Sunday, October 6, 2013

Make it Your Wonderful Life (Humanistic)

by "Abraham Maslow" 

Tara is steadily making her way through the Hierarchy of Needs.  For the first part of her life there were times of struggle to make the ends meet, but eventually she made a comfortable lifestyle for her family.  Tara and her husband sold their small house that was in "bad" neighborhood and moved into a safer neigherborhood with better schools to raise their family.  Her family grew and continued to form the bonds of love and trust.  She has developed esteem and self-actualiztion as well.

As everyone Tara has not yet reached 100% of all of these levels.  It is not a stepping up Hierarchy rather than a continual growth.  Tara is doing pretty well, but needs some more esteem...  she is doing a fine job of parenting and needs to realize her childhood cannot be duplicated.

"Freud supplied to us the sick half of psychology and we must now fill it with the healthy half"  (Burger page 279)  I believe Tara's life can be depicted much better through this more optimistic description.

Tara described to me a "peak experience" she had as a child that she feels is still a very important part of her life.  She said that she was on a week long beach vacation with her family.  It was at the beginning of the trip so there were many days left and she can picture herself in the pool which was along side the beach.  She was doing back flips off the side of the pool and just felt an unreal feeling of happiness.  She was just happy to be alive.  The sun was warm, she was having an amazing time and she was just plain happy.

This situation has often resurfaced in her life today as she raised her own children.  She has her own theory that if she can remember it from her childhood it must be important and feels obligated to give that experience to her own children.  This is a strength for her as a parent because it gives her goal and provides motivation, but sometimes when things don't work out it can upset Tara and she needs to realize that its a different life and it's not going to be the exact one she lived.





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