The Quest for Self-fulfillment

Regarding this quest for self-fulfillment, sociologist Daniel Yankelovich arrived at an astounding analysis. He’d studied several couples in their pursuits and came to this conclusion. Please notice the word “and” in his summary of one particular couple he called “Abby and Mark.”

Here’s what he said. “If you feel it is imperative to fill all your needs, and if these needs are contradictory or in conflict with those of others, or are simply unfillable, then frustration inevitably follows. To Abby and to Mark self-fulfillment means having a career and marriage and children and sexual freedom and autonomy and being liberal and having money and choosing non-conformity and insisting social justice and enjoying city life and country living and simplicity and graciousness and reading and good friends and on and on.”

He adds, “The individual is not truly fulfilled by becoming ever more autonomous. Indeed, to move too far in this direction is to risk psychosis, the ultimate form of autonomy. The injunction”–notice this now please– “The injunction that to find one’s self, one must lose one’s self, contains the truth any seeker of fulfillment needs to grasp.”