Norma sat quietly in the back room of her home, soaking up the sunlight pouring through the French doors. She could see two rabbits exploring the flowers in the garden for a good meal. Norma thought of rising to chase them off but instead just smiled, thinking she’d let them eat what they wished. They would later anyway, even if she chased them off for now. Norma’s smile made her think back over her life with gratitude. She’d been doing that a lot lately, knowing that her years were swiftly drawing to their natural close. Norma had lost her husband years ago. But he had set things up so well for Norma that she had lived securely since his passing. And Norma knew that she could continue to do so until her demise. Yes, that was one of the many things Norma appreciated about her husband. He had kept their legal affairs in good order for both of them and for their children and grandchildren. They’d had a good life, and she looked forward to seeing him again soon.
Life
This guide has repeatedly indicated that keeping your legal affairs in order can contribute to a good life. Law is so prevalent, touching on every human relationship, condition, and interest, that disordered legal affairs generally mean a disordered life. Legal affairs are not something laid atop your life, like a luxury fur coat. Legal affairs instead reflect the condition of your life. Legal affairs grow out of and entwine themselves around every aspect of your life. If, for example, rabid pursuit of pleasures of the flesh are your thing, you’ll have attendant legal issues, especially if your pursuit transgresses necessary social and personal boundaries. If, for another example, cut-throat business competition is your modus operandi, you’ll have attendant legal issues, especially if your overly aggressive practices violate necessary business standards or cause harm to others. Your legal affairs reflect the quality and commitments of your life. Measure your legal success in the quality of your life.
Relationships
The quality of your relationships also goes a long way toward measuring your legal success. Your most-significant relationships depend on your ability and willingness to keep your legal affairs in order. You can measure your success in keeping your legal affairs in order by the quality of your most-important relationships. If your spouse can’t trust you to conform your conduct to legal standards, including such things as obeying the traffic laws, holding up your end of contractual bargains, respecting safety and environmental regulations, and paying your taxes, among a few dozen other legal requirements, then your relationship with your spouse will suffer. The same will be true with your children; your legal transgressions and issues will unsettle, frustrate, and embarrass them. Your relationships with your employer, neighbors, and friends likewise depend on your basic ability to keep your legal affairs in order. Your employer needs you to keep your license or certification, your neighbor needs you to respect the laws of privacy and nuisance, and your friends need you not to lead them astray into crimes, accidents, offenses, and liabilities. If your relationships are basically good, you’re likely keeping your legal affairs in good order.
Peace
You know that you have your legal affairs in order when you have a peaceful state of mind. Your state of mind should matter a lot to you. Your state of mind, whether worried, angry, happy, or sad, colors everything you see and do. Peaceful contentment is worth far more than worrisome gold. Yet you cannot have peace when your legal affairs are in chaos. Law has the backing of the authority of the state. That authority means that if you’re not doing as the law demands, the state can make you do so. The state’s methods, including arrest, imprisonment, property seizures, and other sanctions, are not kind and gentle but instead intentionally disruptive and distressing. State law enforcement intends to get your undivided attention and complete obedience, come hell or high water. Disordered legal affairs roil your mind and emotional state. Worrisome legal issues keep you distracted, stirred up, and without peace or rest. If your mind is at peace, then you’re likely keeping your legal affairs in order.
Abundance
You also know that you have your legal affairs in order when you have good things in abundance. As suggested above, the good things may be relationships and a peaceful state of mind. The good things may also be necessary things, like shelter, food, and clothing. The good things may also be helpful things, like education, a job, and career. Your abundance may overflow into your finances, friends, faith, creativity, productivity, giving, and legacy. Those who have their legal affairs in order, aligned well with the demands and interests of the world, often find the world to be a place of endless abundance. Those who have disordered legal affairs, out of alignment with the world’s patterns and requirements, often find the world to be a hard place, stingy with its goods. If you find yourself in a place of surprising and satisfying abundance, then you’ve likely kept your legal affairs in good order.
Purpose
You also know that you have your legal affairs in good order when you have a constant sense of purpose. Life is most difficult not when you lack things you desire but instead when you lack the purpose to pursue them. A meaningless life is the worst life of all, dark and despairing. Disordered legal affairs frustrate purpose. You cannot act with the necessary freedom, helpful resources, and heartening assurance of positive outcomes when your legal affairs are constantly interfering with your progress. Keeping your legal affairs in order paves the path for steady progress toward goals and their rewarding outcomes. Measure your legal success by the sense of purpose that invigorates and drives you throughout the day. If your legal affairs were in disarray, you wouldn’t have the privilege and power of purpose.
Respect
You also know that you have your legal affairs in good shape when you have the respect of your peers and community. Respect means a lot, more than some people think. Respect means that you can carry yourself with confidence rather than shame among those around you. Respect is like a well of goodwill on which you can draw at any time, internally for your own encouragement or externally for grace and favor. If you have the privilege of leadership positions, especially volunteer leadership positions to which your community has elected or appointed you, then you know you have your community’s respect and thus must have your legal affairs in order. Your community will not accept your leadership or grant you privileges if your legal affairs show that you are not worthy of honor.
Faith
If you have the faith to move forward in life with reasonable confidence, hope, and assurance, you are likely keeping your legal affairs in order. Law purposefully makes freedom of religion its first promise. Your ability to pursue your life in a meaningful, purposeful, and rewarding pattern, bound together by an integrated view of the world’s origin, nature, and destiny, is your greatest interest. If you have studied the world’s patterns and purpose to discover its meaning and destiny, and you have drawn the assurance of entering its eternal paradise, then you have likely kept your legal affairs in order. Disordered legal affairs will distract you from any such confidence. You cannot live a life of legal ignorance and rebellion while simultaneously living a life of rich, deep, and abiding faith. You know you’re doing well with your legal affairs when you are able to live a confident and full life of faith.
Reflection
On a scale from one to ten, how would you rank your quality of life? No matter the ranking you gave your life, do you see the connection between your quality of life and whether you’re keeping your legal affairs in order? Do you have abundant good relationships, especially with those individuals closest and most important to you? Can you see the connection between your legal affairs and the quality of your relationships? Can you see the connection between your legal affairs and your peaceful state of mind? Do you sense an abundance in your life or the possibility of abundance? Do you have a continual sense of purpose as you go about your day? Has your community afforded you respect, particularly with the honor of recognition or privilege of leadership? Are your legal affairs sustaining your confidence and faith in a flourishing future? Would improving the order in your legal affairs improve the quality of your life?
Key Points
Your life’s quality shows whether you are keeping legal affairs in order.
Good relationships depend on keeping your legal affairs in order.
Your peaceful state of mind depends on ordering your legal affairs.
Abundance of goods in your life indicates order in your legal affairs.
Continual purpose in your life indicates order in your legal affairs.
Community respect and leadership is proof of sound legal affairs.
Your faith in a flourishing future depends on orderly legal affairs.