The great English writer H.G. Wells memorably said, “Accomplished literature is all very (good) in its way…but much more interesting…are the books that have not (yet) been written.\u201d This evocative statement is especially relevant to Abraham Maslow’s life. As his biographer, I assure you that he died at the peak of his intellectual vigor at age 62. Maslow always worked on a half-dozen books simultaneously; if not for his chronic heart disease, he might well have produced other seminal works into a ripe old age. <\/p>\n
After a major heart attack in 1967, Maslow felt himself in an intensified race against time. Little could be done medically back then; he publicly told audiences that he was living a moment-to-moment, “post-mortem” existence (his words) in which he had so much to say, and few remaining days to do so. <\/p>\n
Fortunately, Maslow’s varied publications and posthumously published private journals provide clear “leads” in this regard, as do reminiscences by close colleagues in his final days. What do we know about the books that Maslow never lived to write? <\/p>\n
First on Maslow’s agenda was a self-help<\/a> book for adolescents, based on his hierarchy of inborn needs. Although previously shunning this genre for its oversimplifications, he now felt a pressing need for popularization. His goal: To guide adolescents along the path to self-actualization, avoiding both the illusory appeal of the hippy-and-drug subculture and competing pressures for social conformity<\/a>. “Drugs, which can be helpful when wisely used,” Maslow wrote scant weeks before his death, “become dangerous when foolishly used. Instead of being ‘surprised by joy,’ ‘turning on’ is scheduled\u2014advertised, sold, hustled\u2014and (eventually) regarded as a commodity.” He was especially interested in offering ways that idealistic adolescents could leverage their desire for belongingness into effective, socially useful activities. <\/p>\n Intertwined with Maslow’s focus on adolescent flourishing was his growing interest in radical educational reform and change. Aldous Huxley’s final novel, Island, had seized Maslow’s imagination<\/a> on the possibilities for a new pedagogy to enhance children’s inherent curiosity, creativity<\/a>, and cooperativeness. He had just begun a friendship<\/a> with Huxley when the latter died from illness. In ensuing years, Maslow increasingly envisioned writing an educational psychology text, particularly geared to teachers in training (and other school personnel). Incorporating the latest research findings, it would help catalyze Huxley’s novelistic dream of incorporating all known features of healthy development\u2014intellect, emotion<\/a>, and body\u2014into mainstream classroom learning. <\/p>\n Another major book project for Maslow comprised what he called “the wisdom<\/a> of the body.” For decades, he had embraced his mentor William Sheldon’s view that human personality<\/a> is affected by somatotype. More broadly, our needs, satisfactions, and pleasures are influenced by innate temperamental aspects. Quite independently of Maslow, Huxley too came to this same outlook. Based on the then-current biomedical research coupled with his bodywork experiences at California’s Esalen Institute, Maslow became enamored with the nascent field of somatic psychology. “What if the organism is seen as having `biological wisdom?'” he mused in Farther Reaches of Human Nature. Clearly, the result would be vital changes in fields as diverse as counseling, psychotherapy<\/a>, education<\/a>, and, of course, health care. <\/p>\n A fourth, future book for Maslow reflected his interest in the “collaborative personality.” Decades of college teaching had convinced him that the ability to work harmoniously\u2014and effectively\u2014with others varied widely among students, as well as faculty and other professionals. It seemed to have little to do with intelligence<\/a>. Some high-IQ people\u2014even “celebrity intellectuals”\u2014whom Maslow knew had proven incapable of collaboration<\/a> even if their ideas meshed, due to traits like argumentativeness, arrogance, or defensiveness. Yet others, in many work settings, accepted disagreement amicably and resolved it productively. What made them different?<\/p>\n As America became increasingly polarized and contentious during the Vietnam War, Maslow viewed the “collaborative personality” as crucial for national health. Drawing on his study of the indigenous Blackfoot tribe and his mentor Ruth Benedict’s anthropological research, he argued that cultures either promoted or discouraged cooperation; the US needed much greater synergic training in everyday life. His goal, therefore, was to teach the fundamentals of collaboration, beginning with the reality of synergy for those who had never experienced it or even believed it possible. <\/p>\n Finally, as I recently highlighted on this site, Maslow became deeply interested in what he called plateau experiences: Extended periods of higher awareness. This interest arose from both his personality research and increasing study of Daoism, as taught at Esalen. Less emotionally and physically charged than peaks, plateau experiences involved feelings of deep serenity rather than heady exuberance, in response to what he termed “the miraculous and the awesome.” <\/p>\n Perhaps reflecting Maslow’s entry into his sixties after a major heart attack, he suggested that plateau experiences were more common as people aged; they gained a greater acceptance of life’s inevitable limitations and a greater appreciation for simple joys. “Plateau-experiencing can be achieved, learned, [and] earned by long, hard work,” he asserted. “To take up residence on the high plateau of unitive consciousness… tends to be a lifelong effort.” Recognizing, of course, that the industrialized world was demographically aging, he was eager to describe at length this elevated state of consciousness and provide specific means for its attainment. <\/p>\n Behaviorism Essential Reads<\/p>\n Though we can never be certain what Maslow might have produced with added years of life, these unwritten books might well have become central to his enduring legacy today. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The great English writer H.G. Wells memorably said, “Accomplished literature is all very (good) in its way…but much…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22781,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[489,156,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-23408","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}