288 Part III Humanistic/Existential Theories
self-actualizing people are not ordinary people with something added, but
rather ordinary people with nothing taken away. That is, if food, safety, love,
and esteem are not taken away from people, then those people will move
naturally toward self-actualization.
Maslow was generally optimistic and hopeful about humans, but he
recognized that people are capable of great evil and destruction. Evil, how-
ever, stems from the frustration or thwarting of basic needs, not from the
essential nature of people. When basic needs are not met, people may steal,
cheat, lie, or kill.
Maslow believed that society, as well as individuals, can be improved,
but growth for both is slow and painful. Nevertheless, these small forward steps
seem to be part of humanity’s evolutionary history. Unfortunately, most people
“are doomed to wish for what they do not have” (Maslow, 1970, p. 70). In other
words, although all people have the potential for self-actualization, most will
live out their lives struggling for food, safety, or love. Most societies, Maslow
believed, emphasize these lower level needs and base their educational and
political systems on an invalid concept of humanity.
Truth, love, beauty, and the like are instinctoid and are just as basic to
human nature as are hunger, sex, and aggression. All people have the
potential to strive toward self-actualization, just as they have the motivation
to seek food and protection. Because Maslow held that basic needs are
structured the same for all people and that people satisfy these needs at
their own rate, his holistic-dynamic theory of personality places moderate
emphasis on both uniqueness and similarities.
From both a historical and an individual point of view, humans are an
evolutionary animal, in the process of becoming more and more fully human.
That is, as evolution progresses, humans gradually become more motivated
by metamotivations and by the B-values. High level needs exist, at least as
potentiality, in everyone. Because people aim toward self-actualization,
Maslow’s view can be considered teleological and purposive.
Maslow’s view of humanity is difficult to classify on such dimensions
as determinism versus free choice, conscious versus unconscious, or bio-
logical versus social determinants of personality. In general, the behavior of
people motivated by physiological and safety needs is determined by out-
side forces, whereas the behavior of self-actualizing people is at least par-
tially shaped by free choice.
On the dimension of consciousness versus unconsciousness, Maslow
held that self-actualizing people are ordinarily more aware than others of
what they are doing and why. However, motivation is so complex that people
may be driven by several needs at the same time, and even healthy people
are not always fully aware of all the reasons underlying their behavior.
As for biological versus social influences, Maslow would have insisted
that this dichotomy is a false one. Individuals are shaped by both biology and
society, and the two cannot be separated. Inadequate genetic endowment
does not condemn a person to an unfulfilled life, just as a poor social envi-
ronment does not preclude growth. When people achieve self-actualization,
they experience a wonderful synergy among the biological, social, and