Maslow’s forgotten pinnacle: Self-transcendence

Abraham Maslow’s famous hierarchy of needs is depicted as a triangle with self-actualization at the very top. Right before his death, Maslow wanted to add another to the hierarchy: Self-transcendence.

Big ThinkMatt Davis

** Clinical Practicum includes this missing piece, and practitioners are taught to view these areas in terms of areas of self-assessment. In the ketamine psychedelic research, self-transcendence, a more poetic way of saying "ego death" and is more secular than "mystical experience".

Maslow was informed by studies of how indigenous cultural knowledge, and various global religious beliefs might be incorporated into a "Western" model to psychology and mental health practice.

There has been ongoing critique of Maslow's lack of reciprocal collaboration with the communities who shared their wisdom-approaches to personal health and mental well-being balanced with community support for a personally-experienced first-hand experience in what we call now "transcendence".

Maslow’s hierarchy connected to Blackfoot beliefs (Michel, 2014)

See Also:

Psychedelic Therapy: Does the psychedelic experience matter?

Psychedelic medicines have been studied in the Western medical literature consistently for over 100 years, over 60 of which in the ongoing study and practice of racemic ketamine. Psychedelic experiences are described similarly and often felt as profoundly meaningful.

Psychedelic Institute of Mental Health & Family TherapyMichael DeMarco, PhD

Could the Blackfoot Wisdom That Inspired Maslow Guide Us Now?

How indigenous ways of life may offer us a way forward.

The Good Men ProjectThe Esperanza Project

The Dark-Side of Humanistic Psychology: The Blackfoot Confederacy’s Un-Recognized Contributions – Psychological Roots: Past and Present Perspectives in the Field of Psychology (Under Development)

PressbooksDouglas Alards-Tomalin

... it’s been shown that Maslow ventured to the Northern Blackfoot Confederacy where he visited the Siksika Nation. During his time there, he was inspired by the Siksika people’s way of life, eventually basing important humanistic theories off of their knowledge and ways of being. Due to this, the Blackfoot Confederacy had an enormous contribution to the history of humanistic psychology that has not yet been recognized and acknowledged. The next steps to acknowledging the Blackfoot’s contributions further would be to implement their knowledge, values, and beliefs, into educational resources when learning about humanistic psychology or psychology in general. The importance of their knowledge goes beyond any western educational resources and needs to be shared to acknowledge the importance of Indigenous teachings within psychology. Implementing the Indigenous worldview and knowledge would create a culturally safe and diverse practice that would emphasize the role and importance of community, love, acceptance, and belonging.

Relevance to Practice: Phenomenologically, a "western-trained psychologist", Maslow, found resonance in the teachings of other cultures, which not only included, but emphasized transcendence of "self" towards something beyond the self, with approaches to medicine for physical / mental / spiritual / community / cultural healing that included plant medicines. Research is ongoing.

• PIKUNI-BLACKFEET TRADITIONAL MEDICINE: NEUROPROTECTIVE ACTIVITIES OF MEDICINAL PLANTS USED TO TREAT PARKINSON’S DISEASE-RELATED SYMPTOMS (2017)

In a psychedelic ketamine approach, the experience of self-transcendence is built into the process, and given a general definition of "psychedelic" and the poorly-phrased "Adverse Effects". Clients are prepared (as much as can be) to be supported through a process of self-healing with the addition of a medicine within the context of a supportive container as they access a first-hand experience with self-transcendence, offering a window period to begin new mental health practices of the mind and body. Individuals need appropriate minimal level of support to experience this self-transcendence, but over 60 years of study in humans and animals suggests it is safe for most people, and effective at producing this self-transcendent experience, in most people. Ketamine has been given in knock-out doses to billions of people since being FDA-approved in humans and animals since its synthesis in 1962 and subsequent FDA-approval in 1970.

Considering this perspective, it's a lack of self-transcendence that leads to the psychological harms / dysfunctions we experience as "mental illness", and part of the healing is to induce a well-contained psychedelic experience. Currently, this can be done at sub-anesthetic ranges used in various routes of administration of ketamine as specific to individual's needs/risks. The result of this experience seems to indicate ongoing improvement in various mental health indicators/inventories, and, according to neuroscience, it's measurable.

Neural correlates and subjective experiences in meditation vs psychedelics, including ketamine (Preliminary Lit Review)

A preliminary, evolving review of the literature. (Ongoing Draft) | Psychedelic Institute of Mental Health & Family Therapy

Psychedelic Institute of Mental Health & Family TherapyMichael DeMarco, PhD

Humanistic Psychology, largely informed by indigenous practices emphasizing self-transcendence through supported plant medicine approaches establishes a well-studied framework, inclusive of mind-body approaches such as cognitive-behavioral therapy, to support psychedelic medicines through pathways such as ketamine, or plant medicine pathways in Colorado.

Applicability:

• Licensed Psychologists, Licensed Marriage & Family Therapists, Licensed Mental Health Counselors (including Creative Arts Therapists), Social Workers
• Allied medical care providers in anesthesia, pain-management, palliative care, psychiatry practitioners, critical & primary care practice, hopsice, chaplaincy, end of life specialists including death doulas
• Non-Clinicians– Community training & support (SMART Recovery), clergy & spiritual practitioners