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Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
By Saul McLeod, updated 2018
What Is Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs?
- Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is a motivational theory in psychology comprising a five-tier model of human needs, often depicted as hierarchical levels within a pyramid.
- Needs lower down in the hierarchy must be satisfied before individuals can attend to needs higher up.
- From the bottom of the hierarchy upwards, the needs are: physiological, safety, love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization.
Deficiency needs vs. growth needs
This five-stage model can be divided into deficiency needs and growth needs. The first four levels are often referred to as deficiency needs (D-needs), and the top level is known as growth or being needs (B-needs).
Deficiency needs arise due to deprivation and are said to motivate people when they are unmet. Also, the motivation to fulfill such needs will become stronger the longer the duration they are denied. For example, the longer a person goes without food, the more hungry they will become.
Maslow (1943) initially stated that individuals must satisfy lower level deficit needs before progressing on to meet higher level growth needs. However, he later clarified that satisfaction of a needs is not an “all-or-none” phenomenon, admitting that his earlier statements may have given “the false impression that a need must be satisfied 100 percent before the next need emerges” (1987, p. 69).
When a deficit need has been ‘more or less’ satisfied it will go away, and our activities become habitually directed towards meeting the next set of needs that we have yet to satisfy. These then become our salient needs. However, growth needs continue to be felt and may even become stronger once they have been engaged.
Growth needs do not stem from a lack of something, but rather from a desire to grow as a person. Once these growth needs have been reasonably satisfied, one may be able to reach the highest level called self-actualization.
Every person is capable and has the desire to move up the hierarchy toward a level of self-actualization. Unfortunately, progress is often disrupted by a failure to meet lower level needs. Life experiences, including divorce and loss of a job, may cause an individual to fluctuate between levels of the hierarchy.
Therefore, not everyone will move through the hierarchy in a uni-directional manner but may move back and forth between the different types of needs.
The original hierarchy of needs five-stage model includes:
Maslow (1943, 1954) stated that people are motivated to achieve certain needs and that some needs take precedence over others.
Our most basic need is for physical survival, and this will be the first thing that motivates our behavior. Once that level is fulfilled the next level up is what motivates us, and so on.
1. Physiological needs – these are biological requirements for human survival, e.g. air, food, drink, shelter, clothing, warmth, sex, sleep.
If these needs are not satisfied the human body cannot function optimally. Maslow considered physiological needs the most important as all the other needs become secondary until these needs are met.
2. Safety needs – protection from elements, security, order, law, stability, freedom from fear.
3. Love and belongingness needs – after physiological and safety needs have been fulfilled, the third level of human needs is social and involves feelings of belongingness. The need for interpersonal relationships motivates behavior
Examples include friendship, intimacy, trust, and acceptance, receiving and giving affection and love. Affiliating, being part of a group (family, friends, work).
4. Esteem needs – which Maslow classified into two categories: (i) esteem for oneself (dignity, achievement, mastery, independence) and (ii) the desire for reputation or respect from others (e.g., status, prestige).
Maslow indicated that the need for respect or reputation is most important for children and adolescents and precedes real self-esteem or dignity.
5. Self-actualization needs – realizing personal potential, self-fulfillment, seeking personal growth and peak experiences. A desire “to become everything one is capable of becoming”(Maslow, 1987, p. 64).
Maslow posited that human needs are arranged in a hierarchy:
“It is quite true that man lives by bread alone — when there is no bread. But what happens to man’s desires when there is plenty of bread and when his belly is chronically filled?
At once other (and “higher”) needs emerge and these, rather than physiological hungers, dominate the organism. And when these in turn are satisfied, again new (and still “higher”) needs emerge and so on. This is what we mean by saying that the basic human needs are organized into a hierarchy of relative prepotency” (Maslow, 1943, p. 375).
Maslow continued to refine his theory based on the concept of a hierarchy of needs over several decades (Maslow, 1943, 1962, 1987).
Regarding the structure of his hierarchy, Maslow (1987) proposed that the order in the hierarchy “is not nearly as rigid” (p. 68) as he may have implied in his earlier description.
Maslow noted that the order of needs might be flexible based on external circumstances or individual differences. For example, he notes that for some individuals, the need for self-esteem is more important than the need for love. For others, the need for creative fulfillment may supersede even the most basic needs.
Maslow (1987) also pointed out that most behavior is multi-motivated and noted that “any behavior tends to be determined by several or all of the basic needs simultaneously rather than by only one of them” (p. 71).
Hierarchy of needs summary
(a) human beings are motivated by a hierarchy of needs.
(b) needs are organized in a hierarchy of prepotency in which more basic needs must be more or less met (rather than all or none) prior to higher needs.
(c) the order of needs is not rigid but instead may be flexible based on external circumstances or individual differences.
(d) most behavior is multi-motivated, that is, simultaneously determined by more than one basic need.
The expanded hierarchy of needs
It is important to note that Maslow’s (1943, 1954) five-stage model has been expanded to include cognitive and aesthetic needs (Maslow, 1970a) and later transcendence needs (Maslow, 1970b).
Changes to the original five-stage model are highlighted and include a seven-stage model and an eight-stage model; both developed during the 1960’s and 1970s.
1. Biological and physiological needs – air, food, drink, shelter, warmth, sex, sleep, etc.
2. Safety needs – protection from elements, security, order, law, stability, etc.
3. Love and belongingness needs – friendship, intimacy, trust, and acceptance, receiving and giving affection and love. Affiliating, being part of a group (family, friends, work).
4. Esteem needs – which Maslow classified into two categories: (i) esteem for oneself (dignity, achievement, mastery, independence) and (ii) the desire for reputation or respect from others (e.g., status, prestige).
5. Cognitive needs – knowledge and understanding, curiosity, exploration, need for meaning and predictability.
6. Aesthetic needs – appreciation and search for beauty, balance, form, etc.
7. Self-actualization needs – realizing personal potential, self-fulfillment, seeking personal growth and peak experiences.
8. Transcendence needs – A person is motivated by values which transcend beyond the personal self (e.g., mystical experiences and certain experiences with nature, aesthetic experiences, sexual experiences, service to others, the pursuit of science, religious faith, etc.).
Self-actualization
Instead of focusing on psychopathology and what goes wrong with people, Maslow (1943) formulated a more positive account of human behavior which focused on what goes right. He was interested in human potential, and how we fulfill that potential.
Psychologist Abraham Maslow (1943, 1954) stated that human motivation is based on people seeking fulfillment and change through personal growth. Self-actualized people are those who were fulfilled and doing all they were capable of.
The growth of self-actualization (Maslow, 1962) refers to the need for personal growth and discovery that is present throughout a person’s life. For Maslow, a person is always ‘becoming’ and never remains static in these terms. In self-actualization, a person comes to find a meaning to life that is important to them.
p>As each individual is unique, the motivation for self-actualization leads people in different directions (Kenrick et al., 2010). For some people self-actualization can be achieved through creating works of art or literature, for others through sport, in the classroom, or within a corporate setting.
Maslow (1962) believed self-actualization could be measured through the concept of peak experiences. This occurs when a person experiences the world totally for what it is, and there are feelings of euphoria, joy, and wonder.
It is important to note that self-actualization is a continual process of becoming rather than a perfect state one reaches of a ‘happy ever after’ (Hoffman, 1988).
Maslow offers the following description of self-actualization:
‘It refers to the person’s desire for self-fulfillment, namely, to the tendency for him to become actualized in what he is potentially.
The specific form that these needs will take will of course vary greatly from person to person. In one individual it may take the form of the desire to be an ideal mother, in another it may be expressed athletically, and in still another it may be expressed in painting pictures or in inventions’ (Maslow, 1943, p. 382–383).
Characteristics of self-actualized people
Although we are all, theoretically, capable of self-actualizing, most of us will not do so, or only to a limited degree. Maslow (1970) estimated that only two percent of people would reach the state of self-actualization.
He was especially interested in the characteristics of people whom he considered to have achieved their potential as individuals.
By studying 18 people he considered to be self-actualized (including Abraham Lincoln and Albert Einstein) Maslow (1970) identified 15 characteristics of a self-actualized person.
Characteristics of self-actualizers:
1. They perceive reality efficiently and can tolerate uncertainty;
2. Accept themselves and others for what they are;
3. Spontaneous in thought and action;
4. Problem-centered (not self-centered);
5. Unusual sense of humor;
6. Able to look at life objectively;
7. Highly creative;
8. Resistant to enculturation, but not purposely unconventional;
9. Concerned for the welfare of humanity;
10. Capable of deep appreciation of basic life-experience;
11. Establish deep satisfying interpersonal relationships with a few people;
12. Peak experiences;
13. Need for privacy;
14. Democratic attitudes;
15. Strong moral/ethical standards.
Behavior leading to self-actualization:
(a) Experiencing life like a child, with full absorption and concentration;
(b) Trying new things instead of sticking to safe paths;
(c) Listening to your own feelings in evaluating experiences instead of the voice of tradition, authority or the majority;
(d) Avoiding pretense (‘game playing’) and being honest;
(e) Being prepared to be unpopular if your views do not coincide with those of the majority;
(f) Taking responsibility and working hard;
(g) Trying to identify your defenses and having the courage to give them up.
The characteristics of self-actualizers and the behaviors leading to self-actualization are shown in the list above. Although people achieve self-actualization in their own unique way, they tend to share certain characteristics. However, self-actualization is a matter of degree, ‘There are no perfect human beings’ (Maslow,1970a, p. 176).
It is not necessary to display all 15 characteristics to become self-actualized, and not only self-actualized people will display them.
Maslow did not equate self-actualization with perfection. Self-actualization merely involves achieving one’s potential. Thus, someone can be silly, wasteful, vain and impolite, and still self-actualize. Less than two percent of the population achieve self-actualization.
Rogers’ Theory of Self-Actualization
Educational applications
Maslow’s (1962) hierarchy of needs theory has made a major contribution to teaching and classroom management in schools. Rather than reducing behavior to a response in the environment, Maslow (1970a) adopts a holistic approach to education and learning.
Maslow looks at the complete physical, emotional, social, and intellectual qualities of an individual and how they impact on learning.
Applications of Maslow’s hierarchy theory to the work of the classroom teacher are obvious. Before a student’s cognitive needs can be met, they must first fulfill their basic physiological needs.
For example, a tired and hungry student will find it difficult to focus on learning. Students need to feel emotionally and physically safe and accepted within the classroom to progress and reach their full potential.
Maslow suggests students must be shown that they are valued and respected in the classroom, and the teacher should create a supportive environment. Students with a low self-esteem will not progress academically at an optimum rate until their self-esteem is strengthened.
Maslow (1971, p. 195) argued that a humanistic educational approach would develop people who are “stronger, healthier, and would take their own lives into their hands to a greater extent. With increased personal responsibility for one’s personal life, and witha rational set of values to guide one’s choosing, people would begin to actively change the society in which they lived”.
Critical evaluation
The most significant limitation of Maslow’s theory concerns his methodology. Maslow formulated the characteristics of self-actualized individuals from undertaking a qualitative method called biographical analysis.
He looked at the biographies and writings of 18 people he identified as being self-actualized. From these sources, he developed a list of qualities that seemed characteristic of this specific group of people, as opposed to humanity in general.
From a scientific perspective, there are numerous problems with this particular approach. First, it could be argued that biographical analysis as a method is extremely subjective as it is based entirely on the opinion of the researcher. Personal opinion is always prone to bias, which reduces the validity of any data obtained. Therefore Maslow’s operational definition of self-actualization must not be blindly accepted as scientific fact.
Furthermore, Maslow’s biographical analysis focused on a biased sample of self-actualized individuals, prominently limited to highly educated white males (such as Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, William James, Aldous Huxley, Beethoven).
Although Maslow (1970) did study self-actualized females, such as Eleanor Roosevelt and Mother Teresa, they comprised a small proportion of his sample. This makes it difficult to generalize his theory to females and individuals from lower social classes or different ethnicity. Thus questioning the population validity of Maslow’s findings.
Furthermore, it is extremely difficult to empirically test Maslow’s concept of self-actualization in a way that causal relationships can be established.
Another criticism concerns Maslow’s assumption that the lower needs must be satisfied before a person can achieve their potential and self-actualize. This is not always the case, and therefore Maslow’s hierarchy of needs in some aspects has been falsified.
Through examining cultures in which large numbers of people live in poverty (such as India), it is clear that people are still capable of higher order needs such as love and belongingness. However, this should not occur, as according to Maslow, people who have difficulty achieving very basic physiological needs (such as food, shelter, etc.) are not capable of meeting higher growth needs.
Also, many creative people, such as authors and artists (e.g., Rembrandt and Van Gogh) lived in poverty throughout their lifetime, yet it could be argued that they achieved self-actualization.
Psychologists now conceptualize motivation as a pluralistic behavior, whereby needs can operate on many levels simultaneously. A person may be motivated by higher growth needs at the same time as lower level deficiency needs.
Contemporary research by Tay and Diener (2011) has tested Maslow’s theory by analyzing the data of 60,865 participants from 123 countries, representing every major region of the world. The survey was conducted from 2005 to 2010.
Respondents answered questions about six needs that closely resemble those in Maslow’s model: basic needs (food, shelter); safety; social needs (love, support); respect; mastery; and autonomy. They also rated their well-being across three discrete measures: life evaluation (a person’s view of his or her life as a whole), positive feelings (day-to-day instances of joy or pleasure), and negative feelings (everyday experiences of sorrow, anger, or stress).
The results of the study support the view that universal human needs appear to exist regardless of cultural differences. However, the ordering of the needs within the hierarchy was not correct.
“Although the most basic needs might get the most attention when you don’t have them,” Diener explains, “you don’t need to fulfill them in order to get benefits [from the others].” Even when we are hungry, for instance, we can be happy with our friends. “They’re like vitamins,” Diener says about how the needs work independently. “We need them all.”
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How to reference this article:
McLeod, S. A. (2018, May 21). Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Retrieved from https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html
APA Style References
Hoffman, E. (1988). The right to be human: A biography of Abraham Maslow. Los Angeles, CA: Jeremy P. Tarcher.
Kenrick, D. T., Neuberg, S. L., Griskevicius, V., Becker, D. V., & Schaller, M. (2010). Goal-driven cognition and functional behavior: The fundamental-motives framework. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 19(1), 63-67.
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review, 50(4), 370-96.
Maslow, A. H. (1954). Motivation and personality. New York: Harper and Row.
Maslow, A. H. (1962). Toward a psychology of being. Princeton: D. Van Nostrand Company.
Maslow, A. H. (1970a). Motivation and personality. New York: Harper & Row.
Maslow, A. H. (1970b). Religions, values, and peak experiences. New York: Penguin. (Original work published 1966)
Maslow, A. H. (1987). Motivation and personality (3rd ed.). Delhi, India: Pearson Education.
Tay, L., & Diener, E. (2011). Needs and subjective well-being around the world. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 101(2), 354-356. doi:10.1037/a00
Wulff, D. M., & Maslow, A. H. (1965). Religions, values, and peak-experiences. The Journal of Higher Education, 36(4), 235.
Further Information
Maslow Notes Maslow’s Theories Maslow Hierarchy of Needs Infographic Poster Hierarchy of Needs Rediscovering the Later Version of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs:Self-Transcendence and Opportunities for Theory, Research,and Unification BBC Radio 4 Programme: Maslow and the Hierarchy of Needs Hierarchy of Needs Quiz Questionnaire: Are you self-actualized? How to Write a Psychology Essay
Application of the Maslow’s Hierarchy of Need Theory
Organizational culture, human resource and employee’s performance
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How to reference this article:
McLeod, S. A. (2018, May 21). Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Simply Psychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html
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Carl Rogers
By Saul McLeod, updated 2014
Carl Rogers (1902-1987) was a humanistic psychologist who agreed with the main assumptions of Abraham Maslow. However, Rogers (1959) added that for a person to “grow”, they need an environment that provides them with genuineness (openness and self-disclosure), acceptance (being seen with unconditional positive regard), and empathy (being listened to and understood).
Without these, relationships and healthy personalities will not develop as they should, much like a tree will not grow without sunlight and water.
Rogers believed that every person could achieve their goals, wishes, and desires in life. When, or rather if they did so, self actualization took place.
This was one of Carl Rogers most important contributions to psychology, and for a person to reach their potential a number of factors must be satisfied.
Self Actualization
“The organism has one basic tendency and striving – to actualize, maintain, and enhance the experiencing organism” (Rogers, 1951, p. 487).
Rogers rejected the deterministic nature of both psychoanalysis and behaviorism and maintained that we behave as we do because of the way we perceive our situation. “As no one else can know how we perceive, we are the best experts on ourselves.”
Carl Rogers (1959) believed that humans have one basic motive, that is the tendency to self-actualize – i.e., to fulfill one’s potential and achieve the highest level of ‘human-beingness’ we can.
Like a flower that will grow to its full potential if the conditions are right, but which is constrained by its environment, so people will flourish and reach their potential if their environment is good enough.
However, unlike a flower, the potential of the individual human is unique, and we are meant to develop in different ways according to our personality. Rogers believed that people are inherently good and creative.
They become destructive only when a poor self-concept or external constraints override the valuing process. Carl Rogers believed that for a person to achieve self-actualization they must be in a state of congruence.
This means that self-actualization occurs when a person’s “ideal self” (i.e., who they would like to be) is congruent with their actual behavior (self-image).
Rogers describes an individual who is actualizing as a fully functioning person. The main determinant of whether we will become self-actualized is childhood experience.
The Fully Functioning Person
Rogers believed that every person could achieve their goal. This means that the person is in touch with the here and now, his or her subjective experiences and feelings, continually growing and changing.
In many ways, Rogers regarded the fully functioning person as an ideal and one that people do not ultimately achieve. It is wrong to think of this as an end or completion of life’s journey; rather it is a process of always becoming and changing.
Rogers identified five characteristics of the fully functioning person:
1. Open to experience: both positive and negative emotions accepted. Negative feelings are not denied, but worked through (rather than resorting to ego defense mechanisms).
2. Existential living: in touch with different experiences as they occur in life, avoiding prejudging and preconceptions. Being able to live and fully appreciate the present, not always looking back to the past or forward to the future (i.e., living for the moment).
3. Trust feelings: feeling, instincts, and gut-reactions are paid attention to and trusted. People’s own decisions are the right ones, and we should trust ourselves to make the right choices.
4. Creativity: creative thinking and risk-taking are features of a person’s life. A person does not play safe all the time. This involves the ability to adjust and change and seek new experiences.
5. Fulfilled life: a person is happy and satisfied with life, and always looking for new challenges and experiences.
For Rogers, fully functioning people are well adjusted, well balanced and interesting to know. Often such people are high achievers in society.
Critics claim that the fully functioning person is a product of Western culture. In other cultures, such as Eastern cultures, the achievement of the group is valued more highly than the achievement of any one person.
Personality Development
Central to Rogers’ personality theory is the notion of self or self-concept. This is defined as “the organized, consistent set of perceptions and beliefs about oneself.”
The self is the humanistic term for who we really are as a person. The self is our inner personality, and can be likened to the soul, or Freud’s psyche. The self is influenced by the experiences a person has in their life, and out interpretations of those experiences. Two primary sources that influence our self-concept are childhood experiences and evaluation by others.
According to Rogers (1959), we want to feel, experience and behave in ways which are consistent with our self-image and which reflect what we would like to be like, our ideal-self. The closer our self-image and ideal-self are to each other, the more consistent or congruent we are and the higher our sense of self-worth.
A person is said to be in a state of incongruence if some of the totality of their experience is unacceptable to them and is denied or distorted in the self-image.
The humanistic approach states that the self is composed of concepts unique to ourselves. The self-concept includes three components:
Self-worth
Self-worth (or self-esteem) comprises what we think about ourselves. Rogers believed feelings of self-worth developed in early childhood and were formed from the interaction of the child with the mother and father.
Self-image
How we see ourselves, which is important to good psychological health. Self-image includes the influence of our body image on inner personality.
At a simple level, we might perceive ourselves as a good or bad person, beautiful or ugly. Self-image affects how a person thinks, feels and behaves in the world.
Ideal-self
This is the person who we would like to be. It consists of our goals and ambitions in life, and is dynamic – i.e., forever changing.
The ideal self in childhood is not the ideal self in our teens or late twenties etc.
Positive Regard and Self Worth
Carl Rogers (1951) viewed the child as having two basic needs: positive regard from other people and self-worth.
How we think about ourselves, our feelings of self-worth are of fundamental importance both to psychological health and to the likelihood that we can achieve goals and ambitions in life and achieve self-actualization.
Self-worth may be seen as a continuum from very high to very low. For Carl Rogers (1959) a person who has high self-worth, that is, has confidence and positive feelings about him or herself, faces challenges in life, accepts failure and unhappiness at times, and is open with people.
A person with low self-worth may avoid challenges in life, not accept that life can be painful and unhappy at times, and will be defensive and guarded with other people.
Rogers believed feelings of self-worth developed in early childhood and were formed from the interaction of the child with the mother and father. As a child grows older, interactions with significant others will affect feelings of self-worth.
Rogers believed that we need to be regarded positively by others; we need to feel valued, respected, treated with affection and loved. Positive regard is to do with how other people evaluate and judge us in social interaction. Rogers made a distinction between unconditional positive regard and conditional positive regard.
Unconditional Positive Regard
Unconditional positive regardis where parents, significant others (and the humanist therapist) accepts and loves the person for what he or she is. Positive regard is not withdrawn if the person does something wrong or makes a mistake.
The consequences of unconditional positive regard are that the person feels free to try things out and make mistakes, even though this may lead to getting it worse at times.
People who are able to self-actualize are more likely to have received unconditional positive regard from others, especially their parents in childhood.
Conditional Positive Regard
Conditional positive regard is where positive regard, praise, and approval, depend upon the child, for example, behaving in ways that the parents think correct.
Hence the child is not loved for the person he or she is, but on condition that he or she behaves only in ways approved by the parent(s).
At the extreme, a person who constantly seeks approval from other people is likely only to have experienced conditional positive regard as a child.
Congruence
A person’s ideal self may not be consistent with what actually happens in life and experiences of the person. Hence, a difference may exist between a person’s ideal self and actual experience. This is called incongruence.
Where a person’s ideal self and actual experience are consistent or very similar, a state of congruence exists. Rarely, if ever, does a total state of congruence exist; all people experience a certain amount of incongruence.
The development of congruence is dependent on unconditional positive regard. Carl Rogers believed that for a person to achieve self-actualization they must be in a state of congruence.
According to Rogers, we want to feel, experience and behave in ways which are consistent with our self-image and which reflect what we would like to be like, our ideal-self.
The closer our self-image and ideal-self are to each other, the more consistent or congruent we are and the higher our sense of self-worth. A person is said to be in a state of incongruence if some of the totality of their experience is unacceptable to them and is denied or distorted in the self-image.
Incongruence is “a discrepancy between the actual experience of the organism and the self-picture of the individual insofar as it represents that experience.
As we prefer to see ourselves in ways that are consistent with our self-image, we may use defense mechanisms like denial or repression in order to feel less threatened by some of what we consider to be our undesirable feelings.
A person whose self-concept is incongruent with her or his real feelings and experiences will defend because the truth hurts.
Carl Rogers Quotes
“The very essence of the creative is its novelty, and hence we have no standard by which to judge it”. (Rogers, 1961, p. 351)
“I have gradually come to one negative conclusion about the good life. It seems to me that the good life is not any fixed state. It is not, in my estimation, a state of virtue, or contentment, or nirvana, or happiness. It is not a condition in which the individual is adjusted or fulfilled or actualized. To use psychological terms, it is not a state of drive-reduction, or tension-reduction, or homeostasis”. (Rogers, 1967, p. 185-186)
“The good life is a process, not a state of being. It is a direction not a destination”. (Rogers, 1967, p. 187)
How to reference this article:
McLeod, S. A. (2014, Feb 05). Carl Rogers. Simply Psychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/carl-rogers.html
* What is homeostasis in the body?
Homeostasis refers to stability, balance, or equilibrium within a cell or the body. … Homeostasis can be thought of as a dynamic equilibrium rather than a constant, unchanging state. Feedback Regulation Loops. The endocrine system plays an important role in homeostasis because hormones regulate the activity of body cells …
Homeostasis and Regulation in the Human Body ‹ OpenCurriculum
https://opencurriculum.org › homeostasis-and-regulation-in-the-human-body
homeostasisHuman homeostasis is the process that maintains the stability of the human body’s internal environment in response to changes in external conditions. Your body has built-in sensors that constantly monitor body activities and attempt to correct imbalances when they occur. Getting out of balance can lead to serious consequences, including disease and a shorter lifespan. Your lifestyle and attitude has a great deal to do with maintaining balance in your body.
Here’s a short list of some of the main homeostatic processes in humans:
- body temperature: Human body temperature is optimum at 98.6° F (37°C) for most people although variations of 1 degree up or down are normal. When it’s out of balance we shiver (too cold) or sweat (too hot)
- cell counts and size: The natural life span of a red blood cell in your body is about 120 days. White blood cells lifetime varies. Low cell counts trigger anemia or other pathologies. Sometimes your body can catch up,other times, it needs help from outside forces (diet, medicine).
- blood pH: pH is a measure how acidic or alkaline your blood is. Normal is about 7.4pH (water is 7). When your blood pH is off, too much acid for example, acidosis can occur and your lungs and kidneys work hard to restore balance.
- blood sugar: (glucose) Humans regulate blood sugar with natural insulin and glucagon. Insulin, secreted by the pancreas, transports glucose to the body’s cells. When insulin is deficient or cells become resistant to is, diabetes occurs.
- water balance: Kidneys remove excess water and ions from the blood, which are expelled as urine.
- oxygen: if oxygen content of the blood decreases, or carbon dioxide increases, blood flow is increased and depth of breathing increases.
- sleep: normal rhythms in your body control the amount and depth of sleep you experience. If these rhythms are off, your body will slow down to preserve energy – diminishing physical and mental functions in order to do so.
- personality traits and mood: hormones and other chemicals in the body regulate your mood.
As you age, your natural ability to achieve homeostasis decreases, opening your body up to complications related to slight or extreme imbalances in body systems. Many of these imbalances can be helped by changes in lifestyle, diet,activity level and sometimes assisted with supplements and medicine.
Your body is incredibly resilient – working hard all the time to maintain homeostasis. Monitoring your health, including diet, exercise, “vital signs (above”, overall feelings and moods are critical to a long and happy life.
Role of massage in homeostasis
Since massage has effects on the circulatory, digestive, nervous, lymphatic and other systems, it leaves the body in a better position to maintain homeostasis. Massage is also one way to combat stress – a major enemy of homeostasis in the body. Stress aggravates just about every body system and reducing stress, with massage or any other activity, will go a long way toward regaining balance.
Will – Founder of Elev8lfe.com
The
The Principles I’ve observed that lead to success:
- Secret to Success Obsession: The Ultimate Love for what you do. It’s easy to do something better than anything that you’ve ever done is by falling in love with the game.
- The Game is anything that you can focus on with a Singular Focus that fits into your Definite Purpose. Making Money could be an obsession, but a more realistic way of looking at it might be “I’m Focused on Creating Value for Online or Podcast audiences via Providing the Highest Quality Information and Products designed to boost Focus while working in a business environment.”
One would then develop a line of products like books or e-books and products focused solely on sharpening the mind and the minds of your business ie employees via health, work tools, and specific/niche products to improve focus past 30-60 minutes.
- Simplicity – Simplifying all phases to align with the Definite Purpose to which you are devoted.
A. For Example, only have 4 apps on your phone. This will provide you with laser focus. If you’re like myself, simplify your apps till you only have 4 per folder, then cut out folders.
- Ruthless Time Management. What is the value of your time? IF there is something more important than your time, focus solely on that, ruthlessly.
- Availability. Don’t give out your phone number or email. This directly affects your time.
- Don’t use Social Media for now Definite Purpose Related Activities.
- Be efficient. With your time.
- Focus. Meaning whatever distracts you from your Definite Purpose, eliminate it.
- Meditate. This allows you to regenerate willpower and Focus.
- Put yourself in situations that you dislike or hate and be great at them.
- Gamify Life. This will take the edge of the constantly Stoic nature of your purpose.
- Get Coaching, Mentors and Teachers to educate and Push you.
- Master Learning specifically within your own learning and strengths.
- Measure your Success Metrics and improve upon them.
- No Alcohol. This detracts from your mental Capacity.
- Work in your Highest Value Activities Most of the Time. Ruthless TM.
- The Way You do One thing is How you DO EVERYTHING.
- Solve Problems.
- KNOW YOUR HIGHEST VALUE ABILITIES.
- Know Your LOWEST VALUE ABILITIES.
- Study Learn and Master.
- “The key to pursuing excellence is to embrace an organic, long-term learning process, and not to live in a shell of static, safe mediocrity. Usually, growth comes at the expense of previous comfort or safety.”
- “Growth comes at the point of resistance. We learn by pushing ourselves and finding what really lies at the outer reaches of our abilities.”
- “In performance training, first we learn to flow with whatever comes. Then we learn to use whatever comes to our advantage. Finally, we learn to be completely self-sufficient and create our own earthquakes, so our mental process feeds itself explosive inspirations without the need for outside stimulus.”
- “Mental resilience is arguably the most critical trait of a world-class performer, and it should be nurtured continuously. Left to my own devices, I am always looking for ways to become more and more psychologically impregnable. When uncomfortable, my instinct is not to avoid the discomfort but to become at peace with it. When injured, which happens frequently in the life of a martial artist, I try to avoid painkillers and to change the sensation of pain into a feeling that is not necessarily negative. My instinct is always to seek out challenges as opposed to avoiding them.”
- “I have long believed that if a student of virtually any discipline could avoid ever repeating the same mistake twice— both technical and psychological— he or she would skyrocket to the top of their field.”
- “When nothing exciting is going on, we might get bored, distracted, separated from the moment. So we look for new entertainment, surf channels, flip through magazines. If caught in these rhythms, we are like tiny current-bound surface fish, floating along a two-dimensional world without any sense for the gorgeous abyss below. When these societally induced tendencies translate into the learning process, they have devastating effect.”
- “This concept of Making Smaller Circles has been a critical component of my learning process in chess and the martial arts. In both fields, players tend to get attached to fancy techniques and fail to recognize that subtle internalization and refinement is much more important than the quantity of what is learned.”
- “The secret is that everything is always on the line. The more present we are at practice, the more present we will be in competition, in the boardroom, at the exam, the operating table, the big stage. If we have any hope of attaining excellence, let alone of showing what we’ve got under pressure, we have to be prepared by a lifestyle of reinforcement. Presence must be like breathing.”
- “If you are interested in really improving as a performer, I would suggest incorporating the rhythm of stress and recovery into all aspects of your life. Truth be told, this is what my entire approach to learning is based on— breaking down the artificial barriers between our diverse life experiences so all moments become enriched by a sense of interconnectedness. So, if you are reading a book and lose focus, put the book down, take some deep breaths, and pick it up again with a fresh eye.”“Not only do we have to be good at waiting, we have to love it. Because waiting is not waiting, it is life. Too many of us live without fully engaging our minds, waiting for that moment when our real lives begin.”
- “In my opinion, the answer to both questions lies in a well-thought-out approach that inspires resilience, the ability to make connections between diverse pursuits, and day-to-day enjoyment of the process. The vast majority of motivated people, young and old, make terrible mistakes in their approach to learning. They fall frustrated by the wayside while those on the road to success keep steady on their paths.”
- “The key to pursuing excellence is to embrace an organic, long-term learning process, and not to live in a shell of static, safe mediocrity. Usually, growth comes at the expense of previous comfort or safety.”
- “The problem is that when I got angry, I was thrown off my game. I tried to stay level-headed, but this one rival of mine had no limits. He would push me to the point of utter exasperation, and I would often self-destruct. I have come to believe that the solution to this type of situation does not lie in denying our emotions, but in learning to use them to our advantage. Instead of stifling myself, I needed to channel my mood into heightened focus — and I can’t honestly say that I figured out how to do this consistently until years into my martial arts career when dirty opponents tried to take out my knees, target the groin, or head-butt me in the nose in competition.”
- “When uncomfortable, my instinct is not to avoid the discomfort but to become at peace with it.”
- “A competitor needs to be process-oriented, always looking for stronger opponents to spur growth, but it is also important to keep on winning enough to maintain confidence. We have to release our current ideas to soak in new material, but not so much that we lose touch with our unique natural talents.”
- “In order to grow, he needs to give up his current mind-set. He needs to lose to win. The bruiser will need to get pushed around by little guys for a while, until he learns how to use more than brawn. William Chen calls this investment in loss. Investment in loss is giving yourself to the learning process.”
- “The theme is depth over breadth. The learning principle is to plunge into the detailed mystery of the micro in order to understand what makes the macro tick……. Depth beats breadth any day of the week, because it opens a channel for the intangible, unconscious, creative components of our hidden potential.”
- “Once we reach a certain level of expertise at a given discipline and our knowledge is expansive, the critical issue becomes: how is all this stuff navigated and put to use? I believe the answers to this question are the gateway to the most esoteric levels of elite performance. When I started thinking about how I could consistently make my perception of time be different from my opponents’, I realized that I had to delve into the operating mechanism of intuition.”
- “It’s amazing how much you can learn about someone when they get caught in the rain! Some will run with their hands over their heads, others will smile and take a deep breath while enjoying the wind. What does this say about one’s relationship to discomfort? The reaction to surprise? The need for control?”
- “The more present we are at practice, the more present we will be in competition, in the boardroom, at the exam, the operating table, the big stage. If we have any hope of attaining excellence, let alone of showing what we’ve got under pressure, we have to be prepared by a lifestyle of reinforcement. Presence must be like breathing.”
- “I would suggest incorporating the rhythm of stress and recovery into all aspects of your life.”
- “My answer is to redefine the question. Not only do we have to be good at waiting, we have to love it. Because waiting is not waiting, it is life. Too many of us live without fully engaging our minds, waiting for that moment when our real lives begin. Years pass in boredom, but that is okay because when our true love comes around, or we discover our real calling, we will begin. Of course, the sad truth is that if we are not present to the moment, our true love could come and go and we wouldn’t even notice. And we will have become someone other than the you or I who would be able to embrace it. I believe an appreciation for simplicity, the everyday — the ability to dive deeply into the banal and discover life’s hidden richness — is where success, let alone happiness, emerges.”
- “But far more critical than these rare climactic explosions, I believe that this type of condensing practice can do wonders to raise our quality of life. Once a simple inhalation can trigger a state of tremendous alertness, our moment-to-moment awareness becomes blissful, like that of someone half-blind who puts on glasses for the first time. We see more as we walk down the street. The everyday becomes exquisitely beautiful. The notion of boredom becomes alien and absurd as we naturally soak in the lovely subtleties of the “banal.” All experiences become richly intertwined by our new vision, and then new connections begin to emerge. Rainwater streaming on a city pavement will teach a pianist how to flow. A leaf gliding easily with the wind will teach a controller how to let go. A housecat will teach me how to move. All moments become each moment. This book is about learning and performance, but it is also about my life. Presence has taught me how to live.”
- To walk a thorny road, we may cover its every inch with leather or we can make sandals.
- “In Making Smaller Circles we take a single technique or idea and practice it until we feel its essence. Then we gradually condense the movements while maintaining their power, until we are left with an extremely potent and nearly invisible arsenal.”
- “In Slowing Down Time, we again focus on a select group of techniques and internalize them until the mind perceives them in tremendous detail. After training in this manner, we can see more frames in an equal amount of time, so things feel slowed down.”
Key Lessons from “The Art of Learning”
- Meditation is key
- Practice makes perfect
- Don’t be afraid to lose
Meditation is key
It is one thing to have a private, peaceful and quiet place for meditation; it is something else to apply that peacefulness in combat. So every person’s imperative must be to learn how to meditate anywhere, at any time. Transform yourself completely and understand the true meaning of happiness.
Practice makes perfect
Obviously, greatness requires patience and determination. However, there is one thing more important than these two- Practice! When you face your opponent openly (no matter the game), you’ll have to put your skill to the test. It is impossible to win if you employ predictable moves and strategies. Instead, a real master is flexible and has plenty solutions.
Don’t be afraid to lose
What is the best way to improve? The only way would be to play or confront superior opponents. Courageous people know how to lose, they are not afraid of defeat, so they are willing to face stronger opponents in pursuance of real knowledge and wisdom.
“The Art of Learning” Quotes
But as with all skills, the most sophisticated techniques tend to have their foundation in the simplest of principles.C
- Your Environment reflects you. Your Room, Your Car, Your Mind, Your Body, Your Friends, and How you Dress, Your Music, Your lane Changes, Your Decisions, Your Habits.