Title: Self-Actualization and its Philosophical Underpinnings

by Nigel Savio DSa

November 21, 2014.
Abstract:
This paper examines the use and origins of the concept of self-actualization as it came to be employed in
psychotherapy. The term is most often associated with the theory and work of Abraham Maslow. An
interdisciplinary approach is employed to contextualize the history and origins of self-actualization theory,
with a primary emphasis on philosophy and psychotherapy, along with broader references to historical and
literary contributions to the development of self-actualization. Aristotle coined the Greek work entelechy
to explain an intrinsic force that drives the organism to realize its full potential. This concept has been
taken up and developed further both in myth, literature and from the Enlightenment era onwards by
philosophers such as Kant, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Heidegger. Carl Rogers and Maslow further
developed self-actualization within the burgeoning field of psychotherapy in the 1950s.

Body:
What a man can be, he must be. This need we may call self-actualizationIt
refers to the desire for self-fulfillment, namely, to the tendency for him to
become actualized in what he is potentially. This tendency might be phrased as
the desire to become more and more what one is, to become everything that
one is capable of becoming. (Maslow. 1943, 370-96)

Self-actualization in psychology is a term commonly associated with humanistic

psychology and the theories of Abraham Maslow beginning in the 1950s. However,
holistic psychologist Kurt Goldstein, an organismic theorist, first advanced the term in
the 1930s. In his view, the individual is a totality striving towards actualization: "the
tendency to actualize [the organism's] individual capacities as fully as possible is the
basic drive... the only drive by which the life of an organism is determined." (Goldberg,
1934/1959, p.82). Under Goldbergs influence Maslow developed his hierarchy of
human needs, placing self-actualization at the top of his pyramid, attainable once lower
order physical and social needs have been met. Yet, even before Goldstein and Maslow,

other psychologists have addressed the concept of self-actualization. Swiss

psychoanalyst Carl Jung was a precursor in the 1920s with his theory of self-realization
through individuation, a lifelong process where intrinsic elements of the individuals
psyche together with life experiences are integrated into a well-functioning whole. Turnof-the-century American psychologist William James with his psychology of the self can
also be said to be a forerunner. Self-actualization is not so much a discovery in the field
of psychology as an elaboration of a philosophical concept that goes back to Aristotle and
perhaps further. The chief assumption in self-actualization is that of intrinsic purpose
that of fully realizing innate potentials and being all that one can be. This paper takes
an interdisciplinary approach to the development of self-actualization psychology, tracing
its historical underpinnings through philosophy and literature from Aristotle to Maslow.
A foundation for the theory of self-actualization is expressed in the concept of
entelechy, a term coined by Aristotle (384 322 BCE). According to William Sahakian,
Aristotle is the founder of self-actualization psychology, providing the conception of
the soul as the entelechy (self-contained purpose) of the body The person
who actualizes himself fully, i.e., realizes his every major potential capacity or
ability, is adjusted in the sense that he finds himself in a state of eudaimonia
(beautiful state of mind) (Sahakian, 1975, p.9)

Aristotle proposes that within the self there exists an essential propensity for its own
good. Aristotle invented the word entelechy, as Joe Sachs explains in Aristotle's Physics:
a guided study, by combining entels (complete, full-grown) with echein (to be a certain
way by the continuing effort of holding on in that condition), while at the same time
punning on endelecheia (persistence) by inserting telos (completion). (Sachs, 1995,
p.245). Sachs interprets entelechy to mean being-at-work-staying-the-same which may
sound somewhat confusing but relates to motion and the actuality of a potentiality. Sachs

gives the example of a man walking across a room. The actuality of the potentiality to
be on the other side of the room, as just that potentiality, is neither more nor less than the
walking across the room. (Sachs, 1995, pp. 7879). Thus it can be said that purposeful
activity is the actualization of potentialities.
As Sahakian outlines, Aristotle conceives of the psyche or soul as having three
kinds, the vegetative (found in plants), the sensitive (found in animals), and the rational
soul which only humans possess, although humans also possess the lower two types of
souls. This hierarchical design anticipates Maslows hierarchy of needs. As the soul
defines the purpose of the organism, each corresponding organ has teleological
objectives:
the lower functions exist for the higher, their functions being an activity of life
in the following ascending order: (1) nutrition (vegetative life); (2a) perception
(life of sensation); (2b) kinetic soul (life of creative power, desire, and
locomotion); and (3) dianoetic or rational soul (life of intellect or reason).
(Sahakian, 1975, pp 8-9).

Aristotle seems to indicate that self-actualization is a process of ascending through the

catalysts of the lower functions; and that since the soul is unitary, it is indivisible and
found in each function, from the lowest to the highest. Like Maslows pyramid, the
higher functions (or needs) build on the preceding ones. In Sahakians definition of
entelechy, it is the soul or form-giving energy activating realization or actualization.
(ibid). So for Aristotle, the human being carries within it an entelechy that informs its life
purpose, upon achievement of which one finds oneself in a state of eudaimonia or
happiness.
Prior to Aristotles conception of self-actualization, we may consider the famous
Greek dictum Know thyself as possibly carrying the connotation self actualization.
Socrates, in Platos Phaedrus, invokes the dictum when young Phaedrus asks him to

explain a myth. Socrates says he cannot, claiming I am not yet able, as the Delphic
inscription has it, to know myself; so it seems to me ridiculous, when I do not yet know
that, to investigate irrelevant things." (Plato, 230A). Socrates repeats the same sentiment
in Platos Philebus, arguing that to remain ignorant of oneself is the height of folly. Selfknowledge, for Socrates, then, is a lifelong journey, and one that supersedes in
importance all other categories of knowledge. The second and companion inscription at
Delphi, Nothing in excess would seem to indicate moderation and self-mastery or,
taken together with the first, a rationalized self-knowing as the guiding principle on lifes
journey. This sense of self and prioritizing of introspection was then taken further by
Aristotle into the realm of life activity, as an unfolding of the implicate self and making
explicate what one already is.
In formal philosophy there were few further explorations of self-actualization
until Emmanuel Kant, however writers such as St Augustine with his autobiographical
work Confessions in 397AD did much to bring into perspective a sense of interiority,
self-auditing, and spiritual striving. The Medieval period saw numerous sagas and epics
such as the Old English 10th century Beowulf and the Old Norse Poetic Edda. In the 12th
to 15th centuries came Arthurian Romances such as Parzival, Sir Gawain and the Green
Knight, and Le Morte d'Arthur. Common to all was the heros journey they were often
magical and harrowing accounts of the self-transformation of the hero through trials and
ordeals. To paraphrase Joseph Campbell, hero myths are public dreams of selfactualization. Yet, it was not until the Enlightenment era (1650-1800) that private
dreams began to gain public currency, with Shakespeare representing a kind of bridge
between the medieval romances and the new individualism. Indeed Shakespeare gives

hint of this coming era in Hamlet (1600), a drama in which codes of duty, conduct and
social position are at odds with a growing existential subjectivity and introspection. As
he expresses it in the words of mad Ophelia: Lord, we know what we are, but know not
what we may be. (Shakespeare, Hamlet 4:5:63)
The Western sense of self broke through to a deeper psychological level with
Rousseaus Confessions in 1766, the first secular autobiography, in which Rousseau took
pains to disclose even the more shameful acts of his youth, and offered a detailed account
of his personal development and emotions. With Rousseau, Western subjectivity reached
a new benchmark, inspiring others such as Goethe and Wordsworth to write deeply
personal autobiographies. Contemporary with Rousseau was the birth of the modern or
realistic novel as writers increasingly explored their characters psychology. Goethes
1795 novel Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship sets its young protagonist on a journey of
self-realization. In Germany the novel became the prototype for a new genre of what
would later be termed Bildungsroman (novels of formation) in which a young man sets
out to become who he is in a post-traditional world characterized by ambition, initiative
and social mobility.
In the midst of this century, German philosopher Emmanuel Kant defined both
the Enlightenment and its chief ideal: the conception of the self as rational, responsible
and self-determining. He expressed this 18th century zeitgeist in his 1784 essay "What is
Enlightenment?"
Enlightenment is mans release from his self-incurred tutelage. Tutelage is
mans inability to make use of his understanding without direction from
another. Self-incurred is this tutelage when its cause lies not in lack of reason
but in lack of resolution and courage to use it without direction from another.
Sapere aude! Have courage to use your own reason! --that is the motto of
enlightenment. (Kant 1784, p82)

Kants philosophy was concerned with ethics and moral duty, with the objective
determining of laws of universality and necessity. These laws, Kant argues, cannot be
evinced in the external world, and are therefore to be derived only from pure reason.
Central to reason, for Kant, is freedom. Reason itself presupposes freedom for without
freedom reason could not act, make judgments and make choices. Kant therefore
conceives of the self as autonomous and free, for if it were entirely causally determined,
our reasoning faculty would be pointless.
In his earliest published work, Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces
(1747), Kant returns to Aristotles concept of entelechy as an attempt to weigh in on the
problem of mind-body dualism ongoing at the time. Kant argues for an essential force, a
dynamic teleological structure at the heart of each body or substance. Entelechy is the
nouminal self-actuating force, the implicate order of the phenomenal self the ground or
full potentiality of being. Self-accualization for Kant then, is premised on the assumption
of a soul. (Schoenfeld, 2000, p89)
Kants philosophy is often accused of being overly moralistic and bound by duties
to community. We are obligated to develop both our moral capacities and our natural
capacities. Regarding the latter, Kant states in his 1797 work, The Metaphysics of
Morals:
It is a duty of man to cultivate his natural powers (of the spirit, of the mind, and
of the body) as means to all kinds of possible ends. Man owes it to himself (as
an intelligence) not to let his natural predispositions and capacities (which his
reason can use someday) remain unused, and not to leave them, as it were, to
rust. (Kant, 1797, ch6:444)

While Kant leaves it up to the individual as to which capacities one chooses to develop, it
is ones imperfect duty to make a concerted effort to nurture the gifts of nature not
haphazardly, but intentionaly and rationaly towards fulfillment of self and contribution to

culture. The will or self-actualizing force is guided by judgement towards fullness of

being. Kant scholar Robert Johnson argues that for Kant, failure in ones duty towards
self-actualization is a moral failing, but rather than wronging society, one wrongs oneself:
what makes it wrong to fail in this obligation is not that you will let others
down or even that the world will be made worse off, although both might also
be true. What makes it wrong is that you have failed to respect your own
humanity. (Johnson, p14)

For Kant, then, self-actualization is a primary duty in maintaining moral self-regard, and
entelechy is synonymous with human dignity.
Following Kants reworking of the concept of self-actualization, his successor in
the German philosophical tradition, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770 1831)
further developed self-actualization psychology. Like Kant, Hegels conception of selfactualization is also teleological and premised on Aristotles notion of entelechy, that of
an a priori form that possesses within itself the aspired end. Hegel is similar to Kant in
that happiness may result from self-actualization, but is a conditioned good and not a
final aim. For Kant happiness is secondary and dependent upon moral virtue. For Hegel,
the goal of self-actualization is neither happiness nor moral virtue, but freedom. It is a
complex freedom in which one becomes free from nature (animality) through a
relationship with nature rather than a being determined by nature. Thus self-actualization
is first a process of converting our natural drives for indeterminate objects into directed
drives for determinate objects. Choosing is essential to self-actualizing.
In his essay, Freedom as Correlation: Recognition and Self-Actualization in
Hegels Philosophy of Spirit, Robert R. Williams outlines four features of Hegels
conception of freedom: autonomy, union-with-other, self-overcoming, and allowing-theother-to-be. For Hegel, freedom is only realized within relationship with the other. As

Williams writes: freedom is not located simply in the individual, but rather in the
between. The self-realization of freedom is bound up with the mutual accomplishment
of a certain sort of community or we. (Williams, 2013, p167) Self-actualization is
achieved through a dialectical process in which the subject mediates its relation-to-self
and relation-to-other, and resolves oppositions into an autonomous functioning individual
at home among others. Thus Hegel emphasizes intersubjectivity, mutuality, and
recognition of and by the other as necessary to self-actualization. Many features of the
psychotherapeutic relationship can be found in Hegels philosophy of self-actualization.
In psychology, the concept of self-actualization came to the fore in what was
known as the third force or humanistic psychology. This third force was in some ways
a reaction to both the Freudian school of psychoanalysis where unconscious forces and
childhood traumas determined the individual, and the behaviorist model represented
largely by B.F. Skinner wherein conditioning aimed to modify non-adaptive behavior.
Humanistic psychotherapy shares a lot in common with existential psychotherapy. They
both apply a client-centered approach rather than a diagnostic and didactic one. They
prefer to engage with the present person rather than interpret his or her past and they
share a belief that people have the capacity for self-awareness and choice. Both schools
were influenced by the 19th century philosophers Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) and
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 -1900). A key concept first expressed by Kierkegaard was
authenticity the degree to which one is true to oneself despite external pressures and
intervening agencies such as the church or the media. 20th century philosophers Martin
Heidegger (1889-1976) and Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) developed the concept of
authenticity further.

For both humanistic and existential psychotherapy, the concept of selfauthenticity is central to therapeutic improvement. Rather than prescribing socially
adaptive measures, the therapist assists the client in transcending debilitating selfconcepts and attitudes, clearing the way for growth and self-actualization. Selfactualization psychology, prefigured by Kurt Goldstein in the 1930s with his holistic
theory of personality, grew popular in the US starting in the 1950s through the works of
Abraham Maslow (1908-1970), considered the founder of humanistic psychotherapy and
of self-actualization theory, and Carl Rogers (1902-1987), the founder of client-centered
therapy. Rogers is known for introducing a non-directive approach in therapy and
emphasizing empathy and unconditional positive regard as essential to the therapist-client
relationship. Self-actualization is a key tenet in his understanding of human psychology
and is articulated as such in his nineteen basic propositions, upon which his theory is
based. The fourth proposition in Rogers book Client-Centered Therapy (1951) states
that: The organism has one basic tendency and striving to actualize, maintain, and
enhance the experiencing organism. (Rogers, 1951, p489). His theory shares some
strong parallels with the philosophy of Nietzsche, particularly his book Thus Spoke
Zarathustra (1885) where Nietzsche declares the death of God and the advent of the
bermensch, symbolizing the authors concepts of self-mastery, self-cultivation, selfdirection, and self-overcoming.
In Zarathustra, Nietzsche symbolizes this transformation in three stages: I name
you three metamorphoses of the spirit: how the spirit shall become a camel, and the
camel a lion, and the lion at last a child" (Nietzsche, 1885/1969. p54). While the camel is
a beast of burden, doing what it must do and ought to do, in the (existential) desert, in

the solitude of its predicament, it transforms (with therapeutic encouragement) into a lion
because "it wants to capture freedom for itself and be lord in its own desert" (ibid). The
lion is secure in its relationship to itself, but it still must become a child. As Nietzsche
writes: But tell me, my brothers, what can the child do that the lion cannot? The child is
innocence and forgetfulness, a new beginning, a sport, a self-propelling wheel, a first
motion, a sacred Yes (ibid.). Nietzsche describes a state where one is no longer blocked
or defensive, and where self-actualization is expressed as a spontaneous and natural
movement. Rogers also sees in early childhood an explanation for his fourth proposition:
The whole process (of self-enhancement and growth) may be symbolized and
illustrated by the childs learning to walk. The forward direction of growth is
more powerful than the satisfaction of remaining infantile. Children will
actualize themselves in spite of the painful experiences of so doing. (Rogers,
1951, p490-491).

For Rogers, the childs forward-moving tendency is always stronger than any regressive
behavior. The childs orientation is to value what is self-enhancing. Distortions set in
when the child is evaluated by others and a struggle to preserve a positive self-concept
can result in the distortion of perceived experience.
Nietzsches philosophy emphasized the quality of the individual life and is more
radical in its conception of self-actualization than Hegel, veering towards sheer
individualism. His final book, published posthumously in 1908, was titled Ecce Homo:
How One Becomes What One Is. Here, as in previous works, Nietzsches conception of
self-actualization entails a strenuous over-coming of the parts that are not yourself and an
assuming of responsibility for ones own destiny. A crucial point in Nietzsches
conception of self-becoming is not disowning disagreeable past or present actions and
experiences, but accepting and even affirming them as stages in self-becoming. The self
is freed for growth and experience once repression and disassociation cease and one can

act from a position of inclusive self-ownership. As Duncan Large writes in his

introduction to the Oxford Classics edition of Ecce Homo:
The dynamic of self-overcoming ultimately involves a kind of incorporation,
then: you incorporate what was deemed alien into your task by affirming it
and deeming it retrospectively to have been a necessary stage in your personal
development. This is what constitutes Nietzsche's key concept of amor fati, or
'love of fate', his 'formula for human greatness': 'not wanting anything to be
different, not forwards, not backwards, not for all eternity. Not just enduring
what is necessary, still less concealing it [. . .] but loving it.' (Nietzsche/Large,
2007, p.xvii).

This conception corresponds with Rogerss conception of congruence in which the

individual can function optimally when there is little to no dissonance between ones selfconcept and ones actual behavior and experience. Psychological strain and tension arise
from morbid self-blame, denial of or disassociation from ones behavior and experience.
Rogers fifteenth proposition in Client-Centered Therapy states that:
Psychological adjustment exists when the concept of the self is such that all the
sensory and visceral experiences of the organism are, or may be, assimilated on
a symbolic level into a consistent relationship with the concept of self.
(Rogers, 1951, p 526)

Thus, a central prerequisite for self-overcoming in Nietzsche and self-actualization in

Rogers is acceptance and affirmation in self-relation and in ones experiences. As Rogers
has said famously elsewhere: The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I
am, then I can change. (Rogers, 1961, p31) When such integration occurs, one is better
able to carry out what Nietzsche calls a revaluation of all values as one becomes more
self-directed and no longer dependent on what Kant terms self-incurred tutelage. Thus
one begins to create new values arising from an affirmative relationship to life rather than
one of resentment. This too is the conclusion of Rogers in his nineteen propositions:
As the individual perceives and accepts into his self-structure more of his
organic experiences, he finds that he is replacing his present value system
based so largely on introjections that have been distortedly symbolized with a
continuing organismic valuing process. (Rogers, 1951, p 533)

It was Maslow however who spearheaded the self-actualization movement in the

1950s and 60s. He first formally articulated the concept in his 1943 paper A Theory of
Human Motivation in which he placed self-actualization at the top of a hierarchical
pyramid of needs. With the basic physiological needs at the bottom, Maslow suggested
that human motivation moves up the pyramid, and must achieve and master each
subsequent level, namely security, belonging, and esteem, before it is able to focus on
self-actualization and fully realize its potential. Many have criticized Maslows
hierarchy, particularly the order in which it is arranged, and that it cannot claim
universality as it fails to take into consideration differences in need-order depending on
the culture and society. In a more collectivist society, the needs of acceptance and
community may outweigh the needs for freedom and individuality. The order of needs
may also vary according to historical context (war time, peace time) or age group. In
terms of whether self-actualization is more applicably western, this would appear
superficially so, but a closer look at Maslows characteristics of the self-actualizing
individual would reveal many similarities with the ideals of Eastern philosophies such as
Taoism and Zen Buddhism.
However this may be, what distinguishes Maslow is that he shifted the focus away
from the study of pathology towards the study of mental health and optimization. For his
principle study on self-actualization, the 1954 work, Motivation and Personality, Maslow
studied the healthiest 1% of the college population as well as exemplary people such as
Albert Einstein, Jane Addams, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Frederick Douglass. As he
explains in the book, "the study of crippled, stunted, immature, and unhealthy specimens
can yield only a cripple psychology and a cripple philosophy." (Maslow, 1954, p236).

For Maslow, the basis for self-actualization is similar to that of Aristotle, Kant and Hegel,
as an a priori blueprint or essential nature that informs self-development. It is not a race
to become or obtain what media and institutions tell us we lack. As Maslow writes, it is
intrinsic growth of what is already in the organism, or more accurately of what is the
organism itself...self-actualization is growth-motivated rather than deficiency-motivated.
(Maslow, 1954, p112).
The prominent characteristics of a self-actualizing individual include realism and
acceptance, autonomy, spontaneity, creativity, simplicity, freshness of appreciation,
enjoyment of both solitude and deeper personal relations, problem-centered rather than
self-centered, dichotomy-transcendence, strong ethical sense, humility and respect
towards others, and peak experiences. (Maslow, 1970, pp278-312). These qualities
indicate a conception of self-actualization that is similar to those of Kant, Hegel, and
Nietzsche, in terms of ethical regard, autonomy within relationship, and a childlike
enthusiasm and absorption in tasks, respectively. While critics of Maslow and Rogers
complain of shortcomings in methodology and lack of empirical support for the
effectiveness of treatments, a major obstacle to fair assessment has been in using the
psychiatric or medical model to test a therapy that is qualitative and holistic.
(Raskin/Rogers/Witty, 2008, p171). Their work on self-actualization has had both direct
and indirect effects on the subsequent development of psychotherapy from the Human
Potential Movement and Esalen Institute, to Constructivism, Narrative therapy and
Transpersonal therapy. Self-actualization remains a salient theme from its beginnings in
classical philosophy, Eastern teachings in self-enlightenment, and medieval hero myths,
to the leading German philosophers of the last three centuries: Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche

and Heidegger. While self-actualization theory has been largely supplanted now in
clinical psychology, it remains an inspirational resource to many. In the last three years
of Maslows life, he modified his hierarchy of needs, determining there to be a higher
motivational level than self-actualization that he designated as self-transcendence.

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