 5% of the population, yet 25 percent of the incarcerated population, The highest divorce rates in the world and are the most litigious country in the world. This is the bed we are going to have to sleep in guys.

It sort of reminds me of the blood lust of the gladiator days. Humans love to commoditize unfortunate situations. At the same time I was congradulating my sister I was trying to portray my mental conflict on the subject as I would prefer our culture to take on a more therapeutic mindset. When we were talking I brought up that it is kind of a negative world view as in the end someone ends up in the trash with little to no future left. In my mind that is good for no one.

My thought is that someone who addressed the underlying causes of issues would do better with the more humanistic view. As the Green channel from discovery channel proved though there is not the money there. What is interesting in respect to the media world is that being green does not pay the way it does for companies as a whole. NPR sited a study that companies who were more green tended to do better. The thought was not that being green brought more business but that the type people who are green are also more thourough.

Similarly, people who wrote their goals in a study did better with their careers 20 years later in Harvard study. In the ethics course I took last year for my PTA job I learned that more ethical therapists tend to do better over the long haul. This stuff encourages me, I have a poster over my TV that says, character determines success and it has a list of characteristics that I want to aim for. I feel like I have to surround myself more and more with this stuff as corruption, hatred and ugliness seem more and more common.

What bugs me though is that my relationship is not better for all my blogging and that I have not gotten more help with this endevor which I would like to poor my whole self into. Speaking of which, it is late and I have an appointment for my yearly physical tomorrow for which I need to poor my whole self into.

I recently learned that men who have had a rupture or partial rupture of their Achilles tend to be healthy and have no other means of preventing it than working out regularly than just on the weekends.  Especially guys my age 30-50.   This fact made me feel better that I was just watching the event from the sidelines although there were mainly women with me and it did make me feel a little self conscious.  It also felt good to be able to socialize at such an event.  I was telling my buddy Phil who was doing the event how I came to be here because of just such an event.  I would not know him, live in Dallas or probably be a PTA had I not done similar athletic events in the past.

Well over ten years ago I did a run and saw an old high school buddy who was doing really well in such events.   He recommended I get a personal trainer certification from the Cooper Institute just down the street from where I now live on Preston Road in Dallas.  Because I had that certification I was able to get a job at the community college fitness center in Santa Fe New Mexico.   Because I had that job I met one of my best friends and found out about a job as a physical therapy tech which is where I found out about the degree for physical therapy assistants.  Because of the best friend I met at the job I know Phil who invited me to rent a room from him in the Dallas area and here I am full circle signed up for a physical at the Cooper Institute which is now just down the street from me.    It feels a little like gravity with the bigger cities being stars and our more compulsive needy selves being the weight that these places pull upon.

That leads me to my recent major life decision.  Tonight I was sitting in bed eating dinner with my new wife watching “Wild China” on netflix.  As with all nature documentaries there was a beautiful male bird showing off his plumage to a non-descript female and it makes about as much sense to me as modern relationships.  I can remember like it was happening now the night I met my wife Mod at a Thai restaurant.    I remember telling my personal training clients about it and that I did not know what I was doing dating another Asian.   I also remember being somewhat impressed and the confusing feeling when I got home knowing that if I was obsessive about it, this could turn out to be a really  momentous event.  Then feelings of anxiety, which also confused me, wondering if she liked me.

Heisenburgs principle of uncertainty states that we can not observe something without changing it in the observing it.   As with a light shining on an electron causing the electron to move I can not test my chances with this lady by the tone of my telling about our first meeting because I know what to look for and want it to go well so will say positive things either way.   I will say it was nice to be with Phil and Melissa again this weekend and to feel the great sense of possibility in being on such an exciting outing with all the characters out there.  It was equally nice to have a wife text me wondering when I would be home as she was looking forward to having me back.

I have had to wonder lately as I have been on paxil and it has acted as a great pacifier for the lonely nights when I felt I would go out and make mistakes if I did not find the right girl soon.  I spoke with my psychologist about ways to cope with feelings that will arise as I meet women and some of them will be the one in a thousand that I hit it off with and have just the right combination of traits to be a perfect compliment.  I want to know what to do when I have doubts that I could have pacified myself better, waited a little longer and played the odds game a little harder.

I personally think that I want the healthiness that comes with continuity.   I really enjoyed hanging out with my friends again and felt like my compulsiveness may have hindered me.  At the same time I have to realize that you can never change the past no matter how hard you try and I have to recalculate and  navigate from exactly where I am as my GPS does when I am distracted and pass my exit.   I want continuity in my life and if I am like a dog, a creation of modern life unable to live outside in the wild lest a hawk carry me off then I need my roof over my head, and now my paxil and blog/ books etc.  God I hope its enough, subtle choices differences of enormous proportion in hind site.

How many nights I have dreampt about this, last night for example, I dreampt that I had a kid and then it was a dog, both male and wanted them but couldn’t reconcile with the ugly truth that I would never be able to handle the task.  I have had friends yell at me about my choices either to snap me out of my thinking or separate themself from my perceived irrational personality.   My recent thought after watching some informative videos on pediatrics for my job is that there is in fact a period of time when we have neuro plasticity that if we dont allow our neurons to make the needed connections we never will, learn it that is.

A baby for example who is born with a cataract will never learn to see if the cataract is not fixed quickly.  Then the other eye must be covered so that it does not hog all the connections.  Neurology scientists know that there is a six month window for gaining our adult vision capacity in the earliest period of development.  So what is the window for relationship skills learning?  On one hand people who don’t have a little optimism stand no chance to learn.  On the other hand too much optimism leads to “magical thinking” as with people on the schizophrenic spectrum with excessive risk taking and neglecting to take the necessary steps to properly address issues.

See, Science of babies on netflix for the research on learning and vision.

Recently I did an experiment.  .I have been interested in Indian style marriages ever since I learned at their extremely low divorce rates and high satisfaction rates.  To me they seem more ethical, people are set up based on logistics, or bio-data rather than choosing based on chemistry.    I found out about a web site that is a matrimony site rather than a dating site for Indians called Shaadi.com.  Another white author went on the site and set up a profile and had interested suitors so I thought what the heck.  I set up a profile and had a similar experience to when I dated an Indian American for a short time.  I found the women very attractive, intelligent and well educated.  It is also refreshing that the goal is less about recreational dating and more about settling down and having a solid family based on forethought.  Ironically, when I talked to a few of the girls who expressed interest in me I quickly found that they were less interested in what their parents had done and more interested in the American way of courting via chemistry.

Okay, well I have to admit that we are in America and chances are infinitesimal that it will happen any other way here but look at what is happening with divorce rates proportional to love based relationships.  The second girl I spoke with was a doctor and she was interested in meeting for dinner.  I got my hair  cut and an anxious mix of excitement, anticipation and fear of not measuring up.  On the other hand I knew I would have the outlet of this blog in the end and that was comforting.  She was what I expected although not as dressed up as in her photos.  She was professional, attractive, well spoken but very quiet.  I did a lot of the talking, that probably says something for what may have been going on in her head.  It also probably reflects what was going in my head quite a bit.  I have been in a relationship for three years and it has at least for the last year been sort of a cant crap yet cant get off the pot experience.  I know I paint an ugly picture but that is how good I have felt this last year.  A lot of signs of chronic depression are there, lethargy, not interested in things I used to be etc.

Back to the doctor lady, we had some things in common.  Read some of the same books, were of similar build, she seemed agreeable to my take on psychiatry.  She agreed to meet up with me again the next week and I let it go until I got home and had some questions to text her with.  She answered when she could and I felt okay about things.  I was thinking that maybe this would be something worth sticking around for.  I worked up the courage to ask what her 5 year plans were and she simply stated that she wanted to settle down.  Nothing specific, just settle down, and I have had all these ideas of things I would like to try such as travel or a new degree.  I felt conflicted and it probably reflected in my anxious questions via text every time I had a spare moment in my day.  I don’t know if this is something kids of divorced parents do like a PTSD patient but it sure not effective if my results have anything to say about it.

We went for tennis the following Tuesday and played for a short time but quickly she tired of it and said she was cold recommending tea to warm up.  Honestly, the fact that she was younger than me and wanted to do tennis troubled me as it was exactly what my mom and dad did on their first date.  That relationship did little good for the world except for my genius sisters it created.  We had awkward conversation over tea for a while before she said we should go.  I drove her back to her car and she told me to have a nice holiday, meaning not interested.  I am not sure if I was expecting a miracle but I was sure hoping for something like that so I was disappointed.  I texted her a few times the next day having received her message in, “Have a nice holiday” as I’m not interested and finally told her that I wish I knew what she was thinking.  I didn’t really need to ask but she was decent enough to text back the next morning that she wasn’t feeling any chemistry.

I had just told her about my experience sitting next to girls like her in Chemistry that night.  How it felt to see their computers working great and mine being frozen.  Great choice of words, for the second time chemistry was blocking my miracles, my goals, the things I used to lay in bed dreaming of in anticipation.  What is paradoxical about it is that I don’t even believe the whole chemistry thing works.  I mean, this is why I was on the site to begin with.  Don’t get me wrong, I believe in the studies of American relationships such as the, Remember the first time you met test, that can predict how a relationship will end or not end with ninety percent accuracy.  If you respond with mostly positive descriptors, good tidings and visa versa.   Chemistry was the canary in the coal mine now for me on so many levels.  I knew when I couldn’t get it in high school that this could mean no more living in the right neighborhood.  I knew it again when the same thing happened in college chemistry.   I told this girl that physically I have no problem pushing the chemistry forward if that was what I thought worked.  I have done it before.

It did occur to me that maybe she was wondering if I had some kind of equipment issues I wanted to hide.  Okay, that’s a reasonable thought but it does not address the fact that these chemistry based relationships have lead me to my current state.  No, I don’t have any equipment issues.  Girls have loved and wanted me to marry them after sleeping together many times.  It is about that feeling when my mom left and I was suddenly shifted from being driven, cooked for, cleaned for to learning it all on my own and falling through the cracks on some things.  With the luxury home I grew up in and with a housecleaner I really have little to complain about but look how these middle class Indians and Asians are succeeding in taking over our industries with their more solid family structures and grittier work ethics.  Something is not working.

I hope that they do not find their American dream as my family has found it, I hope I’m wrong but I have very little faith in chemistry any more.  I feel like I wrote this whole thing much more succinctly last night and just as I was bringing it to a close my ipad went blank.  It was nuts.  I lost it all and wanted to break the thing.  I wondered if I had finally stumbled upon some of my answers with the perfect circumstances and things I have been reading and the happiness gremlins were shutting me down.  In the end, I am still keeping my fingers crossed that I find the perfect medium between my American circumstances and knowledge so say a prayer for me and thanks for reading.

The word “Ethics” comes from the Greek word ETHOS (character)and the latin word mores (customs). When I think of character I think of the human genome and all the idiosyncracies we get with their unique idiosyncracies. We all have our strengths and weaknesses but like the shoulder joint with all its freedom there are areas of lack of integrity. There’s a trade of integrity for freedom in other words. The characteristics that make us mobile make us suseptible to injury. It is so important to be able to take an inventory of our strengths and weaknesses and how they play out in our lives. I don’t think we can ever do it enough, and don’t.

The way I think it relates to relationships iis very ambiguous and poorly understood at this point in history. I think people got it better in the past, hence the title of my blog. I think the people who get it best now are those who still maintain the most traditional of values. I.E. India Indians have the lowest divorce rate that I know of for any culture. The reason I think it works is that they know that it is mostly about logistics and that the body will do the bonding part. With that mentality we don’t focus on shopping but on the miricle of a couple that are able to withstand trials and stay together over time.

In the Utilitarianism sense I think that we have to think about what we are doing more than ever. If you think about it, it is getting more complicated by the day as technology pushes forward. Now, with the click of a mouse we can look at thousands of eligible people all available to us while we sit in the privacy of our home. Surely, there is one better than the one you found on there but at some point we have to consider the value of continuity. Utilitariansim by Jeremy Bentham and John Stewart mill measers the pleasure or happiness, providing the greatest good to the greatest number of people.

The most obvious value of continuity in a relationship is the one that caused evolution to select for those with bonding hormones. It ensures that the kids have the care needed to survive. I don’t think we have that now. I don’t think I had it at 15 with very little supervision. People are really adults when they are 25. Insurance companies know it as rates go down significantly after 25. Marriage counselors know it as couples who marry after the age of 25. Physical therapists and Surgions know it as the epiphiseal plates of bones don’t completely fuse until age 25. We have it all wrong, ages for voting etc. should be older and we should not let our kids leave until later in my opinion.

One question that has plagued me since knowing that a couple who has slept together or lived together before marriage is, Is it better to break it off once you could’nt wait? I mean if I am utilitarian then I guess if the next relationship proves to have more integrity and less impulsiveness then maybe the dynamics are more stable over all. Then I go back and think about the studies of people who had more than 10 partners and were so many more times likely to have sexual disorders. The analogy of the bond being like tape which looses its stickyness the more times it is ripped from and placed on a new piece of skin comes to mind. Damned it, it is confounding.

In Social Contract theory by Thomas Hobbes, it is thought that people come together to create societies. With this mindset you might think of the girlfriend you bring home for Christmas for a couple years who your family gets to know and see for their good attributes. The continuity and knowledge build something solid and productive. The sister who has come to love the girlfriend might be upset when for the sake of no premarital sex you cut it off. Something is lost and it is impossible to quantify and it is upsetting.

His theory of social contract ethics is based upon the thought that people are basically self interested. My understanding of it as it relates to ethics in relationships are that we have to have a contract lest we all have unstable flings constantly.

Deontological or Duty theory emphasizes the mindset. I.E. The shoppers mentality is wrong because there is always something better. In the interest of keeping this interesting I am keeping a mindset of issues of gravity and leaving some ethical principles out. Mainly those that seem superphilous to me or sound too textbook and will put people to sleep.

The Natural Law theory is interesting in that it kind of goes against what I was saying about there always being someone better. Under the natural law theory the person does what is best for them. Therefore it is immoral not to go with the person with the more stable emotional mindset and income. Ariistotle and Thomas Aquinas believed that all natural things have an algorythm which is there to play out the best outcome for the individual. Therefore that algorythm must be allowed to play out.

Virtue ethics seems to me to be redundant of other things I have stated with virtues, either learned or inherent leading to happiness. I suppose I believe in this because on my bedroom wall I have a poster that says, Characcter Determines Success. It lists a series of virtues/characteristics such as Autonomy, Beneficence, Confidentiality. I keep it there as I believe the more I look at it the more I enbody these traits if only a little.

In the end the questions we have to ask are.

1. Is it legal, usually, if something is illegal it is unethical but sometimes in ones best effort to do what is right they slip on rules. I have done so and turned myself in only to be injured personally and professionally. In the end I do not think that it was the best thing for society as I am someone focused on the health of the system as my primary goal in life. A friend of mine said it best that a normal person does his best to correct the mistake and not injure himself so that it is harder to have the kind of integrity needed in the future.

2. Is it Ethical. Honestly, if by US standards something is unethical it must be because we have some funky standards in my opinion. One has to look at the standards of the time and place. I envy those born into traditional Indian or Amish families personally.

3. Is it fair? This is a highly subjective question and I sometimes think how unfair it is that that person perfect to help me have the most integrity is out there but we don’t know each other. I thought it today, imagine the doctor or engeneer with the exact skills personally and professionaly to compplement yours. They are there. That is my idea of fair so how can I sayy. This one bugs me because I have to weigh how a relationship is effecting my ability to be the best guy I can and the feelings of the other.

4. Would you want others to know of your decision? I can think of a couple things I have regretted so much I would’nt want to talk about it as I am sure everyone can. It is a good tool to think abotu before doing something. Sometimes the media makes light of things that in reality would not be as accepted. The Show, House, on Fox does it and personally I think leagalizing media coorporations having political positions does it. It causes and escalation of words. They make light of saying things which I could never get away with both in their sit coms and on the news and I personnally regret it for them.

In the end my questions remain burning in my mind. Is it worse for me to go on with the American style courtship or should I take advantage of sites such as Shaadi for Indian style courtships. Which creates the most stability in the end. Is it worse to have a medical license which can be lost distroying my hard earned reputation for caring or to not have it and pursue something like writing? Writing or working at a wellness center does not have the gravity of consequences and instead highlights my better nature in a way I don’t have to worry so much with. Is that burdon worth the benefits..

Right now I don’t feel like it professionaly and am not sure how tto feel relationship wise. It is all so relative, depressingly so. No good deed goes un punished and as things become more complicated people become more faceless and easy to kick to the curb and never see again. One can do their best and fall through the cracks. For this reason I personally think each person is most ethical when thinking on Natural Law Theory. It encompasses everything else when properly considered.