What I've learned about transformation design thus far #40

Maslow’s approach to peak experiences was radical for his time. Rather than studying pathology, he studied health. Rather than asking what was wrong with troubled people, he asked what was right with thriving ones.

He collected hundreds of accounts of peak experiences, asking people to describe the most wonderful, ecstatic moments of their lives. The consistency of these reports surprised him. Across ages, backgrounds, and contexts, people described similar phenomena: the dissolution of time, the perception of the world as alive and unified, the feeling of being simultaneously more oneself and less separate from everything else.

He found peaks in unexpected places. Not just in spiritual practice but in athletic achievement, creative breakthrough, intellectual insight, sexual connection, encounters with nature. The trigger varied; the character of the experience remained remarkably consistent.