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Abraham Maslow Quotes

Psychologist

Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist born on April 1, 1908, and died on June 8, 1970. He was a pioneer in humanistic psychology and proposed Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which had a profound impact on the field of psychology.

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Famous Abraham Maslow Quotes

“Language can be a way of hiding your thoughts and preventing communication.”

Way Language Communication Hiding Preventing Body Language Concealing Peak Experiences Language And Communication Languages Communication Verbal Communication

Author:Abraham Maslow

“Laugh at what you hold sacred, and still hold it sacred.”

Stills Laughing Sacred Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“Plateau experiencing can be achieved, learned, earned by long hard work.... A transient glimpse is certainly possible in the peak experiences which may, after all, come sometimes to anyone. But, so to speak, to take up residence on the high plateau .... that is another matter altogether. That tends to be a lifelong effort.”

May Long Sometimes Matter Hard Speak Effort Hard Work Glimpse Lifelong Transient Residence Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

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

Source: Future visions: the unpublished papers of Abraham Maslow

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

Persons Spirituality Change Awareness Perspective Self Awareness Awakening Spiritual Awareness Peak Experiences Necessary Change

Author:Abraham Maslow

“The ability to be in the present moment is a major component of mental wellness.”

“One's only rival is one's own potentialities. One's only failure is failing to live up to one's own possibilities. In this sense, every man can be a king, and must therefore be treated like a king.”

Men Failing Possibility Failure Kings Every Man Treated Rivals Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“But behavior in the human being is sometimes a defense, a way of concealing motives and thoughts, as language can be a way of hiding your thoughts and preventing communication.”

Way Humans Sometimes Language Human Beings Communication Behavior Defense Motive Hiding Preventing Body Language Concealing Peak Experiences Language And Communication Languages Communication Verbal Communication

Author:Abraham Maslow

“If I were dropped out of a plane into the ocean and told the nearest land was a thousand miles away, I'd still swim. And I'd despise the one who gave up.”

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

Men Inspirational Humans Stories Race Men And Women Selling Human Race Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“We fear to know the fearsome and unsavory aspects of ourselves, but we fear even more to know the godlike in ourselves.”

Knows Fear Aspect Godlike Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“Classic economic theory, based as it is on an inadequate theory of human motivation, could be revolutionized by accepting the reality of higher human needs, including the impulse to self actualization and the love for the highest values.”

“We may define therapy as a search for value.”

May Values Therapy Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“You will either step forward into growth or you will step back into safety.”

Life Spiritual Motivation Fear Growth Business Steps Courage Learning Personality Encouragement Safety Self Education Steps Forward Business Growth Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“The emotional reaction in the peak experience has a special flavor of wonder, of awe, of reverence, of humility and surrender before the experience as before something great.”

Emotion Wonder Special Humility Emotional Surrender Reactions Awe Reverence Flavor Peak Experiences Emotional Reactions

Book:Toward a Psychology of Being

Source: Toward a Psychology of Being

“Expression and communication in the peak–experiences tend often to become poetic, mythical, and rhapsodic, as if this were the natural kind of language to express such states of being.”

Ifs Kind States Joy Language Natural Expression Communication Poetic Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“What shall we think of a well-adjusted slave?”

Thinking Wells Slave Peak Experiences

Book:Toward a Psychology of Being

Source: Toward a Psychology of Being

“The way to recover the meaning of life and the worthwhileness of life is to recover the power of experience, to have impulse voices from within, and to be able to hear these impulse voices from within — and make the point: This can be done.”

Way Done Able Life Is Voice Impulse Meaning Of Life Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“Dispassionate objectivity is itself a passion, for the real and for the truth.”

Real Reality Truth Passion Objectivity Dispassionate Keeping It Real Truth Hurts Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“One's only failure is failing to live up to one's own possibilities.”

Failing Possibility Peak Experiences

Author:Abraham Maslow

“The person in peak-experiences feels himself, more than other times, to be the responsible, active, creating center of his activities and of his perceptions. He feels more like a prime-mover, more self-determined (rather than caused, determined, helpless, dependent, passive, weak, bossed). He feels himself to be his own boss, fully responsible, fully volitional, with more "free-will" than at other times, master of his fate, an agent.”

Source: Toward a Psychology of Being

About the Author

Born: April 1, 1908
Died: June 8, 1970
Known for: Psychologist
Quotes: 157

Books & Sources

Toward a Psychology of BeingRelated source material

The Maslow Business ReaderRelated source material

Motivation and PersonalityRelated source material

Maslow on managementRelated source material

A Theory of Human MotivationRelated source material

Future visions: the unpublished papers of Abraham MaslowRelated source material

On Dominance, Self-Esteem, and Self-ActualizationRelated source material

American politics and humanistic psychologyRelated source material

The healthy personality: readingsRelated source material

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