Esteem needs?

Since the time I grew an emerging interest in Psychology , I often questioned it's various theories in order to validate it (something , that I've been doing since childhood , about everything). As they say, I have a knack for logical reasoning and inferring relationships , any gap in the knowledge upset me to great extents . It's like something or other have to stimulate my grey cells constantly , otherwise the universe will confront an obvious disequilibrium.  

One such gap in knowledge occurred , when I learned the Maslow's Hierarchy for the first time. Remember Maslow's Hierarchy? Which says, each human being goes through a number of needs (primary to secondary and finally, tertiary ) to reach one's full potential that comprises of highest level of motivation. According to this theory , self actualization is the ultimate need. 'What a man can be, he must be^' this quotation forms the basis of this need. And , to achieve this highest form of need one must not only meet but, master earlier forms of need . They are ~ Physiological need, safety needs, love and belonging and esteem needs respectively. Maslow believed, one must meet an earlier need to achieve the next. Here, my confusion occurred!

I've known people, who are highly motivated in their occupational setup and doing quite well , but, at the end of the day live lonely lives. Some of them, don't have friends, some don't have family , some are the victims of loss of love, while few have a combination of all these together. Regardless this fact , they are highly competent and focused to their work goals. I often wonder, how their esteem needs can be so high , where, they are still struggling with their search for love and belongingness . With this, I recall a memory of a dinner party , that took place years ago , where, I saw this professor of mine (he is a sheer genius in his field of work and holds great recognition and prestige ) in a corner of the dining area , eating on his own.

Yet again, we should remember that 'beauty stands in the eye of the beholder' i.e. everything on Earth is based on perspective. Hence, it may be possible that , they are still striving for their love and belonging needs through their fight to reach the mountains of occupational success as, this will yield them more acceptance by the society, where they will find love. Maybe, it's our shortcoming , that, we with our bare eyes , are unable to see their suffering which mislead us to interpret as their fight for self esteem.
 


More love to them,
Human Potpourri