BACKGROUND
Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who developed an idea called the hierarchy of needs in the 1940-50s. You'll probably most often hear it referred to as Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.
The idea is that humans follow a pattern that drives motivation. The pattern begins at the bottom with basic needs, which are your physiological and safety needs, rises to psychological needs (belongness, love, esteem), and ends at the top with self-fulfillment needs like self-actualization. The idea is that, starting from the bottom, each stage must be satisfied before we can rise to the next stage.
Wellness is defined as the active pursuit of activities, choices, and lifestyles that lead to a state of holistic health. It is multidimensional. If you look it up, you will generally find 6-9 dimensions. For the purposes of Well In Progress, we will go with a model of 8 dimensions.
THOUGHTS
Look kind of familiar?
To spell it out, I'm trying to say the two ideas are pretty closely related. In our individual pursuits of wellness, our focus and motivation are likely influenced by where we are (or have been) within the hierarchy of needs.
The list above for dimensions of wellness are in reverse order of where they fit on the hierarchy of needs for me personally. I think that this order changes for different people or even in different stages of the same person's life. For example, I place financial wellness in safety needs and that's probably the case for many. At the same time, there are many others who have not experienced financial issues that challenged their safety. For them, financial wellness isn't necessarily a safety need but rather more closely related to esteem in terms of prestige and accomplishment. Social wellness may fall more into basic needs than in individualistic cultures where it is considered a psychological need.
In 2020 and the start of 2021 now, both where we are in our hierarchy of needs and where each dimension fits within the hierarchy for us may have changed. If someone lost their job, they could have been working on their esteem needs prior to the pandemic, but now must refocus their attention on providing basic needs for themselves and their loved ones. Students, coworkers, family, and friends may prioritized social wellness and belongness before, and find themselves shifting to their health and safety needs or even just adapting to the changing social scene.
This may cause some internal confusion for us. For example, you could think "I was working so hard to get that promotion before and now I'm just trying to make it through the day. What happened to me?" What happened is our previously fulfilled needs were put at risk, and we may need to shift and refocus where we are within the hierarchy and what dimension of wellness we need to meet.
I've seen and even personally shared content on how "it's OK to just be OK" this year. It's true, but I can also see that it might cause some to question themselves especially the ambitious go-getter types. We tell ourselves it's OK to just be OK, but in the back of our minds we think "Is it really? Am I really going to settle for being just OK as a parent, in my job, with my future, etc.?"
Let's take a deep breath and tell that voice: "YES IT'S F*CKING OK. Where I am right now is not where I have been or usually am. I am currently tending to (this) need, and working on (this) dimension of wellness. It is not a matter of just being OK and giving up forever on being excellent/extraordinary/amazing or living my best life. I am purposefully building a strong foundation so that I can keep going."
Now you can exhale.
ACTIVITY
Take the eight dimensions of wellness and place it where it fits for you within the hierarchy of needs. Date it because it can and likely will change. Keep it in your Wellness Toolbox. Refer to it when you need it, and also for random check-ins.
Ask yourself:
Where am I right now in my hierarchy of needs?
What dimension of wellness meets that need for me?
What are activities that will support this dimension of wellness for me?
Choose 2 small activities and 1 big one for the week that will support your wellness, preferably in the identified dimension or any other that meets your needs.
Acknowledge:
"I will do (activity) to support my (dimension of) wellness to meet my (category of) needs."
Reflect.
Each time you complete an activity, check in briefly by asking yourself:
Did this help support my (dimension of) wellness?
Did this help to meet my (category of) needs?
Why or why not?
At the end of the week, how many of the activities did you complete? Keep in mind not to beat yourself up for not getting to any or all of them. How did this make you feel? Was it helpful to you? Do you have any new ideas for activities to add to the list?
Give yourself credit.
I did (this activity) to support my (dimension of) wellness and/or meet my (category of) needs.
I strengthened my foundation so that I can be more able to reach higher.
This activity did not support to my (dimension of) wellness and/or meet my (category of) need like I thought it would, but I experimented and know for next time to skip this and try something else. This experience helps me understand myself better.
Please share your thoughts and related experiences. I would love to hear what you think!
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