Discoveries in Maslow

[douglas germann]

Hi Spacers--

Here are some more tantalizing tidbits from Maslow:

It looks as if one way to breed grown-up people is to give them
responsibility, to assume that they can take it, and to let them
struggle and sweat with it. Let them work it out themselves, rather than
overprotecting them, indulging them, or doing things for them. Abraham
H. Maslow, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature, p 230

--

For the average man, life is just a succession of maybes. He doesn't
know why people smile at him or why they don't. It is a very comfortable
feeling not to have to guess. It is good to be able to know. Abraham H.
Maslow, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature, p 236

--

It draws some of the truly revolutionary consequences of the discovery
that human nature has been sold short, that man has a higher nature
which is just as “instinctoid” as his lower nature, and that this higher
nature includes the needs for meaningful work, for responsibility, for
creativeness, for being fair and just, for doing what is worthwhile and
for preferring to do it well. Abraham H. Maslow, The Farther Reaches of
Human Nature, p 238

--

Therefore, what the person is craving and wanting and wishing for tends
to be that which is just out ahead of him in the motivational hierarchy.
Abraham H. Maslow, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature, p 240

--

			:- Doug.



On Wed, 2008-12-03 at 11:06 -0500, douglas germann wrote:
> Hi space opening friends--
> 
> Here are some more thoughts, inspired by my reading of Maslow:
> 
>         When I asked my subjects, after they had described their peak
>         experiences, how the world looked different to them, I received
>         answers.... My own boiling-down and condensation of this
>         multitude of words, and these many descriptions to the way the
>         world looks to them, from perhaps a hundred people, during and
>         after peak experiences would be: truth, beauty, wholeness,
>         dichotomy-transcendence, aliveness-process, uniqueness,
>         perfection, necessity, completion, justice, order, simplicity,
>         richness, effortlessness, playfulness, and self-sufficiency.
>         Abraham H. Maslow, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature, p 106
> 
> Is this not indeed what we see in open space? Is it possible that what
> we are up to is opening for peak experiences?
> 
> Maslow also speaks a lot about people becoming fully human; it is a
> scale with a normative end.
>         
> This triggers thinking about groups: when are people in groups, or more
> precisely, groups of people more human and less human? They are more
> human to the the extent they: encourage creativity; develop the use of
> all capacities of the individual and the group; engage more of the
> person; engage more of the inter-dynamics of the persons between and
> among themselves. For sure there are others.
>         
> The point is reflected as we turn it around and compare various
> alternative scenarios for getting people together and ask of each how
> good they are at getting people to the fully human end of the scale? For
> instance, consider lecture, seminar, workshop, The World Café, and Open
> Space Technology: where is each on this continuum of the fully human
> group?
>         
> Do we want each group to be fully human? Certainly we do if we are
> trying to develop a movement in society, and if we are trying to get
> something done in large scale and short time frames. What if we purpose
> to create a tyranny? What if we want to change a way of thinking from
> say, prejudice to inclusiveness? When would we want not to have fully
> human groups?
> 
> Maslow also posits something like this (seen with open space eyes):
> 
> Best people
> + Best moments
> + Best conditions
> = Peak experiences
> ~ What open space invites
> 
> When we bring together the best people (anybody with a good head and a
> good heart), and the best moments (space-times in which issues they care
> about are on the table and they really get into the meat of the issues),
> and the best conditions (a space in which they can safely, fully express
> themselves and hear all voices), we get the possibility of peak
> experiences; this is what open space and any conversation that matters
> proposes and invites. It is an experiment worth trying.
> 
> So does open space = peak experiences, or does it at least conduce to
> them?
> 
> 			:- Doug.

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