The necessities of life change as we grow older. As children, we require food and shelter to survive, but to grow and develop we need a caring and safe environment with plenty of stimulation. The safety needs to be physical but also emotional; children who grow up in emotionally unstable homes suffer damage that often only surfaces much later on in their lives. Children need to be socialised early on. Keeping a child in the company of adults only, can make it very difficult for that child to form relationships with their peers later on.
What is necessary to some, may be less important to others. There is a difference between living a life and just surviving through it. Much of what is considered necessary today is only so because of the world we have created for ourselves. The need for money only exists because we have chosen that way to conduct commerce; bartering with goods and services is still practiced in many communities, but taxes and other governmental payments are made in cash currency. There is also a difference between what humans need, what they want, and what they think they have a right to. All of these get intertwined when we think of what is necessary to live.
Beyond food, water and shelter, there is little else truly necessary for survival. Many tribes still exist today with little more than those three things. Are they happy? That is another indicator of the human desire for what it considers necessary. If a person feels happy, they are satisfied with the things they have, or have access to, the things they personally feel are necessary. A person living in a tribal hut in Africa may not have access to broadband Internet, but are they any less happy because of it? It is likely that clean water available from a standpipe in the centre of the village is a far more important necessity to them, whereas clean running water is taken for granted by most people who also have broadband Internet access.
This leads to the question: if we have not personally experienced something, can we say that it is a necessity of life? If you have never been in love, how do you know if you could live without it? Life necessities are very personal things, and not always applicable to everyone, even within a small community.
Instead of thinking in terms of necessities, perhaps we should focus on what we require to live a productive life. Not only food and water, but a range of foods that fulfill all our nutritional requirements. Not only shelter, but a home that will withstand the full range of weather conditions and that is safe from contamination and intrusion. To be productive we need a reason to be so; living near to, if not directly with, other humans or other living things gives us a purpose. But with all these, it is still a necessity to live within our means, and that is perhaps the hardest thing to come to terms with.
What is necessary to some, may be less important to others. There is a difference between living a life and just surviving through it. Much of what is considered necessary today is only so because of the world we have created for ourselves. The need for money only exists because we have chosen that way to conduct commerce; bartering with goods and services is still practiced in many communities, but taxes and other governmental payments are made in cash currency. There is also a difference between what humans need, what they want, and what they think they have a right to. All of these get intertwined when we think of what is necessary to live.
Beyond food, water and shelter, there is little else truly necessary for survival. Many tribes still exist today with little more than those three things. Are they happy? That is another indicator of the human desire for what it considers necessary. If a person feels happy, they are satisfied with the things they have, or have access to, the things they personally feel are necessary. A person living in a tribal hut in Africa may not have access to broadband Internet, but are they any less happy because of it? It is likely that clean water available from a standpipe in the centre of the village is a far more important necessity to them, whereas clean running water is taken for granted by most people who also have broadband Internet access.
This leads to the question: if we have not personally experienced something, can we say that it is a necessity of life? If you have never been in love, how do you know if you could live without it? Life necessities are very personal things, and not always applicable to everyone, even within a small community.
Instead of thinking in terms of necessities, perhaps we should focus on what we require to live a productive life. Not only food and water, but a range of foods that fulfill all our nutritional requirements. Not only shelter, but a home that will withstand the full range of weather conditions and that is safe from contamination and intrusion. To be productive we need a reason to be so; living near to, if not directly with, other humans or other living things gives us a purpose. But with all these, it is still a necessity to live within our means, and that is perhaps the hardest thing to come to terms with.
