Maslow's pyramid heirarchy of needs is all wrong 🤔🤔

I've been reading Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization by Scott Barry Kaufman and I've learned something pretty interesting:

Maslow never intended his heirarchy of needs to be in a pyramid.

Apparently that was done by a management consultant in the 60s (often I'm surprised at how much management consultants are paid for what they produce, but in this case I wonder if the hierarchy would have been nearly as popular if it wasn't in a pyramid).

They're not meant to be levels in a video game, where you win at one and then move on to the next and eventually you win at life. We are working on all of them at the same time.

Also, life isn't something you win at. It's something you live.

🤔

Since the needs can be grouped into two groups: deficiency needs and growth needs; Kaufman says that a much better analogy is a sailboat.

The deficiency needs represent the hull of the boat. If you don't have them, you're going to spend most of your energy trying to stay above water.

But even if you have all of them, that's not enough for real movement. You're just going to float there. That's where the growth needs come in - they're the sail.

The more you open yourself, the more you open your sail, the further you'll go. The sailboat isn't the purpose in and of itself (the way a pyramid is meant to be conquered), the sailboat is just the vehicle.

The vehicle for us to go out and live life.

The analogy also shows that you can't just pursue self-actualization at the expense of everything else. What good is a sail if you don't have a boat to mount it on?

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