Reflections on the Way

How to Think about Transcendence, the Self, and Community

I’m linking this episode of the Psyche Podcast with my friend, Quique Autrey, a therapist at the Neurodiversity Center of Katy. I’ve been working on my new manuscript each day and in the re-writing and revision stage. It is said that all good writing is re-writing, so that’s what I’ve been doing.

On this episode I talk about Maslow and his “hierarchy of needs,” but my research has lead to to how his time with the Siksika (part of the Blackfoot Nation, an indigenous people in North America), helped him formulate his ideas regarding the hierarchy. At that time, he did not present this research to the public perhaps of the fear that it would go against the mainstream of psychological research. While the hierarchy of needs exists in individualistic and capitalistic societies, where one has to strive to reach the apex of the needs to obtain self-actualization and transcendence, no such struggle exists among the Siksika. Rather than the 2% of people that Maslow talks about (and discussed on this episode) who achieve self-actualization in European cultures, Maslow observed that most of the people of those tribes were brought up having this need met. They were taught it through their community. Rather than a pyramid of needs, often depicted in textbooks of the 60s, the Siksika culture can be described as concentric circles with spirituality (transcendence) in the center and the other needs in interdependent relationship around it. This was how all their needs were met.

The reason why Maslow did not share this with the public was most likely the fear of going against academic status quo. I know this well because not a few university professors in the field of theology would say that my work was not appreciated by the larger body of theology simply because some kinds of theologies were valued more than others. For Maslow, this is where the benefits that he would have contributed to society did not outweigh the risk of being a heterodox. Maslow died at the age of 62 in 1970, and who knows what contributions he could have made if he continued his work on these ideas and shared them with the public. That same year of his death he had added “transcendence” to his hierarchy of needs. The main thesis in my book is that we cannot reach self actualization with out pursuing theōsis or divine union with God as a goal of life. Moving beyond the self provides fulfillment to the self. You will have to wait until my book comes out (crossing my fingers and praying for a good publisher) to see how this is actually done, but I hint at it in the show.

Thanks for all those who have supported, both paid and unpaid. I’ve hit 100 subscribers and am beyond thrilled. My goal for the next 6 months is to reach another 100 subscribers and at least 10 more paid subscribers. The money this Substack page makes goes into the research. I’m not a university faculty member and do not have access to a university library and don’t have the same resources as a faculty member might have to write, research, and lecture. This is the forum for my writing, you are my students, and my lectures are all here. Feel free to share to others if you receive value from these pages.

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