It's Actually a Balancing Act: Maslow's Hierarchy

                Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is a systematic organization of the body and mind’s requirements for growth, development, and happiness in general. The foundational needs (d-needs) are undeniable and relate to the objective functioning and protection of one’s physical body. At the top of the pyramid are needs related to the mind and subjective welfare (b-needs). Someone who is struggling to survive has no extra energy to spare on the delicate balance of their mental/emotional states. If there are physical threats, social or emotional needs must be foregone.  Similarly, social strains affect one’s emotional and even physical well-being. A precise life requires attention to all levels of development because they are interdependent. Imbalances at any individual level will necessarily send ripples both up and down the system; that system being you.

Maslow made a major distinction between the higher and lower order needs. The physiological and safety needs he called deficiency needs: d-needs. The higher order of needs, love/belonging, esteem, and self-actualization, were placed in a category he denoted as being needs: b-needs.

                This hierarchy that Maslow identified especially makes sense in the context of how life and our species evolved. In particular it parallels the development of the physical universe which later formed the basis for biological entities. In turn these biological entities eventually developed minds and consciousness. In the case of humans and several other highly social mammals, consciousness evolved sufficient complexity to become self-aware to varying capacities. As some humans became able to thrive to the point of satisfying all of their needs at every level, the concept of a self-actualized person began to take shape. Maslow himself developed the vocabulary of self-actualization by studying the lives of people such as Einstein, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Frederick Douglass. Many of the people who also inspire this very page and embody the concept include Carl Sagan, Joseph Campbell, and MLK as well as countless others.

                The good news is that for biologically healthy humans raised even in relatively poor conditions, development through some form of self-awareness occurs naturally. That is to say, even those who have been brought up under the toughest of circumstances realize that they do actually exist (self-awareness). They can reflect on their own thought processes, at least if prompted to do so. They have the ability to understand that they are now different than they once were and that they will one day be different than they are now. They can also see how their circumstances have impacted their lives up until the present, which in turn gives evidence that they can now use their influence to shape their experiences as they move forward. This ability gives people the potential power to overcome nearly any deficits in their immediate and natural environment. It is certainly not always easy and different people’s environments have resulted in better or worse positions to achieve self-actualization. However, the privilege of being a healthy human comes with the ingenuity to overcome the unique shortfalls of our individual situations.

                The significance of this system for people attempting to bring greater degrees of precision, refinement, and ultimately happiness to their lives is that the hierarchy of needs is an excellent lens for self-analysis and for understanding others. Anyone who makes an honest attempt to reflect on each of these stages will quickly come to realize some of the aspects of their lives that may be holding them back, how their past may act as an anchor in their present, and it may even offer some insight as to how to accelerate growth in the future.               

Workin' It

Bigger, stronger, faster, smarter, leaner, more skilled, more capable, more knowledgeable, more _________: we all desire growth in some capacity. When we look back and see that right now we are something more than we previously were, we feel good. When we've made gains, and then lose them it can be terribly discouraging. Given that we live in an information epoch, the most significant limiting factor in our personal development is often our own ability to focus effort in a desired field. Fortunately, this is an aspect of ourselves that we can actively address. Regardless of whatever specific area an individual would like to improve in him or herself, there is an underlying current in development; if it doesn't feel like work, it’s probably not working.

While they are related, there is a difference between pain and suffering. Furthermore the concept of work does not mean an activity is unenjoyable. Pain is the body’s physiological response to extreme, often harmful, conditions. Suffering is the mind’s reaction to that pain and is one reason different people have different pain tolerances. A compelling example of this distinction is the historic demonstration by the Vietnamese Monk, Thích Quang Dúc, who self-immolated (some viewers may find images here disturbing), in protest of religious oppression in June of 1963. Thích Quang Dúc undoubtedly experienced extreme pain in this demonstration, his face and body language communicate an experience of serenity as opposed to suffering. This radical example shows an important aspect of how powerful our constitution can truly be. Perhaps most importantly, there are times when our conscious mind can make the overt decision to face work or pain head-on, and it can even be healthy.

The importance of being able to endure pain without suffering is that growth can be uncomfortable. Indeed, any individual must be cautious because pain often signifies possible harm.  However growing pains take many forms and not all pain is bad. Awareness and experience help us to determine which pain catalyzes growth and which one leads to injury or other negative consequences. For those of us looking to actively develop ourselves in any capacity, it is important to remember that if it doesn’t feel like work, it’s probably not working.

Advertisements for easy or quick fixes to significant problems litter the internet and television. Is there a product I can hook to my abs to burn away the fat as I watch tv? Is there a pill that will make me stronger, faster, leaner, and smarter? Science brings us new wonders every year but these advertisements are far more likely to feed us the type of information that may inspires us to buy a product rather than paint an accurate picture of how that product might affect us. Certainly there are physical chemical reactions that underlie change of any kind, but research in athletics and learning sciences alike support that real advancement requires good old fashion work and overt effort.

Does your workout leave your muscles burning and your breath short? Did your ballet practice push your limits or could you easily perform all the acrobatics without much effort? Do you play music you’ve known for years or do you push yourself to learn a new piece that is currently just out of reach? How many mistakes were made while learning math, science, or writing as a student? Lasting growth requires overt and focused work on specific sub-skills. Development only occurs at the fringe of one’s present abilities. At the fringe, mistakes are made but mistakes are how pushing one’s limits take shape in reality. In his book Strength to Awaken, Robert McNamara, performance coach and professor of Psychology at Naropa University, explains some of the deeper implications of strength training. He describes training as a mental practice of expanding one’s ability to endure suffering, and in doing so expanding one’s sense of self and overall capabilities. He goes on to describe the changes one sees in the mirror as a reflection of the interior development a person is making through mindful effort. This concept goes beyond that of physical exercise and is true for any disciplined Practice whether it be physical, mental, or as is usually the case, a combination of the two. 

The Magic of Awareness

     Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night and couldn't remember which direction you were facing in the room, then all of sudden the problem corrects itself and you realize what's going on? Have you ever been in a vehicle traveling around a city or the countryside, and you thought you knew where you were. Then all of a sudden, you came to a place that you definitely recognized, and it didn't coincide with what you thought. In that moment your perceptions 'snap' back to reality as if you traveled through a hidden worm hole. Experiences such as these can be bewildering, and the act of recognizing what's actually going on can feel like magical. In fact it is this phenomena that magicians take advantage of in their performances. These examples demonstrate just how powerful our brain really is and how it literally creates our  every experience. The main point is this: anything outside of our awareness does not seem to exist; when something does enter our awareness, it 'pops' into our personal worldview.

     Each one of us has a particular understanding of the universe in which we live. Our understanding is based on our experiences, and those experiences are the basis for the partial conceptual model universe that is in our brain. As we go about our lives, we continually update this working model. However, our model also influences what we see when we go about our lives so we do not always see what is "really there". It is as if a person spent their whole lives wearing pink colored goggles. If they wore them from an early age, they would simply believe that they colors they have always seen are just how things are. For everyone not wearing tinted goggles, it would be apparent that they really don't see the objective truth. In order to see what's really there, they would have to remove the goggles, and this, in essence, is the situation of us all. Metaphorically speaking, we are all walking around with pink goggles that bias how we interpret the world simply because we are animals. Our perceptions are colored by how we understand things to be.

     We cannot perceive that which is outside of our awareness by definition of the word awareness. Our awareness is only made up of a small slice of all the available information in the cosmos, and there is an infinite amount of information to possibly know. Our awareness can be conceptualized as a circle. Anything outside the circle does not seem to exist to us. Something may enter our awareness and we see it for a period of time. When it leaves the circle, if we did not overtly notice it, it ceases to exist. This is more significant in terms of understanding how things work. When we are unaware of how something works, then it will seem to us like magic. Most of the inventions of science would be perceived as magic to people even a couple hundred years ago. If one has no idea of how a remote control works, then a remote basically seems like a magic wand.

     This same concept is actually how 'magic shows' work as well. There is a greater scheme than we, as viewers, are aware. The magician leads our awareness through a serious of logical steps. When we come to the finale, our past experience makes us ready for one thing to happen, but it doesn't. Instead, something else occurs. It doesn't make sense to us. If the magician executes his performance well, what the audience experiences is really something that feels like magic.