Tag: self-actualization

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Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

In last week’s ballet review, I found an opportunity to bring up Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. When I was thinking about what to post this week, I came across a draft about Maslow’s hierarchy that I had started a while ago.  Seems like the perfect time to dive in, wouldn’t you agree?

Abraham Maslow was a 20th-century American psychologist. He was one of the fathers of the humanistic psychology paradigm, which centers the concept of self.  The individual perceives the world according to their own experiences and this shapes their personality and behavior. For Maslow, foundational needs must be satisfied before an individual can seek to fulfill higher levels of existence.

MaslowsHierarchyOfNeeds.svg
By FireflySixtySeven – Own work using Inkscape, based on Maslow’s paper, A Theory of Human Motivation., CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

The bottom tier of Maslow’s hierarchy is physiological needs – food and shelter, followed by safety, then love and belonging (personal relationships, sense of community, and affiliation with both formal and informal social groups). Esteem, the fourth level in the hierarchy has to do with self-respect and self-confidence as well as the desire to be valued and recognized by others.

The hierarchy is not rigid, one does not need to be completely fulfilled one tier in order to move on to the next level. It is also not absolute – someone may be at the point at which they are striving to fulfill their self-actualization needs and may experience a deficiency in their love/belonging or even physiological needs.

The top tier if Maslow’s hierarchy is self-actualization. This has to do with striving to achieve our potential and satisfying out creative goals. For Maslow, self-actualization is a state in which one is able to transcend ego (this reminds me of our chakra series). It is an interesting paradox.

Scott Barry Kaufman, a professor at Columbia University has revisited and been researching Maslow’s concept of self-actualization.  On his “about” page, I noticed that he refers to his “past life” which made me smile, because I have taken to speaking about the years that I was dancing as my past life.

You can take Dr. Kaufman’s Characteristics of Self-Actualization test (in case you don’t like my hyperlinks, here is the url: https://www.scottbarrykaufman.com/characteristics-of-self-actualization-scale/). I mean, who doesn’t love a good internet personality test? This one is free and anonymous; you don’t have to put in your email address to get the results or anything. I really liked what the questions made me think about.

For Dr. Kaufman, the characteristics of self-actualization are:

  1. Continued freshness of appreciation
  2. Acceptance
  3. Authenticity
  4. Equanimity
  5. Purpose
  6. Efficient perception of reality
  7. Humanitarianism
  8. Peak experiences
  9. Good moral intuition
  10. Creative spirit

You don’t have to have a high score on most (or even many) of these characteristics to be self-actualized.  Different things are more or less important to different people, I can think of lots of people (or maybe it’s just me) who aren’t even interested in having an efficient perception of reality. But someone who scores low on all of these characteristics may be functioning in the little hunger zone, rather than taking advantage of an opportunity to address their big hunger.

Anyway, I thought this was something fun to think about on a Monday.

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An Intro to Chakras – Ajna

“This is the incomparable and delightful abode of Vishnu. The excellent yogi at the time of death joyfully places his prana here and enters that supreme, eternal, birthless, primeval deva, the purusa, who was before the three worlds, and who is known by the Vedanta.”

Description of the Six Centres, Verse 38

Ajna – the third eye chakra

The highest corporeal center is the ajna chakra.  Commonly referred to as the “third eye chakra,” this chakra is located between our two physical eyes and is considered the location of wisdom and of conscience.  It is considered a sacred spot.

Ajna translates as “command,” “authority,” “perceive,” “knowledge,” or “wisdom.”  Any of these translations relate to our accessing our conscience, our inner guide, our intuition. When our third eye is open, we are in touch with our intuition, we cut through the illusion of perception to access truth. It not only helps us to make good decisions, but at the extreme is said to give us access to psychic powers. With the opening of this chakra, the development of our wisdom and humanity is completed and we reach the bridge to divine consciousness.

The ajna mandala is described as a transparent lotus flower with two white petals, said to represent the nadis (energy channels), Ida (feminine energy) and Pingala (masculine energy). Ida and Pingala converge with the Sushmna nadi (the central energy channel which is the path of Kundalini) at ajna, creating a sense of oneness and unity.

Another way of looking at this is that at the ajna chakra, we become aware that there is no duality (light/dark, male/female, etc.) that these are just expressions of a continuum.  For example, rather than hot and cold, something is described as having more-or-less coldness.  In the same way, something isn’t bad, it is just lacking goodness to whatever degree. This realization creates psychic space where we can experience the bliss of the oneness of the universe.

The seed syllable of ajna is “om” which is believed to be the supreme sound of the universe and contain all other sounds. “Om” represents the three worlds (past, present, and future) that are accessed through the ajna chakra (the past and present are perceived with our physical eyes and the future is perceived by our third eye).

When we have a blockage at the ajna chakra, it may manifest in physical symptoms such as vision problems, headaches, migraines, and dizziness or in mental symptoms such as confusion and an inability to think clearly.  By opening ajna, we access our ability to see things without the projection and color of ego. We accept ourselves and others and to treat everyone (including our self) with love, understanding, and forgiveness. We have the clarity and wisdom to recognize the truth that is always around us and the knowledge that we can look within for the solutions to our problems.

Jung describes ajna as the pure sphere of detached observation.  Here you become a non-ego reality, a thing not even to be called “self.” The ego disappears completely; the psychical is no longer a content within us but we become contents of it.

And now it’s time to bring Maslow’s hierarchy back because here we can relate ajna to Maslow’s concept of self-actualization.  For Maslow, self-actualization is the level at which an individual is able to maximize their full potential. A self-actualized person is able to resolve the dichotomies inherent in life experiences through creative activity.  Wait, that sounds familiar…in the ajna chakra we realize that there is no duality…

Ok, so we have reached a higher level of consciousness when we no longer interpret the world around us in terms of opposing forces.  This is the detachment that enables us to view our existence without ego – we are not a part of the universe; we are one with the universe.