Holistic-dynamic theory of personality by A. Maslow

In psychology, the term “Self-actualization” means the complete discovery and disclosure by a person of his inner potential, the implementation of his skills and talents in all spheres of life, the use of all existing inclinations and inclinations.

Thus, we can say that this mechanism manifests itself in the form of a desire for any identification and external expression by the individual of his capabilities. It should be noted that the possibility of self-actualization largely depends on environmental conditions, social conditions and other factors, but at the same time it can in no way be imposed or transformed from the outside. It is also noteworthy that this desire does not have any external goal and is determined purely by the internal positive nature of a person. Self-actualization often underlies humanistic trends in psychology, seen as a complex of personal freedom, the desire for the development of the individual, the realization of all human potentials and desires.

Self-actualization of personality

It should be noted that specialists such as K. Rogers and A. Maslow were more interested in the problem of self-actualization. Thus, the very essence of this concept comes from the classical directions of humanistic psychology. Moreover, the formation of the term is directly related to the formation of humanistic psychotherapy in the middle of the 0th century, when it took one of the leading places along with psychoanalysis, which was already popular by that time.

Taking as a basis the processes of self-actualization themselves, the movement is considered as a direction based on the belief that each individual has the ability to achieve absolute disclosure if he is given the freedom and the necessary conditions for this. In this case, the subject will be able to fully determine and direct his own destiny.

Some experts, in particular A. Maslow himself, believed that precisely such mechanisms as self-realization and self-actualization of the individual represent absolutely leading human needs, capable of replacing even food and sleep. Experts also identified a number of qualities, some common characteristics of the character traits of individuals who are very successful in self-actualization or have already reached great heights in it:

• Such people often do what they love throughout their lives. • They are not subject to outside influence and are in complete control of their lives. • The individual strives for constant improvement and development. Likes to gain new information through reading. • Usually these are highly creative individuals. They are also often prone to positive thinking. • Open in the emotional sphere. It is much faster and easier to forgive yourself for any breakdowns or incontinence in a sensitive person.

To summarize, we can say with confidence that such an approach is the “golden key” to a happy life, because such people are in complete harmony with themselves.

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Personal needs according to Maslow

According to the scientist, a person’s need for self-actualization includes certain needs.

Own safety. When a person is not in danger, he is in a calm state.
Recognition and respect. Whatever actions an individual takes, he wants to feel successful and be appreciated.
Aesthetic needs are necessary to create harmony and stability.
Physiological. Need for food, sleep, water.
Love. To be completely happy, a person must love and feel loved, feel the support of loved ones.
Creativity and cognition. This need is especially acute for children who are interested in everything around them.
Spiritual needs. The personality improves, engages in self-knowledge, and develops abilities.
The craving for self-actualization plays a significant role in the period of personality formation, and it already depends on the motives, goals and attitudes of the person.

All needs can be considered in the form of five levels depending on their importance on the path to self-actualization:

first level – physiological, necessary for life, protection, sexual satisfaction,
the second is reliability, concern for health, material well-being, a happy old age,
third, social needs, satisfaction when communicating in society,
fourth – the need for respect and self-esteem, having a high place in society.
fifth, the desire for personal development, self-realization.

Self-actualization Maslow

A. Maslow became known as the founder of the movement of humanistic psychology. Unlike his contemporaries, colleagues and specialists, he sought to study the psychological norm. That is, he paid much more attention to healthy individuals, creatively developed, and also, subsequently, to those who reached certain peaks within the framework of self-actualization. Maslow's self-actualization, or rather, his theory regarding this psychological process, is based on the internal experience of the individual. From the point of view of a specialist, this was an absolute experience, liberated, alive and pure, that is, not burdened with “teenage shyness.”

Maslow also proposed his list of characteristic traits that he identified as leading for a person striving for self-actualization:

• Such a person has a more accurate and effective perception of the surrounding reality and is able to more adequately contact it. • Absolute acceptance of yourself and your personality, environment, other people. • Such people are somewhat spontaneous, they are open, never cheat, and at the same time they always clearly know their goal and move towards it. • They are autonomous. Independent of the surrounding society and any cultural conventions. At the same time, they often need a certain solitude and isolation. • They are capable of deeper and stronger interpersonal relationships. They are also able to separate the ends from the means and separate the concepts of “good” and “evil.” • Quite often they experience a feeling of union with those around them; they are rarely impartial. • As a rule, these are creative people.

Maslow's main assumption regarding self-actualization was that in order to achieve set goals and avoid disappointment in human nature, an individual must first of all abandon the illusions imposed on him about it. That is, such people initially perceive themselves and those around them as they really are.

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Holistic-dynamic theory of personality by A. Maslow

Holistic-dynamic theory of personality by A. Maslow

Either you take a step forward towards personal growth, or you take a step back into safety.

Abraham Maslow's (Abram Samuilovich Maslov) personality theory has been variously called humanistic theory, transpersonal theory, the third force in psychology (the first force is psychoanalysis and its modifications. The second force is behaviorism and its modifications), the theory of needs and the theory of self-actualization. However, Maslow himself called the theory holistic-dynamic because it assumes that a person is constantly motivated by one need or another and that people have the potential to grow towards achieving full self-actualization. To achieve self-actualization, people must satisfy lower-level needs such as hunger, security, love, and esteem. Only after they have been relatively satisfied in each of these needs can they achieve self-actualization in the higher level needs.

A. Maslow criticized both psychoanalysis and behaviorism for their limited views of human nature and their inadequate understanding of the psychologically healthy person. Maslow believed that people have a higher nature than psychoanalysis or behaviorism described.

Maslow's personality theory is based on several basic assumptions:

First, it is a holistic approach to motivation: the whole person, and not some separate part or function, is motivated.
Second, motivation is typically complex, meaning that a person's behavior may stem from several distinct motives. For example, the desire for sexual intercourse may be motivated not only by the Freudian psychosexual genital need, but also by the need for dominance, communication, love and self-esteem. Moreover, the motivation for behavior may be unconscious or unknown to the person. For example, a college student's motivation to achieve a high grade may mask a need for dominance or power. Maslow's recognition of the importance of unconscious motivation is one important aspect. Any action, in addition to obvious and conscious motivation, may have other hidden and underlying motives.
The third assumption is that people are constantly motivated by some need or another. When one need is satisfied, it usually loses its motivational power and is then replaced by another need. For example, as long as people's needs for food remain unsatisfied, they will strive to obtain it. But once they have enough food, they move on to satisfy higher-order needs, such as the needs for safety, friendship and self-esteem.
The fourth assumption of the theory is that all people around the world are motivated by the same basic needs. The ways in which people in different cultures obtain food, build homes and relationships may vary widely, but basic needs such as food, safety and friendship are common to all humanity.
A final assumption regarding motivation is that needs can be organized into a hierarchy, with basic physiological needs at the bottom and self-actualization needs at the top.

Nature of motivating needs

Maslow hypothesized that some human needs are initially determined by instincts, but can be changed through learning. Sex, for example, is primarily a physiological need as part of the reproductive instinct, but the way in which this need is expressed depends on learning.

One of the criteria for separating instinctive (instinctoid) needs from non-instinctive ones is the level of violations when they are dissatisfied. Suppression of instinctual needs leads to the development of pathology, while frustration of non-instinctoid needs does not produce such a negative effect. For example, when people are denied enough love, they get sick, just as when they lack food or a safe environment.

The second criterion for distinguishing between instinctoid and non-instinctoid needs is that instinctoid needs are persistent and their satisfaction is necessary to maintain mental health. Non-instinctoid needs, on the contrary, are usually temporary in nature, and their satisfaction is not a prerequisite for health.

The third difference is that instinctoid needs are species specific. Therefore, animal instincts cannot be used as a model for studying human motivation. For example, only a person can be motivated by self-esteem and self-actualization.

Fourth, although instinctual needs are difficult to change, they can be shaped, suppressed, or changed by environmental influences. Many instinctoid needs (for example, love) are weaker than the external forces of society (for example, aggression in the form of crime or war). Therefore, Maslow insisted that society must “protect the weak, subtle and gentle instinctual needs so that they are not suppressed by the harsher and more powerful culture.” In other words, instinctoid needs can be changed and even destroyed by more powerful forces of nature and civilization. Therefore, a healthy society must seek ways in which its members can receive satisfaction not only of physiological and safety needs, but also of love, respect, and self-actualization needs.

Lower and higher needs

Important similarities and differences exist between higher-level needs (love, esteem, self-actualization) and lower-level needs (physiological and safety). Higher needs are similar to lower ones in that they are also instinctoid. Maslow insisted that love, self-esteem and self-actualization are as biological as thirst, hunger and sex and love. The differences between higher and lower needs lie on a different plane.

First, higher level needs are found later at the phylogenetic or evolutionary level. For example, only humans (a relatively recent biological species) have the need for self-actualization. In addition, higher needs appear later in the course of individual development. Lower needs must be unconditionally met in infants and children so that they can progress to higher levels of needs.

Second, satisfying higher-order needs gives people greater feelings of happiness and more peak experiences. Peak experiences are a term coined by Maslow to describe sudden intense feelings of happiness, fullness of existence, which are often also accompanied by a feeling of unity with the world, nature, other people, works of art, awareness of some “absolute truth”, the unity of all things. Hedonic pleasure generated by the satisfaction of lower needs is usually temporary and incomparable with the quality and level of happiness experienced when higher needs are satisfied. In addition, satisfaction of a higher level of needs is more subjectively desirable for those people who have experienced both higher and lower level needs. In other words, a person who has reached the level of self-actualization will not have the motivation to return to a lower stage of development.

The concept of hierarchy of motives

Maslow's hierarchy of needs suggests that lower-level needs must be satisfied, or at least partially satisfied, before higher-level needs can become effective regulators of behavior. These needs are in a hierarchy (pyramid or ladder), where each subsequent level reflects more spiritual (higher) and less and less necessary needs for survival. For example, someone to be motivated by self-esteem or self-actualization must satisfy their needs for food and security in advance. Satisfaction of physiological needs is a priority for survival. Maslow listed the needs in order of their predominance: physiological needs, safety needs, love and belonging needs, esteem needs and self-actualization needs. Maslow calculated that the hypothetical average person would have satisfaction in their needs to approximately the following levels:

Physiological - 85%
Safety - 70%
Love and belonging - 50%
Self-esteem - 40%
Self-actualization -10%.

The more a need at a lower level is satisfied, the greater the need at the next level arises. The quantitative ratio of the expression of needs is graphically successfully displayed in the form of a layer pyramid. For example, if love needs are only 10% satisfied, then esteem needs may not appear at all. But if the needs for love are satisfied by 25%, then the need for respect can develop by 5%. If love is satisfied to 75%, then the need for respect expands to 50%, and so on. Therefore, needs arise gradually, and a person can be simultaneously motivated by needs from two or more levels.

For example, a self-actualizing creative person may be the guest of honor at a dinner given to him by close friends in a quiet, cozy restaurant. The act of eating satisfies a physiological need, but at the same time the guest of honor may be satisfied by security, love, respect and self-actualization needs.

Although the basic hierarchy of needs is the most common, sometimes 10.1, sometimes needs can be reversed. For some people, the desire for self-esteem or creativity (the need for self-actualization) may take precedence over safety and physiological needs. An enthusiastic artist may risk safety and health to complete important work. A person who considers human dignity and universal humanistic values to be an absolute is capable of opposing the superior forces of totalitarian states and dictatorships, risking his safety. In some cases, the apparent inversion of the hierarchy of needs is not such, since the behavior is based on hidden motives of the basic hierarchy.

Physiological needs

The most basic needs of any person are physiological needs, including food, water, air, maintaining a constant body temperature, and so on. Physiological needs are the strongest motivators. Perpetually hungry people are motivated to get food and eat, not to make friends or gain self-esteem. When people do not have their physiological needs met, they live primarily to satisfy those needs and constantly strive to satisfy them. Starving people become preoccupied with food and will do almost anything to get it.

Physiological needs differ from other needs in at least two important respects:

First, these are the only needs that can be fully satisfied or even over-satisfied. People can become so full that food completely loses its motivational power. For someone who has just eaten too much, the thought of eating more can even have a nauseating effect.

The second characteristic characteristic of physiological needs is their recurrent nature. After people have eaten, they will eventually become hungry. Also, people constantly need to replenish their supplies of food and water, and after the deepest breath they will have to take more and more breaths. Higher level needs do not need to be constantly satisfied. For example, people who have at least partially satisfied their needs for love and respect will normally remain confident that they can satisfy these needs.

Need for security

When people partially satisfy their physiological needs, they become motivated to ensure their safety, including physical safety, stability, independence, and freedom from threatening forces such as war, terrorism, disease, fear, anxiety, danger, chaos, and natural disasters. The needs for law, order and regulation are also security needs.

Safety needs differ from physiological needs in that they cannot be oversatisfied. People can never be completely protected from the dangerous actions of others and emergency situations. In democratic societies not subject to war or sociopolitical upheaval, most healthy adults can easily satisfy their security needs, so that over time they become relatively unimportant. However, children in any society are almost constantly motivated by security needs, because for them there are many subjective and objective threats: darkness, animals, strangers and punishment from parents. Additionally, some adults also feel relatively insecure because they retain irrational fears from childhood that cause them to act as if they are still afraid of parental punishment. This condition is determined by acquired basic anxiety, which develops due to an unmet need for safety in childhood.

Needs for love and belonging

After people partially satisfy their physiological and safety needs, they become able to be motivated by such needs as the desire for friendship and love, the desire to get married and have children, and the need to belong to a family, club, community or nation. Love and belonging also include some aspects of sex and affection, as well as the need to both give and receive love. People who have had their needs for love and belonging adequately met from an early age do not experience fear or anxiety when they are denied love or friendship. Such people are confident that they are unconditionally accepted by those who are important to them, so when other people reject them they do not feel empty. See an example of how the needs for love and acceptance manifest themselves in the psychological analysis of the dialogue between the Little Prince and the Fox.

Another group of people consists of those who have never experienced love and a sense of belonging, and therefore are not capable of giving love themselves. As children, such people were never hugged or expressed their love in words. Maslow believed that these people over time devalue the meaning of love and take its absence for granted.

The third category includes those people who have received only a little love and community. Such people know the taste of love and will be highly motivated to find it. In other words, people who received only a small amount of love have a stronger need for affection and acceptance by others than people who received either a fair amount of love in childhood or no love at all.

Children need love in order to grow psychologically, and their attempts to satisfy this need are usually straightforward and spontaneous. Adults also need love, but their attempts to achieve it are often skillfully disguised. Adults may engage in self-destructive behavior by pretending to be aloof, cynical, cold, or rude in interpersonal relationships. They give the appearance of self-sufficiency and independence, but in reality they have a strong need to be accepted and loved by other people.

Other adults, whose need for love remains largely unmet, may take too obvious steps, putting too much effort into “catching love”, thereby undermining their own success. Their constant pleas for acceptance and obsessive attachment make others wary, unfriendly, and cause them to distance themselves from such a person.

Esteem needs

To the extent that people satisfy their needs for love and belonging, they become able to pursue the fulfillment of esteem needs, which include self-esteem, self-esteem, competence, and the knowledge that others value them highly. Maslow identified two levels of esteem needs: reputation and self-esteem. Reputation is how the world perceives a person, the level of prestige, recognition or fame that a person has achieved in the eyes of others. Self-esteem is a person's sense of self-worth and self-confidence. Self-esteem reflects a person's desire for achievement, mastery and competence, confidence in the face of society, and the desire for independence and freedom. In other words, self-esteem is based on a person's actual competence, and not just on others' opinions of him. Sooner or later, people achieve the desired level of self-esteem and find themselves on the threshold of the highest need - self-actualization.

Self-actualization needs

When lower level needs are satisfied, people move more or less automatically to the next higher level. However, after the needs for respect are satisfied, people do not always move to the level of self-actualization - there are no more than 10% of such people in the population. Only people who share such values as absolute values such as truth, beauty, justice and other values of a higher spiritual order move to self-actualization. People who do not share these values do not move to the level of self-actualization, even if all their other needs are satisfied. In addition to the blocks at the previous stages of satisfying needs, Maslow identified the Jonah complex as a significant internal resistance to its full realization. The Jonah complex is characterized by attempts to escape from one's destiny just like the biblical Jonah. The Jonah complex, which is found in almost every person, represents the fear of success, the fear of being the best, and the fear of being in awe of beauty and perfection.

Self-realization must include the realization of the individual's potential, and the desire to become a creative person in the full sense of the word. People who have reached the level of self-actualization become real people in the full sense of the word, capable of satisfying spiritual needs of a higher order that other people do not experience and will never experience. Self-actualized people are natural in life in the same sense in which animals and babies are natural in the world. They are able to express their basic human needs and do not allow other people to suppress them. Self-actualizing people retain their sense of self-worth even when they are despised or rejected by others. In other words, self-actualizers do not depend on the satisfaction of love or esteem needs. Such people become independent of lower-level needs.

Criteria for self-actualized individuals

First, self-actualized people are free from psychopathology. They are neither neurotic nor psychopathic, and do not have mental disorders. This is a very important criterion because some neurotic and psychotic individuals may have experiences and experiences that are superficially similar to the peak states of self-actualized individuals: a heightened sense of reality, mystical experiences, creativity, and detachment from other people. Maslow excluded from the list of possible self-actualizing people anyone who showed clear signs of psychopathology - with the exception of some psychosomatic diseases.

Secondly, self-actualizing people have moved up the hierarchical ladder of development of needs, and therefore live above the usual subsistence level of existence and have no threats to their safety. In addition, they have experienced love and have a well-developed sense of self-esteem. Because they have lower-level needs satisfied, self-actualizing people are better able to tolerate the deprivation and disappointment of satisfying lower-level needs, even in the face of criticism, contempt, and danger. They are able to love a wide variety of people, but do not feel obligated to love everyone.

Maslow's third criterion for self-actualization is the adoption of higher spiritual values. Only people who share them are able to become self-actualized. Among the population of developed democratic states, such people make up no more than 1% of the population. They must share and incorporate the highest “B-values”: truth, goodness, beauty, integrity or transcendence, naturalness or spontaneity, uniqueness, perfection, completeness, justice and order, simplicity, completeness, ease, playfulness or humor, self-sufficiency or autonomy.

Self-actualized people are:

More effective perception, analysis and assessment of the surrounding reality.
Accepting yourself, others and the world around as they are.
Spontaneity, simplicity and naturalness.
Problem-centeredness as opposed to egocentredness.
The need for privacy with the ability not to be alone with oneself.
Autonomy and knowing your worth.
Sincerity of gratitude.
The ability to experience peak emotional states.
A sense of community and unity with humanity.
The depth of personal relationships.
Democratic views and behavior.
Ability to differentiate between means and ends.
Philosophical views.
A friendly (not hostile) sense of humor.
Creativity.
Resistance to inculturation (imposition of cultural values from the outside).
The ability to “give” love, the special depth of intimate relationships.

The fourth criterion for achieving self-actualization is “full use and exploitation of talents, abilities, potentialities, etc.” In other words, his self-actualizing personalities fully satisfy their needs for growth and constant development in order to become what they are capable of becoming.

To assess the values and behavior of self-actualized people, there is a Personal Orientation Inventory (POI) questionnaire [E. Shostrom, 1974].

Additional needs

In addition to the basic five needs, Maslow identified three more categories of needs: aesthetic, cognitive and neurotic. Satisfaction of aesthetic and cognitive needs ensures psychological well-being, while deprivation of these needs leads to the development of maladjustment or mental pathology. Formed neurotic needs lead to disruption of mental functioning, regardless of whether they are satisfied or not.

Aesthetic needs

Aesthetic needs are not universal, but at least some people in every culture are motivated by the need for beauty and the experience of aesthetic pleasure. From the time of cave dwellers to the present day, people have created art for art's sake. People with strong aesthetic needs desire a beautiful and orderly environment, and when these needs are not satisfied, they suffer in the same way as people who suffer if their basic conative needs are not satisfied. People prefer beauty to ugliness, and they may even become physically and spiritually ill when forced to live in squalid, disorderly surroundings.

Cognitive (cognitive) needs

Most people have a need to gain knowledge and information, solve mysteries, understand phenomena, and be curious. Maslow called these desires cognitive needs. When they are blocked, all the needs in Maslow's hierarchy are compromised, since cognitive abilities are required to satisfy each of the five basic conative needs. People can satisfy their physiological needs only by knowing how to get food, safety needs by knowing how to build a shelter, love needs knowing how to treat people, respect needs knowing how to gain some level of self-confidence, and self-actualization requires complete cognitive resource.

Maslow believed that healthy people want to know more in order to theorize, test hypotheses, solve mysteries, or figure out how something happens. However, people whose cognitive needs were not satisfied, who were constantly lied to, whose curiosity was suppressed, whose access to reliable information was limited, acquire certain personality deformations, which manifest themselves in distrust, skepticism, pessimism and cynicism.

Neurotic Needs

Satisfying conative, aesthetic and cognitive needs is the basis for healthy physical and mental development of a person. Unsatisfied needs lead to the formation of pathology, both at the physical and mental levels. The presence of neurotic needs in a person only leads to stagnation in development and the development of pathology. By definition, neurotic needs are counterproductive. They capture an unhealthy image and lifestyle, have no adaptive function and undermine the healthy desire for self-actualization. Neurotic needs are usually reactive, that is, they appear and serve as compensation when basic needs are not satisfied. For example, a person who does not have their security needs met may develop a strong desire to hoard money or possessions to protect themselves. The accumulative instinct is a neurotic need that leads to pathology, whether it is satisfied or not. Likewise, a neurotic with unmet needs for safety, love and affection may strive to form a close relationship with another person, but these relationships may be neurotic, consumerist, which will not lead to true love. A neurotic person either needs to have their needs met or to be disappointed in them (for example, people who want to be convinced that love or friendship does not exist, or that a psychologist cannot help them).

Unmet needs

Failure to satisfy any of the basic needs leads to one or another type of pathology. Deprivation of food leads to malnutrition, fatigue, and loss of energy. Threats to one's own safety lead to fear, uncertainty and terror. When love needs go unmet, a person becomes defensive, overly aggressive, or socially timid. Lack of self-esteem leads to painful self-doubt and self-abasement. Deprivation of opportunities for self-actualization also leads to pathology, or more precisely, metapathology: lack of values, lack of self-realization and loss of meaning in life

Unmotivated behavior

Maslow believed that some behaviors are not motivated. There are expressive behaviors that are caused by other factors, such as conditioned reflexes, maturation, or exposure to psychoactive substances (drugs, alcohol).

Expressive and coping behavior

Expressive behavior, which is often unmotivated, differs from coping behavior, which is always motivated and aimed at satisfying an actual need.

Expressive behavior is often an end in itself and serves no other purpose. This is often an unconscious behavior that occurs naturally and without much effort. It has no purpose, but is simply a way of expressing personality. Expressive behavior includes actions such as slouching, looking stupid, relaxed, angry, or happy. Expressive behavior may continue even in the absence of reinforcement or reward. For example, a frown, blush, or sparkle in the eyes is usually not specifically reinforced. Expressive behavior also includes gait, gestures, voice intonation and smiles. A person, for example, may exhibit compulsive behavior simply because he is an obsessive-compulsive personality, and not because he needs to (although this possibility cannot be completely ruled out). Other examples of expressive behavior include art, play, enjoyment, appreciation, surprise, awe, and excitement. Expressive behavior usually does not require training, occurs spontaneously, and is determined by conditions within the person rather than by the environment.

Coping behavior is usually conscious, requires effort, learning, and is determined by the external environment. It involves the individual's attempts to cope with the environment, provide food and shelter, make friends and be accepted, and establish self-respect. Coping behavior serves some purpose or task (although not always conscious or known to the person himself), and it is always motivated by some kind of deficit need.

Use in psychotherapy

According to Maslow, the goal of therapy is for clients to accept the values of being, that is, they begin to value truth, justice, kindness, simplicity, and so on. To achieve this goal, clients must be freed from their dependence on others so that their natural impulse for growth and self-actualization can become active, since every person has an innate tendency to strive for the best, for a positive fullness of life and feelings.

Intervention goals stem from the client's position in the hierarchy of needs. If a person is dominated by lower physiological and safety needs, then such people will usually not be motivated to work with a psychologist in order to move towards higher life goals. Instead, they will seek food and protection. Most people who seek therapy have their lower needs met but have some difficulty achieving love and belonging. Therefore, psychotherapy, according to Maslow, is largely an interpersonal process. Through warm, loving, interpersonal communication in the relationship with the psychologist, the client receives the satisfaction of the need for love and belonging, thereby moving towards gaining a sense of confidence and self-esteem. Therefore, a healthy interpersonal relationship between client and psychologist is itself a significant therapeutic factor. Finding acceptance by others gives clients a sense of becoming worthy of love, which facilitates their ability to form other healthy relationships outside of therapy. This view of psychotherapy is almost identical to that of Carl Rogers.

Literature

Psychology.Theories of Personality, Seventh Edition. McGraw−Hill Primis, 2008

Andrey Demkin

Need for self-actualization

In humanistic psychology, the need for self-actualization is considered as the main internal manifestation of the individual’s desire for development. For example, K. Rogers in his concept assumed that self-actualization is based on a quality or even a whole phenomenon inherent in any living being, which literally pushes it to move forward. That is, this theory is based on the assumption of the existence of a certain innate quality, which, according to K. Rogers, always exists and only waits for certain positive conditions in order to manifest itself. At the same time, if we consider the theory of A. Maslow, the main motivating force for human development can be a strong sense of the individual’s experience, aimed at his internal self-awareness and personal experience. This nature also assumes that self-actualization is reflected in the mechanisms of hedonism, that is, the enjoyment of the highest goods, being reflected in a feeling of absolute satisfaction with life, inner harmony, and enlightenment.

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Development of self-actualization

Today, in the modern world, the development of self-actualization is not only a pressing issue, but also very problematic. The rapid pace of life, the development of technology, the constant new conditions that our century dictates - all this poses before each person the task of adapting to these conditions. Very often, self-actualization is perceived as a psychological new formation, a kind of complex. Which is very strongly associated with achieving maximum peaks, opportunities and skills in all areas of his life that are relevant to an individual.

Success in this direction sets the further pace of development of the subject. The process of self-actualization ensures the preservation of the integrity of the inner world, its balance. At the same time, the harmony of the psychological organization of the individual largely determines the individual’s motivation for further actions and development of himself as a unique personality.

Self-actualization has always remained and remains a pressing issue for any person - it has a great positive impact on the positive experience and foundation in the external world and manifestations of a person, which steadily leads to his internal positive experience and growth of self-esteem.

conclusions

Self-actualization is the embodiment of your best qualities, skills and talents. We can say that self-actualization is the peak of development of any person. Personal growth is a necessary part of our lives. Without him, our life cannot be complete. And it is self-actualization that makes us unique individuals, helping us to pursue our goals and ideals. Psychologists believe that every person has hidden potential that he can realize. Perhaps you have long wanted to start drawing, playing a musical instrument, or learning a foreign language. But self-actualization is not limited to art. This is creativity that can be used in all areas and will make your life much more interesting.