There are many studies and theories about what human beings’ greatest needs are. In The Space Between Us: Conversations About Transforming Conflict, Betty Pries offers: belonging, significance, contribution, security, being known, being understood, and being respected.[1] On her website, Argentine psychologist and educator Chloe Madanes offers: certainty, variety, significance, connection, growth, and contribution.[2] American speaker, author, and researcher Scott Barry Kaufman (via Abraham Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’) offers: safety, connection, self-esteem, exploration, love, and purpose. [3] The “healthy self”, "emotional competence”, or “emotional intelligence” are what I am calling the “true self”. American Trappist priest and author Thomas Keating describes the true self as “the image of God within us”.[4] It is the image of your ideal, fully healthy, mature, actualized self that your Creator knows you to truly be. It is what we are at our best, when our deepest needs are being met.
The opposite of this “true self” is the “false self”. Thomas Keating describes the false self as
“the idealized image of ourselves developed from early childhood to cope with emotional trauma due to the frustration of our instinctual needs for survival / security, affection / esteem, and power / control. The false self also seeks happiness through identification with a particular group from whom it can find acceptance and thus build feelings of self-worth. On the social level, it gives rise to violence, war, and institutional injustice.”[5]
[1] Betty Pries, The Space Between Us: Conversations About Transforming Conflict (Harold Press, Harrisonburg, VI, 2021), p. 53.
[2] https://madanesinstitute.com/the-6-human-needs/
[3] Scott Barry Kaufman, Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization, (TarcherPerigee, New York, NY, 2021). xiii-xvi
[4] Thomas Keating, Open Mind, Open Heart (Bloomsbury Continuum, New York, NY, 2023), p. 99
[5] Keating, Open Mind, Open Heart, p. 2-3
