75 quotes from Abraham Maslow (and human needs)

Abraham Maslow is one of the important psychologists of the 20th century. He is known as the father of one of the great currents of psychology, humanism. His theory, known as the Pyramid of the hierarchy of human needs, He was born from the idea that the actions of human beings are born from motivation directed towards the objective of meeting certain needs.

At the highest level of this pyramid, are the self-actualization needs, which are internal needs, spiritual, moral or seeking a mission in life

• To learn more, we invite you to read our article: "The Personality Theory of Abraham Maslow"

The most famous and remembered phrases of Abraham Maslow

Throughout his life, Maslow delivered various full quotes that exemplify his theory.

In this article, we have compiled the best quotes, famous quotes and reflections of Abraham Maslow.

1. Self-actualized people have a deep sense of identification, sympathy, and affection for human beings in general. They feel the kinship and connection, as if all the people were members of their family

When we feel self-actualized, we will feel good and have higher self-esteem. Which, in turn, will affect relationships with others.

2. A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write. What a man can be, must be

You must fight for what you really love to give your life meaning.

3. Be independent of the good opinion of other people

One must find in himself the motivations that make him happy.

4. We can orient ourselves towards defense, security or fear. But, on the opposite side, there is the option of growth. Choosing growth over fear twelve times a day means moving towards self-realization twelve times a day

Maslow is known as one of the most influential psychologists in personal development.

5. We must understand love, we must be able to teach it, create it, predict it, or else the world is lost in hostility and suspicion.

Love is one of the most pleasant sensations you can feel in life. It is our great motivation.

6. The people we classify as sick are those who are not themselves, who have created all kinds of neurotic defenses

Abraham Maslow is one of the psychologists who originated positive psychology.

7. If you deliberately plan to be less than you are capable of being, I warn you that you will be deeply unhappy for the rest of your days.

When someone has a goal in life, they must fight for it.

8. One can choose to go towards safety or to advance towards growth. Growth must be chosen over and over again; fear must be overcome again and again.

Maslow's pyramid has several stages and each of them must be overcome to continue.

9. Many of us, most of the time, do not listen to each other, but rather listen to the introjected voices of mom, dad, the system, the elders, authority or tradition.

Culture and environment affect how we think. Many times, not letting hear what we want to say to ourselves.

10. In certain definable and empirical senses, man needs to live in beauty rather than in ugliness, just like he needs to have food for his hungry stomach or rest for his stomach tired

A thought-provoking quote from Abraham Maslow.

11. I have the impression that the concept of creativity and that of a healthy, self-fulfilling and fully human person are becoming closer to each other and may turn out to be the same

Abraham Maslow, referring to the creativity.

12. One cannot choose wisely in life unless he dares to listen to himself, to his own self, in every moment of his life.

For this author, people are active agents of our change.

13. Satisfaction of the need for self-esteem leads to feelings of self-confidence, worth, strength, ability and sufficiency, of being useful and necessary in the world

There is a close relationship between self-esteem and self-confidence.

14. The study of motivation must be, in part, the study of the ends, desires or ultimate needs of the human being

Maslow brought great insight to theories of motivation.

15. We could define therapy as a search for value

Humanistic therapy starts from the idea that self-realization and personal well-being are related.

16. In order to invent or create it is necessary to possess the “arrogance of creativity” that many researchers have pointed out. But if you only have arrogance without humility, then you are paranoid. We must be aware not only of the divine possibilities in us, but also of the existential human limitations

It is necessary that we believe in ourselves, but always respecting others.

17. All the evidence we have indicates that it is reasonable to assume that in virtually all human beings, and In almost all newborns, there is an active will, a drive toward health, growth, and realization

People are active in our own self-development. That is why Maslow has influenced many coaching professionals.

18. Most of us could be better than we really are

We have the ability to continually improve ourselves.

19. Life is a continuous process of choosing between safety and risk. Take the growth choice a dozen times a day

This phrase refers to the concept of comfort zone.

20. False optimism sooner or later means disappointment, hatred and hopelessness

Optimism must be authentic, otherwise it will end in frustration.

21. There is anthropological evidence to indicate that the ultimate or fundamental desires of all human beings differ little from their everyday conscious desires. The main reason for this is that two different cultures can generate two totally different ways of satisfying a particular desire.

Desires are influenced by culture.

22. Self-actualization means experiencing fully, vividly and selflessly, with total concentration and absorption. It means experiencing without the shyness of the adolescent. At that moment, the person is totally and fully human. This is a moment of self-realization, the moment in which the self is actualized

There is a close relationship between the state of flow and self-realization.

23. I have learned that the novice can often see things that the expert cannot. What is necessary is not to be afraid to make mistakes or to appear naive

Fear is one of the limiting beliefs that affect our personal development.

24. People are not bad, they are unhappy

For Maslow, people are born with potential, but not all develop it.

25. The typical desire is clearly a need of the whole person.

We all have desires in life that motivate us.

26. The only rival of one is his own potentialities. The only failure is failing to live up to your own possibilities. In this sense, every man can be a king, and he must, therefore, be treated as a king.

When we set limits, we are negatively affecting our personal development.

27. We must teach people to pay attention to their own tastes. Many don't

Self-knowledge is one of the great virtues of the human being.

28. Satisfying one need creates another

Human beings want more and more. Once we have achieved one goal, we want another.

29. Something like human curiosity can be easily observed in higher animals

A phrase that invites free reflection.

30. We should renounce, once and for all, the pretense of drawing up a meticulous inventory of impulses or needs. For different reasons, such an inventory is theoretically unconscious

After all, needs come from within yourself.

31. If I was thrown out of a plane into an ocean and told that the nearest land is thousands of miles away, I would still swim. And I would despise the one who would surrender

A quote that expresses how Abraham Maslow thought.

32. The ability to be in the present moment is a major component of mental health

Currently, teaching to live present is part of some third generation therapies.

33. Self-actualization is an ongoing process. It means making all the many decisions one by one about whether to lie or be sincere, whether to steal or not. at a given time, and it means making each of those decisions as a choice of increase. It is a movement towards self-realization

Maslow believes that self-actualization depends on ourselves. We are the ones who have to fight to achieve it.

34. In reality, self-actualized people, those who have reached a high level of maturity, health, and self-satisfaction, they have so much to teach us that at times they almost seem to belong to a different species of Humans

Not everyone is capable of overcoming their limiting beliefs and moving towards self-realization.

35. We would never want to compose music or create mathematical systems, or decorate our houses, or do well. dresses, if our stomach was empty at all hours, or if we were continually dying thirsty

For Maslow, the phases have to be overcome one by one. You cannot think about self-realization if we have not managed to meet our basic needs.

36. In short, the musician must play, the painter must paint and the poet must write, if they want to live in peace with themselves.

Each of us has a path to follow to achieve self-realization.

37. The independence of the environment achieves relative stability in the face of a hard blow, deprivation, beatings, frustrations and the like. These people can maintain relative composure in the midst of circumstances that could lead other people to suicide. They are also described as "self-sufficient"

It is not easy to achieve what we want in life. You have to keep going even in bad times.

38. Children do not need to be taught to be curious

People, innately, are explorers.

39. If your only tool is a hammer, you tend to treat every problem like a nail.

This phrase refers to mental flexibility when solving problems and adapting to the environment.

40. The most important problems of the greatest and best characters in the history of mankind must be covered and explained

In Maslow's book many characters appear that he uses as examples of successful people.

41. If all needs are unsatisfied, and the organism is therefore dominated by physiological needs, the remaining needs may simply be non-existent or displaced at the bottom

The preference is always to satisfy lower-order needs.

42. If you only have a hammer, you tend to see all problems as a nail

It is more difficult to adapt to the environment with an inflexible mind.

43. We must immediately ensure that human motivation is rarely realized in behavior, if not in relation to a situation and some people

Motivation is a psychological variable that is very present in our personal development.

44. What needs to change in a person is self-awareness

Trusting yourself is one of the best virtues to achieve what we want.

45. We fear our maximum possibilities. In general, we are scared of becoming what we envision in our best moments, in the most perfect conditions and with the greatest courage.

Another concept that arises from Maslow's pyramid theory is the jonah complex.

46. There are people who are afraid to bet on themselves

Some individuals have ways of thinking that limit them to personal growth.

47. Will you walk forward to growth or walk backward to safety

Living in the comfort zone does not allow you to develop fully.

48. The fact is that people are good. Give people affection and security and they will give affection and be safe in their feelings and behaviors.

For Maslow, people are born good but society corrupts them.

49. When people appear to be anything but good and decent, it is only because they are reacting to stress or deprivation of needs such as security, love, and self-esteem.

People are born good, but the situation makes them good or bad

50. As incomes increase, people actively desire and strive for things that they would never have dreamed of a few years before.

When people meet the need for security, then they start to think of other needs.

51. What a man can be, he must be. We call this need self-realization

Maslow, in clear reference to the needs of the highest order

52. If you plan to be anything less than you are capable of, you will probably be unhappy every day of your life.

True happiness is achieved only by satisfying the needs for self-realization.

53. It is not normal to know what we want. It's a strange and difficult psychological achievement

Knowing what we want requires a great effort, because you have to take time to think about it

54. Any worthwhile theory of motivation must address the superior capacities of the strong and healthy person, as well as the defensive maneuvers of paralyzed spirits.

Maslow is recognized as one of the great theorists of motivation.

55. Studies of mentally healthy people indicate that, as a defining characteristic, they are attracted to the mysterious, the unknown, the chaotic, the disorganized, and the unexplained

With his research, Maslow tried to extract the strengths of successful people.

56. Psychopathological effects are probably true when basic needs are frustrated

Maslow thought that psychopathologies are associated with the achievement of needs.

57. The so-called psychopath personality is another example of the permanent loss of love needs. One way to understand this personality dysfunction is that people who lacked love in the first months of their life, they have simply lost that desire forever, as well as the ability to give and receive affected

He also thought that much of who we are is determined by the beliefs we acquire in childhood.

58. The need to know and understand is seen in early childhood, perhaps even more strongly than in adulthood.

The early stages are the most important for our development.

59. The good society is one in which virtue is rewarded

Unfortunately, society does not always give us back everything we give it.

60. I wanted to show that human beings are capable of something more transcendent than war, prejudice and hatred. I wanted to get science to consider all the problems that laymen have handled: religion, poetry, values, philosophy, art. I continued with them trying to understand the great people, the best specimens of humanity that I could find

Maslow tried to find the relationship between people who have been successful in this life.

61. The human being needs a framework of values ​​and a philosophy of life

Existentialism greatly influenced Maslow's humanistic philosophy, as manifested in this phrase.

62. The best way to analyze a present problem is to give everything for it, study its nature and discover the answer to the problem within the problem itself.

To overcome challenges, you must first understand them.

63. Most people experience both tragedy and pleasure in varying proportions, and any philosophy that leaves out one of the two cannot be considered complete.

The so-called "negative emotions" are also part of life.

64. Quitting smoking can be an excellent test of your own character

Something as simple as kicking an unhealthy habit is a step toward personal development.

65. The ability to be in the present moment is the main component of mental well-being

This idea of ​​being in the here and now is common to many other humanistic approaches.

66. In a way, each person is their own project

One of Maslow's phrases in which he talks about the idea of ​​personal development empowered by oneself.

67. The most beautiful destination is to receive a payment to do what we are passionate about

Living doing what we love is a luxury.

68. One of the goals of education should be to teach that life is beautiful

Education should not simply consist of instruction.

69. To fall for the option of growth instead of fear twelve times a day is to move twelve times a day towards self-actualization.

A metaphorical way of talking about personal growth.

70. The only happy people I know are those who work well at something they consider important.

Once again, Maslow talks about the union of work and pleasure.

71. Everything in life is education, and everyone is a teacher and a student at the same time

Life is a constant progress without ever stopping.

72. Creativity is a characteristic that is given to all of us at birth

Maslow talks about the innate character he attributed to this mental ability.

73. What is necessary to change a person is to change their idea of ​​themselves

Our selfconcept Has a lot of power.

74. What is life for? Life is for you

A simple and beautiful phrase about the meaning of life.

75. We are what we do and we do what we are

For Maslow there is no separation between theory and practice in one's own personality.