Inga Rhonda King: Publisher on SVG

Enigma of Answered Prayer: Journey to Writing, Publishing, and Building Communites of Practice
by Inga Rhonda King
January 6, 2010, 11:31 am

Falling in Love with Wisdom: American Philosophers Talk About Their Calling edited by Karnos and Shoemaker profoundly influenced my life; it introduced me to myself and to kindred spirits. Synchronizing belief and behavior or acting in accordance with the truths one has acquired along the way is much easier said than done. So, I continued to be curious of the mindless busyness around me, which appeared (to me) to yield very little.

Although I never became fully engaged in the so-called 'rat race,' I was not quite able to escape it completely either. I took up residence in no man's land. The late Milton Friedman, the 1976 Nobel Laureate in Economics, said that "Only a crisis, actual or perceived, produces real change." Luckily, so it was with me. My crisis was a diagnosis of cancer which gave me the courage to change course entirely, thus beginning the new journey of consciously trying to live more closely in tune with my core beliefs.

I was born in Curacao, Netherland Antilles, I grew up in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and I have lived and worked in several Caribbean islands, the United States of America and China. I possess a strong background in pure and applied mathematics (and chemistry); I was also trained in the language of business and I have assisted companies, for more than twenty years, to maximize profitability while adhering to Federal and State laws and regulations. I started my professional life as a staff accountant with an accounting firm, later I moved into private industry at first specializing in management accounting and financial management before focusing almost exclusively on treasury management. Teaching mathematics along the way, I worked primarily with medium-sized firms where I was consistently able to facilitate significant expansions and increase effectiveness and profitability.

My forte is recognizing patterns and diagnosing problems thereby enabling turnarounds. Over time, this strength began to show up beyond the boundaries of organic chemistry, business and my students' fear of mathematics. I became less and less interested in designing, analyzing or fixing systems for organizations and more and more interested in changing mindsets or rather, altering the systems in people's minds and designing methods for unlocking insights. Understanding how we receive information or how we think and why we think the way we do is paramount to the success of any endeavor and the creation of the good life.

Systems or companies are as effective as the people who work in them. Today, I believe people are ailing. Contemporary culture is plagued by the passion to possess – "more is better" is the prevailing philosophy. We are constantly being told what to do and how to think – the market place is crowded with things to buy and things to do; opinions about what to buy, what to do and why; images of how to look and how to be. The complexity of rushing to achieve and accumulate more and more overwhelms us. The result: much of our producing is of a non productive sort, we are less collected, more reactive, true happiness and peace of mind elude.
Why, then, am I choosing to enter an already overcrowded and over-communicated market place?

Because I believe it is our urgent duty to rouse ourselves to fresh reflection about what is worthwhile and what is not. But now, these reflections must be grounded in better critical thinking capacities. I would like to see people awaken and become more conscious and better equipped to navigate this crowded field of moving targets and make better choices in building real prosperity. Real prosperity, for me, means wholeness – prosperous lives are lives that are not only financially secure but peaceful and serene as well. So I have embarked upon the task of making critical reflection fashionable and building communities of practice.

More than twenty years in the world of business, some ten, concentric years of teaching mathematics, experiences from living in many places, sojourns amongst different cultures and peoples, much bewilderment and many missteps preceded the creation of Strategy Forum Inc, a small village of thinkers and a Caribbean publishing hut, established in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines in 2006. I created the SFI label which stands for Strategy, Forethought and Insight. Under this label a weekly journal (The Little Caribbean Journal of Ideas) is circulated to approximately 2500 people. I like to think of it as oasis in cyberspace serving a broad spectrum of people. I created this oasis to deal specifically with the nature of strategy and strategic thinking as it relates to the various aspects of our day-to-day lives and promote an environment which encourages critical reflection. But what makes it different is this: we stay away from establishment or institutional jargon and stay close to photography, art and real life stories, circumstances and conditions. In 2009 I launched SFI Books which endeavors to link authorship, entrepreneurship and social movement.

My health crisis has ended and so has my ambivalence. My position is now clear: know your core values and what you believe, live in accordance with them, insist on your freedom to change those beliefs, be aligned with a cause greater than yourself then you shall know peace. However, I am not naive enough to believe that I can negotiate the twists and turns of day-to-day living without sound critical and strategic thinking skills. Thinking critically and strategically are imperatives in the quest for peace and prosperity in this modern epoch.

“SFI recognizes that the global society is also a visual society, where people must be stimulated visually if the message is to be transmitted successfully. The aesthetic appeal of books published under the SFI label is therefore key in their creation; design becomes as critical to conveying the message as the medium itself. Under the SFI label, each book remains a work of art while being a conduit for sharing valuable information and insight, using fiction and non fiction alike.

Working on a shoestring budget and buoyed by a compelling vision, SFI is not deterred by these limitations but uses innovative business practices and the best technology available to create timely products that achieve the objective—to create printed works of art that are tools for engaging the world and building communities of practice.”

Web Sites:
The SFI Book: www.thesfibook.com (www.sfibooks.com is under construction and will be launched on February 1, 2010)
The SFI Journal: www.sfisvg.com (and http://thesfijournal.blogspot.com/ )
Good Life Designs: www.ingarhondaking.com

http://www.redroom.com/blog/irhondaking/enigma-answered-prayer-journey-writing-publishing-and-building-communites-practice