by HR professional in healthcare, London UK.
In medicine, and in life, ‘quality of life’ can be used as a measure or as a way of making decisions.
Quality of life has many definitions including:
- “The general well-being of a person or society, defined in terms of health and happiness, rather than wealth.” (1)
- “The standard of health, comfort, and happiness experienced by an individual or group.” (2)
- “The patient’s ability to enjoy normal life activities.” (3)
- “The degree of satisfaction an individual has regarding a particular style of life.” (4)
- “A patient’s general well-being, including mental status, stress level, sexual function, and self-perceived health.” (5)
In health, decisions can be made based on quality of life e.g. helping patients make decisions about treatments, decisions about a care pathway through a particular illness, disease, or surgery, and decisions about end of life care. In our lives we can also make healthy living decisions about our quality of life – e.g. exercise, countryside walks, certain foods or nutrients. We also make quality of life decisions based on where we live e.g. to live in the countryside or in a certain town or village, and about what type of work or where we work e.g. flexible hours, or somewhere that is easy to commute to.
Whilst these conversations and decisions are important, do we ever consider our quality in life?
What if our quality in life is equal to or more important than our quality of life?
What’s the difference between our quality of life and our quality in life?
As with the definitions above, quality of life would seem to relate to two things –the quality of life based on an individual’s sense of wellbeing (e.g. what gives them a sense of wellbeing and what doesn’t – does having their family close by support them, or, do they like to live in the countryside, or by the sea), and also what is important to them in daily life about the way they function e.g. if they have a health condition, a clinician may want to understand from the patient which parts of the patient’s life are impacted and what matters to them most in their life at that time. For example, a patient may be asked if they prefer a drug that is effective for their medical condition but has a side effect versus a different care regime that has no drugs or side effects but is perhaps less effective.
What then is our quality in life? Whilst we each have a physical body, we are far grander than we realise and there is much more to us than our body. We are more than physical flesh as we are first and foremost a spark of divine light. This spark of light is our true essence, from which comes our true quality. Every one of us, no matter what walk of life, or age, or gender has an inner essence, which we can each connect to and it is living in connection with our inner essence that enables our true quality – our divine quality – to be expressed.
So how does this relate to living our quality in life or living a quality of life?
We can choose to live life in disconnection to our inner essence, which is living in disconnection to our divine quality. In living this way, we are denying our multidimensionality, living functionally in a physical body, but, living in a way that is reduced from, and in separation to, the whole of who we are.
Energetically this is a primary cause of illness and disease, as we are living away from our true self. If we live in this way, our wellbeing and quality of life is often based on bettering our functional physical body, and bettering our life e.g. our homes, social lives, material possessions, jobs, and making the best we can of the life we have – whatever we value in life, we make the most of it.
Or
We can choose to live life in connection to our inner essence, our divine quality, and as we move our body throughout our daily life, wherever we work or live, whatever our circumstance, our quality is with us – as we are that living quality, a quality that we then bring to all aspects of life, whether cutting up vegetables, cleaning our teeth, or serving customers as we work. Through living and breathing this quality, we are a living quality in life, and the ripple effect of this is that it emanates throughout our life – so that our quality of life is based on what has been first been lived as our quality in life.
Put simply, when we live a life disconnected to our divine quality we have a life where we are searching for quality from outside of us and we are constantly seeking to feed a feeling of emptiness, or imbalance or disharmony that we can feel – and we try and fill it up with material possessions, or great holidays, or bettering how our physical health is.
When we live a life in connection to our divine quality, we realise we are already everything, and whilst it is honouring to live and work in a way that is nourishing and confirming of our quality, we are not seeking outside of ourselves for something, as we can already feel a warmth and connection from within – we are living our quality in life – living from inside out.
I wonder how different the world would be if we were to all choose to live our quality in life? It is likely that we would not need all the entertainment and, for instance, some of the material possessions that we have nowadays. It is also possible that illness and disease would not be rising exponentially as it is now, as, in living our quality in life, we would be learning to live a life from inside out – and from this, we would take a far greater care of our physical body and how we lived our lives in every way.
In the words of modern day philosopher Serge Benhayon: (6)
“Body function and body harmony –
It is for all of us to learn this major difference.”
Surely this is a conversation worth having?
What if quality in life is the way to ensure a true quality of life?
References:
- https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/quality-of-life
- Oxford Dictionaries Accessed 29th August 2017
- http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=11815 Accessed 29th August 2017
- Miller-Keane Encyclopedia and Dictionary of Medicine, Nursing, and Allied Health, Seventh Edition. 2003 by Saunders, an imprint of Elsevier, Inc.
- http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/quality+of+life accessed 29th August 2017
- Serge Benhayon, Esoteric Teachings & Revelations: A New Study for Mankind, Unimed Publishing 2011