Abraham Maslow and self-actualization

[Tistepiste]

What is your guys view on Maslow's hierarchy of needs vs self-actualization?

Self-actualization is on the top of Maslow's hierarchy and the rule is that all other steps must be fulfilled before reaching the top shelf.

These include, as you all probably know,  food, shelter, warmth, security, sense of belonging.

 

This means that self-actualization is dependent on all of this previous steps. If one of these falls away, you will no longer feel fulfilled / alive.

(eg. sense of belonging), you'll still be dependent on your friends / family etc. eg if your spouse makes you feel unhappy, treats you badly suddenly, even though you might be happy, suddenly this sense of belonging starts to be in danger, so you drop a "step". You will try to fulfill this step again, and try to move up again, like a Jo-Jo.

 

What is your view on this?

[Tistepiste]

2 minutes ago, Feel Good said:

@Tistepiste

Malsows hierarchys section of d-needs (deficiency needs) should be met before maturation. These are childhood needs, and when they are not completed this creates your shadow. The shadow is unfinished business, uncompleted events that hold you back from moving on with your life. The being needs stage is when a person has freed themselves from their shadow, completed all of their unfinished business and is no longer held back by trying to get deficiency needs met. 

If you feel you need something because you feel deprived then you need to do some shadow work to complete that issue.

 

I get that, but 'sense of belonging' is something that, feels to me, is dependent on the people you surround yourself with, no? 

If this environment crumbles, it seems like this "sense of belonging" becomes in danger meaning that you're not on the top of the shelf anymore.
What if you suddenly become poor and don't have money for food anymore. Is there any room for self-actualizaiton, because the fulfillment of shelter and food would come in danger.

 

Also, how does one complete their unfinished business?

 

Maybe I'm missing something..

Edited August 1, 2018 by Tistepiste

[Tistepiste]

 

1 minute ago, Feel Good said:

@Tistepiste

The sense of belonging is a childhood need. It's a real need at the time.

It's not a real need in adulthood.

Those looking for belonging in adulthood are still trying to get their childhood needs met because those needs were not satisfied in the past. 

Yes, if you don't get that need satisfied in childhood because your family unit wasn't healthy and you were not indoctrinatrd into an emotionally healthy social group, then yes you will struggle in adulthood to try to complete those steps so you can move on. 

You can complete your unfinished business by doing shadow work. 

I share how to resolve shadow material here 

 

 

Thank you very much dear fellow, I will take a look into it! <3

Have a great day, thank you for clearing some of my doubts. Big love.

[Nahm]

This is a really significant post. In general, imo, a lot of people (forum wise) are ignoring the pyramid and trying to “be” Turqoise / Nondual / Enlightened, and it is causing a lot of unneeded stress and confusion. Living in your parents house and making arguments for your own ‘having awakened’ when you have yet to attain financial & emotional self reliance, for example. So there is a grosse lack of appreciation & humility in many cases, which detrimentally stunts personal growth by means of frustration. Or to put it simple, it’s like someone pretending they’re a millionaire online for so long that they never actually developed themselves by becoming a millionaire - or a sage, or enlightened, etc. Or someone pretending they are self actualized for so long they never accomplish holding down a job by being able to communicate and work with others effectively. 

Shadow work, imo, is the most underutilized & under-appreciated work. As if everyone just figures they can skip it. I suppose that’s an inherent challenge of the nature of ego. Or in the biggest picture, it’s like not doing much for yourself, your life, your happiness, because you’re “already” self actualized, having negated all the things you want in life by nullifying, but in actuality having fooled yourself. I wonder if this is an offset of having access to people who are self actualized..?  

[Tistepiste]

11 minutes ago, Nahm said:

This is a really significant post. In general, imo, a lot of people (forum wise) are ignoring the pyramid and trying to get be Turqoise / Nondual / Enlightened, and it is causing a lot of unneeded stress and confusion. Living in your parents house and making arguments for your own ‘having awakened’ when you have yet to attain financial & emotional self reliance, for example. So there is a grosse lack of appreciation & humility in many cases, which detrimentally stunts personal growth by means of frustration. Or to put it simple, it’s like someone pretending they’re a millionaire online for so long that they never actually developed themselves by becoming a millionaire - or a sage, or enlightened, etc. Or someone pretending they are self actualized for so long they never accomplish holding down a job by being able to communicate and work with others effectively. 

Shadow work, imo, is the most underutilized & under-appreciated work. As if everyone just figures they can skip it. I suppose that’s an inherent challenge of the nature of ego. Or in the biggest picture, it’s like not doing much for yourself, your life, your happiness, because you’re “already” self actualized, having negated all the things you want in life by nullifying, but in actuality having fooled yourself. I wonder if this is an offset of having access to people who are self actualized..?  

Exactly how I thought about this.

It feels like a lot of people just "ignore" their "problems" or "unfinished business".
It's like a foundation that is destined to crumble.
 

It's like building a house on a foundation that is not strong, not solidified, not taken care of.
One might be able to live in this bliss for a while, convincing yourself of the opposite, but sooner or later the reality will hit you when this foundation will be challenged. When an unfortunate event will take place, challenging this foundation.

Consequently, that beautiful utopia you have built for yourself will crumble to pieces and you'll need to build it up once again, just to fall to pieces once more with each setback.

I feel like being honest an genuine to ones-self is very under appreciated. Knowing yourself fully well and working on your own inner demons, learning to live with them and creating an indestructible foundation for you to feel fully alive anywhere, anytime, in any situation.

[Nahm]

@Tistepiste @Feel Good I appreciate what you guys are sayin. It could be the nature of communicating online, and how diverse the subjects are on the forum. Sometimes I notice the Self Actualized section, labeled as the ‘main section’, has far less activity than the Enlightenment section. It’s like there’s a channel that someone needs to be learning from, but there’s this other channel that’s just far more interesting. This is just human nature I guess. 

[Tistepiste]

@Nahm I guess it's mostly because of the fuss going on about enlightenment. And also the idea of "meditation" in the other section is very easy to grasp. So it's something where people feel kind of "attracted to", since they are more familiar with these concepts.

Self-actualization is something harder to grasp for someone who isn't really knowledgeable maybe? For me, I never heard about self-actualization before visiting this forum.

[Nahm]

@Tistepiste I hear that.   Me neither. 

[Tistepiste]

@Nahm Lol I was meditating with headphones while listening to music and I heard a sound didn't know where it was coming from but it was you quoting me.

Something silly just happened, I was getting deeper into my meditation and then I juts felt my arm sting, and I felt some tingly feeling in my arm. I thought it might be an effect of meditating, that inner feelings are being externalized or something I don't know.

I just look at my arm now and it was just a big mosquito sting  now my arm is itching like crazy

Edited August 2, 2018 by Tistepiste

[Nahm]

@Tistepiste LMAO! That’s awesome.

[Leo Gura]

On 8/1/2018 at 4:16 AM, Tistepiste said:

the rule is that all other steps must be fulfilled before reaching the top shelf

That's not a rule, that's a loose generalization.

Careful not to turn Maslow (or any model) into a limiting belief.

[Tistepiste]

@Leo Gura No, I meant to say "According to Maslow, the rule is.."

[Joseph Maynor]

I think it's a good system, but you can't take it too literally.  It's a useful structure.  I think Spiral Dynamics is like the newer technology -- if we think of conceptual systems as more or less useful technologies, which they actually are.  

Edited August 2, 2018 by Joseph Maynor

[Leo Gura]

12 hours ago, Feel Good said:

But isn't it better and smoother to deal with shadow and develop the ego first?

I see a few loose cannons in the enlightenment scene who would well benefit from learning basic social skills first before letting their ego loose on the world. These people still cause suffering and ultimately are their own worst enemy in life.

It all depends.

Of course the vast majority of people are not mature enough to handle enlightenment work. But you won't know until you try.