“Maslow noted only one in a hundred people become fully self-actualized because our society rewards motivation primarily based on esteem, love and other social needs”(McLeod). Pi, the novel’s protagonist, moves through the very same motivational levels that Abraham Maslow identifies in his landmark psychological studies. Understanding the different stages helps show why certain behaviors are occurring and eventually after all stages are fulfilled is when a person becomes self-actualized.
Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who introduced the concept of the motivational needs in his paper “A Theory of Human Motivation” written in 1943. He explains that humans have certain needs that need to be fulfilled and when they are not met is what gives he or she the motivation toward achieving that goal. His work was popularized by a representation of the motives using a pyramid. The pyramid displays the needs in chronological order until one becomes self-actualized. Maslow states that a person will finally reach self-actualization when, “A basically satisfied person no longer has the needs for esteem, love, safety, etc” (1433-1434). The lower levels of the pyramid are more easily accomplished as compared to the higher levels that are more challenging. In order to graduate from one level to another, the lower levels must be satisfied first or else one cannot progress further according to Maslow.
The story Life of Pi is about a young boy trying to discover himself in through the means of religion. He is already in the beginning phase of self-actualization until major tragedy of a shipwreck while on his way to Canada causes him to be stranded in the middle of the ocean with a tiger on a lifeboat. He is now left wit...
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...correctly once the prior aspects of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs have been met respectively. Many seek to have a satisfied feeling of knowing the definition of life which Maslow defines is only when a person is fully done with the hierarchy of needs that he or she can fully be satisfied with life. Pi falls from being in the self actualized phase of the hierarchy and just as Maslow’s hierarchy begins with fundamental physiological needs, so does Pi’s journey.
Works Cited
Dewey, Russ. "B-needs and D-needs." B-needs and D-needs. N.p., 2007. Web. 06 Apr. 2014.
Martel, Yann. Life of Pi: A Novel. New York: Harcourt, 2001. Print.
Maslow, Abraham H. (2011-01-16). Hierarchy of Needs: A Theory of Human Motivation. www.all-about-psychology.com. Kindle Edition.
McLeod, S. A. (2007). Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Retrieved from http://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html
Stranded for 227 days at sea in a lifeboat, with no one else except an adult Bengal tiger. This is exactly what the main character Pi, in "The Life of Pi" went through. "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel is a story about a boy named Piscine Molitor Patel, an Indian boy who survives more than seven months floating on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean, with no one else but a 450-pound tiger (Cooper). Yann Martel was born on June 25, 1963, in Salamanca, Spain. His parents, Emile Martel and Nicole Perron, were both born in Canada. He spent his childhood in several different countries, including France, Mexico, the United States, Canada, and Costa Rica. As an adult, he lived in many other places but one of them was India, which may be where he got inspiration for writing “Life of Pi”. Yann Martel uses the literary elements similes and foreshadowing, to express the theme that believing in religion can give you the faith to want to survive.
Pi Patel in Yann Martel’s Life of Pi is a young Indian boy who is put through a tremendous traumatic experience; he gets lost at sea! Not only does he lose all his family, but he is forced to survive 227 days at sea with very limited resources. This ordeal causes great psychological pressure on Pi and causes his mind to find ways to cope with all the stress. When asked to describe what happened, Pi tells two stories: one with him surviving with animals including an adult Bengal tiger named Richard Parker, and a parallel story with humans in which Pi is forced to bend morality. Pi’s story of his survival with Richard Parker is a fiction that he creates to cope with a reality that is too difficult to face.
In the final level of Maslow’s Hierarchy, self-actualization must be met to complete Maslow’s Hierarchy. Pi acknowledges Richard Parker’s importance during the duration of his survival. He meets the criteria of having a profound and significant relationship describing Richard Parker’s help: “He pushed me to go on living. I hated him for it, yet at the same time I was grateful. I am grateful. It's the plain truth: without Richard Parker, I wouldn't be alive today to tell you my story.”
Have you ever thought about how people become motivated to do things? Maybe you even wonder what motivation really is. Motivation is the desire to do things. Motivation creates a drive that pushes a person close to their breaking point and beyond. It helps an individual reach goals that some couldn’t even imagine of doing. But have you ever truly thought about what motivates people. What really gives people that drive? What empowers people to reach their aspirations? If so you are not alone, a ton of people has thought about what it is the gives people such a drive. Including American psychologist Abraham Maslow. Maslow has created a psychological advanced thinking on what he think inspires people to do such gargantuan complex things. Maslow made a theory, which states that people fulfill needs in stages or levels in life. There are five stages that are divided into basic needs, such as safety, love, and esteem, and growth needs like self-actualization.
Through the completion of the steps in the journey, the protagonist of the story successfully becomes a hero. The main character in Life of Pi, Pi demonstrates this journey with his background being introduced as sad and gloomy with an academic background in religious studies and zoology. He is also shown as a believer of three ‘polar’ religions, Hinduism, Christianity and later Islam simultaneously. The second stage, the call to action occurs when Pi’s father makes a dramatic decision to emigrate out of India and into Canada. This subtly introduces how Pi’s life was going to begin to experience turmoil and learn how to overcome grim obstacles. Every hero has a moment of refusal where they momentarily decline the journey out of fear of the unknown. Pi demonstrates this as well with his hesitation of leaving his homeland and travelling to a foreign and unknown country. The most climatic stage of the journey would be crossing the threshold which shows the hero entering an unfamiliar district with unknown rules (Writers Journey). When the ship sinks, Pi gets separated on a lifeboat stranded alone with only the company of a hyena, zebra, orangutan and a Bengali tiger. This validates Pi’s unawareness of what to do in the circumstances. The ordeal, when the hero faces their greatest fear and briefly meets death is the
The credible version of hierarchy of needs of Maslow (1943, 1954), have five motivational levels that are arranged in a pyramid with depicted levels. The stages are divided in basic needs which include, psychological, love, safety, and esteem. These needs are also primary of deficiency needs. The other needs are growth needs which incorporate self-actualization needs. When basic needs are not met, they are said to motivate people. The strength of the desire of such needs depends with the time in which they are denied. For example, the more a person lacks food, the hungrier that person becomes. Basic needs must be satisfied before a person proceeds to satisfy other needs in the higher levels. When basic needs are satisfied reasonably, the person can now strive at achieving the self-actualization level, which is the highest level.
Maslow believed that there was a hierarchy of five innate needs that influence people’s behaviors (Schultz & Schultz, 2013, p.246-247). In a pyramid fashion, at the base are physiological needs, followed by safety needs, then belonginess and love needs, succeeded by esteem needs, and finally the need for self-actualization. Maslow claimed that lower order needs must be at least partially satisfied before higher level needs are addressed. Furthermore, behavior is dominated by solely one need
Psychologist Abraham Maslow created the hierarchy of needs, outlining and suggesting what a person need to reach self-actualization and reveal the true potential of themselves. In the model, Maslow propose that a person has to meet basic needs in order to reach the true potential of themselves. Biological/physiological needs, safety needs, love/belonging need, esteem needs according to Maslow is the fundamental frame for reaching the peak of self. The last need to be met on the scale
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is a theory in psychology that was first presented by Abraham Maslow in a paper entitled “A Theory of Human Motivation” in 1943. The theory includes five hierarchy levels of needs and is usually displayed as a pyramid. The bottom level is “Physiological”, the next level is “Safety”, the level above that is “Social”, the next level is “Esteem” and the highest level is “Self-actualization”. As told by McLeod (2007) an individual must fulfill lower level needs before advancing upwards towards the next level of needs. The bottom level, “Physiological” needs are basic physical requirements such as; food, water sleep and warmth, the next level up is “Security” and it refers to
In the article, Maslow explored a range of different issues that had an influence in psychology in a variety of ways. Furthermore, the above figure illustrates the central concept that Maslow was trying to get the experts within his career field to understand and to explore as a viable framework for further analysis. Maslow (1943) stated that certain things drive people to attain particular needs, and then organized the fundamental human needs into a hierarchy of relative prepotency. Also, Maslow identified that some needs take priority over others. As figure one shows, physical survival is the human beings most basic need; therefore, this will be the first thing that motivates human behavior. Furthermore, once people fulfill that level of needs, then they will go to the next level, and the next level, et cetera (Cite Main
Maslow (1943) stated that people are motivated to achieve certain needs. When one need is fulfilled, a person seeks to fulfil the next one, and so on. The earliest and most widespread version of Maslow's (1943, 1954) hierarchy of needs includes five motivational needs, often depicted as hierarchical levels within a pyramid.
The Life of Pi, written by Yann Martel, is the story of a young man, Piscine, or Pi for short, who experiences unbelievable and unrealistic events, which are so unrealistic ambiguity is aroused amongst the reader. Duality reoccurs over the course of the novel through every aspect of Pi’s world view and is particularly seen in the two contradictory stories, which displays the brutal nature of the world. Martel wonderfully crafts and image of duality and skepticism though each story incorporated in this novel.
Martel’s “Life of Pi” is a coming-of-age story containing a young boy who reaches maturity through a tragic yet miraculous account of tremendous loss and survival. The story is based on a journey which encompasses humor, tragedy, and adventure. The examination from the hero archetype, it is the perfect testimony towards faith and divinity. Martel’s exploitation of Pi’s development serves to accomplish the purpose of others believing in God.
Martel’s novel is about the journey of a young man being forced to test his limits in order to survive the unthinkable predicament of being lost at sea alongside an adult Bengal tiger. Life of Pi starts out by introducing an anonymous author on a quest to find his next big story and goes to a man by the name of Piscine Molitor Patel who supposedly has a story worth hearing. Patel begins his story talking about his childhood and the main events that shaped him such as his family’s zoo, the constant curiosity in religion he sought as a young boy and also how he got his nickname Pi. Mr. Patel continues explaining how his father contracts a Japanese ship to transport his family, along with a number of their zoo animals, from India to Canada in order to avoid political upheaval. While traveling the ship began sinking and Pi was the only one to manage to make it onto the life boat and survive the wreck. The disaster left Pi along with a fe...
Pi is provided form just as the hungry followers of Jesus