The psychological needs of other people - by Aramal Malik

The 20th century psychologist Abraham Maslow outlines in his famous, 'A Theory of Human Motivation', a defined hierarchy of survival needs that every single human being must have in order to grow and develop throughout life. This Hierarchy of Needs, as it is called, ranges from basic physiological needs such as 'food, water, shelter and warmth' and progresses into higher self-actualization needs like 'pursuit of inner creativity and fulfillment'. Overall, Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs supplies us with a generalized list of necessities that are both motivational and meta-motivational to our survival,whether we are talking about just physical or spiritual by design.

My point in mentioning this is to provide a psychological directive that I personally feel must be established and provided to the people that we come in contact with, regardless if they are considered clients, volunteers, friends or family. It is a proper understanding of the emotional and psychological needs of other people that make our individual and combined efforts for helping others, effective and satisfactory.

For instance, it is easy for us to supply the first of anyone's basic needs, namely through feeding people, providing tents and blankets and functional clothing. However, we should look past the idea of 'food, water, shelter, and warmth' and look into a metaphorical and perhaps metaphysical approach to these simple concepts. For instance, while we may prepare and serve nutritious meals that provide the necessary compliments of vitamins, carbohydrates and minerals; we should also look into the need to 'feed' people with education and information. Another example is the idea that we provide 'warmth' with blankets and clothing, but then again we should be aware that the greatest form of 'warmth' that a person can give is in Love. The simplicity of harmonious and caring interaction between people is a deep psychological need that is also part of survival.

Many of societies 'demons' such as alcoholism and drug abuse are only persistent in our world because of a lack of proper application of compassion and love. I know that many of the individual people whom we work with day-to-day, are people who suffer from the burden of depression and addiction. Yet, through some of our individual efforts I have seen depression become replaced with hope and addiction has been killed with a desire to achieve fulfillment. So the most effective method we hold as individuals, is our individual and ultimately combined effort to bestow Love and Compassion as a form of necessities with and within everything we are concerned with.