Abraham Maslow Quotes

On feeling restless despite having a stable, comfortable life:

What a man can be, he must be. This need we may call self actualization.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality

On feeling connected to strangers, not just your inner circle:

Self actualizing people have a deep feeling of identification, sympathy, and affection for human beings in general.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality

On needing to feel accepted before you can grow:

Psychological health is not possible unless this essential core of the person is fundamentally accepted, loved and respected by others and by himself.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality

On playing it safe with your potential:

If you deliberately plan on being less than you are capable of being, then I warn you that you'll be unhappy for the rest of your life.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature

On choosing growth when safety feels easier:

One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, Toward a Psychology of Being

On accepting your own flaws while still striving to grow:

There are no perfect human beings. Persons can be found who are good, very good indeed, in fact, great.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, Toward a Psychology of Being

On avoiding self reflection because it is uncomfortable:

Fear of knowledge of oneself is in many ways similar to our fear of external nature, except that this is inner.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, Toward a Psychology of Being

On applying the same solution to every new problem:

If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail.

Abraham Maslow, Abraham Maslow, The Psychology of Science: A Reconnaissance

Deciding to face a pattern you have been avoiding:

What is necessary to change a person is to change his awareness of himself.

Abraham Maslow, Toward a Psychology of Being

Choosing between a comfortable job and a risky opportunity:

In any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or to step back into safety.

Abraham Maslow, Toward a Psychology of Being

Second-guessing whether to fully let yourself love someone:

Love is a righteous state, a healthy, desirable, ennobling state, which, when it occurs, should be welcomed, enjoyed, and utilized to the fullest.

Abraham Maslow, Toward a Psychology of Being

Weighing whether to aim higher than what feels safe:

The story of the human race is the story of men and women selling themselves short.

Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality

Deciding whether to finally pursue the work you feel made for:

A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself.

Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality

Weighing yourself against your own standard instead of others:

One's only rival is one's own potentialities. One's only failure is failing to live up to one's own possibilities.

Abraham Maslow, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature