WHERE ARE YOU ON THE LADDER OF LIFE?

There are certain basic needs for all of us that need to be fulfilled in some way and this blog is about those.    And you may find during your life that you dip in and out of these.   It’s not a matter of ‘you get there and that’s that’.   I am a perfect example of that!!

Abraham Maslow

I am going to use the model of the American Psychologist, and one of the founders of Transpersonal Psychology, Abraham MASLOW who claimed that our basic needs must be at least minimally fulfilled before we can move onto our wants.

Basic Needs 

According to Maslow, your physical needs (air, food, drink, shelter, sleep) are the most basic and when these are met, you can use your energies to pursue the next level.   For me, when I think about it, this makes a lot of sense, don’t you agree?

I love the saying by Gandhi –  “Even God cannot talk to the hungry man except in terms of bread”.

Safety Needs

Then at the next level, you must feel minimally safe and secure in your day-day activities whatever these may be as they are different for each of us.   What is being talked about here is the need to feel that your life and work are rooted in solid ground is fundamental.

Social Needs

You must feel a sense of companionship and affection at the next level.    We all need love and have a sense of belonging – some kind of knowing that you are part of a community of some sort, that someone cares.

Esteem Needs

Your self-esteem can be badly damaged by the lack of recognition from others, and a sense of achievement.    If you engage in life and work activities that you believe are worthwhile in which you can be a contributing member of society, your self- worth will rise.

To the extent that you spend your precious time on activities that you don’t value, that you consider “worthless”, your self- worth will diminish.    I know I can say to myself – ‘Well that was a waste of time for me and all concerned’ and I can feel down and not good about myself’.

Self-actualisation

At the highest level, you need to operate with purpose where you’re growing, stretching and using your highest gifts and talents and have a satisfying answer to the question –  ‘Why do I get up in the morning?”   You are realising your potential here.

However, Maslow added –  “Even if all these needs are satisfied, we may still often (if not always) expect that a new discontent and restlessness will soon develop unless the individual is doing what they are fitted for.  Musicians must make music, artist pain, writers write if they are to be ultimately at peace with themselves.   What a person can be, he or she must be. This need we call self-actualisation”.

I really do love you

For me, I see self-actualisation as being comfortable in your own shoes or skin.   It is allowing you to be the woman you are comfortable with when you look in the mirror and say, ‘I really do love you’.

My story

I know for me that Maslow’s ladder of needs made a lot of sense, and then I was in intensive care and nearly died from Bowel Cancer!!     The ladder went all to pot, as it were.    I had to start all over again very slowly with much tooing and frooing.    It was not an easy time at all, I can assure you.

Yes, I know that was a bit extreme and some of you may lose your job, your marriage, your home, your health even and literally have to start again.    Life is not hierarchical – it’s messy and up and down.   I would say that is why life is so interesting!!!  It has both pain and joy.

If you are starting all over again then I know you can and will do it – get up (even eventually) and start again.   And that the most important thing is that you have your own love and self-respect when you do begin.

I’d love to hear where you see yourself on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.