Have you ever really thought about the way you are living? No. You simply just live, as every person does. But no one really realizes the actual reality of how we survive.

As humans, we only need a few things to survive. The first is oxygen. Well, thank god we do not have to spend any money to be able to breathe because then we would all we broke, dying, and probably would not make it to our 20's. It is pretty much self-explanatory.

The second is water. We absolutely need water to survive. Our bodies are practically made of water (60% if you were curious). On average, a person can survive about 3-7 days without water. Please do not try it. However, did you know that we do have to pay for water? Yes, yes we do. Bottled water, faucet water, filtered water, bath water, pool water, brand name water, flavored water, etc. You get the point. Unless you would like to go down to your closest body of water that is probably extremely polluted and catch some disease that will put your chances at survival to a minimum, then I suggest you drink that nice cold fiji water that you just paid $2.99 for. So, yes sir, please let me give you $3 for that water bottle, so I don't die. Thanks.

Food. Yes, we need that too. If you were curious, because I know you are, the average person can go about 1-2 months without food. Maybe that's why they jack up the prices on food because they know we don't need it as badly as water. Yes, we pay for food. We probably pay for food more than we pay for water, yet we do not need it as bad. And, if you haven't noticed, the cheapest types of food are the unhealthiest, for the most part. That's why all of the fast chain restaurants will never go out of business because a good amount of the population is in some type of poverty.

The fourth is shelter. This one can be controversial, but not a lot of people can survive long in the wilderness. Especially, during the brutal winters we are having. And don't forget about the weather that changes from hot to cold every hour of the day. We really do need some means of shelter to survive. Now, notice how I said shelter and not a huge 1.7 billion dollar mansion. But it is true. And sadly, as you could've guessed, we pay for shelter. At least, the majority of us do.

Last, but not least, we absolutely need sleep. This one might have you a bit curious, at least I was. Well, the average person can go 11 days maximum without sleep. Our bodies need sleep to cognitively function throughout the day. Without it, we start becoming fatigue, having hallucinations, a fever may develop, the body's nervous and endocrine systems start to get all out of whack and practically shut down. Fortunately, this is the other privilege we get to have without paying for it.

Now, My purpose in writing this was not to give you a bunch of statistics and numbers on means of survival. I am just trying to make you, reading this, to realize how much we depend on money. We literally depend on money for everything. Clothes, cars, shoes, technology, etc. From birth until the age of 18, we depend on our parents, who depend on money to keep us alive. We pay to keep warm in our houses. We pay to get an education, and then we go to college to get a degree so that we can MAKE MONEY. For crying out loud, there is an actual site that shows how much people are worth!

Like, really? C'mon now. Let's be better than that.