Today, while taking a shower, I had a sudden burst of inspiration about the concept of “spiritual needs”: Is it possible that we are not starting to pursue spiritual needs after satisfying the basic ones, but instead, we are losing our spiritual fulfillment in the process of striving to meet those basic needs?

I thought about how our generation seems to place more emphasis on spiritual needs in all aspects of life. This includes the recent buzzword “sense of ritual,” the phenomenon of “90s/00s generation reforming the workplace,” hot topics like gender and racial equality, the focus on mental health, and the generation gap these issues create. Essentially, as a common narrative suggests, our generation is one that, after solving basic survival issues, turns to pursue higher-level spiritual needs.

Then, I also thought of the notion that people in the past lived simpler, more relaxed, and happier lives (assuming this isn’t just a romanticization of the past but is actually true). These nostalgic theories often mention entertainment in nature without the internet and electronic gadgets. Often, a conclusion drawn that industrialization and the internet have rotten people’s spiritual lives.

So, I started to wonder if today’s increasing focus on the spiritual world might actually be influenced by the latter (negative) theory, rather than being a purely positive implementation of Maslow’s pyramid.

Then I also realized that Maslow’s hierarchy describes an individual perspective, interpreting personal needs and development. The latter theory, however, looks at society as a whole. If we flip Maslow’s pyramid and view it from the top down, interpreting each layer as a societal guarantee, it seems that in a society where basic needs are assured, the amount of societal guarantee for basic needs becomes the “ceiling” for spiritual guarantee. It limits the total capacity of spiritual nutrition society can provide. For example, industrialization is a necessary step for a developed society to feed its members effeciently. But it also brings about the homogenization of urban development, leading to the aforementioned questioning of life being less relaxed and happy on a spiritual level.

So, does this implicit rule really exist? In an ideally developed society, does the process of fulfilling basic needs always limit the fulfillment of higher-level needs like an inverted pyramid? If such a phenomenon does exist, which exact steps or processes of the societal development cause the limitation at each layer?

These thoughts are just random and based on many “assumed to be correct” points. I don’t have any expertise in sociology or anthropology. All I know is that if I stay in the shower any longer, my water and electricity bill will very much “developed”.