Life is a System

Life from a biological definition requires a pattern, structure, and process to be. These elements are intimately connected in nature and where one exists the others are present. Pattern, structure and process vary depending upon the purpose of the living organism. Not only are they responsible for our being but these elements serve as natural building blocks for how we choose to live.

The Natural Act of Interdependence

You had no choice in the biology that you inherited, however you do have a choice in how you view and live your life. Hence, life is an objective phenomenon but how you live is a subjective reality. Your perceptions, emotions, and actions have everything to do with how you live. They qualify the nature of your experience. These emerge as your patterns of thought and behavior. They are evident in how you organize the various parts of your life, the structure and quality of your relationships, as well as the processes you utilize in manifesting your daily living experience. They are inter-related and changeable enabling you with the powers to re-create your life. They represent your life’s method of operation. Together these essential elements operate within a system that formulates a lifestyle. Change your methods and you will change your operating system. It is through these that our lives unfold. As you positively fine tune your life patterns, structures and processes you create a new and higher living system for yourself. In reality there is no separation of the three essential elements, they move as one. Change and influence one, and the others are impacted as well. As such, a small incremental change can result in a quantum leap of growth. Just like a spiraling hierarchy, as you grow you move up to a higher level and you expand into a greater system than the one before. Personal change can begin by examining your life’s patterns, structure, and processes.

The empowerment found in understanding the three criteria of life is that it provides us with three distinct areas in our lives to focus our energies and efforts to create change and exercise our natural powers to grow and develop. They represent the existential elements of what constitutes living. They serve to breakdown the complexity of life as we live it, into three major areas for self-examination and re-creation to improve our lives.

Understand your life as an interdependent system of patterns, structure, and processes, and you will know the natural components for self study to identify strengths and areas in need of improvement.