Category: Hierarchy of Needs

Gaza-The Golden Age

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Gaza-The Golden Age

Gaza-The Golden Age

 

By John Curran

 

I actually can’t believe I’m still here and in one piece. I live in the rubble now of what once was our home. The nights are starting to get cold and its harder and harder to find fuel now to keep the rickety old heater going. Food they say will be coming now because there has been a truce, a ceasefire, whatever they want to call it. I hardly ever eat now and I’m hungry all the time as are the rest of the kids. My family is gone, they’ve all been killed, mother, father, my three sisters. There’s just me and my two younger cousins now. We have a small space here that we’ve cleared out of the rubble. They’re both younger than me. They rely on me now-we’re all we have, though all of our neighbors and people we know try to help out because all of us, children, adults, old people, all of us, we’re all in the same boat, just trying to survive day to day.

Its very hard. My cousin Maki is just six and he has no hands, they were blown off. He picked up something that he thought was something else and the thing exploded and blew off his hands. He needs a lot of help all the time. My other cousin, Fabio is blind. He’s only eight years old. At least he has the rest of his little skinny self to help out as best he can. He’s actually a big help and he’s getting pretty good at adjusting to his blindness. He helps so much with Maki, feeding, the toilet, all ‘a that. I can’t always be there. I’m twelve and I feel grown up already because I guess I need to be. We’re just trying to stay alive like always only it’s harder and now and its so sad. I miss my family so bad. They say that a golden age is coming now but really, for me, its just grey as ever. I just hope we can get something to eat.

BASIC NEEDS: When Self-Isolating

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BASIC NEEDS:

When Self-Isolating

By Trevor K. McNeil

Priorities

I am self-isolating. I have to admit I am rethinking some old assumptions. Such as, what is important? What is not important? Since I was a kid, adults have told me to “sort out your priorities.” Something that is usually easier said than done. Not least because the reasons for my priorities tend to be individualized to me. What I want, and what my mother, or my neighbor, for that matter, are not the same. Certainly the individualization of priorities makes the notion of shared or “fundamental” values, as applies to the human race, something of an absurdity.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

The closest thing to a ranking of needs or priorities, is Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs”.  Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist, who wrote about human needs.  In 1943 he wrote, “Theory of Human Motivation”.   He admitted some of his work and writings were based on observation and some good old-fashioned guess work.  Maslow believed people are motivated to fulfill a certain set of basic needs. Maslow used a five tier pyramid to depict those needs.The base of the pyramid is physiological, the most basic of needs: air, food, water, excrement and sex.

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