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70-446: The Jonah complex is the fear of success or the fear of being one's best. This fear prevents self-actualization , or the realization of one's own potential. It is the fear of one's own greatness, the evasion of one's destiny, or the avoidance of exercising one's talents. As the fear of achieving a personal worst may serve to motivate personal growth, likewise the fear of achieving a personal best may hinder achievement. The Jonah complex

140-507: A correlation between the postulating series of causal links between culture and self-construals, finding instead that correlations between traits varied both across cultures did not correlate with Markus & Kitayama's identifications of "independent" or "interdependent" self. The philosophy of self seeks to describe essential qualities that constitute a person's uniqueness or a person's essential being. There have been various approaches to defining these qualities. The self can be considered as

210-477: A culture is found by individuals in the setting of their own life. There can be different types of spiritual Self because it is determined by one's life and experiences." Human beings have a Self—that is, they are able to look back on themselves as both subjects and objects in the universe. Ultimately, this brings questions about who we are and the nature of our own importance. Traditions such as in Buddhism see

280-586: A first-person perspective and suggests potential uniqueness. Conversely, "person" is used as a third-person reference. Personal identity can be impaired in late-stage Alzheimer's disease and in other neurodegenerative diseases . Finally, the self is distinguishable from "others". Including the distinction between sameness and otherness , the self versus other is a research topic in contemporary philosophy and contemporary phenomenology (see also psychological phenomenology ), psychology , psychiatry , neurology , and neuroscience . Although subjective experience

350-532: A great artist or teacher may never realize their talents if their energy is focused on attaining the basic needs of humans. As a person moves up Maslow's hierarchy of needs, they may eventually find themselves reaching the summit — self-actualization. Maslow's hierarchy of needs begins with the most basic necessities deemed "the physiological needs" in which the individual will seek out items like food and water, and must be able to perform basic functions such as breathing and sleeping . Once these needs have been met,

420-409: A moral norm." However, if it is indeed as good a reality as they purport, then a certain eagerness in their communication is understandable. In general, during the early twenty-first-century, "the usefulness of the concepts of self and self-actualization continue to attract discussion and debate." The concept has also been criticized in recent years for its Western-centrism, as it is not indicative of

490-487: A negative point of view – man is a conditioned or tension reducing organism – to a more positive view in which man is motivated to realize his full potential. This is reflected in Maslow's hierarchy of needs and in his theory of self-actualization. Instead of focusing on what goes wrong with people, Maslow wanted to focus on human potential, and how we fulfill that potential. Maslow (1943, 1954) stated that human motivation

560-413: A person can move on to fulfilling "the safety needs", where they will attempt to obtain a sense of security , physical comfort and shelter, employment, and property. The next level is "the belongingness and love needs", where people will strive for social acceptance , affiliations, a sense of belongingness and being welcome, sexual intimacy , and perhaps a family . Next are "the esteem needs", where

630-438: A person is willing to risk his or her life in order to maintain "self-actualization" (Selbsverwirklichung), the realization of his or her "essence" of the person he or she feels that she/he IS. Carl Rogers used the term "self-actualization" to describe something distinct from the concept developed by Maslow: the actualization of the individual's sense of 'self.' In Rogers' theory of person-centered therapy , self-actualization

700-423: A real wish to be themselves, to be fully human, to fulfill themselves, and to be completely alive, as well as a willingness to risk being vulnerable and to uncover more "painful" aspects in order to learn about/grow through and integrate these parts of themselves (this has parallels with Jung's slightly similar concept of individuation ). Although their studies were initially biologically centered (or focused around

770-461: A stigmatized group. According to Cox, Abramson , Devine , and Hollon (2012), if an individual has prejudice against a certain group, like the elderly and then later becomes part of this group. This prejudice can be turned inward causing depression. The philosophy of a disordered self, such as in schizophrenia , is described in terms of what the psychiatrist understands are actual events in terms of neuron excitation but are delusions nonetheless, and

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840-535: Is growth-motivated rather than deficiency-motivated." This explanation emphasizes the fact that self-actualization cannot normally be reached until other lower order necessities of Maslow's hierarchy of needs are satisfied. While Goldstein defined self-actualization as a driving force, Maslow uses the term to describe personal growth that takes place once lower order needs have essentially been met, one corollary being that, in his opinion, "self-actualisation ... rarely happens ... certainly in less than 1% of

910-443: Is "Selbstverwirklichung." "Self-realization" may be a more adequate translation than the "self-actualization" used in the translation of "The Organism". Goldstein sets this notion of self-actualization in contrast to "self-preservation" (Selbsterhaltung). "Self-actualization" for Goldstein means something that comes close to realization of one's "essence", one's identity, one's felt sense of oneself; which may in consequence mean that

980-581: Is a set of psychotherapeutic principles and techniques established by the Austrian-born American psychoanalyst Heinz Kohut upon the foundation of the psychoanalytic method developed by Freud, and is specifically focused on the subjectivity of experience, which, according to self psychology, is mediated by a psychological structure called the self. Examples of psychiatric conditions where such "sameness" may become broken include depersonalization , which sometimes occurs in schizophrenia , where

1050-452: Is also the risk of confusing " self -actualizing and self- image actualizing...the curse of the ideal." By conflating "the virtue of self-actualization and the reality of self-actualization," the latter becomes merely another measuring rod for the "topdog" – the nagging conscience: "You tell me to do things. You tell me to be – real . You tell me to be self-actualized...I don't have to be that good!" Barry Stevens remarks: "Abe Maslow

1120-421: Is based on people seeking fulfillment and change through personal growth. Self-actualized people are those who are fulfilled and doing all they are capable of. 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

1190-427: Is central to selfhood, the privacy of this experience is only one of many problems in the philosophy of self and scientific study of consciousness . The psychology of self is the study of either the cognitive and affective representation of one's identity or the subject of experience. The earliest formulation of the self in modern psychology forms the distinction between two elements I and me. The self as I ,

1260-414: Is continuous as the individual matures into a socially competent, interdependent autonomy, and is ongoing throughout the life-cycle. When there is sufficient tension between the individual's sense of self and their experience, a psychopathological state of incongruence can arise, according to Rogers, "individuals are culturally conditioned, rewarded, reinforced, for behaviors which are in fact perversions of

1330-662: Is evident in neurotic people. Although Abraham Maslow is credited for the term, the name "Jonah complex" was originally suggested by Maslow's friend, Professor Frank E. Manuel . The name comes from the story of the Biblical prophet Jonah 's evasion of the destiny to prophesy the destruction of Nineveh . Maslow states, "So often we run away from the responsibilities dictated (or rather suggested) by nature, by fate, even sometimes by accident, just as Jonah tried—in vain—to run away from his fate". Any dilemma, paradox or challenge faced by an individual may trigger reactions related to

1400-413: Is little more than what Eric Berne described as the game of '"Self-Expression"...based on the dogma "Feelings are Good"'. Broader criticism from within humanistic psychology of the concept of self-actualization includes the danger that 'emphasis on the actualizing tendency...can lead to a highly positive view of the human being but one which is strangely non-relational'. According to Fritz Perls there

1470-474: Is possible to correlate cognitive and affective experiences of self with neural processes. A goal of this ongoing research is to provide grounding insight into the elements of which the complex multiple situated selves of human identity are composed. What the Freudian tradition has subjectively called, "sense of self" is for Jungian analytic psychology, where one's identity is lodged in the persona or ego and

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1540-532: Is related to the concept of anattā in Buddhist philosophy. In Buddhism, the term anattā ( Pali : 𑀅𑀦𑀢𑁆𑀢𑀸 ) or anātman ( Sanskrit : अनात्मन् ) is the doctrine of "non-self" – that no unchanging, permanent self or essence can be found in any phenomenon. While often interpreted as a doctrine denying the existence of a self, anatman is more accurately described as a strategy to attain non-attachment by recognizing everything as impermanent, while staying silent on

1610-651: Is subject to change in maturation. Carl Jung distinguished, "The self is not only the center but also the whole circumference which embraces both conscious and unconscious; it is the center of this totality...". The Self in Jungian psychology is "the archetype of wholeness and the regulating center of the psyche ... a transpersonal power that transcends the ego." As a Jungian archetype , it cannot be seen directly, but by ongoing individuating maturation and analytic observation, can be experienced objectively by its cohesive wholeness-making factor. Meanwhile, self psychology

1680-639: Is supposed to be egoistic, unique, separated from the various contexts, critical in judgment, and prone to self-expression. The interdependent self is supposed to be altruistic, similar with the others, flexible according to contexts, conformist, and unlikely to express opinions that would disturb the harmony of his or her group of belonging. However, this theory has been criticized by other sociologists, including David Matsumoto for being based on popular stereotypes and myths about different cultures rather than on rigorous scientific research. A 2016 study of 10,203 participants from 55 cultural groups also failed to find

1750-456: Is the Self's search for "ultimate meaning" through an independent comprehension of the sacred. Another definition of spiritual identity is: "A persistent sense of Self that addresses ultimate questions about the nature, purpose, and meaning of life, resulting in behaviors that are consonant with the individual’s core values. Spiritual identity appears when the symbolic religious and spiritual value of

1820-452: Is the ego, also called the learned, superficial Self of mind and body, egoic creation, and the Self which is sometimes called the "True Self", the "Observing Self", or the "Witness". In Hinduism , the Ātman (Self), despite being experienced as an individual, is actually a representation of the unified transcendent reality, Brahman . Our experience of reality doesn't match the nature of Brahman due to māyā . One description of spirituality

1890-504: Is the ongoing process of maintaining and enhancing the individual's self-concept through reflection, reinterpretation of experience, allowing the individual to recover, develop, change, and grow. Self-actualization is a subset of the overall organismic actualizing tendency , and begins with the infant learning to differentiate what is "self" and what is "other" within its "total perceptual field," as their full self-awareness gradually crystallizes. Interactions with significant others are key to

1960-480: Is the subjective knower. While, the self as Me , is the subject that is known. Current views of the self in psychology positions the self as playing an integral part in human motivation, cognition, affect, and social identity . Self, following the ideas of John Locke , has been seen as a product of episodic memory but research on people with amnesia reveals that they have a coherent sense of self based on preserved conceptual autobiographical knowledge. Hence, it

2030-402: Is unique to them, and is one of the true goals of life. Whether famous or unknown, educated or not, rich or poor, self-actualizers tend to fit the following profile. Maslow's self-actualizing characteristics are: Maslow's writings are used as inspirational resources. The key to Maslow's writings is understanding that there are no quick routes to self-actualization: rather it is predicated on

2100-516: The "Jonah complex". These challenges may vary in degree and intensity. Such challenges may include career changes, beginning new stages in life, moving to new locations, interviews or auditions, and undertaking new interpersonal commitments such as marriage. The crux of the Jonah Complex distinguishes to the subject an inability to differentiate humility from self-helplessness. Other causes include: Self-actualization Self-actualization

2170-503: The adult population." The fact that "most of us function most of the time on a level lower than that of self-actualization" he called the psychopathology of normality . Maslow's usage of the term is now popular in modern psychology when discussing personality from the humanistic approach. Maslow's work is considered to be part of humanistic psychology , which is one of several frameworks used in psychology for studying, understanding, and evaluating personality . The humanistic approach

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2240-479: The basic needs of humans must be met (e.g. food, shelter, warmth, security, sense of belonging) before a person can achieve self-actualization. Yet, Maslow argued that reaching a state of true self-actualization in everyday society was fairly rare. Research shows that when people live lives that are different from their true nature and capabilities, they are less likely to be happy than those whose goals and lives match. For example, someone who has inherent potential to be

2310-530: The capacities of the organism." Maslow defined self-actualization to be "self-fulfillment, namely the tendency for him [the individual] 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." He used the term to describe a desire , not a driving force, that could lead to realizing one's capabilities. He did not feel that self-actualization determined one's life; rather, he felt that it gave

2380-411: The danger that 'emphasis on the actualizing tendency ... can lead to a highly positive view of the human being but one which is strangely non-relational.' According to Fritz Perls there is also the risk of confusing " self -actualizing and self- image actualizing ... the curse of the ideal." For Perls, by conflating "the virtue of self-actualization and the reality of self-actualization,"

2450-444: The desire for self-fulfillment, namely, to the tendency for a person to become actualized in what they are potentially. Maslow based his theory partially on his own assumptions or convictions about human potential and partially on his case studies of historical figures whom he believed to be self-actualized, including Albert Einstein and Henry David Thoreau . He considered self-actualizing people to possess "an unusual ability to detect

2520-400: The direct seeking for 'kicks' and for non-social and purely private pleasures ... is often mislabelled self-actualization." In this sense, "self-actualization" is little more than what Eric Berne described as the game of "'Self-Expression' ... based on the dogma 'Feelings are Good'". Broader criticism from within humanistic psychology of the concept of self-actualization includes

2590-644: The final level of psychological development that can be achieved when all basic and mental needs are essentially fulfilled and the "actualization" of the full personal potential takes place. In this treatment, self-actualization is at the top of Maslow's hierarchy of needs , and is described as becoming "'fully human' ... maturity or self-actualization." According to Maslow, people have lower order needs that in general must be fulfilled before high order needs can be satisfied: 'five sets of needs – physiological, safety, belongingness, esteem , and finally self-actualization'. As Abraham Maslow noted,

2660-485: The first place. Using thought experiments such as these, Parfit argues that any criteria we attempt to use to determine sameness of person will be lacking, because there is no further fact . What matters, to Parfit, is simply "Relation R", psychological connectedness, including memory, personality, and so on. Religious views on the Self vary widely. The Self is a complex and core subject in many forms of spirituality . Two types of Self are commonly considered—the Self that

2730-550: 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." One of Abraham Maslow's earliest discussions of self-actualization was in his 1943 article "A Theory of Human Motivation" in Psychological Review 50, pp. 370–396. Here, the concept of self-actualization was first brought to prominence as part of Abraham Maslow 's hierarchy of needs theory as

2800-413: The individual a desire, or motivation to achieve budding ambitions. Maslow's idea of self-actualization has been commonly interpreted as "the full realization of one's potential" and of one's "true self." A more explicit definition of self-actualization according to Maslow is "intrinsic growth of what is already in the organism, or more accurately of what is the organism itself ... self-actualization

2870-413: The individual having their lower deficiency needs met. Once a person has moved through feeling and believing that they are deficient, they naturally seek to grow into who they are, i.e. self-actualization. Elsewhere, however, Maslow (2011) and Carl Rogers (1980) both suggested necessary attitudes and/or attributes that need to be inside an individual as a pre-requisite for self-actualization. Among these are

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2940-432: The individual will desire a sense of competence , recognition of achievement by peers, and respect from others. Once these needs are met, an individual is primed to achieve self-actualization. While the theory is generally portrayed as a fairly rigid hierarchy, Maslow noted that the order in which these needs are fulfilled does not always follow this standard progression. For example, he notes that for some individuals,

3010-422: The latter becomes merely another measuring rod for the "topdog" – the nagging conscience: "You tell me to do things. You tell me to be – real . You tell me to be self-actualized ... I don't have to be that good!" Barry Stevens remarked: Maslow was unhappy with what happened with many people when they read what he wrote about 'self-actualizing people'. What they did with it

3080-507: The medial posterior parietal cortex. The posterior cingulate cortex , the anterior cingulate cortex , and medial prefrontal cortex are thought to combine to provide humans with the ability to self-reflect. The insular cortex is also thought to be involved in the process of self-reference . Culture consists of explicit and implicit patterns of historically derived and selected ideas and their embodiment in institutions, cognitive and social practices, and artifacts. Cultural systems may, on

3150-463: The more ordinary, psychological self-nature), there have been many similarities and cross-references between various spiritual schools or groups (particularly Eastern spiritual ways) in the past 40 years. Maslow early noted his impression that "impulsivity, the unrestrained expression of any whim, the direct seeking for 'kicks' and for non-social and purely private pleasures...is often mislabelled self-actualization." In this sense, "self-actualization"

3220-424: The natural directions of the unitary actualizing tendency." In Rogers' theory self-actualization is not the end-point; it is the process that can, in conducive circumstances (in particular the presence of positive self-regard and the empathic understanding of others), lead to the individual becoming more "fully-functioning". Maslow early noted his impression that "impulsivity, the unrestrained expression of any whim,

3290-402: 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. In his later work, Maslow suggested that there are two additional phases an individual must progress through before achieving self-actualization. These are "the cognitive needs," where a person will desire knowledge and an understanding of

3360-420: The one hand, be considered as products of action, and on the other, as conditioning elements of further action. The way individuals construct themselves may be different due to their culture. Hazel Rose Markus and Shinobu Kitayama 's theory of the interdependent self hypothesizes that representations of the self in human cultures fall on a continuum from independent to interdependent . The independent self

3430-411: The past, present and future. It is a theoretical solution to the question of personal identity, being contrasted with "Empty individualism", the view that personal identities correspond to a fixed pattern that instantaneously disappears with the passage of time, and "Closed individualism", the common view that personal identities are particular to subjects and yet survive over time. Open individualism

3500-417: The person may or may not be responsible for "sharing" in the mind's process, or the events which occur, such as visions and auditory stimuli, may persist and be repeated often over hours, days, months or years—and the afflicted person may believe themselves to be in a state of rapture or possession. Two areas of the brain that are important in retrieving self-knowledge are the medial prefrontal cortex and

3570-427: The problem of personal identity is concerned with how one is able to identify a single person over a time interval, dealing with such questions as, "What makes it true that a person at one time is the same thing as a person at another time?" or "What kinds of things are we persons?" A question related to the problem of personal identity is Benj Hellie's vertiginous question . The vertiginous question asks why, of all

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3640-428: The process of self-actualization: As a result of interaction with the environment, and particularly as a result of evaluational interaction with others, the structure of the self is formed – an organized, fluid but consistent conceptual pattern of perceptions of characteristics and relationships of the 'I' or the 'me', together with the values attached to these concepts. The process of self-actualization

3710-429: The same relative position. Parfit poses the question of whether or not the teletransporter is actually a method of travel, or if it simply kills and makes an exact replica of the user. Then the teleporter is upgraded. The teletransporter on Earth is modified to not destroy the person who enters it, but instead it can simply make infinite replicas, all of whom would claim to remember entering the teletransporter on Earth in

3780-407: The schizo-affective or a schizophrenic person also believes are actual events in terms of essential being. PET scans have shown that auditory stimulation is processed in certain areas of the brain, and imagined similar events are processed in adjacent areas, but hallucinations are processed in the same areas as actual stimulation. In such cases, external influences may be the source of consciousness and

3850-416: The self appears different from the subject. The 'Disorders of the Self' have also been extensively studied by psychiatrists. For example, facial and pattern recognition take large amounts of brain processing capacity but pareidolia cannot explain many constructs of self for cases of disorder, such as schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. One's sense of self can also be changed upon becoming part of

3920-466: The self, and by Thomas Nagel in The View from Nowhere . Tim S. Roberts refers to the question of why a particular organism out of all the organisms that happen to exist happens to be you as the "Even Harder Problem of Consciousness". Open individualism is a view in the philosophy of self, according to which there exists only one numerically identical subject , who is everyone at all times, in

3990-559: The source of consciousness, the agent responsible for an individual's thoughts and actions, or the substantial nature of a person which endures and unifies consciousness over time. The self has a particular prominence in the thought of René Descartes (1596-1650). In addition to the writings of Emmanuel Levinas (1906-1995) on "otherness", the distinction between "you" and "me" has been further elaborated in Martin Buber 's 1923 philosophical work Ich und Du . In philosophy,

4060-423: The spurious, the fake, and the dishonest in personality, and in general to judge people correctly and efficiently." Maslow examined the lives of each of these people in order to assess the common qualities that led each to become self-actualized. In his studies, Maslow found that self-actualizers really do share similarities. He also believed that each of these people had somehow managed to find their core-nature that

4130-504: The subjects of experience out there, this one—the one corresponding to the human being referred to as Benj Hellie—is the one whose experiences are live ? (The reader is supposed to substitute their own case for Hellie's.) Hellie's argument is closely related to Caspar Hare's theories of egocentric presentism and perspectival realism , of which several other philosophers have written reviews. Similar questions are also asked repeatedly by J. J. Valberg in justifying his horizonal view of

4200-427: The ultimate existence of an unchanging essence. In contrast, dominant schools of Hinduism assert the existence of Ātman as pure awareness or witness-consciousness , "reify[ing] consciousness as an eternal self." One thought experiment in the philosophy of personal identity is the teletransportation paradox . It deals with whether the concept of one's future self is a coherent concept. The thought experiment

4270-415: The values of many cultures that do not value individualism as highly. Self In philosophy , the self is an individual 's own being , knowledge , and values , and the relationship between these attributes. The first-person perspective distinguishes selfhood from personal identity . Whereas "identity" is (literally) sameness and may involve categorization and labeling , selfhood implies

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4340-421: The world around them, and "the aesthetic needs," which include a need for "symmetry, order, and beauty." Maslow also added a further step beyond self-actualization, which is self-transcendence . Self-transcendence occurs at the "very highest and most inclusive or holistic levels of human consciousness." A self-actualizer is a person who is living creatively and fully using his or her potentials. It refers to

4410-443: The world. The tendency toward self-actualization is "the only drive by which the life of an organism is determined." However, for Goldstein self-actualization cannot be understood as a kind of goal to be reached sometime in the future. At any moment, the organism has the fundamental tendency to actualize all its capacities and its whole potential, as it is present in that exact moment, under the given circumstances. Goldstein's work

4480-414: Was coined by the organismic theorist Kurt Goldstein for the motive to realize one's full potential: "the tendency to actualize itself as fully as possible is the basic drive ... the drive of self-actualization." Carl Rogers similarly wrote of "the curative force in psychotherapy – man's tendency to actualize himself, to become his potentialities  ... to express and activate all

4550-445: Was developed because other approaches, such as the psychodynamic approach made famous by Sigmund Freud , focused on unhealthy individuals that exhibited disturbed behavior; whereas the humanistic approach focuses on healthy, motivated people and tries to determine how they define the self while maximizing their potential. Humanistic psychology in general and self-actualisation in particular helped change our view of human nature from

4620-730: Was first used by the German psychiatrist Kurt Goldstein . Maslow attributed the term "self-actualization" to Goldstein in his original 1943 paper. 'Kurt Goldstein first introduced the concept of the organism as a whole, ' which is built on the assumption that "every individual, every plant, every animal has only one inborn goal – to actualize itself as it is." Kurt Goldstein's book, The Organism: A Holistic Approach to Biology Derived from Pathological Data in Man (1939), presented self-actualization as "the tendency to actualize, as much as possible, [the organism's] individual capacities" in

4690-414: Was formulated by Derek Parfit in his 1984 book Reasons and Persons . Derek Parfit and others consider a hypothetical "teletransporter", a machine that puts you to sleep, records your molecular composition, breaking you down into atoms, and relaying its recording to Mars at the speed of light. On Mars, another machine re-creates you (from local stores of carbon, hydrogen, and so on), each atom in exactly

4760-468: Was in the context of Classical Adlerian psychotherapy , which also promotes this level of psychological development by utilizing the foundation of a 12-stage therapeutic model to realistically satisfy the basic needs. This then leads to an advanced stage of "meta-therapy", creative living, and self/other/task-actualization. Goldstein's work is also seen in the context of Gestalt therapy . The German term used by Goldstein, translated as "self-actualization",

4830-422: Was unhappy with what happened with many people when they read what he wrote about 'self-actualizing people'. What they did with it was very strange. I have received a fair number of letters saying 'I am a self-actualized person'. Maslow said that he must have left something out. Fritz (Perls) put it in. He saw that most people actualized a self-concept. This is not self -actualizing." The term "self-actualization"

4900-411: Was very strange. I have received a fair number of letters saying 'I am a self-actualized person'. Maslow said that he must have left something out. Fritz (Perls) put it in. He saw that most people actualized a self-concept. This is not self -actualizing. According to Paul Vitz , this may be connected with the charge that "Rogers and Maslow both transform self-actualization from a descriptive notion into

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