Self-Actualization

I have been thinking a lot about this in the past few years.

Initially, I think that self-actualization is more relative than Maslow's initial idea of self-actualization. Although, Maslow thought that Lincoln, Gandi, and others of significant fame or influence on humanity were good examples of SA, I think that a doctor, lawyer, stay at home mom, construction worker can also achieve self-actualization without having a large voice in public sentiment.

I'll get back after some research.

Good Subject!!!!

Fill up these glasses again serving wench,strike up the band and bring on the dancing girls.F**k dignity.

I musta missed something, spendius!

I kind of feel like Esteem pretty much feeds right into Self-Actualization and they are not far apart.

8 steps to SA
Below is a quick paraphrase of Maslow's 8 steps to attaining SA:

1.Experience things fully, vividly, selflessly. Throw yourself into the experiencing of something: concentrate on it fully, let it totally absorb you.
2.Life is an ongoing process of choosing between safety (out of fear and need for defense) and risk (for the sake of progress and growth): Make the growth choice a dozen times a day.
3.Let the self emerge. Try to shut out the external clues as to what you should think, feel, say, and so on, and let your experience enable you to say what you truly feel.
4.When in doubt, be honest. If you look into yourself and are honest, you will also take responsibility. Taking responsibility is self-actualizing.
5.Listen to your own tastes. Be prepared to be unpopular.
6.Use your intelligence, work to do well the things you want to do, no matter how insignificant they seem to be.
7.Make peak experiencing more likely: get rid of illusions and false notions. Learn what you are good at and what your potentialities are not.
8.Find out who you are, what you are, what you like and don't like, what is good and what is bad for you, where you are going, what your mission is. Opening yourself up to yourself in this way means identifying defenses--and then finding the courage to give them up.
(Ref: Maslow, 1968)

I might be with Spendius on this...

Maslow would have agreed. He used examples of prominent people because a large portion of the population could relate to and understand the examples. He never intended it to mean that one couldn't acheive self-actualization if they weren't world famous.

Basicly good
It looks like Maslow based the SA theory on Kant's Categorical Imperative and the simpler idea that man is basically good.




Anyway, in a preliminary manner, I think that the main keys to SA are:
1.Developing the intellect to its max capacity (diff. depending on the person).
2.Attaining a high degree of unbiased logic in interpreting the world
3.Ability to appear as amoral
4.High adaptability
5.Free of fear in general

Re: Basicly good


I'd disagree. I don't see where any of these are necessary.

The entire concept of using the hierarchy of needs is that any one person bounces through the varuious levels daily. A homeless person with a 2nd grade education can acheive self actualization in a matter of hours if things all fall in place at the right time. That same person could find themselves back at looking for basic survival needs again the next day.

Self actualization isn't some static status that one achieves and maintains. It's an ebb and flow and each individual is the only judge of whether or not they've acheived S-A or not.

Good observation!

May be the case, but it is entirely possible that it is a stage that one can achieved as well. Could be a combination of both as well. No biggie!

Maslow, I suspect, mentioned specific examples such as Lincoln not because he wished to imply that fame was a necessary characteristic of S-A but because we could all understand his meaning through these examples.

I think that all persons have S-A potential but that person must find his or her own path to such an achievement. I suspect we all have a matrix of talents, most undiscovered, that can be the source for striving for S-A. S-A is, I think, a journey and not a destination. Here-today-and-gone-tomorrow.

Maslow mentioned that he was trying to discover "how tall a human could grow". I suspect that is not an absolute measurement but is for the individual relative to what can be versus what s/he does achieve.

I think yardsale hit the nail on the head with this analysis;
Anyway, in a preliminary manner, I think that the main keys to SA are:
1.Developing the intellect to its max capacity (diff. depending on the person).
2.Attaining a high degree of unbiased logic in interpreting the world
3.Ability to appear as amoral
4.High adaptability
5.Free of fear in general

Chuck

In the analysis yardsale spoke of "appearing amoral". This I had some problem with. I checked out a web site and found some thing that supports yardsales message of amorality.

Discrimination: means and ends, Good and Evil
The SA does not confuse between means and ends and does no wrong. He enjoys
the here and now, getting to goal--not just the result. He makes the most tedious
task an enjoyable game and has his own inner moral standards (appearing
amoral to others).

I think I now understand what yardsale meant and it now makes sense to me.

Chuck

I dunno. Maslow seems awfully simplistic.

Agreed on the example implications.

Thanks chuck, couldn't have said it any better about appearing amoral.


Additionally, I think that it may be imperative for someone striving to achieve SA to take a step back, through all of their current beliefs to the side (clear the slate). Similar to what Descartes did in efforts to develop a new system of thought. "Descartes peels away the layers of beliefs and opinions that clouded his view of the truth. But, very little remains, only the simple fact of doubting itself, and the inescapable inference that something exists doubting, namely Descartes himself." (http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/d/descarte.htm)

This may be the most productive or only way to achieve the highest degree of unbiased logic.