The Qualities of Quality

By

Hossca Harrison

2018

 

How do we live a life of quality when we live in a particleboard society with faux wood veneer?

Quality of life is undoubtedly what most people desire to experience, but how many become confused with the quality of life living in a particleboard society? Those who do not know what particleboard is, it is sawdust glued with toxic chemicals into a panel, cheap and toxic. Most houses and furniture are made using particleboard. Still, the point is not about constructing houses or furniture, but rather a metaphor about constructing the quality of our life.

Do we live a bargain-basement life or a quality life? This is not about how much money you have; this is about how one chooses to care for self. I have worked with billionaires, millionaires, and those living in poverty; they all seek the same quality of life. So just what is a quality life?

Perhaps to more fully understand the quality of life, we need to understand what life is. We live on a rock inhabited by almost eight billion people traveling at 67,000 miles per hour, or 110,000 kilometers per hour through space. Of these billions of people, over one million commit suicide each year, while twenty million attempt suicide, according to WHO. How many billions are committing slow suicide by making choices to end their life prematurely because they lack a quality life, caring for self?

Do we surround ourselves with particleboard “friends,” cheap and toxic?

Life is what we make it, be it positive or negative. We can meditate on the universe asking for assistance, but meditating without action makes our meditations ineffective. We can choose to be kindhearted to people, but being kindhearted without using wisdom can attract friends, including boyfriends or girlfriends who want to take advantage of you, especially if you have not established a personal commitment to a quality life.

To understand life, you need action with wisdom in establishing a quality life.

How does one choose to use action with wisdom? It requires dedication to the most critical person in your life, you.

But what does this mean, establishing a dedication to self? Most people live their life honoring that, which is not honorable, honoring primitive and paranoid beliefs passed from one generation to another. One such belief, often causing suffering mentally and emotionally, is based on what others say about you. Understand when someone is critical or gossiping about you; they are critical about themselves based on not loving themselves. Unless someone knows you inside and out, do not accept their criticism, for they have not walked in your shoes. In essence, they are seeking to create power over you. If you give power to others’ criticism, you will put up a wall preventing yourself from establishing a quality life.

Another primitive and paranoid belief passed on from generation to generation is what American comedian George Carlin called the invisible man living in the sky with total and complete control over you, life and death. One can say, I do not believe in such, but is the programming still there? One may express they do not believe in the invisible man living in the sky, but have you given others, including the invisible man living in the sky, power over you, especially women who have been taught for thousands of years, are inferior to men? I call it the rib syndrome.

No person can have a quality life if they allow themselves to be under the control of another. When one allows themselves to be controlled by others, they become fake, fake like the cheap particleboard often covered in plastic made to look like wood grain. Step out of others’ toxic shadows and become the real you made of pure oak designed and built by the heart to live a lifetime of beauty.

Critical thinking is needed for a quality life. It is developing the ability to think clearly and rationally about what to do next in your life. This includes using independent thinking. Independent thinking recognizes the old generational programming of thoughts and emotions passed down from generation to generation. Independent thinking does not allow beliefs and emotions from toxic friends or relatives to influence your heart desired creation. Independent thinking will assist you in recognizing when toxic people may be controlling your life. It is essential to understand when an issue in life is presented, focus on the problem, not the toxic person, for this person is only a reflection in your life. That toxic person can leave your life, but another toxic person will reappear if the issue is not resolved. Do not get into deep analytical thinking; this is not critical thinking, although some teach it is the same. Analytical thinking runs your thoughts in a loop ending up where you began, but spiritually, mentally, and emotionally exhausted.

To create and preserve your quality of life, do not make decisions when you are angry or mentally and emotionally exhausted. Quality of life works best when you allow yourself to feel. Do not confuse feelings with programmed thoughts and emotions. One leads to joy, the other pain.

Want to learn about creating a quality life, learn from ones who talk their walk and walk their talk, meaning listen to what they say, but most importantly, watch what they do. Actions speak louder than words. Continuously examine your life, not in judgment, but for seeking clarity. Seeing life as an expression of merely existing or surviving is living a life unexamined, unfulfilled, and worse of all, undesired.

To achieve a meaningful quality life with no regrets requires love, joy, patience, resilience, honesty, responsibility, spiritual maturity, sensitivity, receptiveness, trustworthiness, motivation, intuition, and most notably, being loyal to your heart and your friends of the heart.