Death By Restlessness

As human beings, we have a variety of needs and desires, some of which are more essential than others. The famous psychologist, Abraham Maslow, outlined these fundamental needs in a theory well known as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. This theory states that at the base of our existence we have physiological needs that include air, food, and water. When these needs fail to be met, the capacity for desire is nonexistent. After all, how can one desire things if they are dead? In Leo Tolstoy’s “How Much Land Does a Man Need?,” the reader will witness a young and ambitious peasant man named Pakhom as he confronts this question in a rather abrupt and unfortunate way.

            In this parable of universal human temptation, one can look at it through the lens of multiple perspectives, but for the sake of this post, the idea of restlessness will be explored. Similar to greed and the constant desire to want what someone else has, restlessness has lead today’s young and broken generation to seek approval from others through social media. As Erin mentioned, we are seeking validation through likes, favorites, and comments from people we hardly know. The more people that like our posts, the more powerful or beautiful we feel, all because of how we fair in comparison. But to take this one step further, one must ask themself why they feel the need to share their enhanced looking life in the first place. Does it stem from a desire to validate your life as being better than someone else’s or are you trying to convince yourself that the life you live actually is better? The latter seems true for our dissatisfied society who seems to be struggling with who they are, where they are, and what they currently have.

The unfortunate truth, though, is that this ugly cycle is nothing new. For years, people have grappled with feelings of discontentment. They have sought to fill a God-sized whole in their heart with materialistic things, just as Pakhom tries to do through acquiring land.

In regards to how this relates to Maslow’s theory, Pakhom has no problem fulfilling the first three essential needs. All of his physiological and safety needs are presumably met and we are told he is married to a woman whom which we can assume he feels a sense of love and belonging to. That being said, the next level of human desire on Maslow’s pyramid is esteem, in which lies the acceptance and value from others, as well as oneself. This is where Pakhom seems to fall short, leaving him incapable of reaching the highest human desire that is self-actualization. Thus, we watch Pakhom fall into a restless cycle of desire starting the moment he hears that the mistress in town is selling her land to his neighbors (Tolstoy, 4). Over and over again we watch Pakhom make deals with passersby (the peasant on pg. 6, the merchant on pg. 9), all because of his dissatisfaction with the land he already has. Ultimately, this growing “I should have more” attitude is what leads Pakhom to his unfortunate end. Had Pakhom been more content with who he was and what he had, his constant desire to acquire more land wouldn’t have lead to this death. You can call it greed or ambition, but at the end of the day, it all leads back to whether you love yourself or not.