Love and Belonging Without the Ego

Episode Transcript

Debra Maldonado (00:00.734)
Hello everyone. Welcome back to Jung on Purpose. I am Debra Maldonado.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (00:06.38)
I’m Dr. Rob. Welcome to the program.

Debra Maldonado (00:09.943)
And we are continuing our talk about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, great psychological topic. We talked last week about security and physiological needs. And today we’re talking about love and belonging and esteem needs. But I think the most important thing I’d love for you to take away from this is that universally we’re all we all have these needs.

But are we pursuing them from the ego or conditioned self that we were shaped by the world? Or are we pursuing these needs from a higher place, from an evolved place, as Carl Jung would say, after individuation, right? When you’re individuating and making the different choices. And they look very different. So we’re going to talk about that. But before I begin, please remember to subscribe to our channel if you’re watching us on YouTube. This little button in the corner. If you’re listening to us on any of the podcast services.

We’d love for you to subscribe and be with us every week as we explore more psychological and spiritual concepts about becoming your true self. So let’s start with a little review for those who missed last week. Just very shortly, we talked about Maslow and Abraham Maslow and his hierarchy of needs, which is very popular if you do a search for it online. Everyone’s talking about it.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (01:18.136)
Nice.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (01:33.558)
Mm. Yeah.

Debra Maldonado (01:33.824)
interpreted differently, but

## What is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (01:38.071)
Yeah, his little pyramids come up all the time. Although he did not formulate it as a pyramid, but as a hierarchy in general. but the pyramids are useful just to think in terms of steps. just like climbing a pyramid, you have to begin at the bottom and work your way up. his idea was that these physiological and safety needs are primary.

that you’re not going to be thinking about social order, institutions, law and order, or poetry or arts when you don’t meet these basic physiological and safety needs. Once you

Debra Maldonado (02:24.708)
So if you’re on an island and you’re, you know, have no food and water, you’re not thinking, Am I gonna get that promotion? Or I wonder if Bill’s gonna call me back and I’m if I get married one day, you’re thinking, No, I have to build shelter, I have to find food, I have to get warm, I have to eat something and make sure I’m safe from danger, animals and storms.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (02:46.508)
Yes. Yeah, and most of us, of course, we met or have met these needs from the get go, through our families and societies and cultures. but they still play a role in understanding our psychology. I you know, when we were preparing for this podcast, we were talking about these kids that I used to work with

Who early on, let’s say in their first five years, experienced hunger, malnutrition, even though they met the needs afterwards, let’s say they were set up in good families and foster families or adoptive families, their recollection or their biological experience of not having enough food to eat.

played into their behavior. They some of them would hoard food and they would stash peanut butter and cookies and things underneath their beds or in their closets, even though there was plenty in the kitchen and there was plenty of meals and so forth. So it’s a good way to understand our biology, our biological needs and how important they are and when they’re not met,

And this goes for all these needs. When the previous step is not met completely or is somehow aberrant, it leads into strange behaviors at the next level.

## How does childhood trauma or a lack of safety affect love and belonging?

Debra Maldonado (04:32.097)
So can I ask you a question? So when we think about people who’ve had like trauma or grew up in a war situation or like even abuse situations, that feeling of physical safety was not met in that life. And so there that would inhibit their ability to go to that next realm of love and belonging and because they would be distrusting of others, not sure if things are safe or maybe looking for red flags all the time of

being overprotective of themselves to deal and then of course everyone deals with it differently. Some people are highly resilient and other people let it define them. and so those are the things that play it like if you don’t feel safe early on, it could it could carry the rest of your life, but it doesn’t mean a life sentence if you get if you individuate from it. Because that’s what Jung’s right, that’s what Jung’s theory is all about. It’s not fixing the past

Dr. Rob Maldonado (05:22.424)
That that’s it.

Debra Maldonado (05:27.402)
But seeing that you’re not defined by it and that you can be whoever you want to be. I’m not who I what happened to me, I’m free to choose who I want to become or something. Paraphrasing him.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (05:38.531)
Yeah, that that’s it. That it’s a it’s a very individual situation. And it also depends on what happens after the events. So if somebody goes through a war, if they never process it, if they never get a chance, no I’m not necessarily saying therapy, it could be coaching, it could be even just a community experience of being safe.

Debra Maldonado (05:48.221)
Mm.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (06:08.376)
Then those things play out or interfere with their next challenge, which is the building love and belonging, a sense of love and belonging. We’ll talk about that. And this esteem needs. The esteem needs

Debra Maldonado (06:26.665)
Which is about achievement, about being like acknowledged in the world and feeling like you’re a accomplished person, successful.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (06:36.27)
Yes. Have having confidence, having a sense that you’ve achieved something, respect and being respected.

## Why do we pursue love and belonging from the ego instead of the individuated self?

Debra Maldonado (06:47.678)
So let’s go to love and belonging because that was my… I just stuck there for decades. and the thing I want to point out is again, we can pursue love and belonging from ego or we can pursue it from a higher place. And so when we pursue love and belonging, what happens is and I’ve you know coached thousands of women and men across the years and decades on love. And a lot of times what they were searching for was actually safety or feeling secure.

Like once I find that person, I’ll feel secure. once I meet that person or have a plan with my life, there was some kind of not insecurity like low self-esteem, but insecurity of there’s some kind of social pressure to be a couple. And I have to feel that so I could feel like I can relax. And I can’t tell you how many women I talked to that were like, I feel like I’m flailing in the world.

And like a boat adrift at sea, you know, and then if I find that partner, they’re going to give me that sense of security. And so if you haven’t resolved the security from your life early on, it’s going to reflect in those relationships. And instead of finding security in a relationship, you’re going to reinforce your lack of security in a relationship. And people will let you down, people will lie to you, people will cheat on you, people will not show up when they say they are, they’ll disappoint you.

because you haven’t really found it within yourself. And I think with love and belonging, we’re looking from an ego perspective, looking outside of ourselves for that reinforcement versus finding it within ourselves. And that’s the difference between ego and individuated self. An indiv individuated person finds it inside first and then sees the reflection.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (08:33.762)
Yeah, it becomes like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Whatever we’re expecting to find in the world, our brain is designed to verify that for ourselves. In other words, to show us precisely what we expect to see. And so if you are coming out of an insecure situation, and then you’re going into this need for love and belonging.

meaning developing friendships, developing intimacy, with others. You’re if you’re expecting to be betrayed or to be rejected, that’s what you’ll find in a sense. That’s what you’ll see and you’ll experience those things. So it’s a strange kind of situation for people because it doesn’t make logical sense. in a logical world, right, if

If you experience the something, let’s say a deficit, a lack of safety, you would think, Well, I’m going to desire and create safety for myself and trust others so that I can cultivate that in this next level of love and in intimacy, friendship and

Debra Maldonado (09:55.672)
That’s it like a more evolved conscious person would say. Not the ego. The ego’s like, you gotta find that person that’s never going to leave you. And then look for clues of the red flags because you don’t want to be disappointed. And so you talked about in use the word insecure, which I thought that would be a good segue to talk about what’s popular in the pop psychology of this idea of attachment theory and that this these labeling of our styles.

And you know, I’m sure there was some benefit to it in on some level, but there’s also can people get stuck in their labels? So you wanna just briefly, where did that come from attachment theory?

## Are attachment styles permanent?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (10:31.351)
Okay.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (10:35.512)
Well, the research grew out of Bowlby’s work and one of his great students who actually set up these experiments, but they were essentially meant to look at early childhood attachment patterns. and they found sure enough there they are there are these patterns in children.

there’s secure attachment and insecure attachment styles. But what happens is once it gets into the popular culture, it’s often misinterpreted. people think it’s like when you get your cards read or your astrological charts done, that it’s the going to determine your future. That if somebody tells you, we did this test and

your attachment style is insecure, that it’s a label that you have to live with for the rest of your life. That’s not how it was designed and not what the research is telling us. It’s essentially telling us that these patterns are conditioned probably by the environment, the household psychology that’s going on in the moment.

And these children were responding in these particular ways, but that they you can modify them easily. as soon as you change yeah.

Debra Maldonado (12:10.869)
But situations, people change with who that person’s in with and what the situation is, you might have a different response. And so though I just want to back up a bit because some people don’t may not know about attachment styles. And basically it’s a way to see how basically open they are for like connection with someone else, like how willing they are to receive love and feel connection with other people and

Dr. Rob Maldonado (12:18.702)
That’s right.

Debra Maldonado (12:39.67)
feel a bond with other people, it starts with the mother, obviously, and then their friendships and romantic relationships eventually, like our style. so for example, if you were growing up and you’re there was like dis lot of distrust. Like you it wasn’t safe for you to like be vulnerable, ask for what you want or cry even, you learn to maybe pull back a little and not

be little weary and like me feel a little insecure of is it okay for me to reach out at for a hand or feel any kind of affection from someone, or maybe it’s like inconsistent where sometimes the parents loving, sometimes they’re like on drugs or, you know, the extreme of like personality or they’re stressed and they act a different way and there’s that kind of uncertainty. And so we look at the child like how do they respond into that environment and how open they are for love.

And connection, is that would that be a good way to describe it?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (13:38.979)
Yeah. the original experiments had to do with the reaction of the baby when the mother left the room and left the baby with a stranger. And the stranger didn’t interact with the with the baby. the baby had toys on the floor and they were free to maybe just do whatever they wanted.

But the stranger was there in the room, therefore causing a little bit of anxiety in some of the kids. And then the experimenter was interested in how would the child respond once the parent came back in. So when the mother walked back in, what they noticed was that the secure the securely attached child just kind of, you know, asked for comfort and

kind of stretched out its arms to be held and protected. And that’s a secure attachment style. The insecure ones were ambivalent about how they reacted. Some of them were angry, some of them would actually hit the mother, kind of cry, become very confused as to what the situation was.

So those kind of situations then gave us these patterns of attachment. So the I think there’s four. There’s secure attachment, insecure attachment, ambivalent, and then disorganized, meaning there’s all kinds of reactions that the child is so confused that they might respond in all kinds of different ways. But again, these patterns are modifiable.

through working with the parents, working with the child, working with the household situations, easily kind of transformed into better situations. And even as adults, they’ve found that yeah, you can work with attachment styles and change them. But a lot of people because of the kind of the use in popular psychology, they believe that

Dr. Rob Maldonado (16:03.258)
If somebody defines you as a particular attachment style or with a particular attachment style that you’re stuck with that and that defines you. And so they incorporate it into their identity, their way of seeing themselves. And again, what happens is when you see yourself through that particular lens, you actually experience it because your brain is designed to pick out those things.

that support your ideas about what to

Debra Maldonado (16:33.702)
And so we have this like inner identity that we always unconsciously we’re always kind of filling with information. And so then, that label goes right in here. And then you think it’s because you get reinforcement that you have this situation occur over and over and well that must be it. It must be my pattern. But you know what I find interesting, and this is a question I never asked you before, but if we think about you’re talking about that experiment, that as a baby. So what if that

you did that experiment with that same baby at five years old or at seven years old or ten years old, I’m sure the reactions would be different because they would the baby, you know, the child would have different experiences, maybe a sibling or maybe the parent situation. So there’s all these like factors that can change and evolve even in those early 10 years. So to give someone a label based on their adult experience, thinking that’s happen and then that’s how your whole childhood was.

is sort of oversimplifying that idea. And I wanted you to you we talked about this earlier, which you talk about this a lot with me privately, about assessments and your opinion on assessments. And I wanted you to share that a little bit because I think people need to hear that perspective.

## Why are personality tests and labels like “narcissist” misleading?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (17:51.767)
Yeah. So there are yeah, there’s a lot of tests or they’re called instruments in psychology, personality assessment instruments or behavioral assessment instruments. What they do is they give us like snapshots of what’s happening in the individuals’ lives.

Debra Maldonado (17:53.548)
My personality tests and stuff like that people take online.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (18:18.446)
in these particular domains, behavior, emotional stability, neurological status, safety needs, et cetera, et cetera, personality, styles, attachment styles, all these things. Now they’re not meant to be communicated directly to the client or the patient, just like that. In other words, that, because

Debra Maldonado (18:46.968)
Like they do online now. Just take your test and assess yourself.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (18:48.502)
Yeah, because this test shows that you know, you came out it showed that you have a personality disorder that you would communicate it just that way to your client. ultimately in a good assessment, everything is considered the current presentation of the client, their history, their own needs at the moment, their

their communication styles with the psychologist or clinician. And it’s up to the clinician to put it all together, not just from one test. To use only one test and to label the client would be considered unethical. Because it’s a human being that

Debra Maldonado (19:38.946)
And so even labeling other people, we see that you’re like a checklist if your ex was a narcissist or your mother was a toxic, you know, narcissist, or your father, you know, was this or that. you know, they like you’re testing other people too, which I think it’s kind of like a checklist if they exhibit this behavior and this behavior and this behavior, like on Instagram. Like I see this, I’m like, what are we doing here?

I mean, I think people want to educate people. a lot of therapists want to educate people on psychology, but it’s also if people take that and run with it and then they run away with these labels and then not only project labels onto themselves, but other people, you know, and then that person becomes the narcissist and that’s all they can be. so and then it’s not a professional that’s actually assessing, it’s a person without any experience,

Dr. Rob Maldonado (20:28.674)
Yeah, it’s totally

Debra Maldonado (20:35.445)
just reading an Instagram post and be like, well, this points to that.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (20:40.098)
Yeah, exactly. And then you put it on social media and it becomes a real mess. and completely distorted from the intentions of these people that worked hard on developing these tests and these assessments. They’re not meant to be used that way. And so we always teach our coaches do not use these labels you know, haphazardly.

Just because somebody says, my mother was a narcissist, that doesn’t mean anything. you have to ask them, well, was she diagnosed properly? Was she assessed and you know, really found to be this way? Or it was this something just somebody, some clinician told you, your mom sounds like she might be a narcissist or something like that. And then you kind of ran with that idea.

That’s totally wrong. And it’s dehumanizing.

Debra Maldonado (21:40.703)
And then you feel powerless. Well, I can’t find love because my mother was a narcissist and she never gave me love and therefore I’m gonna have problems with relationships my entire life because of this one thing. And we hear this a lot when we work with people, they tell you their story and they give their diagnosis they got. And sometimes therapists even say, Your mother was this or that which I feel like kind of is crossing the line, like until the therapist examines that patient directly, they shouldn’t be diagnosing people, other people.

You know, maybe like that could be a problem or something, but and you never know what happens behind closed doors. And that person ran with a title. But I feel like these labels and titles box us in to a certain conditioned way of seeing and a limited way of seeing ourselves, but also box the other person in a label of seeing them, and they can’t be anything else, and we can’t be anything else. And then that’s why we’re stuck. Okay, well, let’s work on that. This is what you do when you’re anxious attachment. You need to

Build your self-esteem or something to get out of it and you feel this brokenness about you. and then it might not even be real. Like it could just be you took that test and it was after a breakup, or you took that test, you know, you lost your job and you’re feeling a little insecure, and you’re gonna answer those questions a lot differently than if you’re really happy with your career and you’re happy with your life and a lot of different things will come up, right? In that moment, it’s a snapshot of your mind. It’s not a full

Dr. Rob Maldonado (23:02.37)
Mm-hmm.

Debra Maldonado (23:09.017)
uncovering of your whole psychology in one test. Yeah. So let’s go back to love and belonging then. So these this is how it affects relationships, these assessments. But also when we think about what’s happening right now, when we think of love and belonging, people are seeking some kind of security and there’s ways to do that. Like I want to make up for the lack of love I receive from my family. That is ego.

The ego seeks to fill a desi deficit. It’s not and so we end up chasing love to feel secure or to feel finally loved or finally belonging to someone or having that like someone to tell us we’re okay versus I want to share my heart with you. I want to like share my heart with someone, it becomes more of an ego driven approach to belonging. Like it’s rooted in that fear of security and safety.

## Can AI meet our need for love and belonging?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (24:06.85)
Yeah, that’s a good point. This stage of the hierarchy of needs, right? This need that we have for love and belonging, it has primarily to do with friendship, intimacy, meaning romantic relationships, and family. Family relationships, right? So those three things, if you think about that’s most of our relationship life.

You know, besides work, friends, intimate partners and family members that we have to associate or that we love to associate with, that makes up a huge aspect of the satisfaction that we have in our lives. So if these needs are subverted by social media, for example, like you were saying,

Because we feel well, I’m in touch with my family through the social media, you know, and I see them and I see their photos and they see my photos. perhaps that’s enough. You know, and I can I can relax. I have that need met. But is it really met? We know the research on social media is that it’s not the real thing. It’s not giving us

Debra Maldonado (25:33.314)
You have all these fake friends that like you don’t even know. Yeah.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (25:36.863)
Exactly. And it’s not really fulfilling our needs completely. It’s kind of a facsimile of it, like a virtual reality of it, not the real thing. And so often people are walking around without these needs being really met. Right? They’re met artificially or

Debra Maldonado (26:00.154)
Well i AI coaching or AI therapy, the same thing, right? They you’re thinking you’re not really talking to a human being, you’re talking to a machine.

And it’s like a faux love and belonging, right? You get the machine to tell you you’re great and agreeing with you and supporting you, but it really it’s a machine, it’s not a human being. So it’s some part of us must know that it’s not real.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (26:28.738)
I’ve never done it. I mean I’ve interacted with AI and spoken to it of course, but I’ve never asked it for advice or for you know, emotional support or that kind of thing. have you? I don’t know, maybe may Yeah.

## What did Carl Jung say about loneliness?

Debra Maldonado (26:43.692)
Bearing your soul. No, no, I haven’t. No. I think I because I have you. you know, and this a great quote from Carl Jung. He says that loneliness doesn’t come from having no people around one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself or from holding certain views which others find in inadmissible. So it’s really about like the loneliness is like if you have

like a strong belief about something or passion about something, but you can’t share that with someone else. Yeah, you can share with AI, hey, I got this great idea. And AI’s like, great, you’re so brilliant, but you’re not really showing it to someone else. And then also, like I always say, that you need to be able to be vulnerable to have love and belonging. You can’t just receive love without

opening up the door. So when you think about love and belonging, how open are you to receive love and be invited to belong, you know, and feel safe to share. Even things that people may judge, you know, just being yourself. the whole idea of the persona was building up the persona to keep us separate from each other. keep us from putting, you know, not showing our true face to other people. And so

that’s why individuation is so powerful because I think before individuation we have these relationships and friendships that seem very superficial. Or relationships we have because we’re family or neighbors, or people you work with because you see them every day and you’re like, yeah, like Mary and I are best friends because we get coffee together, but it’s we never really talk about anything deep. and then we have this it post-individuation where people

They start to break away from those old relationships. Sometimes even their families, they feel like I can’t relate to them anymore. And they find a new kind of community, but it’s more satisfying and more enriching. And even the romantic relationship they attract, I know I could say for myself, a lot different than the relationships you attract with the pattern. So the key is not just feeling loved and belonging and building up your ego. It’s about you doing the work to individuate from.

Debra Maldonado (29:04.457)
the past so you can have really a direct experience of the love of belonging.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (29:09.644)
Yeah. So friendship, we know there’s a kind of an epidemic of loneliness around the world. and AI, of course, is not the sole cause of it, but it doesn’t help. it isolates people in a lot of ways. because you know, just it’s been in the news recently,

Kind of that Meta knew from their own research that it tends to do these things, especially the way their algorithms work, that they feed you things that are going to catch your attention, the your emotional attention, meaning anger, rage, kind of that triggering.

Debra Maldonado (30:05.586)
Not bonding, but hate, right? Yeah.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (30:09.43)
And so it works to kind of cultivate your outrage at other people and kind of point the finger at what other people are doing wrong, the that kind of pattern. and they know that this is this is not the good let’s say a good way to condition a human being.

And they’re doing it to children, of course, and to adults as well, to older people as well. But it’s contributing to this divisiveness in society. But they do it of course because it

Debra Maldonado (30:55.128)
it’s instead of love and bel belonging, it’s hate and belonging because people now bond through, well, a lot of I won’t say us, but there’s some people that bond through hate, you know, and that becomes a like, I hate that too and we hate that and let’s get together and hate it together. And then you belong to a group that has that common hate and that really that’s like the mob mentality.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (31:19.694)
Yeah, exactly. then you get into intimacy questions, meaning dating. we know the apps, the dating apps are still very popular and people use them in different ways. But in general, again, they’re not really designed to help you find the an intimate partner for yourself.

They’re designed to keep you scrolling on their app. That’s the objective.

Debra Maldonado (31:53.776)
They lose a customer if you meet someone. The business model doesn’t support you finding love, it supports you seeking love.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (31:56.45)
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (32:01.836)
Yes. And so you may have some luck here and there, but because that you are meeting people and you are talking to people. But again, the overall trend is towards divisiveness, isolation, keeping you lonely, et cetera. And with family, that’s a whole different matter. Again, we’ve seen recently like people divorcing their parents, right? And kind of

Excommunicating them from their lives needlessly, again, because a lot of this is misunderstanding of the psychology of narcissism and personality. they’re misunderstood, the labels are misused, and people kind of project that all their problems are coming because of the parent and because of the way they are.

And then they’re given this these psychological labels and they project those labels onto them and then, you know, they’re kind of kind of acknowledged or sanctioned that they’re doing the right thing by cutting off communication with family members.

Debra Maldonado (33:19.129)
Well, wouldn’t you say I know people I when I was just doing regular reading books and not studying psychology professionally, I didn’t understand the idea of countertransference where the person who’s a therapist or coach, they maybe they have some issue with their parent. They’ll end up like projecting unconsciously, not consciously, they would don’t do this on purpose, but pro like kind of almost like interpret

that person’s situation through their own personal experience. And not everyone does that, but that does happen. And then they tend to or they specialize in that area, right? Like I had a parent that was narcissistic. So everyone that’s who I work with. And then we end up kind of stuck in that same pattern because we’re unconsciously using the label from, you know, that person’s perspective, the therapist or coach’s perspective. And that can be limiting

for the client as well. That we have to separate our own personal life and our own personal experience as much as we can from working with the client or patient.

## What is a healthy community versus a cult?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (34:28.824)
Yeah. And then the larger kind of need of love and belonging is having a community, a real connection beyond your personal life and your work to this larger aspect of humanity, which we call community. And community is so rare nowadays. I mean it’s so rare, but so precious and so needed.

As human beings, that’s when we’re happiest, when we feel embraced by a community. It’s not just the our family, it’s not just our friends. It’s kind of this larger sense of the world that we’re walking into and we’re contained by it.

Debra Maldonado (35:20.456)
It does have a dark side, because it can lead to cult activity where people join a group because you know, they’re not they wanna they love how they feel like they belong finally in a place and then they’re afraid to leave when the things well, we’ve all watched those Netflix documentaries on cults and it and you wonder like why doesn’t this person leave if this is not good or it’s abusive or whatever and

it’s because you they don’t know who they are without that community. So it can be it’s really powerful that group and that charismatic leader and then you have someone who feels it’s they’re gonna their security is taken away if the community goes away. I think people that happens too with religion, people that leave religion or they you know have a church or they have a

a religious community they’re in and then they break away from it and their family is that religion. so there’s a lot of challenges when we’re doing our own individuation is that sometimes those old communities weren’t really built from a conscious place. They’re kind of generation and generation kind of beliefs and ideologies. And then we start to choose for ourselves. So imagine being in a community that’s conscious and individuated.

that doesn’t need each other from an ego place, but wants to give and you’re you are free to leave anytime, you know, like you don’t feel this need to if I leave, then everything’s going to fall apart. And that’s really the type of community you want to be a part of, you know, for yourself is to check in, do I feel like I’m gonna feel lost if I leave? That’s a red flag. It’s like, hmm, okay, what am I trying to get from this external thing that I’m not giving myself?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (37:10.84)
Yeah. Yeah, i we live in a strange age because we see these universal needs. they’re they haven’t gone anywhere. We still have these needs. We still have the need for physiological needs, safety needs, love and belonging, as well as esteem needs, which we’ll talk about next. But this sense of community

can be used in a negative way, like you were saying. And we have seen, of course, in cultural history, these kind of cults that spring up around people that abuse people’s needs for connection.

## What are esteem needs in Maslow’s hierarchy?

Debra Maldonado (37:59.997)
Yeah. And so I think of the love and belonging as more like the anima in Jung psychology, the heart and the soul to feel connected and community, more the feminine energy and not gender feminine, but feminine energy and more of a energetic stand. And then when we go to above that is the a social need for esteem, I feel that that’s more animus needs. And the anima is the masculine force, and again, not gender.

But the will and the power. And so we also have needs to feel like we have agency in ourselves in the world that we’re accomplished in some way. I know for me when I was single, like getting married was an accomplishment. It was check. You’ve reached some level of success in your life if you’re married. That’s kind of a culture I grew up in, is that that’s the next step. If you’re not married, something’s wrong. You gotta get that.

like that checklist for your life to that you’ve made it in some way. it doesn’t matter. I know some of my clients I worked with over the years. They could be doctors, they could be running a nonprofit, but their family is still going, well when are you gonna get married? When are you gonna have babies? so ’cause the family is still back in the old way of thinking. So when we talk about self-esteem, I used to, you know, I grew up in the with reading self help in the eighties and nineties.

And showing my age a little bit. And what was really popular, there was a movement about low self-esteem. And that movement told you that if you just would increase your self-esteem, you will have things in your life that you want. So I was like, okay, I got it. I’m gonna get more self-esteem so I could I’m gonna increase my self-esteem so I can find a partner. That’s why I’m not in a partnership, that’s why I’m alone, that’s why.

guys don’t call me back because I have the low self-esteem. So I have this little label on me. And even before we get into the research, you I remember it was about 10 years ago. I was my niece is a lot younger than me, obviously. She’s like 30 years younger than me. And this was when she was in college. And I met her and her friend. I was in Miami for some event. And she was going to college in Florida nearby. So she came by to have dinner with me. She brought her friend.

Debra Maldonado (40:23.801)
The three women are sitting around. I’m the elder lady here. And I’m talking about self-esteem and confidence. And, you know, I used to be really insecure, but now I built up that confidence. And now, you know, I help other people build up their confidence. And I looked at them and I said, Yeah, do you know we ever felt that way where you were insecure? You didn’t have confidence and, you know, and how you changed. And they looked at me like I had three heads.

They looked at each other and looked at me like, what are you crazy? Like we have to go we never had insecurities. Like, what are you talking about? And I thought, my God, that is so interesting. Generationally, those of women of my age are probably thinking, yeah, I heard that low self-esteem message. I’m sure Oprah tooted it from her little her books and back then it was the big thing and just not getting that label.

It didn’t exist for them. And so I thought that was really fascinating. And then Rob, you have research that actually concludes that scenario of esteem. Yeah.

## Does low self-esteem cause failure?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (41:27.57)
Well, yeah, I mean, in the popular culture they kind of reported it as that this self-esteem idea has been debunked. But that that’s not really what happened. it’s more nuanced than that. It’s essentially that of course we still need esteem, self-esteem, right? Which means this sense of confidence, this sense of achievement, respect and

respect from others, those kind of things. it’s simply that people had it or at that time we had it backwards. We thought if we increase, let’s say, children’s self esteem, that they’ll tend to do better in math and science and reading and so forth and in friendship and, you know, just feel good about themselves. That

Debra Maldonado (42:20.995)
Get the get the right job, score higher on tests.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (42:24.546)
Yes, that kind of do better in sports and all that. But it turned out once the researchers started to really test that theory, it didn’t pan out. It’s the it’s the reverse. It’s simply the reverse. If you have low self-esteem or lack self-esteem, what you need to do is challenge yourself and try to do things that are beyond your

You know, your sense of capacity, self-efficacy, it’s called. When you do that, in other words, when you try to do things that you’re not sure you can do and achieve them.

That builds self-esteem, not the other way around. In other words, if you’re trying to build self-esteem first before you try the hard thing, you’re gonna fail. But if you try to do the hard things first and say, I’m gonna give it my best shot, the things that you achieve and succeed at, those things really increase your self-esteem.

## How do you build confidence? Start with small wins.

Debra Maldonado (43:33.866)
And I know I spent years thinking positive, reprogramming my mind to you’re good enough, you’re smart enough, and do things that make me, you know, kind of change my ego, build up my ego. And when I left the corporate world and started my own first business and started making my own money by myself on my own, that was the biggest self-esteem boot. I was like, wow, I have agency in the world.

I don’t have to be to get permission to do this. I gave myself permission and it was such a powerful shift. And I remember thinking, I’ve been trying so hard, waiting until I’m confident enough to do this or take this step. And that’s what a lot of people do, like a lot of coaches or therapists or people that want to start a business or have an idea to change or leave the corporate world.

they’re having that career pivot. Let me, I don’t feel confident enough yet. Let me get my confidence up and then I can do it. You become confident by doing it. And I think one of the biggest things that we can do, if you feel that you’re not confident enough to do something, I always say get little wins. Do one little thing and get that little win and that builds the confidence. Not build confidence to get the win, but build a win to get the confidence.

And you could start with small goals. And yeah, it’s amazing that it’s the opposite. So we do need esteem. We do need to feel like we have some kind of agency in the world. But I the label of low self esteem, like me hearing that over and over, and that was the cause. And I if I could just fix the low self esteem, I could get this, you know, find love. that was the wrong message for me.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (45:25.814)
Also though people would read it as a character flaw, that if you have low self esteem, that’s part of your character and therefore well, what can you do about that? whereas when we understand that it’s something we can cultivate and we should cultivate, and that we cultivate it by challenging ourselves. Right. And like you say, it doesn’t have to be a big challenge. You can start with small wins or set yourself up to win.

Debra Maldonado (45:29.681)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (45:55.156)
And that starts to build and cultivate self esteem.

Debra Maldonado (45:59.696)
And that it has been like I think the like again, the younger generations, not my gener younger generations don’t use that term anymore. But I remember even one of my girlfriends, we were all sitting around drinking wine and one girl said something to me that I found very insulting, and I cried a little bit. I was like, that was kind of mean. And then someone else in the group goes

Remember, Debbie has low self-esteem. And that’s why she’s crying. And I’m like, my God. So your friends and everyone around you can reinforce that label. And I’m like, I just want to be confident finally. You know, I want to get rid of this label. And that’s the ego. That’s the ego identifying with your performance. Your ego is measuring itself all the time by what you have in your life, what everyone else has. It compares everyone to what everyone else has.

And then makes you feel bad because you don’t have those things too, and assumes, you know, something’s really wrong with you because you should have what Becky has or Mary has or Joe has. And yeah, so we can use these terms very harshly on ourselves and identify as them. And that’s what individuation is all about. It’s about dropping those labels. It’s about seeing us beyond the labels.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (47:17.728)
Yes. So nowadays we can talk about it as confidence in achievement. I how confident are you that you can achieve things? that’s kind of more in the vein of our current social situations that we think of people that achieve are confident and achieve their goals as, you know, successful individuals.

But that all comes from what we used to call self esteem. that it that is Yeah.

Debra Maldonado (47:52.732)
And that comes through resilience too, too, because everything you do is not always going to be successful. in dating, you’re going to have dates that aren’t working out or relationships. You can’t let that stop you. And the and true confidence arises from the inside that this is what I want, this is what I want to create, and the world is showing me this. that’s not what I’m agreeing with. I’m gonna keep going. I started a business, okay, they had a bad month, had another bad month, okay.

Trying this, trying that, and your trial and error and through failure, that’s how you gain confidence, which is weird because we think we gain confidence just with success. But if we can go face failure and still keep going, that is the biggest confidence boost you can do for yourself because you are building your confidence just by saying, Nope, I deserve this, I’m gonna keep going. And so it really is the opposite. And then when you get that win, it reinforces it, but it you have to also

have that confidence that you’re actually in action, you’re actually doing something. You’re actually trying. They say success is in the try, right? Not in the actual thing that you get. it’s in the trying. Although Yoda would say there is no try, but

Dr. Rob Maldonado (49:04.79)
That’s a good point.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (49:09.55)
But the biggest lessons really come from what people call failure. but there is no failure, like Yoda said. There is no failure. There’s only doing, right? And the more that we do and continue to do, we cultivate that sense of ourselves as having agency, having efficacy. Yeah, so now we see.

Debra Maldonado (49:15.043)
Yeah.

Debra Maldonado (49:20.513)
Yeah.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (49:39.075)
We started with the physiological needs, meaning the body, the what it needs. We once we give it what it needs, then there’s this safety need, meaning now we need to take care of those things and make sure we continue to have safety and then we the these next steps are really social needs. Because we need others to have love and belonging.

Debra Maldonado (49:53.175)
Hang on to that safety rather.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (50:08.888)
We can’t do it by ourselves.

Debra Maldonado (50:11.787)
And we can’t achieve anything without someone else saying, You did a good job a witness to our achievement, right?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (50:17.674)
And so what’s going on in the world, it you know, what this theory shows us is that there’s not less need for love and belonging and self-esteem. There’s i there’s still very much human needs that we all have. They’re universal. It’s simply that the mechanisms to get those things.

To achieve those things or to cultivate those things are very different now. And we’re kind of struggling to find ways to meet those needs for ourselves. Because now technology kind of has put another layer of obstacles in our way in achieving those things. And there’s a lot of confusion as to what do we do with this? the technology is moving so fast that

we’re having a challenge catching up to it. But we will. I think we will because as human beings these needs are so powerful that they will find a way to triumph and to come

Debra Maldonado (51:21.719)
Well also you Yeah.

Debra Maldonado (51:34.09)
And the machine can’t give them to us. And one of the things that we talked about too was just when you think about all these needs and love and belonging and esteem and safety, we have a crisis of like I don’t know if it’s a crisis yet, but there’s a declining marriage and birth rates now. And maybe it may seem that people need love and belonging needs from others. finding

Dr. Rob Maldonado (51:37.207)
Exactly.

Debra Maldonado (52:01.541)
ego substitutes for these things, you know? The young boys, you know, going online and finding like AI porn to find their, you know, satisfaction for connection in some kind of pseudo way or

Dr. Rob Maldonado (52:14.808)
Well, I tell yeah, there’s a really good example of this. In and this the story comes from Japan, but I’m sure it’s happening all over the world. but there are these young men that are finding artificial girlfriends, like digital avatars that become their girlfriends and they feel connected to these digital

experiences

Debra Maldonado (52:45.535)
Like that movie Her with Joaquin Phoenix.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (52:48.066)
Very much yeah, very much like that. So that that’s a possible kind of substitute for some people. We’re not judging, right? Some people may say that that’s enough for me. But again, it’s a it’s an expression of this human need now kind of projected onto the technology available to us.

Debra Maldonado (53:15.537)
And eventually it can never have the same because there’s a human need, there has to be an exchange. So having success or esteem based on your own, you know, inner little world of success and or having a relationship with something fake, on some level, on a human level, we must know that it’s not real and there’s still a hunger there.

But I think they people do that because to have real love and belonging, to have real esteem takes risk, social risk, opening up intimately and a lot of people are staying in that safety realm.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (54:01.699)
Well, what real relationships challenges us with, and again, this kind of hits both love and belonging and esteem needs, is that they challenge us to open up, meaning to be vulnerable emotionally. And that is difficult. That is challenging. We’re not saying it’s easy, but in challenging ourselves, just like we were seeing with the with the building of confidence, in challenging.

And trying things that we’re not sure we can do, that’s where we gain the most. So these human relationships, they’re challenging for us versus you know, kind of staying at home and playing on the computer. but they’re going to give us a lot more if we face that challenge.

Debra Maldonado (54:53.937)
Well, and it all comes back to that security, that feeling of like I don’t feel secure enough to open up and so you feel like you’re having a relationship or you’re having achievement, but you’re still operating on that lower level of needs is just like I was saying to you earlier, these billionaires that have all this money and power and they’re still in this need, you know, for security.

no matter how much money they have, they don’t they’re still acting like that is defining them, that money, that security is going to bring them happiness. And we see this a lot with our work is that people that are successful, they reach those levels and they’re like, wait a minute, I’m doing all this for security. And then they realize there’s no meaning in it. And so human connection and feeling a sense of achievement that is really raw and real.

is a lot more meaningful than just an easy win or a superficial relationship with a like a, you know, a sex object that you have because you have all this money. it can and that goes before both size men and women. they but the having real meaningful relationships is really what our soul wants to have in the in this world. And that’s what’s gonna lead us to the next level, which is a little bit more of self realization.

which is the top level. We’ll not talk about that today. But that’s where we were heading, you know, and but we have to take care of the transition from ego needs to having a connection with our true self.

## What is the future of love, belonging, and human connection in the age of AI?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (56:33.816)
So what’s your prediction? What’s gonna happen? What’s the future like?

Debra Maldonado (56:39.232)
I think we’re gonna split, humanity’s gonna split into there’s going to be people that are going to not evolve and they’ll be in that kind of mechanical world. And I do believe there’s going to be a large population of people that use technology but aren’t like getting all their needs fulfilled from it and they’re able to create connection and community and love.

and missions for kick taking care of human beings versus taking care of the bottom line and keeping up with all the hottest technology and building their portfolios and their stock portfolios. They’re actually looking at what is the human capital and feeling a sense of meaning, you know, a meaning of helping others and making the world a better place. And I don’t know how the split will be, will be 70-30, we’ll be 80-20.

But there definitely will always be people that don’t want to evolve. And then there’ll definitely be people that choose to wake up and evolve and be a part of something meaningful and be like know themselves beyond just the conscious level, like Jung would say, explore the deep well of wisdom within us and see the see the depth of who we are. And that’s really the way we connect with people on a deeper level is we have to go deep within ourselves first.

So that we can meet people at that deep place and not feel that we’re flailing on the top of the ocean, just you know, surviving. We’re like part of the ocean and that we’re where there’s nothing to lose. Like if someone rejects us, it’s okay. We’re fine. We’ll get over it. We have a we know who we are and we’re much more than just one person’s opinion. We’re not afraid. Yeah. What do you think?

Dr. Rob Maldonado (58:28.344)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I kinda see something similar. I mean you mentioned the ego, and we can look at our human history as the era of the dominance of ego, right? It kind of everything we’ve built up to this point has been driven by ego. And ego is always very narrow minded.

it’s always looking for, you know, kind of a immediate gratification. So it doesn’t worry too much about the long run. Even though it can you know, when with our mind we can project what’s gonna happen if we continue on this path. We ignore that and we just say, well, from our ego perspective, as long as we got what we need today and tomorrow we’re let’s go for that. You know, the devil that we know.

Debra Maldonado (59:26.347)
Yeah.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (59:27.214)
kind of the situation.

Debra Maldonado (59:29.173)
You used to say that the rich person clings to his mansion the same way a homeless person clings to his cardboard box. You know, where you if you’re clinging to the material items, you’re no no more evolved than a person who needs that box to survive, you know, like you’re looking at your bank account and your titles and your accomplishments and your beautiful partner and your beautiful clothes as security, then you aren’t

you know, ever going to feel that deep sense of meaning. You have to find you can’t find it outside of yourself.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (01:00:04.386)
Yes. But just like the individual, when you go through the dark night of the soul that the ego kind of drives you towards, it wakes you up. And so I’m thinking it we already kind of see a backlash against all this AI. Not necessarily to completely reject it, right? But to say, Well, wait a minute, let’s slow down and think about what kind of future are we creating?

I mean, it’s up to us. Nobody’s forcing us to create these things. We’re doing it ourselves. So that backlash then begins kind of this self-reflective element that we see in individuals, that we start to question our motivation and we really start to grow up in a sense and take responsibility for the long term future. Instead of just saying, Well, if I have what I need right now, that’s good enough. No.

What’s going to happen in the next generation, the next one, and the next one? Then we start to see, okay, that’s the real wisdom in the human mind that we’re able to project into the future and kind of prepare for that and take care of those things too. So I think that’s where we’re at. And I’m optimistic. I think there’s going to be a resurgence of self.

Analysis which leads to self-realization, what Jung called the realization of the true essence of your beingness and the true nature of reality. That will lead to a type of renaissance of human culture where we’ll rebuild, but in a more creative and conscious way.

Debra Maldonado (01:02:00.199)
Beautiful. I agree. I agree. The earth is our garden. And if we don’t tend to it, the weeds will grow, keep growing. And so it’s our responsibility, all of us, to do our part in making ourselves wake up and not be asleep at the wheel in our own life so we can actually wake up humanity. And it just happens one mind at a time.

Well, thank you for joining us for today’s episode. It was a little longer than today, but it was so much we covered. And next week we’ll finalize our series on Maslow and the hierarchy of needs. Talking about, well, I don’t know, maybe we might have another one after this, but self-actualization and what that is and you know the need for that. The need for self-actualization. and that’s kind of where we’re heading.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (01:02:50.37)
Look forward to it.

Debra Maldonado (01:02:51.685)
Yes. Take care everyone. Have a great week and we’ll see you soon. Bye bye.

Dr. Rob Maldonado (01:02:55.352)
See ya soon.