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            Our situation on planet Earth is characterized, from birth to death, by four realities.  We have life-long feelings about these realities and make constant efforts to respond, in the form of various compensations.  Our choice of compensation is always a creative response, although framed and influenced by our heredity and experience.  If these choices are characterized primarily by self-interest, a sense of discouraged impotency is ultimately experienced in life.  When the pattern of these choices is characterized by social-interest, the experience of encouraged potency is created.  Walking through this matrix, step by step, with a goal of understanding, will enable the power to transform your life.

Summary:

BASIC REALITIES

             From the raw experience of life on our planet earth, in the form of four subjective realties, we actively respond by constructing our impressions, interpreting our situation and generating our response.  This is our creative power we exercise in our life. [22] 

Reality #1:  Born on planet earth in motion: 

                        The planet earth is in motion [23] and therefore all that is “on” the planet is in motion.  This fact requires a “movement” response from all livings things in the form of activity.  Our human response is creatively goal oriented and is conceptualized by synergistic psychology in the form of three basic tasks of life (self, relations, and work), where each task has an independent psychological goal (significance, belonging, and usefulness).  These tasks/goals are derived from the three other realities that exists as we find ourselves on the planet earth in the vast universe.  All interest in “motivation” is but as interest in how we respond to life. [24]  Our striving is from our perceived deficit to our aspirations of success, from felt “minus” to felt “plus” position.  We strive to develop a significance of self, create interpersonal belonging, and achieve a working solution for basic needs that gives us the impression of increased security and a higher quality of life. 

Reality #2:  Born with needs not provided: 

                        We exist on the thin and muddy crust of a planet that does not provide essential food and shelter, except for our efforts.  We must put forth individual effort, create cooperative group efforts, and contribute to providing shelter and food to reduce our anxiety about our existence and our surviving as individuals and as a species.  Currently, this kind of basic effort is most easily observed during times of natural disasters, when it is easy to see the survival spirit of “pulling together” and the benefit of neighbors helping neighbors, such as in the aftermath of an environmental crises, such as a hurricane, tornado or flood.  In short, we must activity work and be useful with others to continue our own existence and perpetuate the human species.  Beyond this, we work to create a higher quality of life and reduce our experience of anxiety.  

Reality #3:  Born as unitary individuals: 

                        We are born by separating from our mothers as helpless and dependent infants, immediately needing others to survive, as nature has not provided us with the biological equipment to survive independently.  The initial experience of the “social feeling” in relations with others is the first experience of security for the helpless infant, a deep source of relations security leading us to solve the unpleasant feeling of separateness.  Having co-evolved with all others from our birth, we are social beings, socially embedded and we have a life-long desire to belong in the context of these relations.  Due to the reality of death, we must replicate ourselves by conceiving and birthing children in the context of sex, love, family and community relationships. [25]  We have a deep wish to belong with others and are constantly motivated to satisfy this desire. 

Reality #4:   Born as helpless infants: 

                        We are born as unique but helpless individuals and possess a continuous desire (a striving) to be competent and significant among others throughout our lives and make efforts to overcome basic inferiority feelings.  Our uniqueness means we are creative in our subjective interpretations about life and we respond uniquely to situation of life.  We create unified meanings to life and all of our thoughts, actions, feelings, physiology, memories and dreams lead toward unified goals as we create a unique life-style.  We are each a whole system, undivided, and are differentiated by our self-created guiding themes.  Who we are is important to us and our task of self-development toward competence and the goal of being unique among others is always motivating for us. [26]  We strive to find our place in the world and desire that it be a uniquely recognized existence.  Happiness will be experienced if such an existence includes useful contribution, with an interest in the welfare of others. 

Summary 

            Four situational realities result in four basic feelings experienced by all humans from birth to death.  While these feelings, by their nature, generate compensatory responses, we are free to make basic choices regarding the direction of expression.[27]

            Early child guidance training in life will influence these choices but as we mature, our experience with life’s consequences and guidance from role models will incline us toward basic self-interest goals or basic social interest goals, depending upon our self-knowledge and courage.

            Inclinations toward intense self-interest require movements toward individualism, superiority, domination and withdrawal.  Ultimately, this response process leads to intense discouragement and depression in life.

            As an alternative, feelings of encouragement result from satisfactorily compensating for the four basic feelings of inferiority, separateness, anxiety and movement by a sufficient display of social interest via successful efforts in the tasks of connection, cooperation, contribution and community.  The goal oriented “pursuit of happiness” is, therefore, the persistent movement toward significance, belonging, usefulness and stability.  Taken holistically, the reality of potency emerges. [28]

            With education and guidance, striving toward these useful goals can create a positive experience in life for everyone and, at the expense of no one. 

Comments:

(1)  This matrix integrates Existential philosophy (in the spirit of Kierkegaard, Pascal, Heidegger and Tillich), the work of Erich Fromm, and the Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler.  This integration serves as the basic model upon which the Goal Evaluation and Matrix Analysis (GEMAÔ), the 360 degree assessment tool, is built. [Back]

(2)  Two important statements on the subject of choice are found in Adler’s Understanding Human Nature, 1927.  “We orient ourselves according to a fixed point which we have artificially created, which does not in reality exist, a fiction.”  p. 67   “The purpose of this assumption is simply to orient ourselves in the chaos of existence, so that we can arrive at some apperception of relative values.”  p. 68.  Also, from William James, Ph.D.: “The greatest revolution of our generation is the discovery that human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives."  [Back]

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            While this is a difficult book to read, the wisdom comes directly from Adler and his timeless insights are many and profound.

(3)  “I began to develop the finalistic viewpoint of Individual Psychology, and came to the conclusion that we must look upon the psychic life as a movement, directed toward the solution of certain almost immutable life tasks.”  Adler, Alfred. Superiority and social interest: a collection of later writings.  Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Ill., 1964, p. 114   [Back]

(4)  “All forms of behavior (thinking, feeling, acting, physical responses) are thought of by Adler as movement of the individual in his field of action.”  Forgus, R. & Shulman, B. H., Personality: a cognitive view.  Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc. 1979, p. 106.   Also, from Loren Grey:  “Perhaps the law which influences our temporal lives the most immediately and profoundly is the law of motion.  From birth to death, the necessity for survival (perhaps another law itself), ordains that the human body be in ceaseless internal and external motion.”  Grey, L.  Alfred Adler, the forgotten prophet: a vision for this 21st century, Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1998, p. 30. [Back]

(5) Chaos is the goal of the individualist.  They have no use for the community, coupled with the deep fear that they could not be accepted in their "being."  Individualistic striving for superiority, at the expense of the group, is the ultimate "sin" of social living.  Striving to make superior and useful contributions for the benefit of the group, is evidence of "sainthood."  [Back]

(6)  Stability found in the context of community requires leadership, selected by the democratic process.  “Leadership is the ability of humans to relate deeply to each other in the search for a more perfect union.  Leadership is a consensual task, a sharing of ideas and a sharing of responsibilities, where ‘leader’ is a leader for the moment only, where the leadership exerted must be validated by the consent of followers, and where leadership lies in the struggles of a community to find meaning for itself.”    - William F. Foster  [Back]

(7)  Anxiety is expressed by the existential philosophers with the German word “Aengstlichkeit.”  The English derivative is “angst” which proposed by adherents of existentialism to express the concept that anxiety profoundly characterizes the human experience from birth to death and primarily arises from our developing awareness that we are responsible for our choices required to survive on the planet.  Modern day anxiety is less evoked by a fear the absence of basic needs than by a fear of "missing out" amidst infinite opportunities.  Of course, nuclear destruction, rampant disease and environmental collapse are constant sources of anxiety for our growing population of the planet.  [Back]

(8)  “Man is not only a rational and social animal.  He can also be defined as a producing animal, capable of transforming the materials which he finds at hand, using his reason and imagination.  Not only can he produce, he must produce in order to live.” From Erich Fromm, Man for himself: an inquiry into the psychology of ethics.  Henry Holt and Company, New York, N.Y., 1947, p. 84. [Back]

(9)  Self-elevation is the goal of striving for individualistic superiority, to be above all others.  Which, paradoxically, is why it doesn't work.  "Equality is the ironclad logic of social living." -Rudolf Dreikurs  [Back]

(10)  “The most sensible estimate of the value of any activity is its helpfulness to mankind, present and future . . . . we know when we are guided by the impulse to act usefully, and the better a person’s adjustment is, the nearer he approaches to true perception.”  Adler, A., Problems of Neurosis, Philip Mairet (Ed.) New York: Harper Torchbooks, Harper & Row, 1964, p. 78. [Back]

(11)  “The deepest need of man, then, is the need to overcome his separateness, to leave the prison of his aloneness.  The absolute failure to achieve this aim means insanity, because the panic of complete isolation can be overcome only by such a radical withdrawal from the world outside that the feeling of separation disappears - because the world outside, from which one is separated, has disappeared.”  Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving, NY: Bantam Books, 1956,  p. 8.  Also, “He must be alone when he has to judge or to make decision solely by the power of his reason.  And yet he cannot bear to be alone, to be unrelated to his fellow men.  His happiness depends on the solidarity he feels with his fellow men, with past and future generations.”  From Erich Fromm, Man for himself: an inquiry into the psychology of ethics.  Henry Holt and Company, New York, N.Y., 1947, p. 43. [Back]

(12)  Hypothesized by Adler as the “social feeling” with the German word “Gemeinschaftsgefuhl.”  Adler writes:  “Human psychological life is not capable of doing just as it likes but is constantly confronted with tasks which have arrived from somewhere.  All these tasks are inseparably tied up with the logic of man’s communal life.”  From: The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler, Ansbacher & Ansbacher, p. 128.  Also:  “The first evidence of the inborn social feeling unfolds in his early search for tenderness, which leads him to seek the proximity of adults.”  Adler, A. Understanding Human Nature, 1926, p. 46. [Back]

(13)  Control is the goal of domination activity.  Often generated by the fear of being controlled by others, domination is seen as the "safe-guarded" method for success.  However, "successful" domination simply leads to discouragement, as do all the self-elevation ambitions.  [Back]

(14)  Belonging is the goal of cooperation with others.  In the history of humankind, there is little evidence that humans have ever been inclined to live in isolation.  [Back]

(15)  This was hypothesized by Adler as the “inferiority feeling” with the German word “Minderwertigkeitsgesuhl.”  In the book The collected works of Lydia Sicher: an Adlerian perspective (QED Press, Ft. Bragg,, California, 1991, edited by Adele K. Davidson, Ed.D.), Dr. Sicher suggests “Two Problems in early Life” (p. 79) where 1) the child is constantly exposed to the vertical plane of life by the fact of being picked up and put down and 2) the designation that one is a child and one is an adult creates the impression that the “...desire to be and the striving to become are evaluated as opposites.” p.81.  Also, Carl G. Jung wrote of inferiority feelings, stating:  “Everything that is unconscious in ourselves we discover in our neighbour, and we treat him accordingly.  We no longer subject him to the test of drinking poison; we do not burn him or put the screws on him; but we injure him by means of moral verdicts pronounced with the deepest conviction.  What we combat in him is usually our own inferiority side.”  From:  Jung, C.G., Modern man in search of a Soul, p. 142.  This concept created by Jung is very close to the concept of "depreciation tendency" created by Adler.  [Back]

(16)  “Man ascends through the discovery of the fullness of his own gifts.  What he creates along the way are monuments to the stages of his understanding of nature and of self.”      -Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man.  While many models espouse the virtues of creating a balance between "work and family," Synergistic Psychology espouses an integrated balance among "work-relations-self."  [Back]

(17)  The basic self-interest goal of withdrawal is “safe-guarded” vanity, as vanity simultaneously refers to both “excessive pride” and the “lack of usefulness.”  “The vain character is satisfied with elevating himself over the rest of humanity by a trick, and etching the character of others with the sharp acid of his criticism.  It is not strange that such individuals occasionally develop a fine technique, since they have extraordinary practice and training in it.”  p. 160.

                Also:   “The derogatory, depreciating fashion of such individual, who cannot criticize too much, is their expression of a character trait which is common enough.  We have called this the depreciation complex.  It indicates actually what the point of attack of the vain person is:  it is the worth and value of his fellow man.  The depreciation tendency is an attempt to create the feeling of superiority by the degradation of one’s fellows.  The recognition of another’s worth is equivalent to an insult to the vain one’s personality.  From this fact alone we can draw far-reaching conclusions, and learn how deeply rooted in the personality of a vain individual his feeling of weakness and inadequacy is.”  p. 161.

                Also:  “In the forefront of these manifestations are pride, vanity, and the desire to conquer everyone at any price.  The latter may be subtly accomplished by the relative elevation of the individual, by his deprecation of all those with whom he comes in contact.  In the latter case the important thing is the “distance” which separates him from his fellows.  His attitude is not only uncomfortable for the environment, but for the individual who practice it, because it continually brings hum into contact with the dark side of life and prevents him from experiencing any joy in living.”  Adler, A., Understanding Human Nature, 1926, p. 70.  [Back]

(18)  “If we want to illuminate a conception of the striving for significance in this light, we must say: Of course, it can come about only if it is founded in the original disposition.  But what we see, such as the character, cannot be thought of outside society, because the striving for significance, seen as character, must be regarded as a social function which can show itself only within a social frame.” Adler, Alfred. Superiority and social inters: a collection of later writings.  Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Ill., 1964, p. 212. [Back]

(19)    Basic results are experienced from the basic choices.  Choices are altered by consequences.  [Back]

(20)    Discouraged impotency results from pursuing self-elevation.  [Back]

(21)     Encouraged potency results from pursuing social-interest contributions.  [Back]

(22)  “Everyone is capable of reconfiguring and rearranging his contacts with the outer world to fit his life pattern.  The individuality and uniqueness of a human being consists in what he perceives and how he perceives.  Perception is more than a simple physical phenomenon; it is a psychic conclusion concerning the inner life.”  Adler, A. Understanding Human Nature, p. 50. [Back]

(23)  In addition to planetary motion around the sun, the earth moves around on an axis, moves by the arm of the Milky Galaxy, and moves in accord with the galaxy.  In addition, the earth has internal motion at its core, surface motion of the continental plates, and weather, as a form of motion most readily experienced by its inhabitants. [Back]

(24)  The word “movement” is derived from the same language source as “motivation.” [Back]

(25)  In Adler’s original thinking, as described in Dr. Edward Hoffman’s book: The drive for self: Alfred Adler and the founding of Individual Psychology, Dr. Hoffman writes:  “In a short article published in a new educational monthly that Freud might well have missed, Adler was also asserting that we all have an innate need for affection, whose early manifestations [now quoting Adler] ‘...are sufficiently striking and well known.  Children want to be fondled, loved, and praised.  They have a tendency to cuddle up, always to remain close to loved person, and to want to be taken into the bed with them.  Later this desire aims at loving relationships from which originate love of relatives, friendships, social feelings, and [sexual] love.’”  Hoffman, Edward, The Drive for Self: Alfred Adler and the Founding of Individual Psychology, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, New York, 1994. [Back]

(26)  “When we consider any number of mistaken responses to the environment we find ourselves dealing with constant developmental attempts on the part of the soul to make a correct response and to progress throughout life in a continual experiment.”  Adler, A. Understanding Human Nature. p. 41. [Back]

(27)  Referring to N.B. Shoobs (1942), Dreikurs writes:  “‘An immediate compensation takes place to improve this unfavorable condition.’  He reiterates Adler’s biological principle of compensation:  ‘Nature responds to a deficiency or inferiority in three ways:  1) Successful overcoming or compensation, 2) Complete breakdown of the organ or part affected, 3) Exaggerated over-compensation.’ ”  Taken from Dreikurs, R.  “The socio-psychological dynamics of physical disability,” in Psychodynamics, Psychotherapy and Counseling, Chicago:  Alfred Adler Institute of Chicago, 1967, p. 178. [Back]

(28)  “Potency thus is the same as virtue; impotence, the same as vice.  Happiness is not an end in itself but is what accompanies the experience of increase in potency, while impotence is accompanied by depression; potency and impotence refer to all powers characteristic of man.”  From Erich Fromm, Man for himself: an inquiry into the psychology of ethics.  Henry Holt and Company, New York, N.Y., 1947, p. 27. [Back]

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