Well, it’s been a busy few weeks – my clients are very busy, which means I’m busy too! Which is all good. But it does mean that the blogging suffers. Being a perfectionist, I find it difficult to post something without having carefully considered every word, ensuring that what I’m posting is meaningful, helpful and useful to any readers out there. However, I’ve been reminded of that old aphorism ‘Done is better than perfect’, so am determining to get my thoughts out there a bit more often. Because I do find, frequently, that my ‘half-baked’ is someone else’s ‘fantastic!’ (Of course, my ‘fantastic!’ is often someone else’s ‘meh’, but you can’t have everything.)
Today I’m pondering Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Heavy stuff, eh? I remember the theory from (probably) management lectures at library school, (certainly) training courses in my first couple of jobs, and more recently the inner debates I’ve been having about the freelance life and why it suits me. And it got me thinking that Maslow’s theory might not hold up when it comes to this kind of lifestyle / career approach. (Stick with me – I only said ‘might’…)
[NB: I am not an expert in psychology, anthropology, sociology or ideology [I’m better at tragical-comical-historical-pastoral], so please don’t take what follows as anything other than the ramblings of a mind at leisure.)
Maslow proposes that humans experience different stages of growth, moving from basic functional needs to ‘higher’ aspirations. This is traditionally represented in a pyramid shape, with ‘physiological needs’ at the bottom, and progressing through ‘safety needs’, ‘love and belonging’ and ‘esteem’ before reaching ‘self-actualisation’ at the top. The idea is that you need to satisfy your basic requirements before you can spare a thought for more lofty, intellectual ideals; in other words, if you’re starving, homeless and jobless you won’t be concerning yourself with ‘stretch objectives’ to enable you to move up to the next rung of management – never mind saving the world.
Which got me thinking… I’m a freelancer. All’s going well at the moment, but I’m constantly aware that it could all come crashing down at any moment. My husband has a job, but we still need my income to pay for our house and everything that goes with it. So in theory I’m not really that secure. And yet most of the questions I’m bothering myself with at the moment relate absolutely to the ‘self-actualisation’ peak of the pyramid. Do I like what I’m doing? Does it have meaning? Is there anything else I could be doing to contribute to society and the world at large? Have I fulfilled my creative potential? Hardly the thoughts of someone who’s worried about whether they’ll have a home in six months’ time.
Why is this? Is it because, despite working in an insecure fashion, I’m not really that much more insecure than any ‘normal’ person in a ‘normal’ job with the very real and ‘normal’ threat of redundancy hanging over them? Because even though in six months’ time I may not have an income, right now I do – which is more than can be said for many? Because I definitely, always, absolutely know where my next meal is coming from? Maybe my idea of ‘insecurity’ reeks of that frankly irritating Twitter hashtag #firstworldproblems. I know that, if crunch time came and I lost all my clients in a freak earthquake, I would somehow get through. I have a husband with a job. I have a family with spare beds. I have – I hope – a sweet and friendly personality that will endear me to anyone of whom I might need to beg a favour. Plus, of course, I have skills I can sell – and there will always be people needing what I have to offer. So maybe what seems like insecurity to me really isn’t worthy of the name.
I guess that what I’m trying to say is that, while many people see self-employment (in a recession! Heavens!) as the scary option that’s going to leave them starving, homeless and jobless, this isn’t necessarily the case. I genuinely started this blog post thinking I was going to overturn Maslow and his precious theory, by showing that it is possible to work on intellectual aspirations while also fretting about the food bill – but as I’ve reflected on what this actually means, I’ve come to realise that I’m nowhere near as badly off as I thought. And believe me, I’m greedily counting my blessings.
So there it is. The reason I’m able to sit here in a cafe writing this blog post is because I spent the last month slogging away earning hard cash, postponing that sense of real insecurity for a while yet. But what I need to do, constantly, is ensure that I have additional options tucked away for a rainy day. I can never stop looking for new initiatives, new ways of working, new places to go and people to meet – which is at the same time horrifically insecure and unbelievably exciting.
So maybe Maslow was wrong after all…
What do you think? Am I talking out of my behind, or do we need to revisit what ‘security’ means to us these days? Please share your comments below!