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Quality of Life
How does your quality of life measure up? Do you get to spend a good portion of your time doing what you love or do you find that you spend more time than you would like completing chores and responsibilities that you don’t particularly enjoy?
Ask yourself the following questions to find out how good your quality of life is:
Answer “yes” or “no”:
1) Can you choose what time to get up in the morning?
2) Do you love the work you do most of the time(as in your career)?
3) Do you have less than two people that depend upon you for meals, transport and other life duties?
4) Do you get at least seven hours of sleep per night?
5) Are your finances sufficient to cover the basics such as accommodation, food, energy bills?
6) Is there at least one person in your life that understands you and whom you can talk to about your worries?
7) Is your health fairly good and stable, allowing you to live your life without major hindrance?
8) Are you able to control, or at least influence, 75% or more of the decisions taken in life that affect you?
9) Do you feel hopeful about your future?
10) Do you feel loved and accepted by at least one other person?
11) Do you have the means, opportunities to find ways to achieve your goals (access to information, to knowledgeable others etc)?
12) Are you able to deal with stress effectively by using strategies to prevent stress escalating?
13) Can you express your opinions and emotions easily?
14) Do you feel that you are making a positive contribution to the world?
15) Do you try to remain mindful and in the moment, thereby reducing unnecessary stress and anxiety?
Add up your “yes” and “no” scores. Obviously, if you have scored fifteen yes answers then you are very likely to be enjoying a good quality of life. Between 7- 11 yes answers puts you in the average category. Look at the answers where you answered “no” and see if there are any ways to improve those areas of your life. If you scored under 7 there is a lot of work to be done to increase your enjoyment of life.
Perhaps you do not have enough control over your life? Are you too passive and letting others walk all over you or are you trying to please others too much?
This questionnaire is only a guideline but it can be a good starting point to confronting and dealing with areas in life that aren’t working for you.
We can’t control others but we can control how we spend our time, who we spend our time with and what we allow to upset us (although this last one takes a little practise).
As Bob Dylan famously said: “What’s money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and inbetween does what he wants to do”. Now, to me, that’s real quality of life.
Mandy X
add poll – shorter life quality or longer with less quality?
Author: Mandy Kloppers
Mandy is a qualified therapist who treats depression, anxiety, OCD, PTSD, trauma, and many other types of mental health issues. She provides online therapy around the world for those needing support and also provides relationship counselling.
