Maslow's Hierarchy (of Suffering)

Ok, so we're going to start this one with a teachable moment here.

In the world of psychology, there exists what is known as Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, and over the years since it was created it has been a successful tool in gauging what parts of a person's past are still lingering in the present, specifically in terms of what "needs" they currently have and what needs may not have been met when they were younger.

The hierarchy of needs are presented in a pyramid, with the most basic, important needs on the bottom. It looks like this:

These are the things which, at their essence, are important for a person to have, or feel that they have, throughout life in order have the security needed for full actualization, or becoming their "optimal" self.

Often, when a person comes to therapy, their presenting struggles can be linked to the lack of security in one or several of these areas. For example, typically, a person struggling with anxiety has experienced or is currently experiencing a need in some amount of safety and also love or belonging.

The need for safety is present in the struggle to trust their own emotions and thoughts, especially since anxiety tends to be very convincing with the arguments it produces for those feelings and emotions, despite generally being irrational in nature.

The need for love and belonging is also present, and often more easily identified, as the subject of anxiety typically has a basis in feeling accepted by one's environment due to the irrationality of one's thoughts, regardless of how convincing anxiety can be.

Anxiety can also come from a lack of security in the other areas as well. A person's experience with a lack of physiological safety as well as the two higher levels. In a future article, I will go deeper into anxiety and discuss its mechanisms in regards to suffering. But for now, we're going to stay with the hierarchy.

Generally speaking, it is necessary for a person to obtain security in the lower levels in order to reach security in the higher ones. If I am still struggling to feel love and belonging, obtaining security in my own self esteem is going to be a difficult endeavor, because the way that my environment accepts me, or feels to be accepting, will validate the truths I believe about myself. If it doesn't validate feelings of positive self esteem, or feels as though it doesn't, my belief about myself will reflect that, lowering my self esteem.

So how does suffering play into the hierarchy? Simply by being the catalyst of any lack of security throughout our lifetime.

Here's what I mean.

If I grew up in a home which was lacking substantial amounts of food, warmth, physical comfort, etc, that would be considered a form of suffering. I am subject to malnourishment, hunger, etc, as a result of this condition of need. Now, developing in that environment, I have a greater likelihood of growing up to focus on pursuits which allow me to satisfy that need more acutely. I might focus on higher paying jobs to eliminate the possibility of not being able to provide those needs.

For some, this need and pursuit of satisfaction works itself out to the point where a person has also obtained awareness of where their need has come from and is able to separate their pursuit and success or lack thereof from their own identify. For others, the suffering they experienced in that regard remains as a more neurotic desire to keep from returning to the state of suffering they were subject to. (This is where anxiety enters as a harbinger of sorts, because the idea of returning to the past is more of a haunt than a motivator.)

Already, I've mentioned two levels on the hierarchy which have been involved in just one area of mental health. And if you notice, what I began speaking about was mostly within the physiological realm of need, and as my hypothetical self grew older that lack of security developed into both a physiological need and a need for safety as well. It wouldn't be unusual if "I" also grew into a state of anxiety which told me that the ways in which my security was "in danger" were intertwined with the feeling of love, acceptance, belonging, etc from those in my life, as my anxiety is likely telling me that I may lose them as well if I don't keep things in line.

See the point?

Bringing this back around, the presence of suffering is something that is pivotal in how a person develops, and more importantly, how they fashion themselves as person in society. Want to know what a person in the midst of suffering values the most? Find out what they didn't have enough of growing up. In other words, if you want to know what a person is and aims to be, find out what suffering they endured as a child or adolescent, and then ask what they learned from it. Whatever their answer is will tell you how suffering formed their worldview, which will give you insight into what they need, what they are striving for, and what all of that has convinced them about those around them.

We'll go deeper into this in the next article, so stay tuned for more talk of the benefits of suffering, especially in the lens of providing mental health. Thanks for reading!