How Free Are We?
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
Every human has needs to exist and maintain homeostasis, let alone be happy and fulfilled. The needs most people are familiar with are physiological needs, including food, water, and shelter. The sad thing is that many people do not have access to these core essential needs, but there are actually many more needs. There is a hierarchy called Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs.
Taken from: https://www.simplypsychology.org/
https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html#The-expanded-hierarchy-of-needs
We do not claim ownership of this information, and we encourage everyone to go to this source to learn more about humanity’s needs.
However, we have created a tool to extend this idea to see how well our needs and freedoms are accessible and protected. We call it “the Maslow Score.” This tool is meant to be an objective way for you to gauge your own freedoms and ability to meet your needs.
Click this button to go to this tool. It is an external link to a calculator rather than an embedded tool to keep costs low for the website.
Is our Time our OWn?
Time is our most valuable resource. While people with more resources can extend their lives through certain means (healthcare, etc.), this is one of the few unifying characteristics of all humanity; we only have so much time. In fact, we even have the little time we are allotted cut short through no fault of our own due to natural catastrophes, illnesses, other people, or pure random happenstance. While people may say that every day is a gift and encourage us to spend our time in ways that matter, are we able to do so? How much time do we have to spend in the ways we prefer, with the people we love, and in ways that actually matter to us and fill us up? What is preventing us from spending this little time in valuable ways? Let’s find out together.
Click this button to go to this tool. It is an external link to a calculator rather than an embedded tool to keep costs low for the website.
How free are we?
This resource, along with your Maslow Score, can help you truly determine how free you are to live your life as you prefer. We may not have thought about the ideas in this assessment as being coerced upon us, and that we choose to do them. However, a choice or right cannot be a freedom if it requires time, energy, or resources to make, or if we are coerced into participation due to potential or actual negative consequences from the system or society in which we exist. A lack of choice to opt out is by very definition, coercion, not a freedom. Coercion can include threats, violence, neglect, harming you or those you care about, collective punishment, withholding of resources, tying your ability to exist to productivity or labor, using your labor and resources in ways that cause harm or do not serve you and your community, lack of representation in the governing body that affects your life and/or the governing body making decisions that negatively impact your life, and more.
Two important distinctions for rights:
Positive Right – “A claim to somebody or something, an entitlement, a right to something.”
Negative Right – “A freedom to not do something, a right from something.”