As you know (and as we’ve discussed many times), Abraham Maslow once said that “What one can be, one must be.”
He described this as the need to self-actualize. As you ascend his hierarchy of needs, this need to self-actualize — to more and more consistently express the best within yourself — becomes as real as the need to breathe. (Which is why I like to call it Soul Oxygen.)
In Toward a Psychology of Being, Maslow puts it another way. He tells us that we have “capacities” that are “clamoring to be used.”
It’s a beautiful passage so let’s go straight to the source for this one. Here’s how he puts it:
“The muscular person likes to use his muscles, indeed, has to use them in order to self-actualize, and to achieve the subjective feeling of harmonious, uninhibited, satisfying functioning which is so important an aspect of psychological health. People with intelligence must use their intelligence, people with eyes must use their eyes, people with the capacity to love have the impulse to love and the need to love in order to feel healthy. Capacities clamor to be used, and cease their clamor only when they are used sufficiently.”
Today’s +1 is (deceptively) simple.
What capacities do you have within YOU that are clamoring to be used?
Seriously. Take a moment. Step back. Reflect.
What capacities do you have within YOU that are clamoring to be used? (Perhaps focus on just one for now.)
Think of a time in your past when you DID fully utilize that capacity. Now imagine your life with you rocking that capacity again.
And, before we wrap up today’s installment, how about another quick etymology lesson?
The word clamor comes from the Latin word that literally means “cry out.”
For our purposes, know this: Your soul is crying out to be used. Pleading with you to actualize all of your latent potential.
Let’s do that.
How? +1. +1. +1.
(With the occasional bold +11 and +111 that are built on the solid foundation of all those +1s. 🤠)
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