Quality of Life: What is It?

What is "Quality of Life"?

To me this is an important spiritual idea to understand, because ultimately the aim of actions, for those of us in our church, is not the "up and out" kind of spiritual development. The aim of our actions is optimal Quality of Life for all humans, all life, and the planet herself, and all Beings everywhere, and the ultimate in that Quality of Life includes the highest levels of spiritual development.

So it's important to understand what Quality of Life is, how it differs from person to person, yet we must find a way to live together so that each person can have their optimal Quality of Life. And no one at the expense of anyone else.

So here I set forth my own idea of what a great Quality of Life for me is, and what I might wish for others, and you can use my list to agree or disagree with each item and create your own list.

To the extent you answer No (or to a few, Yes) to any of these questions, then IMO you have a diminished Quality of Life. I grant that many people for example with physical handicaps do experience what they consider an excellent Quality of Life, perhaps even enhanced in some unusual ways, by their limitations. More power to 'em, I say. Quality of Life is not an absolute, nor the same for everyone. Thus, no one can tell anyone else what is required for their Quality of Life !!!!!! Quality of Life is a totally subjective matter.

Also, each of the questions below might be phrased not as "Can you....?" but as "To what extent do you......?"

But here are what I consider to be the basics of Quality of Life, that I wish for everyone in the world. [But, again, this is my opinion about your Quality of Life, and might not be your own opinion of your own Quality of Life ! It is really important to realize I am not placing judgment on anyone who doesn't have what I am calling a high Quality of Life. For example, I do not judge folks who feel helpless, or do not seek a sense of expansion in life. But if I were to choose, I would wish their life included these elements of what I consider to be a high Quality of Life.]

Then, on top of the basics, each of us has specifics that contribute to our personal individual Quality of Life. There is no upper limit to Quality of Life !!!!!!!

Basic safety in daily life: Can you go about your daily life without a significant risk of being attacked or harmed in any way? Can you go about your daily life without significant health risks? Are your basic needs for air, light, water, nutrition, shelter being met (not necessarily without effort)? Are you able to move about, having all the use of (and be able to express the use of) all your senses and mental and emotional faculties? Do you live free from chronic pain or physical limitations on basic ordinary activities of life?

Basic social needs: Do you have access to social interactions that are satisfying and beneficial for you and are you able to experience yourself as beneficial and contributing to others? Do you have freedom of association, to move into and out of relationships as you choose? Do you have the ability to function in groups, as you choose?

Are you able to make the basic choices of life (via liberty) according to your own desires, such as your travel, your vocation, your place of work, your dwelling-place, what and where you will learn and receive an education, your acquisitions (what you can own), keep and hold and use the results of your physical and mental labor?

Are you able to move away (in whatever sense you choose) from anything you deem harmful to your life, and move toward or go after anything you regard as beneficial to your life? Are you able to engage, to the extent you choose, in activities of life that bring you joy and satisfaction?

Can you affect those things you believe have an effect on your quality of life, or the quality of life of others?

Do you have the freedom to learn about yourself and to express yourself in ways that are satisfying (while respecting others' rights)?

Are you free from internal harsh self-judgments, fears, guilts, depression? Are you subject to deceit, fraud, manipulation by others which take advantage of your ignorance or your weaknesses? Do you experience yourself as empowered, or helpless? Do you experience yourself as the "locus of control" of your experiences, or do you feel like a victim of self or others or the world or nature or God or......?

Are you exploring all the potentials and dimensions of yourself and the world, so you have a sense of expansion of life and self and your place in the Grand Scheme of things as you go through life? Do you have a sense of meaning and purpose in your life?

There are clearly some themes here. They might include: Basic necessities of survival, either free or achieved or provided voluntarily by others. Liberty/freedom. A social context appropriate to being human. A degree of psychological freedom from innerly limiting and harm-inflicting stuff. The ability to implement one's will and achieve success as self-defined. A sense of personal empowerment and self-determination and a sense of free will. An expanding understanding of self, life, and world.

It's good to say explicitly that there are inner and outer components to Quality of Life, and each facilitates the other or impinges on the other. In fact the distinction between inner and outer is only for convenience. We are One within ourselves, as well as with the All.

I'd like to make clear the social-interpersonal balance in all the above. I do not believe anyone owes anyone else any particular of a Quality of Life. In other words, I do not advocate taxpayer-supported health care, housing, or anything that takes anything from anyone without their explicit consent, even for a good cause. Charity and generosity, in my opinion, must, to be moral and ethical, be voluntary. I do not believe anyone is entitled to force anyone to do anything that increases their own or someone else's Quality of Life. I just need this point to be perfectly clear, as it is not the normal usual accepted viewpoint in our society.

But I will work passionately and tirelessly to do everything I am called to do, to increase the Quality of Life of everyone on this planet. I rejoice that I have the freedom and the ability to work in the ways I believe most powerful, most efficacious, for achieving that. My own Quality of Life requires that I be doing that.

Also, my own Quality of Life does not require that others be like me, or that anyone else be any particular way. But it does require that I find and am free to associate as I wish, with others who are like and unlike me, and that I find and am free to associate as I wish with those who are particular ways I like. And my Quality of Life does require that people who don't like me, let me be me, safely and pleasantly.

Also, my own Quality of Life is diminished as I perceive the suffering of others, and enhanced as I do what I can to enhance the Quality of Life of others.

by Rev. Alia Zara Aurami-Sou, Ph.D.
Head Minister

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