Polymathy as a Path to Self-Actualization

What Maslow Might Say About Becoming Many Things

Maslow’s theory of self-actualization was never about arriving. It was about unfolding.

And in many ways, the traits of the self-actualized person closely mirror those of the polymath.

The Inner Path of Polymathy

Polymathy, at its core, is a psychological journey.

It requires curiosity, humility, courage, and an ongoing dialogue with one’s evolving self.

It asks: Who are you becoming? What might you explore next? What truths do you need to integrate?

Maslow’s model of self-actualization described people who:

• Seek peak experiences

  
  

• Live in truth, beauty, and wholeness

  
  

• Are deeply curious and creatively autonomous

  
  

• Feel called to contribute something meaningful and original

That’s not just a psychological profile—it’s a polymathic one.

To actualize our potential, we often must expand into new roles, new ideas, and new ways of being.

To become fully ourselves, we must become many things.

Polymathy is not just a mode of learning. It’s a mode of becoming.

Becoming Is the Point

Let’s be honest: no one arrives.  Not really.

To live well is not to land—it is to evolve.

Maslow himself eventually said that self-actualization wasn’t a static state but a continual becoming.

He later added a higher stage—self-transcendence—to describe those who live in service of something beyond themselves.

Polymathy is not about being everything. It’s about becoming ever more yourself.

In this light, polymathy is more than a way of working or thinking.

It’s a way of growing, healing, contributing, and living.

The Ultimate Invitation

In a world that often asks us to narrow ourselves, specializing to fit a system that no longer fits us, Polymathy says: Become as whole as you can.

Not because the world needs you to master everything, but because you deserve to discover what you are.

We are each born from others—our parents, our past, our circumstances.

But the deeper work of life is to give birth to ourselves.

Not once, but again and again.

To create - and even curate - who we become, over time, with intention, with wonder.

This is the essence of self-actualization:

To not just accept our path, but to love it.

To live it as art.

Amor Fati.