Because of you, my needs

According to humanistic theory point of view, every individual surely has motivation or encouragement to fulfill their needs. Maslow states on his theory “hierarchy of needs” that as human being there are some categories of needs that are basically needed by every individual. There are survival need, safety need, belonging need, and self-esteem need which are categorized on deficiency need and self actualization which is growth need.

I agree with him that individual will try to fulfill their deficiency needs and also growth needs either consciously or subconsciously. I mean subconscious is when individual does not really realize and put more effort on his/her needs because they already have it. For instance, before I entered college and moved from my hometown, I did not aware and struggle to fulfill my survival need, safety need, and belonging need because my parents and my friends has completed it. I had a place to stay and go back to, a freedom to do what I want as long as it does not break the rule, and at least I have a family and friends around me who love and accept me as who I am.

However, when I went to Jakarta to continue my study, my first impression was I have to fulfill my needs alone and put a lot of effort for it. I realized that I needed to find a boarding house to stay. I needed to be careful with what I want to say and what I bring because I had not trusted anyone here and also because news showed how high the level of criminality in Jakarta. Moreover at first moment, I had no friend so that I feel so lonely and unrecognized by others. Then, I behaved well and did my best to what I should do so others can recognize me. By these conditions I consciously ran hard to fulfill my needs, so it meant the conditions made me motivated to be able to survive and be accepted.

There is contemporary idea about individual need which comes after Maslow’s theory. It is the need for self-determination that encourages individual to make a decision in order to control an environment. From this idea, an assumption about three innate psychological needs, i.e. the need for competence, the need for autonomy, and the need for relatedness, is drawn.

I also experienced those needs when I was in senior high school. At that time I was motivated to capable in all subjects. Even though there are 27 subjects and most of them are delivered using Arabic language in written and Bahasa in spoken. I think I have many reasons why I was so motivated. First, I regret that I cannot enter the best school in my hometown because my parents do not trust me that I can scrape along and be responsible. Thus, I wanted to show my best and how responsible I am to my teachers, friends and my parents so that they will not be able to see my weaknesses in academic and they will not underestimate me anymore. That is my need of competence. The second reason, I want to rely on myself whenever my teachers gave me a command or problem in learning. It might be also because I did not really trust my friends in terms of the content taught by the teachers, so I avoided asking them. It might be my need of autonomy. The other reason, I thought that if I was capable in all subjects, my friends can rely on me if they need me and I can help them in learning if they ask me. In my opinion, it can be said as my need of relatedness.