CarrieMpls said:

I am with you my gemini sister!

shausler said:

I define self-actualization as achieving the highest, most unique, and most authentic expression of self.

The authentic part is crucial.. it means you don't sell yourself out. You heed your instinct and intution in forging your destiny, whether it's endorsed or not endorsed by society. It's different for everyone and has nothing to do with money, status, etc.

Your highest vision might be living under a bridge outside of traditional society. (I've met a homeless person -- twentysomething and smart .. who does it because he's such an extreme counter-culturalist, he has to live outside of society. That's cool as as hell ...because he's doing him without apology or regret).


I'm a thinker-writer. And yes I have to publish a novel or sell some screenplays before I die. It's the big looming self-actualization goal that leaves me in cold chills each night.


Nothing else means anything to me. And yet it's been so hard to attain even though I see shitty writers getting published and going on Oprah everday. Let's not even talk about the shitty movies catering to the lowest common denominator. How the fuck do these get made?

I was a teacher. Unfullfilling. I became a newspaper reporter. Again,unfulfilling (it's writing, but who gives a shit about crime, schools and government...I want to write lasting, life changing pieces about existential issues that have haunted mankind since Life began).

Five years ago I thought... well, I guess I better stop moping around and get a master's degree to secure my futre. So I took two semesters in a MBA program then even with A's and A-'s quit because let's face it, I'm not going to be happy in business (and I can't have a professor telling me what to do and thinking I care what he thinks of my work. Because I really don't).

Unless I can sit and think and reflect and write for hours without interruption everyday, I'm not going to be happy.

I admire that Thoreau said to hell with his Ivy League degree and said I'm going to make some fucking pencils. Then, when I'm done with that, I going to go look at some plants and animals. Everyone thought he was a bum who screwed up his potential. Thank god, he followed his destiny.

I wish I could quit and go live in a secluded wood to think.

But right now I'm in an meaningless 9 to 5. And 9 to 5's leave you so ragged-- good luck thinking. I've read a theory that philosophy is the privilege of the leisure class. Sadly, this is proving true. It's hard to mull philosophical issues when you're on the grind.

It's not a matter of trying to make myself 'special." Translating my ideas, reflections, and revelations into print is the only thing that authentically springs from within. To do it leaves me with a relish akin to orgasm. Just 'having (giving birth to) a thought' gets me giddy. It's a case of trying to follow my own 'energies" as John Stuart Mill would say.

I must analyze the world, decode human behavior, and build art (novels, screenplays) on that as a form of self-actualization.

Even if no one else thinks what I produce is good...

I'm trying to invest some now, so I can maybe take a year or two off in a couple of years. Then it's do or die.

I know others crave marriage and babies to be fulfilled. But that would mean nothing to me. No matter what I achieve or what praise I get, I never feel complete because I'm not self-actualized as an author.

It's desperate but at the same time thrilling.
[Edited 12/11/05 7:52am]

Novabreaker said:

but the "self" in self -actualization refers to yourself and not an act you perform. It's about gaining knowledge of the self and using that knowledge to achieve your true potential. we can all perform successful acts, but do we always learn and grow from them?

also:



and Maslow identified peak experiences as a characteristic of Self Actualizing people



....
[Edited 12/11/05 14:51pm]

Number23 said:

whodknee said:

You're reminding me of something I just realized the other day. That I will NEVER have as much time as I'd like to work on things (certainly not the block of time that I've looked forward to & tried to build into my schedule for quite a while now). I simply have to make time for all the things I want to do. I have to choose it. It will be inconvenient, not the way I want it. It will SUCK! But if I have to do it at all, I have to do it along w/ everything else.

I've been bone dry for ideas for a while now, but things are starting to bubble again & I'm so excited for that! Now I have to smash it in w/ everything else & that's gotta be okay w/ me. Nothing is how we want it to be.

In the end, pick up that paintbrush my friend. A bit at a time is better than wishing for the time.

LleeLlee said:

In that case the potential would be just an empty category. Totally meaningless, unless there is something performed. There is no a performer without the performed. It's paradoxal, but the only way out of it just to do something first. It needs to be pushed through.

Actualization of the potential? I wouldn't know about that, very romantic. Actualization of the act is what should matter in the real world.

My head hurts.

Novabreaker said:

Romantic, beautiful and true.

CalhounSq said:

You're right. I tell myself these things every now and then, but patience isn't my strong-suit.

whodknee said:

starkitty said:

I was going to post and then I saw this. Now I don't have too.

Well, I did post, but...

:youknowwhatImean:

Novabreaker said:

All acts start out as potential acts, it's taking that potential and transforming it into something real (the act itself). Somebody might have great potential for writing and tapping into that is taking steps to self-acualization. i.e self - actualization occurs when a person fulfills his or her potential.



anyhow..my toast is burning!....
[Edited 12/13/05 4:14am]

LleeLlee said:

How was your toast, btw? Have you ever tried pumpkin jelly? it's surprisingly delicious.


Anyhow, what I dislike in this scenario - and this I'm saying without having read Maslow's original theory in full - is that it puts so much emphasis on becoming something through by achieving something. I always have trouble with that kind of approach, because it's basically the "celebrity" mentality - you fulfill a potential in order to actualize your desires of yourself first and foremost, not because the act itself would be considered pleasant enough on its own. For many psychologists, and psychology-oriented philosophers the creative act is nothing but a manifestation of the subconscious and an effort to express inner desires. A healthier apporach to artistic creation would be to proceed from the concept of "play" (literally, as in child's mimetic or phantasmastic play), creativity without defined rule and purpose. Only gor the pleasure of the creative process itself, the use of imagination and ultimately being allowed to view the finished object in front of yourself.

So basically, it's more important to write a whole lot of poems than to become a poet. In the "poet" sense the creativity is confined to a goal, and that is not benefial to the full concept of particular-art-object as itself. Because of this very ideal of "self-actualization" I think we have heaploads of popular cultural products that people describe with the verb "suck".

Regardless of that I still stick to my original claim that the potential still needs to be worked out to even become a potential in the first place. There is not even potential, unless there is something first performed. It's meaningless, unless a first set of poems is written. When the first poem is finished you posseess potential to become "a poet". But this should not be an achievement in itself, successful acts however should be considered such. Without the first act you'd have the potential to become absolutely anything, and saying that is absolutely redundant as it amounts to absolutely nothing. Latent "talents" are empty because if they weren't learnt from experience, but given in birth instead, there'd be no sense to say we have them if we only found about them later. Genetics matter sure, but it's only the experience that will shape the talent to become a proper talent. I cannot actualize myself, for the genetics are not targeted towards any sort of real-world conceptual activity, only motoric skills or intelligence that serve just the means of self-preservation - biologically speaking. I can only "actualize myself" within the invention of the conceptual and that happens at a very early age, through the division of the subject from the objectivation processes (within language). Alternative claim would be that we actualize ourselves fully during our teenage years, upon the discovery of functional reasoning.

Time for pancakes!