Alfred Adler was an Austrian medical doctor and psychotherapist. He’s the founder of the school of individual psychology.
Now you might be wondering what is individual psychology?
Well individual psychology states that every thought and wish a person has actually comes from their fear of their own inferiority and their need to be better than other people.
My personal favorite few of Alfred Adler’s theories are:
- Everybody’s aspiring to be perfect
- Types of people
- Theology
Everybody’s aspiring to be perfect
According to Adler every human being is trying their best to be their own perfect self in their own way. He considers it a completely normal and natural process that develops in people as they grow. It’s of course different for every person, as all people are different. Now when Adler says everyone’s aspiring to be perfect, he doesn’t mean having perfect grades, or perfect looks, he means that each person wants to be what they believe is perfect. And their aspiration to achieve such perfection would lead them to work really hard, until they get the satisfaction from fulfilling their wish and achieving their perfection.
A healthy person would direct their need for perfection and success towards social goals, but a mentally unstable person would rather direct them towards themselves.
Types of people
Adler wrote about four different personality types that appear in people
1. Dominant and superior type
By its name it’s obvious this type is the dominant, aggressive leader that are extremely energetic
2. Socially useful type
This type is quite similar to the dominant type in terms of energy, but the difference is that dominant people tend to look more out for themselves and make decisions that would definitely benefit them more, while the socially useful type would firstly look out for the social circle and the people around them and try to make their actions benefit more the people than themselves.
3. Leaning type
The leaning type is described as people who have very little energy and need other people’s help to get through life.
4. Avoiding type
This type has the least amount of energy, sometimes it’s said that they don’t have any energy. They avoid social interactions as much as they can and they often tend to get lost in their own heads filled with their comfortable thoughts and little perfect worlds.
Theology
Theology is based on the fact that people are more motivated by their expectations of the future, rather than their experiences from the past.
Adler had this thought that contradicted Freud’s idea that states that the past strongly affects how we act currently and motivates our motivations and future desires.
