You can’t pick up an article or turn on the news without running across the word “sustainability.” So, I got to thinking about what sustainability means on an individual level—not from a purely ecological perspective, but from a humanistic one.

Ecologically, sustainability is about biological systems remaining diverse and productive over time. For human beings, it is about the potential for long-term maintenance of our own well-being. Although I know that without a planet, our own well-being as humans is a moot point, I still think there’s value to considering how to promote our sustainability as individuals.

When you think of your own sustainability, you bump into psychologist Abraham Maslow, who gave us the hierarchy of needs. As you may remember, in Maslow’s hierarchy, once physiological safety, love and belonging, and esteem are satisfied, then the top of the pyramid is self-actualization. From a human perspective, this is very much like sustainability.

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