An online meeting of our Grimsby Philosophy in Pubs group to explore the actualising tendency, Thursday May 28th 2020, 7pm – 9pm
Please sign up so we can manage numbers: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/online-philosophy-in-pubs-grimsby-self-actualisation-tickets-105685104994
Josie, Phil and Billy will present the spark for discussion and here is a little background to whet your appetite.
Self-Actualisation (and individuation) – Maslow, Rogers (and Jung)
The basic idea of the actualizing tendency is straightforward. It is a desire present in all living things that pushes the organism toward growth. In the case of human organisms, we all want to express ourselves creatively and reach our full potential.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs places self-actualization at the apex. It is an ideal that emphasizes personal growth but is not based on a person’s sense of deprivation, as is the case for the first four needs (physiological, safety, belongingness, and self-esteem).
Conversely, Rogers believed that the actualizing tendency acted as the motivating force for all behavior. It is affected by the environment and the people surrounding the individual, near and far. The actualizing tendency is not an end goal reserved for a select few, but instead, it is how life begins. Organisms start with a longing (motivation) to reach completeness in whatever manner suits that organism.
Jung didn’t talk of ‘self-actualisation’, but of ‘individuation’ and this concept may well not be comparable, but is here to offer a different perspective. Jung saw it as the process of self realisation, the discovery and experience of meaning and purpose in life; the means by which one finds oneself and becomes who one really is.
We finish here with a quote by Carl Rogers from Phil, who says of it: A truly beautiful piece of writing. Taken from an astute and wise observation. This approach encompasses deep empathy, something the vast majority of human beings are capable of. It’s also something all of us has the right to. It still has the potential to be revolutionary. Do you agree?
“Whether we are speaking of a flower or an oak tree, of an earthworm or a beautiful bird, of an ape or a person, we will do well, I believe, to recognize that life is an active process, not a passive one. Whether the stimulus arises from within or without, whether the environment is favorable or unfavorable, the behaviors of an organism can be counted on to be in the direction of maintaining, enhancing, and reproducing itself. This is the very nature of the process we call life. This tendency is operative at all times. Indeed, only the presence or absence of this total directional process enables us to tell whether a given organism is alive or dead.
The actualizing tendency can, of course, be thwarted or warped, but it cannot be destroyed without destroying the organism. I remember that in my boyhood, the bin in which we stored our winter’s supply of potatoes was in the basement, several feet below a small window. The conditions were unfavorable, but the potatoes would begin to sprout—pale white sprouts, so unlike the healthy green shoots they sent up when planted in the soil in the spring. But these sad, spindly sprouts would grow 2 or 3 feet in length as they reached toward the distant light of the window. The sprouts were, in their bizarre, futile growth, a sort of desperate expression of the directional tendency I have been describing. They would never become plants, never mature, never fulfill their real potential. But under the most adverse circumstances, they were striving to become. Life would not give up, even if it could not flourish. In dealing with clients whose lives have been terribly warped, in working with men and women on the back wards of state hospitals, I often think of those potato sprouts. So unfavorable have been the conditions in which these people have developed that their lives often seem abnormal, twisted, scarcely human. Yet, the directional tendency in them can be trusted. The clue to understanding their behavior is that they are striving, in the only ways that they perceive as available to them, to move toward growth, toward becoming. To healthy persons, the results may seem bizarre and futile, but they are life’s desperate attempt to become itself. This potent constructive tendency is an underlying basis of the person-centered approach.”
― Carl R. Rogers
