[Neurons] 2013 Meta Reflections #39

[L. Michael Hall]

From: L. Michael Hall

Meta Reflections 2013  #39

Sept 2, 2013

Making Self-Actualization Actionable #2

 

 

EVERYDAY SELF-ACTUALIZATION

AND THE POWER OF CHOICE

 

 

According to Abraham Maslow the first benchmark for living the
self-actualizing life is a total absorption into a being-valued
significance- the personal "genius" state of flow.  That was the theme of
last week's Neuron post.  Here is the second one and it is about the power
of choice.

 

2) Choosing Growth 

The second behavior that benchmarks self-actualization according to Maslow
is "choosing the growth choice."

"Let us think of life as a process of choices, one after another.  At each
point there is a progression choice and a regression choice.  There may be a
movement toward defense, toward safety, toward being afraid; but on the
other side, there is the growth choice.  To make the growth choice instead
of the fear choice a dozen times a day is to move a dozen times a day toward
self-actualization.  Self-actualization is an ongoing process; it means
making each of the many single choices about wether to lie or to be honest,
wether to steal or not to steal, and it means to make each of these choices
as a growth choice.  This is movement toward self-actualization." (44
italics added)

 

If you read the literature of Maslow about self-actualization, you will find
that very frequently he called it "growth."  Self-actualizing is growing to
be fully and completely everything that you can be, growing to be your best
self.  At times he even called this new psychology, Growth Psychology, and
even created a second model, a Growth Model.  And in this model he noted
that inner personal growth is not inevitable- we have to choose it.   You do
not have to grow up and mature!  You can resist it or just not develop it.
To experience it requires a choice.  "Choosing" to step forward, to step up,
to make a choice for growth is one of the behaviors of self-actualization.

 

Now choice involves a meta-state.  It involves meta-stating yourself first
by stepping back or stepping up to a place above and beyond an experience so
that you move to a choice point.   Now you can see alternatives or options.

>From here you can make an informed decision of the pros and cons of the

choice, quality control your frames about choosing, taking a risk, moving
forward, etc.  And what will you choose?

 

As you can tell from the quotation above choosing is a step of
responsibility and taking, owning, and exercising responsibility is choosing
to grow.  These are equivalent.  And choosing is not always the easy thing
to do, or comfortable thing.  Sometimes it is uncomfortable, and
challenging, and even hard.  Yet when you resist the seduction of the status
quo and stretch forward to the next step- you are taking a step of
self-actualizing.

 

3) Choosing Your Way

"Self-Actualization implies that there is a self to be actualized.  A human
being is not a tabula rasa, not a lump of clay.  He is something which is
already there. ... A human being is his temperament, his biochemical
balances, and so on.  There is a self, and what I have sometimes referred to
as 'listening to the impulse voices' means letting the self emerge.

As a simple first step toward self-actualization, I sometimes suggest to my
students that when they are given a glass of wine and asked how they like
it, they try a different way of responding.  First, I suggest that they not
look at the label on the bottle. They will not use it to get any cue about
whether or not the should like it.  Next, I recommend that they close their
eyes if possible and that they 'make a hush.'  Now they are ready to look
within themselves and try to shout out the noise of the world so that they
may savor the wine on their tongues and look to the 'Supreme Court' inside
themselves.  Then, and only then, they may come out and say, 'I like it' or
'I don't' like it.'" (45)

 

Self-actualization also involves discovering your inner self and taking the
courage to let that highest self emerge.  How does this occur?  In part, you
do this by learning to listen to your own inner voice.  And to do that you
probably have to stop listening to all of the other voices around you- the
voice of family, culture, tradition, authority, media, etc.  Ask, "What do I
think and feel?"  This describes the growth from positing authority and
evaluation externally and bringing it inside and owning it for ourselves.
Discovering your own true likes and dislikes.

 

This is not easy.  Maslow recommends learning how to slow down and create an
inner silence- "to make a hush."  The shoulds can so easily get in the way.
"I should do this," "I should do that."  Operating from the shoulds is one
thing; operating from what truly fits for you is an entirely other thing.
Slow down, become silent, and check with your own inner Supreme Court.

"A person who does each of these little things each time the choice point
comes will find that they add up to better choices about what is
constitutionally right for him.  He comes to know what his destiny is, who
his wife or husband will be, what his mission in life will be.  Once cannot
choose wisely for a life unless he dares listen to himself, his own self, at
each moment in life, and to say calmly, "No, I don't like such and such."
(45-46)

 

We describe this as the meta-program of "internally referencing and having
an external check" in NLP.  Yet none of us are born with this program.  This
is one of those programs that we have to develop. We are all born
"externally referenced" because, without instincts, we do not know anything,
much less what we want or need.   So childhood for the majority is lived
always looking outside oneself to find out what is good, what is bad, what
to do, what not to do, etc.  Actualizing your highest and best self means
bringing that outside authority inside.  It means being responsible for
yourself and for your choices.  It means grow up and become the "author" of
your own life as you determine your beliefs, values, ethics, way to live,
etc.

 

Ah, choice- using our executive level of mind to say yes to values and no to
dis-values.  The process of self-actualizing requires the exercising of this
human power.

 

 

                             For more Meta Reflections, go to
www.neurosemantics.com 

                             Click Writings

 

 

 

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

                Neuro-Semantics Executive Director 

                Neuro-Semantics International

P.O. Box 8

Clifton, CO. 81520 USA                             

                1 970-523-7877 

                Dr. Hall's email:
<mailto:meta at acsol.net\hich\af31506\dbch\af31505\loch\f31506> meta at acsol.net


     

    

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