How Do You Measure Your Life?

Have you ever thought about how you measure your life?

What determines whether you have lived a good life when your time on Earth is up?

If you've never considered this, maybe it's time? The time to become who you want to be is now. We never know how much time we have.

By reflecting on how you want to live, you can start living that way today.

In this post, I will gather thoughts from ancient philosophy and modern science to show what you should focus on if you want to measure how well you live.

The purpose of measuring your life should be obvious. By measuring how well one lives, one suddenly has something to strive for and improve.

"If you can't measure it, you can't improve it."
— Lord William Thomson Kelvin

"Happiness"

Over 2000 years ago, Aristotle wrote about Eudaimonia as the ultimate goal. It's the only thing that a human seeks for its own sake (not as a means to another end).

Eudaimonia is often translated into English as Happiness, which would correspond to "lykke" in Norwegian. However, this word is not descriptive enough to encompass all that lies within Eudaimonia. When we think of happiness, we often think of a temporary state in a moment, typically something achieved through pleasurable experiences or favorable circumstances.

Eudaimonia can be better described as “The good life” and should be viewed from a broader time perspective, as an inner feeling we can achieve through our actions over time.

"The ultimate goal of all human activity is eudaimonia, happiness in the sense of living well, which is something all humans seek; all actions are nothing more than different ways to achieve it."
— Hannah Arendt, American Philosopher

Raw Actions

Marcus Aurelius was the world's most powerful man, as emperor of the Roman Empire, in the first century AD. He was also a philosopher and learned and practiced Stoicism. His private notes from his time as emperor are one of the most important texts preserved about Stoic philosophy.

The Stoics shared Aristotle's view that Eudaimonia is the ultimate goal one should seek to achieve. At the same time, they further elaborated on how to achieve this in practice.

Their conclusion is that to live a good life (achieve Eudaimonia), one must live a "virtuous" (read: raw) life by practicing the following virtues:

• Wisdom: Clear thinking, good judgment, seeing things as they truly are.
• Courage: Resilience, being oneself, standing up for oneself and others.
• Justice: Kindness, doing good for others, love for the community.
• Moderation: Self-control, patience, forgiveness, humility, tidiness.

By acting according to these virtues, one makes progress towards Eudaimonia, or The good life.

"If at some point in life you come across something better than wisdom, justice, moderation, and courage; something better than a mind satisfied in the knowledge that it has acted rationally and accepted all outside of its control, if you find something better than this, embrace it unconditionally. It must be something extraordinary. Enjoy it to the fullest."
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Self-Realization

You have probably heard of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Maslow's contribution to psychology was far greater than this. The pyramid was not actually part of Maslow's teaching but was popularized by business consultants based on Maslow's work.

What I perceive as the core of Maslow's teaching is that we humans have a set of innate needs that we naturally seek to satisfy. Which needs we seek to satisfy at any given time depends on our state.

If we are hungry, the need to obtain food will become paramount.

If we live in a war-torn area, the need for safety will be prominent (given that lower needs, such as hunger, are satisfied).

According to Maslow, the ultimate goal for humans is self-realization. This is the need that people experience when their other lower needs are satisfied.

As Scott Barry Kaufman clarifies in the book “Transcend,” there is more to the concept of self-realization than many realize.

The obvious meaning is to develop into the rawest version of oneself. The perhaps less obvious part is that self-realization involves contributing to the world outside ourselves, and that these two are closely connected.

Flourishing

Martin Seligman has been the leading figure in the field of positive psychology, which blossomed at the end of the 20th century. Unlike traditional psychology, which focuses on mental disorders and taking people from -10 to 0 on a quality-of-life scale, positive psychology aims to find out what can help people improve an OK life from 0 to +10 on the same scale.

In the book “Flourishing,” “flourishing” is presented as the ultimate goal for humanity.

Flourishing can be defined as:

"Flourishing is the product of pursuing and engaging in an authentic life that brings joy and happiness through achieving goals, pursuing passions, and enjoying life's pleasures through its valleys and peaks."
— Dr. Lynn Soots, Professor of Positive Psychology

In the book “Flourish,” Seligman summarizes the latest findings in positive psychology by presenting the PERMA model for which factors influence human flourishing.

• Positive emotions: Enjoyment of moments, Optimism, Gratitude
• Engagement: Flow, Use of natural strengths
• Relationships: Love, Doing good for others, Strong social bonds
• Meaning: Sense of utility, Seeing meaning in life, Connecting daily actions to a greater purpose
• Achievement of Ambitions: Setting ambitious goals, Working towards achieving them

Seligman's PERMA Model

For a closer introduction to the PERMA model, you can watch this YouTube video.

Conclusion

Now you have received a brief summary of how some of the most prominent figures believe you should measure your life. It is interesting to draw threads between the various nuances and see that the essence is quite consistent.

To achieve the ultimate goal – The Good Life – we must be good people.

We must strive to become the best version of ourselves and live every moment in accordance with this to the best of our ability.

We must become raw.

The next step you can take is to take out a piece of paper and write down your thoughts on who you want to be.

It may be useful to divide this into different areas of life, for example, like this:

• Energy: What does the best version of yourself look like in terms of energy?
• Work: What does the best version of yourself look like in terms of work/study?
• Love: What does the best version of yourself look like as a partner/parent/daughter/son/colleague, etc.?

This will give you a target to aim for.

The most important goal of your life.

Sources of Inspiration

• Aristotle: Nicomachean Ethics
• Marcus Aurelius: Meditations
• Abraham Maslow: Toward a Psychology of Being
• Scott Barry Kaufman: Transcend
• Martin Seligman: Flourish