Life isn't necessarily self awareness, Do Amoeba's think? It's suggested that we are a multicelled organism, and for us to think we have to utilise a network of neural nodes. A Single celled creature obviously is going to lack any forms of real awareness although it's still alive.
However that single celled form still needs some of the very basics, it needs food, probably light (although the depths of the oceans could prove that wrong). I would suggest senses for survialism, however a single celled organism isn't exactly going to run when it spots trouble being just a single cell.
To me Life can create paradoxes, which inanimate objects can't do alone.