Taking to Engagement
Last week I saw an article in the latest number of a German web-marketing journal about measuring user engagement on websites. The question which occupies the marketeers is: How to get people into an engagement, for example on a website, and start to do something.
The marketing specialist agree that it is most important to incite engagement, but it seems to be quite difficult to measure it: If you can quantify engagement, then you can put a price tag on it and benchmark the reactions you get, invest in raising the level of engagement and the like.
A comment in a blogpost by “Scobleizer” (Robert Scoble, the ex-Microsoft “evangelist”) from 2006 entitled: New audience metrics needed: Engagement, lists, what engagement is about and what might be measured:
1. Reactions (they heard you)
2. Learning (they understood and retained)
3. Transfer (they took in the information and can apply)
4. Results (they use the learning to achieve a goal)
There is a lot of discussion about this topic on the web, but these simple lines very well hit the point of engagement, also in the context of wisdom teachings – though measuring is more than strange in this context: Many people hear something about the inner path (point 1), some get interested and start reading about it (point 2), and this for a longer time.
A few of these transfer it into a practice (point 3) and start training themselves. Of these few again a small group really commits itself to continuous engagement, taking up a regular schedule, combined with some kind of service activities and diving into a deeper understanding of the teachings with studies.
Many quit their initial engagement half way through or get lost in some side-track or the other. In the Eastern scriptures it says, out of 1000 one person changes from one level to the other – from hearing to getting interested, to starting practice, to getting into engagement. So it is 1000 x 1000 x 1000.
The percentage of those who set upon a focused spiritual journey along the guiding lines seems to be very low (marketeers would be very much frustrated…), and hopefully it scores a bit higher. But it also says that the goal of a spiritual teacher is reached, when he finds a fistful who really apply and reach the goal and take up the torch of teaching themselves.
Have a look at “Basics of Spiritual Life” on “The Teacher-Student Principle“.
Which way to take with engagement – turn to commitment, or pass on, or stay undetermined?
