Autonomy, Health, Optimal Living, and Navigating the Money Economy
Metaphysically speaking, I believe that there are a quite multiple primary substances in the world.
There are substances that allow the creation of an objective spatio-temporal universe. Because each substance is unique, each needs to have its own conceptual identity.
However, we can think about them also conceptually as belonging to one collective category: that of substances that create matter.
A separate category however, is the mind. The mental states that allow us to understand the objective reality.
For me health is a concept that represents the optimal care and development of these two categories that make up a human person: the care and development of the physical body and the mind.
Health and Autonomy
Health represents a desired state that can only be achieved through actions.
For an individual to be healthy he needs to act. For an individual to act, he needs autonomy.
Autonomy, the conscious freedom to choose one's actions, is a prerequisite to health.
Those who are autonomous are able to act strategically. Those that are able to act strategically can achieve health. Those that achieve health become fit. Those that are fit survive.
Therefore, maximizing autonomy is essential to survival.
Autonomy and Optimal Living
An optimal life is another useful concept that captures both sides of what health is.
Optimal living involves
- The survival, care, and development of the physical body.
- The survival, care, and development of the mind through optimal pursuit of meaning.
Optimal living is the ultimate goal.
It is achieved by maximizing autonomy.
Autonomy in the Money Economy
Almost all of mankind's needs are met through the money economy. It is just one aspect of the economy but it is the most dominant.
If one depends on money to meet all of one's needs, one needs to exchange something for money.
Essentially, this something is labor. Money is simply a claim to labor. Labor is an action and thus exists in space-time. The performance of labor occupies space and time.
This labor can be exchanged because there is a demand for it. It is a commodity. Because somebody else wants it, its performance by an individual is influenced by the power of another individual. Labor dimishes autonomy.
Autonomy is one's conscious choice to do something. A corollary of this is that an autonomous individual is someone who is able to decide what to do, how to do it, and when to do it.
A laborer has diminished choices when working for somebody else. Aside from this, the time he spends for the work occupies the time he could have spent for what he wants to do.
Navigating the Money Economy
Optimal living is the ultimate goal and it cannot be achieved without autonomy. Because the money economy diminishes the autonomy of many people, a desirable response is therefore to lessen one's dependence on money.
A middle goal is to lessen one's dependence on a single source of income by diversifying one's sources. This goal does not optimize autonomy but protects a money-dependent individual from catastrophes typical in a money economy.
Since health is a desirable state achieved through the performance of actions that
- Cares and develops the physical body
- Cares and develops the mind
Then the only way to achieve health and optimal living while maximizing autonomy in the present money economy is to perform the actions above as independent of money as possible. This means maintaining and optimizing one's life free or inexpensively.
Doing so makes one less reliant on money and labor, and therefore more autonomous.
As one becomes less reliant on money, one will discover two abundant resource of meeting one's physical and mental needs:
- Skills, and
- The Gift Economy