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Scott Barry Kaufman

Psychologist | Author

Sailboat Metaphor

Chances are you’re familiar with Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, a pyramid with self-actualization depicted at the top. You likely learned about it in your Introduction to Psychology course in college or saw it diagrammed on Facebook. As it’s typically presented, the hierarchy indicates that humans are motivated by increasingly “higher” levels of needs. The basic needs — physical health, safety, belonging, and esteem — must be satisfied to a certain degree before we can fully self-actualize, becoming all that we are capable of becoming.

The familiar pyramid shape suggests that once we complete each step, we’re done dealing with that need forever. As if life were a video game, and once we complete each level, we unlock the next, with no looking back. It’s an appealing concept. It’s also a gross misrepresentation of the humanistic vision that propelled Maslow’s work.

In fact, Maslow never actually created a pyramid to represent the hierarchy of needs . Maslow emphasized that we are always in a state of becoming and that one’s “inner core” consists merely of “potentialities, not final actualizations” that are “weak, subtle, and delicate, very easily drowned out by learning, by cultural expectations, by fear, by disapproval, etc.,” and which can all too easily become forgotten, neglected, unused, overlooked, unverbalized, or suppressed. Maslow made it clear that human maturation is an ongoing process and that growth is “not a sudden, saltatory phenomenon” but is often two steps forward and one step back.

A New Metaphor

The pyramid from the 1960s told a story that Maslow never meant to tell: a story of achievement, of mastering level by level until you’ve “won” the game of life. But that is most definitely not the spirit of self-actualization that humanistic psychologists like Maslow emphasized. The human condition isn’t a competition; it’s an experience .

Life isn’t a trek up a summit. It’s more like a vast ocean, full of new opportunities for meaning and discovery but also danger and uncertainty. In this choppy surf, a pyramid is of little use. What we really need is something more flexible and functional: a sailboat .

With holes in your boat, you can’t go anywhere. All of your energy and focus is directed toward increasing the stability of the boat. The human needs that comprise the boat are safety, connection, and self-esteem — security needs that, under good conditions, work together toward greater stability.

Too many people get mired by insecurity throughout their lives, however, and, as a result, miss out on so much beauty and goodness that exists in the world. But human beings are incredibly resilient. Even under adverse conditions, we find the potential for momentum: the sail .

Growth is at the heart of self-actualization — or, as Maslow would come to describe it in his later writings, the transcendent experience of being “fully human.” Ultimately, in order to grow, we need to open up our sail and be vulnerable against the inevitable winds and waves of life. We can still move in our most deeply valued direction, even among the unknown of the sea.

To grow is to continually, day after day, move toward the best of what humanity is capable of. Growth is a direction, not a destination . And that’s where the parts of the metaphorical sail come in: exploration, love, and purpose.

Exploration is the driver of all growth, defined by the desire to seek out and make sense of novel, challenging, and uncertain events. While security is primarily concerned with defense and protection, exploration is motivated by curiosity, discovery, openness, expansion, understanding, and the creation of new opportunities for growth and development. The other needs that comprise the sail — love and purpose — build on the fundamental need to reach higher levels of integration within oneself and to contribute something meaningful to the world.

Note that the need for love that is part of growth is different than the need for connection that is part of security. At a higher level of love, we can love people we don’t even feel a great connection to, and can care for those we may have never even met.

A dynamic sailboat is a better metaphor for life than a pyramid because the key is not which level you reach, but the harmonious integration that you have within yourself, and how that interacts with the world. You are a whole unit moving around in this world, and part of becoming a whole person requires this higher level integration of your security and growth needs.

Every now and then, when we’re really catching the wind– when we aren’t preoccupied with our basic needs and we are moving purposefully in a direction with the spirit of exploration, love, and purpose– we can experience transcendence. Transcendence goes beyond individual growth and allows for the highest levels of unity and harmony within oneself and with the world. Transcendence, which rests on a secure foundation of both security and growth, allows us to attain wisdom and a sense of connectedness and synergy with the rest of humanity.

Transcendent states of being are the most wondrous moments of life. However, healthy transcendence cannot be directly sought after; it is an emergent phenomenon resulting from the harmonious integration of one’s whole self in the service of cultivating the good society. Transcendence comes along for the ride of working on yourself, and increasing your synergy with the world. What is good for you is good for society.

We crave belonging, understanding, safety, and discovery. This, in Maslow’s view, is what it means to be human. To use the sailboat metaphor, while we each travel in our own direction, a wave could come crashing down on all the boats at once making us realize that at the end of the day we’re all sailing the vast unknown of the sea. Together.

For more, see Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization :

The Sailboat Metaphor: Understanding the Self and Human Behavior (Part 1)

1. Water

Can you imagine a sailboat, or any boat, without water? No, because water is essential for the functioning of a sailboat. In the sailboat metaphor, water represents the environment that you live in and interact with. There are many factors that make up your environment i.e. your house, job, personal belongings, location, etc. Just like a sailboat can’t move without water, you cannot function without your environment as it is your direct physical reality. Sometimes you are unsatisfied with the water upon which you sail i.e. the environment you live in. Maybe you want to change your neighborhood because it’s too noisy or too isolated or you hate your job because it’s low-paying or the workplace culture is toxic. It is possible to change the water upon which you sail, by steering your life in another direction. You can move to a new neighborhood or another country, switch jobs, etc. But it will only improve your well-being if the real problem did actually lie in the environment. Sometimes you change the water upon which you sail, but it doesn’t change your level of happiness or well-being, because the problem lied not with the water but with some other element, like maybe there was a leak in the boat (weakness), or maybe the weather was unfavorable (uncontrollable circumstances). Example: Daniel hates his job because he feels it’s not paying him well and his pay is not enough to cover his expenses. So he finds a job that pays better, but soon finds himself hating his new job as well, because the problem was not with the job or the pay. The problem was that his standard of living was too high. As soon as he started earning more, he also started spending more and his standard of living rose dramatically. Basically, there was a leak in the boat (his weakness = high standard of living), and instead of repairing the leak, Daniel chose to change the water upon which the sailboat was sailing. This shows that it’s better to take a good look at the other elements of the boat (other aspects of your life) first and see if there’s a problem with any of them, before deciding to change the water (the physical environment).

2. Steering Wheel

The steering wheel represents our personal values. Values are our basic and fundamental beliefs about what’s important and worthwhile. They are extensions of ourselves: they define us, inform our priorities, guide our actions and help us shape our character. Because they serve as a guide for human behavior, the way we behave constantly reflects our values. For example, my husband always keeps his words and promises, because he values commitment, reliability and dependability. I am always looking for opportunities to learn and grow as a person and I try my best to help others grow, too, because I value growth. I am also quick to forgive and don’t keep grudges, because I value forgiveness. The purpose of a steering wheel in a sailboat is to steer the boat in a certain direction. Similarly, our values serve as the steering wheel of our life and help us steer our life in a certain direction. Mind you, determining whether the direction is right or wrong is not the job of a steering wheel. It’s the job of a compass (the 6th element). When your behavior aligns with your values, you are happy and satisfied. But when you are disconnected from your values i.e. your behavior and values don’t align, you feel a sense of discontent, like something is not right, which can be a real source of unhappiness. For example, suppose you say you value hard work, ambition and success, but you are also very lazy and play PUBG on your phone all day. This shows that your actions are disconnected from your beliefs and values. That’s why it’s important to make a conscious effort to identify your core values and steer your life according to your values.

3. Destination

Destination is the end point of a sailboat’s journey and represents goals that you set. Just like a sailboat has a destination to reach, you should have goals to reach. Without a destination, the sailboat is lost in the sea, perpetually exposed to all sorts of danger and at the risk of destruction and sinking to the bottom of the sea. So if you have no goals, you have no destination which means you are not going to reach anywhere no matter how hard you work or how smart you are (character strengths). Your hard work and intelligence won’t get you anywhere worth being in life if don’t have specific goals. Having a specific destination is what helps the sailor steer the boat in a specific direction. Just like that, having goals will help you stay true to your values (steering wheel) and use your values for your benefit as well as for the greater good of humanity. For example, if you set a goal to study medicine, you can use your values of compassion, empathy and service to work in a noble profession as a doctor and, quite literally, help humanity by saving lives. If you have a goal to write a non-fiction, self-help book, you can use your values of creativity, positivity and education to express yourself and enjoy the prestige associated with being an author while educating the masses and helping them solve a real-life problem.

A leak in the sailboat is something that can make the boat sink if we don’t fix it or take care of it immediately. That’s why leaks represent our weaknesses. Weaknesses reduce personal well-being. A weakness is anything that hinders our functioning, reduces our level of happiness, stifles growth, and prevents us from living by our values and achieving our goals. For example, negative thinking, keeping grudges and seeking revenge, blaming others or your circumstances for whatever happens to you, comparing yourself with others, focusing on material things, trying to change others, living in the past or future, seeking approval and validation from others, being a perfectionist, etc. Fixing leaks in the boat means overcoming your weaknesses. But focusing on the leaks or weaknesses means you are focusing on what is wrong with you and ignoring everything that is right with you. For example, a teacher focusing on a student’s weaknesses, like how he makes silly spelling mistakes, how he never gets A in his tests, how he doesn’t engage in the class, etc. is actually ignoring and undermining this student's strengths. She is ignoring how this student is a great storyteller, a highly expressive and creative writer and is actually smarter than the rest of the class. So the teacher is stuck on helping the student overcome his weaknesses, instead of helping him build or capitalize on his strengths, which could make him happier and more successful in life, school and career. For that reason, only fixing the leaks is not enough if we want to improve our well-being because the absence of illness does not indicate optimal health or wellness. It is possible that even after repairing the leak (weaknesses), the boat won’t function optimally because there’s something wrong with the sails (strengths). So, while it’s important to overcome weaknesses, it is also equally, if not more, important to focus on developing strengths. That's it for now. In the next article , I will talk about the remaining four elements of the Sailboat Metaphor i.e. sails, compass, weather and other boats. Read Part 2 here.

Source : Alberts, H.J.E.M. (2016). The Sailboat. Maastricht: Positive Psychology Program. Available online at https://positivepsychology.com/wp-content/uploads/The-Sailboat.pdf

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| The Art of Living for Students of Life

Why we Need to Evolve Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs from a Pyramid to a Sailboat Metaphor

By Kyle Kowalski · Leave a Comment

Looking for the full book summary of Transcend by Scott Barry Kaufman? Here you go: The New Science of Self-Actualization: “Transcend” by Scott Barry Kaufman (Book Summary)

Did you know Maslow never put his hierarchy of needs into a pyramid?

Scott Barry Kaufman, humanistic psychologist and author of Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization ( Amazon ) believes it’s time for an update. Kaufman says:

I will present a new hierarchy of human needs for the twenty-first century that is in line with the spirit of humanistic psychology but is also grounded in the latest science of personality, self-actualization, human development, and well-being. I believe the new hierarchy of needs can serve as a useful organizing framework for the field of psychology as well as a useful guide for your own personal journey of health, growth, and transcendence .

If a pyramid is no longer necessary, then what do we need?

Life isn’t a trek up a summit but a journey to travel through—a vast blue ocean, full of new opportunities for meaning and discovery but also danger and uncertainty. In this choppy surf, a clunky pyramid is of little use . Instead, what is needed is something a bit more functional. We’ll need a sailboat.

Sloww Sailboat Hierarchy of Needs Transcend Book

The Sailboat Metaphor

Transcend Book Sailboat Hierarchy of Needs

“To use the sailboat metaphor, while we each travel in our own direction, we’re all sailing the vast unknown of the sea .”

“Note that you don’t ‘climb’ a sailboat like you’d climb a mountain or a pyramid. Instead, you open your sail , just like you’d drop your defenses once you felt secure enough. This is an ongoing dynamic: you can be open and spontaneous one minute but can feel threatened enough to prepare for the storm by closing yourself to the world the next minute. The more you continually open yourself to the world, however, the further your boat will go and the more you can benefit from the people and opportunities around you.”
“And if you’re truly fortunate, you can even enter ecstatic moments of peak experience—where you are really catching the wind. In these moments, not only have you temporarily forgotten your insecurities, but you are growing so much that you are helping to raise the tide for all the other sailboats simply by making your way through the ocean. In this way, the sailboat isn’t a pinnacle but a whole vehicle , helping us to explore the world and people around us, growing and transcending as we do .”

The Boat (Security Needs)

“As we sail through the adventure of life, it’s rarely clear sailing. The boat itself protects us from seas that are rarely as calm as we’d like.”

“While safety is an essential foundation for feeling secure, adding on strong connections with others and feelings of respect and worthiness will further allow you to weather the storms.”
“Research is clear that our psychological processes are deeply intertwined with our physiology. For that reason, I feel comfortable combining the physiological and safety needs that Maslow proposed . When safety needs are severely thwarted, people react in quite specific ways to restore balance, or homeostasis.”

The Sail (Growth Needs)

“Having a secure boat is not enough for real movement, however. You also need a sail. Without a sail, you might be protected from water, but you wouldn’t go anywhere. Each level of the sail allows you to capture more wind, helping you explore and adapt to your environment. “

“ The sail represents growth . While growth lies at the heart of self-actualization, one fair criticism of the term ‘self-actualization’ is that it is a vague hodgepodge of characteristics and motives lumped together under a single umbrella. Maslow recognized this, and in his later writings, he preferred the term ‘fully human’ to capture what he was really trying to get at.”
“I have broken self-actualization—and therefore growth—into three specific needs for which there is strong contemporary scientific support: exploration, love, and purpose . I believe that these three needs capture the essence of how Maslow really conceptualized self-actualization.”
“ At the base of growth is the spirit of exploration , the fundamental biological drive that all growth needs to have as its foundation. Exploration is the desire to seek out and make sense of novel, challenging, and uncertain events. While security is primarily concerned with defense and protection, exploration is primarily motivated by curiosity, discovery, openness, expansion, understanding, and the creation of new opportunities for growth and development. The other needs that comprise growth—love and purpose—can build on the fundamental need for exploration to reach higher levels of integration within oneself and to contribute something meaningful to the world .”
“With a secure foundation of safety, connection, and healthy self-esteem, and motivated by exploration and love, we are finally ready to strive toward a higher purpose that simultaneously benefits one’s own self and the world .”

The Seabird (Transcendence)

“From the perspective of Theory Z , you are able to look at all of the human needs—lovingly and nonjudgmentally—from the highest vantage point possible, viewing them not as separate from one another but as integrated and harmonious . This vantage point isn’t tethered to your own self or identity, although if need be, it can still clearly see all of it. Rather, it’s like the vantage point of a seabird, free to soar above or dive within the landscape of human experience, viewing it from any angle .”

“At the top of the new hierarchy of needs is the need for transcendence , which goes beyond individual growth (and even health and happiness) and allows for the highest levels of unity and harmony within oneself and with the world . Transcendence, which rests on a secure foundation of both security and growth, is a perspective in which we can view our whole being from a higher vantage point with acceptance, wisdom, and a sense of connectedness with the rest of humanity .”

Where will you sail?

“ The good life is not something you will ever achieve. It’s a way of living. As Carl Rogers noted, ‘The good life is a process, not a state of being. It is a direction, not a destination.’ This process won’t always bring feelings of happiness, contentment, and bliss, and it may even sometimes cause pain and heartache. It’s not for the ‘faint-hearted,’ as Rogers notes, as it requires continually stretching outside your comfort zone as you realize more and more of your potentialities and launch yourself ‘fully into the stream of life.’ Just like it takes courage to open your sail on a sailboat and see where the winds will take you, it takes a lot of courage to become the best version of yourself. “

About Kyle Kowalski

👋 Hi, I'm Kyle―the human behind Sloww . I'm an ex-marketing executive turned self-education entrepreneur after an existential crisis in 2015. In one sentence: my purpose is synthesizing lifelong learning that catalyzes deeper development . But, I’m not a professor, philosopher, psychologist, sociologist, anthropologist, scientist, mystic, or guru. I’m an interconnector across all those humans and many more—an "independent, inquiring, interdisciplinary integrator" (in other words, it's just me over here, asking questions, crossing disciplines, and making connections). To keep it simple, you can just call me a "synthesizer." Sloww shares the art of living with students of life . Read my story.

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Katerina Tsomi
May 9, 2023

Play in the Service of Growth: The Sailboat Metaphor

By Katerina Tsomi, M.A., M.Sc.

I literally stumbled upon the term “gifted” a couple of years ago, when as a play therapist, I met a five-year-old child who displayed a perplexing profile. He was asynchronous, fast, smart, sensitive and intense. The adults around him seemed to misunderstand his motives and behaviour, but I soon realized that he was driven by various needs which remained unfulfilled. Although the child was safe, his needs for connection, belonging, esteem and self-actualization were clearly not addressed adequately. This resulted in him either suffering from anxiety or experiencing outbursts of rage which he couldn’t regulate.

As a play therapist, I knew, both from theory and experience, that this child’s psychological growth and emotional development was impeded at some level (Moustakas, 1955). What perplexed me was why adults around him could not understand what this child was trying to show: his unfulfilled needs. They seemed to not get that his tendency to move around and explore his environment, his honesty, his intense expression of feelings and his hunger for intellectual stimulation were actual needs like hunger, thirst and rest. I was even more perplexed with the fact that I kind of intuitively understood him, and I even identified with him on some level.

My desire to answer these burning questions brought me to the term giftedness , and I was soon mesmerized by this new but so familiar world. I read about asynchronous development, advanced cognitive abilities and heightened intensity (Rimm et al., 2018) and also about intrinsic intensities called overexcitabilities (Danies & Piechowki, 2008). Finally, I could recognize my young client in this literature, but I could also recognise myself. To cut a long story short, two years later I am studying at Bridges Graduate School of Cognitive Diversity, trying to put into good use for the gifted my play therapy expertise.

Recently, as part of a classroom presentation, I was reminded of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Maslow believed that needs are like instincts and play a role in motivating behaviour. He talked about five levels of needs; namely, physiological needs, safety, love/belonging, esteem and self-actualization (Cherry, 2022). Modern psychology proposes that the hierarchy of needs is like a pyramid: a person needs to satisfy the lower level needs, which are survival needs, in order to move to the higher level needs, which are growth needs. But this analogy appears to be inaccurate as Scott Barry Kaufman explains in two of his books, Transcend and Choose Growth . He stresses that Maslow never used a pyramid as a symbol for his hierarchy of needs. Kaufman developed an alternate metaphor, the sailboat, which aims to help us better understand how fundamental human needs operate. The boat represents the security needs of safety, connection and self-esteem; whereas, the sail stands for the growth needs of exploration, love and purpose (Kaufman & Feingold, 2022). The securely built boat and the open sail enables the sailboat to travel on the waters of life.

As I was pondering on the sailboat metaphor, I kept thinking how fundamental it is for gifted people of all ages to know, understand, accept and fulfill their differentiated needs. As a play therapist I work with metaphors all the time, and this one felt like a good idea for a StoryCraft. The concept of StoryCrafts is created by Joyce Mills and is an essential part of her play therapy model, StoryPlay©. StoryCrafts are transformative activities which are inspired from a story/metaphor. They help transform the metaphor into a tangible form in an artistic way (Mills & Crowley, 2014). As a practice exercise, Kaufman & Feingold (2022) proposed to the reader to draw a shape of his/her sailboat and fill in what it looks like right now. I expanded this idea: what about creating a sailboat as a StoryCraft which will enable further growth and transformational healing?

I decided to try the idea out with my own children, eight-year-old twice-exceptional V and five-year-old gifted G. As the results were beyond my imagination, I will share the whole process here with the hope to serve as an inspiration to both parents and therapists of gifted and twice exceptional children. First, I told the children the following story, inspired from Kaufman’s symbolism: “The other day, I was taking a walk by the sea. The sea was calm, and a mild wind was tenderly caressing my face. As I turned my face towards the sea to admire its eternal beauty, my gaze fell on a sailboat which was traveling on the smooth waters. The boat was sliding safely and with flow on the calm waters, and the sail was open, pushed gently by the light morning breeze. As I noticed the grace with which the sailboat traveled, I wondered what kind of new worlds it was going to explore with its safe boat and its growing sail.” When I ended the story, I added: “You know, each of us is like a sailboat. In order to travel far and explore the world, we both need a safe boat and a growing sail. I wonder how your sailboats look? Would you like to create them?”

The boys were enthusiastic, but they said they wanted to create one sailboat that they would share. As a non-directive play therapist and a StoryPlay® facilitator, I am used to allowing children to lead the process in their own pace and enter their experience as it is played out (Lindo et al., 2012). This philosophy underlies the whole sailboat StoryCraft process.

Firstly, the boys used clay to create the boat. They decided to build it piece by piece, cutting and connecting together little pieces of clay. This process took some time, and gradually V expressed his anxiety that the boat would not be able to hold its pieces together, so he decided to add some glue on it to make sure it would be safe and stable. This is exactly how a StoryCraft works: by experiencing the transformation of information into a concrete, hands-on creation, the child experiences in his/her body the meaningful message that leads to healing. For the sail, children asked me to draw the sail’s shape on paper and to create the mast. After they experienced growth facilitated by their mum, the boys let the sailboat dry and “rest” with the purpose to revisit it the next day.

The next day, we revisited the sailboat, and the children were happy that it felt concrete and ready to open its sail. I reminded them that we too are like sailboats, and I asked them what makes them feel safe. V answered that the house made him safe, and G said that he felt safe when he eats and when he remembers breast-feeding as a baby. These statements were in line with the boat’s needs of safety and connection (Kaufman, 2022). Then I asked them what makes their sails open. V talked about Minecraft, which enables him to build houses, and his love for sweets because they have a nice taste and make him relax. G mentioned breastfeeding again because it made him feel happy, fighting with his brother, running fast like the Flash and fighting Herobrine, Minecraft’s strongest monster.

It is important to notice the metaphor behind what each child said. V’s visual-spatial intelligence is obvious both in the boat’s and the sail’s needs: he focuses on 3D constructs and gains his power from building. G, on the other hand, displays interpersonal intelligence which is played out in the breastfeeding connection and the fighting, another way to enter a relationship. Again, the statements were in line with the needs of exploration and love, which Kaufman placed in the sail (Kaufman, 2022).

After talking, the time had come to paint the sailboat in order for it to be ready for traveling. Well, what happened next was exactly that! The sailboat “did travel” my boys! They began painting the boat and the sail using finger paints (they even created a pirates’ flag on it) but the touch of the paint ignited their sensual overexcitabilities and an intense embodiment process for both of them. During the Embodiment stage of play, children’s early experiences are expressed through bodily movements and the senses, and their concept of body-self is strengthened (Jennings, 1999). V and G painted their hands and arms and left their imprints on the wash basin deliberately, V as a pirate and G as the Flash. When their senses felt satisfied, they washed the paint off their hands and continued their play outdoors, taking the sailboat with them.

The Embodiment process had kicked in the Projection stage of play. During this stage, children respond to the world beyond their bodies, relate to different objects and place them in shapes and constellations. Gradually, children create stories which they project on the objects (Cattanach, 1997). V and G took their weapons with them and arranged them around the sailboat in a ritualistic way, protecting and fighting for it. Then they cut leaves from a tree and used them to create shapes relevant to their growth process: V created Minecraft tools, such as shovels and picks, and weapons, such as tridents and swords. G connected two leaves together with duct tape, symbolizing connection. He also drew Herobrine, captured by a policeman and put in jail.

That was the end of the sailboat experience. As a play therapist, I was impressed both by the symbolic meanings my children attached to the metaphorical task of the sailboat but also by the intense growth process that the task ignited spontaneously in them. As a mum, I enjoyed a rich emotional experience with my children which I highly recommend. I only have one caution for parents: beware of your OEs around mess!

____________________________________________________

Katerina Tsomi, M.A., M.Sc., is a resilience-focused play therapist, psychotherapist,

person-centered counselor and clinical supervisor in play and creative therapies. Her robust academic background, intense experiential training and wide experience allow her to engage deeply and intensely with her clients and to address their diverse needs. She conducts her private practice both online and in person in her office in Athens, Greece. Katerina is also a StoryPlay® facilitator and she facilitates StoryPlay® trainings and other experiential and creative workshops. In 2020, one of her positive disintegrations led her into the field of giftedness and neurodivergence. She discovered that she is a twice-exceptional adult and, from then on she deeply and intensely explores this new/familiar world. She is trained in gifted-specific psychology by Intergifted and as a SENG Model Parent Group Facilitator. She is also an Ed.D. student in Bridges Graduate School of Cognitive Diversity in Education. These days, Katerina’s therapeutic practice focuses on gifted and neurodivergent people of all ages. Katerina is a mum of two gifted children, one of which is twice-exceptional. This parenting adventure further fuels her giftedness-related explorations.

Cattanach, A. (1997). Children’s stories in Play therapy. London, Great Britain: Jessica Kingsley.

Cherry, K. (2022, August 14.). Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Very well mind. Retrieved April 9, 2023, from https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-maslows-hierarchy-of-needs-4136760

Daniels, S. & Piechowski, M. M. (Eds.) (2008). Living with Intensity: Understanding the sensitivity, excitability, and the emotional development of gifted children, adolescents, and adults. Scottsdale, AZ: Great Potential Press.

Jennings, S. (1999). Introduction to developmental play. London, Great Britain: Jessica Kingsley.

Kaufman, S. B., & Feingold, J. H. (2022). Choose growth: A workbook for transcending trauma, fear, and self-doubt. Tarcher perigee.

Lindo, N. A., Chung, C. F., Carlson, S., Sullivan, J. M., Akay, S. & Meany-Walen, K. K. (2012). The impact of child-centered play therapy training on attitude, knowledge, and skills. International Journal of Play Therapy, 21 (3), 149-166.

Mills, J. C., & Crowley, R. J. (2014). Therapeutic metaphors for children and the child within (2nd edn.). Routledge.

Moustakas, C. E. (1955). Emotional adjustment and the play therapy process. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 86 (1), 79-99.

Rimm, S. B., Siegle, D., & Davis, G. A. (2018). Education of the Gifted and Talented (7th ed.). New York, NY: Pearson.

Over-excitabilities
Social & Emotional Development

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I don't understand the metaphor. Maybe I am just retarded.

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Replacing the Pyramid of Needs with a Sailboat of Needs

A bold new book provides an updated version of maslow's theory of needs..

Posted December 22, 2020 | Reviewed by Abigail Fagan

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Maslow’s Pyramid of Needs is undoubtedly one of the most iconic psychological images. Reprinted countless times, the pyramid depicts physiological needs such as breathing, food, and water at the base of the pyramid. The next layer is safety and security, then comes love and belonging, then self-esteem and respect, with self-actualization at the top.

Once you’ve seen it, the idea of a pyramid of needs sticks with you. It is intuitive, it is memorable — and it is wrong. As an image of human needs, Maslow’s Pyramid of Needs is mistaken on two accounts: It’s not Maslow’s pyramid. And the needs don’t form a pyramid .

First, rather surprisingly, Abraham Maslow himself never created a pyramid of needs. Born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1908, Maslow is still regarded as one of the most influential twentieth-century psychologists who is indeed especially famous for his theory of human needs. Reacting to the atrocities of WWII, Maslow wanted to develop a psychology of human potential, the good in each of us, and what humans ultimately need to flourish.

However, the shape of a pyramid is nowhere to be found in Maslow’s writings. It was a bunch of management scholars who in the late '50s and early '60s drew the pyramid as a mnemonic for managers wanting “maximum motivation at the lowest cost.” The pyramid, thus, does not have anything to do with Maslow himself but rather the iconic shape spread through management textbooks and business consultants eager to sell the pyramid as a tool to extract motivation from unsuspecting employees.

Second, the scientific community realized already decades ago that while humans certainly might have psychological needs, these needs don’t arrange themselves into a clear hierarchy. Furthermore, the list of needs provided by Maslow has been challenged by newer, more empirically supported theories.

In a bold new book, Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization , psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman aims to make Maslow relevant again by retaining the healthy core of his theory while integrating his ideas with the developments of empirical psychology that have taken place in the five decades since Maslow passed away in Menlo Park, CA, on June 8, 1970, when his eager writing to revise his theory came to an unfortunate halt through a fatal heart attack.

Kaufman argues that the part of Maslow’s theory that has stood the test of time is a distinction between two types of needs. First, there are the deficit needs, which dominate our motivation and trump any higher needs when they are urgently lacking. If I am underwater and start to be out of oxygen, self-realization is not the first thing on my mind. The only need I care about is the necessity of being able to breathe again. The more precarious a physical need becomes, the more it preoccupies our minds. Hunger is a powerful motivation. However, as long as my access to water, food, and shelter feel secured, I don’t think about them much. The deficit needs thus become activated mainly when we are lacking them.

Human existence, however, is not mere passive reactance to deficits. As the movie character Solomon Northup memorably states in 12 Years a Slave: “I don’t want to survive. I want to live.” We humans are not mere survival-machines, but active and growth-oriented, eager to take on challenges through which to manifest our full potential. A human being has a tendency for self-fulfillment, “to become actualized in what he is potentially," as Maslow put it.

In this quest to realize ourselves, we are guided by what Maslow called growth needs. While deficit needs are driven by fears, anxieties, and a push to quench what we are lacking, growth needs pull us towards what we find intriguing and valuable. They are the sources of intrinsic fulfillment we are drawn towards when we don’t have to worry about mere survival.

The pyramid fails to capture this fundamental distinction between deficit and growth needs. In its place, Kaufman proposes a sailboat. Life isn’t a project or a competition ; it is a journey to travel through “a vast blue ocean, full of new opportunities for meaning and discovery but also danger and uncertainty.” The hull of the boat is what keeps us afloat, offering security from the waves. It represents the deficit needs essential for survival. Kaufman proposes three such needs: feeling safe, feeling that we belong and are not being rejected by others, and protecting our self-esteem. In other words, we need to feel safe both in the physical realm, in the interpersonal realm, and in our relation to ourselves.

Frank Martela based on Scott Barry Kaufman

But having a protective body is not enough for real movement. Kaufman quotes Seneca: “If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.” What we need to do is to open our sail and dare to embrace life and direct our efforts towards actualizing ourselves.

As for the growth-oriented needs, Kaufman again proposes three: exploration, love, and purpose. We explore our environment for the sheer pleasure of it, we want to feel a deep sense of connection and love with others, and we seek goals worth pursuing to energize our activities. The growth needs are thus not depicted as a pyramid to climb; they are ultimately about opening up to life, daring to treat life as a quest.

Of course, the stronger the hull, the easier it is to boldly open up the sails. To dare to explore and grow, we need to have a secure base. That’s why Maslow wanted to democratize the opportunity to live a growth-oriented life by removing the obstacles for it, like material scarcity, emotional coldness, and institutions crushing our dreams . The needs can be used to evaluate our current institutions like schools, workplaces, and whole societies. When designing and critically examining them, we should be asking are they helping us to satisfy our needs or rather the main reason our needs are thwarted. If the latter, they should be revised. Each of us should be given an equal opportunity to pursue our liberty, and this happens only if our institutions provide safety, security, and a sense of belonging.

This is the legacy of Maslow worth fighting for: to build a culture and institutions that support the ability of each of us to grow and become the best versions of ourselves. This is done by ensuring that as many as possible can grow up, live, and work in environments that support the satisfaction of our basic psychological needs.

Bridgman, T., Cummings, S., & Ballard, J. (2018). Who Built Maslow’s Pyramid? A History of the Creation of Management Studies’ Most Famous Symbol and Its Implications for Management Education. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 18(1), 81–98.

Kaufman, S. B. (2020). Transcend: The new science of self-actualization. TarcherPerigee.

Wahba, M. A., & Bridwell, L. G. (1976). Maslow reconsidered: A review of research on the need hierarchy theory. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, 15(2), 212–240.

Frank Martela, Ph.D ., is a philosopher and researcher at Aalto University in Helsinki.

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“Sailboat Metaphor”

Originally posted in our august 2021 top of mind newsletter ..

When thinking about establishing a new paradigm in the classroom, the topic of individual needs invariably comes up. Many of us have heard of Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and it has almost shown as a pyramid.

But, the issue is, Maslow never designed this hierarchy as a pyramid. “Maslow emphasized that we are always in a state of becoming and that one’s ‘inner core’ consists merely of ‘potentialities, not final actualizations[.]'” This state of flux, constant growth and regression, is essential to understand. Not only because it shifts our perspective when developing others but also because it reframes how we meet our needs as facilitators.

So, Scott Barry Kaufman, Ph.D., offers us a new way to think of human needs, like a sailboat .

“With holes in your boat, you can’t go anywhere. All of your energy and focus is directed toward increasing the stability of the boat. The human needs that comprise the boat are safety, connection, and self-esteem — security needs that, under good conditions, work together toward greater stability.”

Continue reading his updated metaphor to understand better how humans adapt to their situations. And, learn how changes in their situation affect the needs they are trying to meet.

Explore more

The Sailboat Metaphor

www.positivepsychologyprogram.com | Positive Psychology Practitioner‘s Toolkit

The Sailboat

Happiness “I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship .“ - Louisa May Alcott

Metaphor This quote beautifully summarizes what can be considered the most important practical aim of n/a positive psychology: enhancing autonomy and resilience. The goal of every helping professional is to eventually become redundant by helping the client to both realize that he/she is the captain Client of his/her own ship and act accordingly. More precisely, the realization that he/she is the only No one who can change his/her own behaviour and reality allows the client to behave in line with personal values and take responsibility for his/her own actions.

A key step in this process is the development of a balanced and complete perspective on the self: a perspective that takes into consideration the many factors that determine daily behaviour and experiences, both positive and negative, controllable and uncontrollable. By becoming aware of personal strengths and weaknesses, of factors that can be controlled and those that are beyond control, of positive and negative social forces, autonomy is facilitated. By comparing human functioning to a sailboat and its journey, this tool offers a multi-faceted, yet easy to understand perspective on the self.

This tool was created by Hugo Alberts (https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Hugo_Alberts). Feel free to use and distribute this tool, but please give credit to the author when doing so.

Please use the following reference: Alberts, H.J.E.M. (2016). The Sailboat. Maastricht: Positive Psychology Program.

The author wishes to thank Lisa Sansom, Rene Brauer, Julian Bradley, Barbara Kuiters, Kim van Oorsouw, Laurens Alberts and Dorien Hodiamont for their valuable comments and suggestions.

The goal of this sailboat metaphor is to offer a simple and multi-faceted perspective on the self. The metaphor attempts to address human functioning from a holistic perspective, taking into account the many factors, both positive and negative, that influence well-being.

[1] www.positivepsychologyprogram.com | Positive Psychology Practitioner‘s Toolkit

■■ The metaphor can be used to explain complex psychological constructs in a relatively simple way. For instance, effective coping can be compared to a boat that stays on course despite stormy weather or effectively gets back on course after stormy weather. Rumination (dwelling on negative thoughts about past failures) can be compared to spending a lot of time looking at the wake (wake pattern) behind the boat. ■■ The metaphor can be used to communicate complex interactive psychological processes (see the section “Interaction between elements” on p.9.). ■■ Clients can use the metaphor to explain their current state. For some clients, the metaphor offers a “safe” way to describe their personal feelings. It allows them to talk about their private experiences in a more indirect and less vulnerable way, without losing the essence of the message. Another related advantage of using the boat metaphor is its flexibility to different interpretations. Allowing the client to explain their understanding of the different elements can enable the practitioner to better grasp the reality of the client. By encouraging the client to explain their own connection to each element (rather than forcing a rigid definition) it promotes a greater connection to the metaphor due to being self-constructed. Examples of potential client use: »» “I don’t feel like my boat is moving. It is floating in one place, bobbing on the waves”: the client may experience a lack of meaning and/or autonomy. »» “I feel like I am sailing in a direction that other sailors want me to sail”: the client is experiencing a high level of social pressure and lack of autonomy. »» “I feel like all I can see is the leaking boat – I keep taking on water”: the client indicates that he/she experiences an excessive focus on his/her problems. »» “I am afraid that my boat will not withstand the stormy weather that is coming”: the client experiences low levels of self-efficacy and has doubts about his/her own coping skills. ■■ The boat metaphor can be used to address both the current experiences of a client as well as future aspirations. For instance, the metaphor can be used as a valuable starting point for an intervention. A client may respond to questions like: What aspect of your boat has the highest priority at the moment? In an ideal world, what would your boat look like? What kind of destination would you like to reach with your boat? ■■ The metaphor can be used in a group context as well. Teams can be perceived as a fleet of boats that, in an ideal situation, sail in the same direction. In other words, the team members are on the same mission. Note, however, that this does not mean that all the boats are similar. On the contrary, it can be better to have different boats, meaning team members with different strengths, so they can work synergistically together in a complementary way.

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Using Metaphor to Unlock Career Narratives: The Sailboat Metaphor

Sailboats at sunset, metaphor to unlock career narratives

As career professionals, we utilize creative tools and strategies to unleash our client’s career story in a compelling way. One of the strategies I’ve enjoyed success with is metaphor. Recently, while driving to visit my parents, I was about to cross a bridge. Before I could cross, I had to wait for a ferry to pass by. Watching the ferry gave me time to ponder about using metaphor to unlock career narratives .

Crossing the Bridge

It was a beautiful ferry. I was immersed in the scenery and captivated by the stillness of the water and the horizon. It was clear this journey was going to take some time, so I relaxed, tuned into classical music, and started meditating. I could see that some people were growing impatient, frowning at the thought of having to wait in their cars for the ferry to pass. As we enter the last stage of reopening in Ontario — after a long wait — even small distractions can seem like hours rather than minutes. The ferry crossed quicker than imagined, the bridge gate lifted, and cars began driving across the bridge. To some, it must have seemed like an obstacle course.

To our clients, crossing the bridge represents the pivotal point where they decide to make a career transition . Society often encourages us to keep moving ever so quickly to reach our destination. But the ironic thing is that we can never fully plan for the unexpected — roadblocks may arise, forcing us to evaluate our direction or take a detour.

In my teens, I recall taking the bus with my friend to go shopping one Saturday afternoon. We somehow took the wrong route, which meant having to walk much further. My friend explained to the bus driver: “We took the wrong route. Please, won’t you make a detour just this one time?” We chuckled afterward, realizing how unrealistic this request had been. We then embraced our fate of having to take a longer walk, but we were awakened to planning for future mishaps. The truth is that we often lean into optimism bias — we become overconfident about the likelihood of positive events happening to us, without addressing all the possible negative outcomes or risks involved.

Taking a Detour

Since the pandemic, many of us have been forced to take a “detour” and switch our direction or even mindset. We have had to sacrifice our patience, resilience, and tenacity as we “wait for the ferry to pass.” Or, we’ve simply had to find a better route. I have learned that the quickest route may not always be the best route in the end. And we have been learning to rely on our own resources and sharing our experiences with our loved ones, neighbours, and peers to make the journey engaging.

While I was waiting for the ferry to pass, creative thoughts started stirring. How many of us, including our clients, feel like a ship in the night yearning to see the “lighthouse” as we pass other sailboats in the fog without direction? During a career transition, clients sometimes feel like a sailboat without a compass. They may feel alone in the dark without any real support.

Reaching Out for Anchors

However, if we look within ourselves, we will discover that we do have internal resources and external supports that we can reach out to like “anchors” to help us make it through the dark, stormy waves of the night. We can stay safe and strong, draw strength from other sailors, and learn to navigate choppy waters.

Ironically, the universe was trying to convey an important message to me as I pondered the metaphor of a journey by boat. The next day, I received an interesting resource in my inbox. It was designed by Hugo Alberts and talks about using the sailboat metaphor with clients.

This quote caught my eye:

“I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship.“ – Louisa May Alcott

We cannot give into fear because each of us represents the captain of our own ship. We must learn to steer our own course and take responsibility for our actions. And, if we trust in ourselves and our abilities, we can focus on and delight in the journey.

I would like to share this empowering exercise based on positive psychology . You can tailor the exercise to your clients, however you wish. The goal of the sailboat metaphor is to understand how we function from a holistic perspective, considering both the positive and negative factors that influence our wellness.

Dissecting the Sailboat Metaphor

Metaphors are powerful .

By dissecting this metaphor, we can understand the various parts of the sailboat that represent valuable pieces of our clients’ career stories.

The water — represents the reality and workplace environment in which clients navigate their careers. The water is not always calm. It can be murky, even unsteady, but we need to navigate the water (environment) or change it altogether for the sake of wellness, meaning, and fulfillment.

The steering wheel or tiller — reflects the needs and core values that steer your clients’ direction. Adaptive values enhance our well-being while maladaptive value patterns reduce well-being. When clients have lost connection with their adaptive values, one or more elements of the boat receive unequal attention.

The destination — represents the goals and wishes of our clients.

Leaks in the boat — symbolize the internal weaknesses or ineffective coping strategies that impact performance and goal achievement. The key is guiding our clients to transform their weaknesses into strengths and seal the “leak” or the “gap.” Yet, fixing the leak is not always enough to drive momentum. It may only be a temporary solution.

Sails — represent personal strengths necessary to not only cope with negative situations, but to thrive, grow, and move forward.

A compass — provides valuable feedback on direction and helps to successfully navigate a course. Similarly, our clients can draw on their feelings, emotions, and intuition to help them navigate their career journey.

The w eather — is beyond our control and yet impacts the progress of a journey by sailboat. We need to guide clients on increasing their resilience and learning to steer around uncontrollable events or “storms” that can take the wind out of their “sails.” And we all need to know the difference between what we can control, what we cannot control, and what we simply need to accept.

Other boats — represent employers, peers, colleagues, or stakeholders that surround us. These people can either champion our successes and remind us of our value and purpose, or persuade us to get off course. We need to discern the people that are supportive, stay true to our own values and ideals, and let go of unsupportive people.

Guiding Our Clients to Use the Sailboat Metaphor

As a lighthouse to our clients in time of need, we can use this metaphor to help clients:

Talk about their current and past experiences as a vehicle for healing and career storytelling , and guide them in identifying future goals.
Discover their “ikigai” or “reason for being” .
Find their ideal work environment and culture .
Understand and gain awareness through career development theory.
Realize that all elements of the sailboat need to balance. For example, if we focus too much on the destination of the boat, we will lose sight of the essence of our journey.
Navigate the “stormy waters” in their life and career, including the changing labour market .
Increase their awareness of their values, goals, strengths, and weaknesses, then help them to evaluate their environment and identify and plan for changes.

Whether you decide to use this sailboat metaphor individually or in groups with clients, it offers an interesting way to understand your client’s experiences from a positive psychology lens and multi-dimensional, wellness-based perspective.

To gain more information on life and wellness coaching, enrol in CPC’s Work-Life Strategist course and earn your CWS certification this year.

“Think creatively and visualize a new career horizon!”

Lori Jazvac is a passionate, award-winning Master Certified Résumé Strategist and Certified Employment Strategist through Career Professionals of Canada. As a multi-certified Master Résumé Writer and Certified Career Transition Coach, she specializes in helping clients navigate challenging career transitions. In 2013, an empowering vision inspired Lori to launch Creative Horizons Communications , a holistic career services firm where she virtually supports jobseekers around the globe to embrace their next career milestone. In her spare time, Lori enjoys dance, blogging, watching comedies and reality shows, yoga, and taking long walks in nature.

Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash

Thank you for another excellent article, Lori. Metaphor is a beautiful way to connect to our clients, help them and their prospective employers understand their life and career stories. When helping my clients write their résumé and prepare for job interviews, I coach them to tell a compelling story that aligns with their value proposition. We are wired for storytelling and remembering stories. Metaphors enrich our vocabulary and job search “toolkit” and make us stand out from other applicants.

Ksenia, thank you for the valuable feedback. I agree! Incorporating metaphor drives holistic meaning into the career narrative and fuels engagement with the audience. Stories are powerful vehicles for connectedness and healing. As always, your approach with clients is very thoughtful and strategic 🙂

Thank you for this article Lori! Metaphors really have a powerful effect because they address different parts of our brain than the ones activated when we go through the usual “Would, Should, Could” type of advices. They often spark those Eureka! moments that help clients gain a new perspective and renewed hope.

You’re welcome, Catherine! Thank you for providing this very interesting insight about metaphors and their impact on our cognition and perception. I agree that metaphors are meaningful and transformative, sparking those moments of epiphany that serve as pivotal points for growth.

Hello there. I am teaching a University Foundations course at Concordia in Edmonton. May I share your article with my students? Mary Frances Fitzgerald, M. Ed.

Hello Mary Frances,

Thanks for your reply and interest in this blog post!

We would be delighted if you could share the article with your students at Concordia.

Please attribute CPC as the original source of the material via link to the original URL if you are sharing the hardcopy. Alternatively, you are welcome to share the URL as freely as you like via email or online.

Kind Regards, Lori

(403) 605.4756 | (778) 557.2640 | [email protected]

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A sailboat as a metaphor for continuous learning and workplace change

Workplace change is a like a sailboat

A good metaphor for change in the workplace is that of a sailboat. When you point your sailboat in the right direction and let the wind do the work, you will go to different and innovative places, sometimes breaking records in the process. While the wind is what moves the sailboat forward, it can also turn into rough weather that can blow it off course. It’s up to the skipper of the vessel to adjust the sails, change direction, and sometimes even switch to backup power. But the skipper cannot do this alone. The master of the boat is only as good as his or her crew. If the crew isn’t motivated, or talking to one another, or working in tandem, the sailboat can come to a standstill, or even worse, run aground.

And you are the skipper who promotes continuous learning

Just as a sailboat uses wind power to move across the water, you can use the power of change to propel you and your department forward on new journeys towards improved and relevant objectives and milestones. But a sailboat also needs to adjust its sails and its direction in response to changing currents and storms. And you must as well you to adapt and respond to unexpected obstacles in your journey.

As a leader you need to be a competent skipper who keeps an eye on weather conditions so as to set and reset to keep your sailboat on course. And you also need to keep your crew motivated, talking to one another frequently so that they are working in tandem. In the workplace, that means that you have to be a strong leader who can keep your high-performing and resilient team communicating and collaborating so that they can adapt to change and still achieve common goals.

The best captains are those who have undergone rigorous training and invested in practicing their skills. The best leaders are those who have embraced a philosophy of continuous learning, and have invested in themselves and their people.

Are you a good skipper and a good leader? What are you doing to adopt an attitude of continuous learning and to instill it in your people? What are you doing to become a better leader? I’d love to hear about what you’re doing. Please share by adding your comment below.

Many of our regular blog readers will know that I am a lifelong champion for continuous learning. In fact, the lobster is the metaphor I have used repeatedly. Here is a past blog post explaining the lobster as a metaphor for continuous learning . And a link to my book Why does the lobster cast off its shell?

Boat Metaphor

This is a hybrid of the Russ Harris' boat with monsters metaphor and weather as emotions metaphor to explain commitment to values.

You have an indestructible ship that only you can steer. You have serveral compasses on your ship (that represent different values). Because there is nothing that can destroy your ship, and you're the only that can steer it, the only thing that moves your compass needle(s) away from the direction you need to go is you. The weather is your emotions- sometimes choppy, sometimes calm, but they can't actually move the boat. The animals and the sea monsters are your thoughts- sometimes scary, sometimes pleasant, sometimes beautiful, sometimes terrifying, but they can't actually move the boat.

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The guide to retrospectives – remote, in person, or hybrid

Master the sailboat retrospective in 4 steps

You want your agile retrospectives to be as valuable as possible, right? Of course you do. We have good news for you: the sailboat retrospective is an engaging way for your team to honestly evaluate your previous sprint and figure out the best way forward. Here’s everything you need to know about this helpful retrospective technique.

What is the sailboat retrospective?

The sailboat retrospective is a retrospective technique where you and your agile team members will envision the last sprint as a sailboat. It’s a visual way for your team to identify what pushed the project forward, as well as what held it back.

The 4 steps to a sailboat retrospective

This sailboat metaphor makes for an enlightening sprint retrospective. But how can you implement the sailboat technique on your own team? Start by opening a sailboat retrospective template on your Miro board. You'll see a sailboat image, a patch of land, a waterline, rocks, and an anchor below the boat. Here's one we love by Miro user Johanna Tortensson. Next, gather your team and equip them with some digital sticky notes in Miro to use during the retro. You can even add their names as tags to the stickies so they know which ones are designated for them. With everything in place, it’s time for your team to brainstorm their answers to the following questions with regard to your last sprint:

What risks did the sprint face?

What delayed the sprint?

What propelled the sprint forward?

Team members will jot their answers to those questions down on individual sticky notes and place them on the appropriate spot on your picture of a sailboat. Then, similar themes can be grouped together, and your team can discuss their findings and vote on what action items they’ll use to improve the next sprint. Make sense? Good. Now, let’s talk a little bit more about the individual elements of the sailboat exercise.

1. Rocks (risks)

What happens if a boat hits a rock? It gets hung up and damaged. The same is true for your sprint. The rocks represent a potential risk or obstacle for your sprint. These can persist for a long time if your team doesn’t come up with a way to address them.

2. Anchors (delaying issues)

An anchor keeps a boat in one spot, and that’s why they’re the perfect representation of the things that held your sprint back. What caused major bottlenecks or challenges? What inhibited your agile team from making as much progress as possible?

3. Wind (helping teams)

Wind propels a sailboat forward, and that’s why it represents what went well with your previous sprint. You’ll identify what was quite literally putting wind in your sails. You might also hear this referred to as the helping team.

4. Land (the goal)

Finally, the land is where your boat is headed. Using the sailboat metaphor it represents your goal or vision for the sprint. It can include both long and short-term objectives for the agile team.

Why the sailboat is such a useful retrospective

The sailboat is a popular retrospective format for a number of reasons. First of all, it’s a fun, visual way to reflect on your past sprint and capture ideas. The use of the sailboat metaphor makes it far more approachable and digestible. A team doesn’t need to be well-versed in agile concepts and terminology to understand how to make this technique work for them. Additionally, many retrospective techniques look mostly at what went well and what didn’t during a sprint. This format digs deeper and challenges teams to identify what is helping and hurting their project, timeline, and their collaboration. This leads to even more continuous improvement.

Keeping collaboration and confidentiality high with sailboat retrospectives

With a sailboat retrospective, your team is bound to uncover a lot of valuable information – some of which might not be meant for everybody’s eyes. If you complete this sailboat exercise on a traditional whiteboard, you’ll need to remove all of your findings at the end of the retrospective meeting or store your board somewhere safe. And, even further, if some of your team members are remote, there’s no way for them to access that information if and when they need it.That’s why it’s better to use a virtual, collaborative whiteboard like Miro . You can use all of your favorite retrospective games and techniques, and your team (no matter where they are!) will be able to actively participate and easily refer back to that information later. Learn more about Miro's online whiteboard tool>>

3 FAQs about the sailboat retrospective

Ask any Scrum master, agile coach, product owner, or team leader, and they’ll be quick to tell you that the sailboat retrospective is a fun way for your team to evaluate your latest sprint. Have more questions about how it could work on your own agile team? We have your answers right here.

1. Why is the sailboat retrospective so widely used?

Here’s our short answer: because it’s simple. The metaphor makes it highly engaging, and it also makes it incredibly straightforward. Everybody understands a sailboat, so teams can use this technique to generate ideas and brainstorm action items without a lot of training or technical expertise.

2. Is a sailboat and speedboat retrospective the same?

They’re very similar in that they both use a metaphor as a good starting point for your sprint reviews. There are a number of different retrospective techniques that use a similar system and metaphor, like the sailboat, speedboat, and even the pirate ship.

3. What do anchors represent in the sailboat retrospective?

Anchors represent the things that held your sprint or project back. What kept it from moving forward as efficiently as possible? Perhaps you had a lot of siloed communication. Or maybe getting the right feedback and approvals was a bottleneck. Those delays are represented as anchors on your picture of a sailboat.

Ready to get started? Try this sailboat retrospective template for free when you sign up for Miro.

You can explore more by visiting our retro template library for a comprehensive collection of templates tailored to various team needs and situations.

Michael de le Maza, Agile Coach Michael is an industry-recognized Agile & Scrum Coach and consultant who helps companies succeed by supporting company-wide agile transformations.

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All at Sea: Nautical metaphors in the English language

Ian Brookes is a freelance writer and editor based in Scotland. He has edited a number of dictionaries and has written books about spelling, writing, and punctuation. In this post, he looks at the origins of several nautical metaphors still used in English today.

Learning English might be easier if people would actually say what they mean. Unfortunately English-speakers often express ideas in terms of a metaphor rather than by a literal description. So when we talk about being ‘ all at sea ’, we do not literally mean that we are out in the ocean, but rather that we are unsure about what to do, as though we were drifting on the water without the reassurance of firm ground beneath our feet.

Metaphors can be difficult enough to decipher even when you are familiar with the objects of comparison. In many cases, however, metaphors refer to things that are rarely, if ever, encountered any more. We still talk about something that is briefly successful as a flash in the pan , even though this refers to an old type of gun in which gunpowder made a flash in a compartment called a ‘pan’ when it was primed before firing. The original point of the comparison is now forgotten, but the idiom survives.

The same is true of many words and expressions that originally referred to sailing. Great Britain is an island nation; in the days before air travel, mastery of the sea was essential to the nation’s defence and trade. In modern times ships play a less important role, and they tend to be powered by engines rather than sails. Yet many expressions derived from sailing remain embedded in the English language. Knowing this may shed light on some apparently obscure terms.

A flagship , for example, was the most important ship in a fleet, which carried the fleet’s admiral and flew his flag. In modern English, however, the word is more likely to be used as a metaphor, so a company’s flagship store is the one that has the most importance and prestige. A mainstay was originally a rope that supported the main mast of a ship, but now is a metaphor referring to any person or thing that provides crucial support, as in tourism is a mainstay of the economy .

The influence of sailing can also be seen in some idiomatic phrases. To sail close to the wind refers to the risky practice of attempting to fill a ship’s sails with wind without losing control of it. This phrase is now used as an idiom: if you tell someone that they are sailing close to the wind you are warning them that they are doing something that is dangerous or possibly illegal. To batten down the hatches literally refers to closing the entrances to the lower part of a ship when a storm is expected, but metaphorically refers to any preparation to withstand a period of difficulty. If a ship has run aground and is unable to return to the water, it is said to be high and dry , an expression we also use to refer to a person who is left in a difficult situation without any assistance.

Some similar phrases have now lost all their original associations with sailing. It may come as a surprise to learn that under way , meaning ‘in progress’, was originally a nautical phrase meaning ‘in motion’. Another example is by and large : to the old sailors, this meant ‘in all conditions’, whether sailing into the wind (sailing by) or with the wind (sailing large), but it is doubtful whether many current English speakers are aware of this when they use the phrase to mean ‘in general’.

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Sailing in Metaphors

By Sheila McCurdy

If you are reading this, sailing has had or will have a profound influence on your life in some way. There is, of course, the physical aspect of sailing—that of making a complex vessel advance through water, harnessing invisible forces.

There is the communal aspect of living and working with others in a confined space for extended periods. There is the practical aspect of planning, preparing, and then responding to a raft of eventualities. We study. We learn. We listen. We screw up and learn again. We find joy in the places we go. We grieve injury and loss. We doubt and overcome. We remember what we have heard or seen on the water when any number of situations arise on land, and are likely to say, “It is just like being on a boat.” Sailing is a metaphor for everything.

There are writers and poets who can conjure language to say what we feel. I offer this sampling that crystalizes some of the feelings for the sea that we have in common.

Marcel Proust was very good at writing long, involved works, but in this quote from Remembrance of Things Past , he seems to sum up why some of us return to passage-making again and again.

The only true voyage of discovery, the only fountain of Eternal Youth, would be not to visit strange lands but to possess other eyes, to behold the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to behold the hundred universes that each of them beholds, that each of them is…

Jerome K. Jerome wrote Three Men in a Boat . It is a lovely yarn about sharing time with chosen friends. I aspire to his list of essentials.

Throw the lumber over, man! Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need—a homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends worthy of name, someone to love and someone to love you, a cat, a dog, and…enough to eat and enough to wear, and a little more than enough to drink; for thirst is a dangerous thing.

Rear Admiral Grace Hopper (U.S.N. ret.) was a practical and persuasive mathematician turned computer scientist. Starting during World War II, she showed the Navy that computers could compile as well as do arithmetic. She did not shy from hard work in a hostile environment. She was one of the oldest active-duty officers in the Navy when she retired at the age of 79. She was fond of an aphorism popularized by John A. Shedd in Salt from My Attic :

A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.

Samuel Johnson was trenchant in his assessment of shipboard life.

Being in a ship is like being in a jail, with a chance of being drowned.

We all know that command at sea is not a democracy. In The Republic , Plato considered the metaphor of a “ship of state” as a warning for how the rule of the people could cause jeopardy. On board Plato’s ship are the captain, the crew, the crew leader, and a navigator.

The captain has power but is “a bit deaf and short-sighted, and similarly limited in seamanship.” The crew is querulous. Each thinks he knows better than the others and tries to influence the captain. The navigator is thought to be a useless “stargazer,” but is the one who has the knowledge to lead them all safely and peacefully.

“They don’t understand that a true captain must pay attention to the seasons of the year, the sky, the stars, the winds, and all that pertains to his craft, if he’s really to be the ruler of a ship… Don’t you think that the true captain will be called a real stargazer, a babbler, and a good-for-nothing…?”

Emily Dickinson never saw the sea, but she captured the sense of how integral, yet off-balance, an immense and immediate ocean can make us feel.

I stepped from plank to plank

So slow and cautiously;

The stars about my head I felt,

About my feet the sea.

I knew not but the next

Would be my final inch, —

This gave me a precarious gait

Some call experience.

The writer of The Prophet , Kahlil Gibran , opened his story as his central character is about to board a ship. The prophet may have felt compelled to express his guiding principles before embarking on a voyage, and he may have had good reason to be thinking of catastrophic danger.

Your reason and your passion are the rudder

and the sails of your seafaring soul.

If either your sails or your rudder be broken,

you can but toss and drift,

or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.

Henry David Thoreau was a champion of self-reliance and independence— qualities that appeal to all offshore sailors. Here he draws a comparison that brings a knowing smile.

The sail, the play of its pulse so like our own lives:

so thin and yet so full of life,

so noiseless when it labors hardest,

so noisy and impatient when least effective.

Love and Life

Maya Angelou combines a surprising quartet in this poem. She seems much less picky about her boats than her men.

Sure I’ll sail them

Show me the boat,

If it’ll float,

I’ll sail it.

Yes, I’ll love them.

If they’ve got style,

to make me smile,

I’ll love them.

‘Course I’ll live it.

Just enough breath, Until my death,

And I’ll live it.

I’m not ashamed to tell it,

I’ve never learned to spell it,

Not Failure.

Emily Brontë brought a gothic quality to her view of the sea, perhaps because the one with which she was most familiar was the North Sea. Constantin Héger, the head of a school she attended, said, “She should have been a man—a great navigator.”

Weep not, but think that I have passed

Before thee o’er a sea of gloom.

Have anchored safe, and rest at last

Where tears and mourning cannot come.

’Tis I should weep to leave thee here

On that dark ocean sailing drear,

With storms around and fears before,

And no kind light to point the shore.

Past, Present, and Future

Joseph Conrad delved into most every human condition in his writings of the sea. In their novel Romance , Conrad and Ford Madox Ford conflate the passage of time with the passage of life and perception. It is a stream of thought that might occur on a solitary night watch.

Journeying in search of romance—and that, after all, is our business in this world—is much like trying to catch the horizon. It lies a little distance before us, and a little distance behind—about as far as the eye can carry. One discovers that one has passed through it just as one passed what is today our horizon—One looks back and says. ‘Why there it is.’ One looks forward and says the same.

In his poem, Ulysses , Alfred, Lord Tennyson wrote of the hero reflecting on his heroic youth:

All times I have enjoy’d

Greatly, have suffer’d greatly, both with those

That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when

Thro’ scudding drifts the rainy Hyades

Vext the dim sea.

But, even in old age, he was still rallying for adventure:

Come, my friends,

‘Tis not too late to seek a newer world.

Push off, and sitting well in order smite

The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds

To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths

Of all the western stars until I die.

Sheila McCurdy has cruised and raced over 100,000 miles offshore. She is a trustee of the Mystic Seaport Museum and a member of US Sailing’s Training and Safety at Sea committees. She has moderated Safety at Sea Seminars across North America since 2002 and contributes to other training programs. For 20 years, she served on the Fales Committee, the civilian advisory group to the sailing programs of the U.S. Naval Academy. She holds a Master of Marine Affairs degree from the University of Rhode Island and a 100-ton USCG master’s license.

A past commodore of the Cruising Club of America, she is writing the history of the CCA for the club’s 100th Anniversary. She serves on the club’s Safety & Seamanship Committee and Bonnell Cove Foundation. She is also a past recipient of Fifteen Thrashes, the Bermuda Race 15 Plus Award, and in 2019 was presented with the club’s Nye Trophy for her leadership in the yachting world and for her many successes in yacht racing. She lives with her husband, David Brown (BOS/NBP), in Rhode Island. They own the McCurdy & Rhodes Concordia 38 cutter Selkie . Editor’s note: This article was originally published in the 2021 edition of Voyages , the Cruising Club of America’s annual publication, and is reprinted with permission. Special thanks to CCA Commodore J. W. Robert Medland and Voyages Editors Zdenka & Jack Griswold.

The Cruising Club of America comprises more than 1,300 accomplished ocean sailors who willingly share their cruising expertise through books, articles, blogs, and onboard opportunities. Together with the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, the CCA organizes the legendary Newport Bermuda Race. With active involvement and support from its 14 stations and posts around the United States, Canada and Bermuda, the club focuses significant national and international outreach efforts on ocean safety and seamanship training through hands-on seminars. For more information, visit cruisingclub.org .

Sailboat Retrospective

Chart a new course with your agile team or start a long journey off right

What is a Sailboat retrospective?

The Sailboat retrospective template is swimming in metaphor. If you can get the whole team on board, it can be a lot of fun (okay, we’ll stop with the puns now).

The Sailboat retro is almost game-like in the way it turns obstacles into objects to sail past, and goals into tropical finish lines.

Time to take your scrum team on a journey of continuous improvement.

What are the Sailboat retrospective prompts?

Let’s breakdown the metaphorical categories of this retrospective technique. Your team are a Sailboat, you’re all on board, sailing toward the island. It could be a speedboat or a cruiser. Just make sure it’s not a mutinous pirate ship!

This is your destination, your final goal, your objective or vision. This doesn’t have to be a single thing, it can be a metric you want to hit, or a list of goals you’d like to achieve, or something even less concrete, like a state you want your team to be in.

Example: Close 100 percent of tickets at the end of the sprint, be in a rhythm of shipping features regularly

Large stones, coral reefs, icebergs, pirates—these are things boats should generally avoid. Things in this category are the potential risks you know about and should try to steer clear of.

Example: Last sprint there were too many super tickets causing bottlenecks! Let’s have stakeholders break them down into small tasks to keep reporting consistent

Obviously your sailboat isn’t going to get anywhere if the anchor is weighing you down. Things in this category do just that: keep you from hitting your goals. Think of things in this category as the items or issues on your team that need to be resolved to make your journey more efficient. If the rocks are external, the anchor represents internal challenges.

Example: Spring break is coming up! Have a plan to balance workload for the parents on the team who have to take time off for their kids

A sailboat can reach its destination faster with a strong wind. Things in this category help your team . They can be things you are already aware of that you know help, or things that would help if you could have them next time.

Example: A strong Q2 budget for ad spend means we can test more versions of our winning creative

Benefits of the Sailboat retrospective

The Sailboat retrospective requires a bit of imagination but it’s fundamentally a visual way of running a retrospective. The visual imagery forces people to think outside the box, which can result in some creative solutions.

You might also notice that there’s a lot of present tense bias in some of the phrasing of a Sailboat retro, and that’s because this template lends itself well to looking forward . Yes, the name “retrospective” does imply looking back, but some teams can benefit from running a Sailboat retro both before and after a project. As a facilitator, scrum master or product owner you could use it for retrospective, post-mortems, or pre-mortems!

Using the Sailboat technique as a pre-mortem works because there’s a concrete goal—everyone knows where you’re going and why—so it’s easier to focus ideas. If suggestions won’t contribute to this specific journey, they can’t be implemented.

When to do a Sailboat retrospective

Just like the Four Ls retrospective, the Sailboat template can yield a lot of data, thanks to the broad prompts. The big difference here is that the Sailboat retrospective tends to focus that data a little more thanks to the journey metaphor .

It’s also a bit like the Start Stop Continue retro in its bias toward action—you’ve got a destination in mind and you need to incorporate feedback right away if you’re going to get there . Here are few instances where a Sailboat retro could come in handy:

For long journeys

The Sailboat sprint retrospective lends itself well to looking back on large undertakings and prepping for new ones.

Maybe you migrated a portion of your company to a new platform or software and you plan to move the rest of the company next year. Having sailed this particular course before, your team will have a better map of the risks and other hazards.

So in this case, the Sailboat retro could work as a postmortem and a pre-mortem. You know the issues you faced migrating the first half of the company onto the new software, and you’ll have a better idea of what to avoid (and what could help) as you onboard everyone else.

To encourage unity

The Sailboat retrospective is also a great template to use to build team unity. By shifting the view of a simple sprint or project into an ocean-spanning journey, team members start to work together—like a ship’s crew—to make sure the journey goes smoothly for everyone next time.

If you want to increase morale and get the whole team involved, a Sailboat retro can get all hands on deck (sorry, just one more pun).

To have some fun

Some like the Sailboat retro just because it’s a fun way to hold an agile retrospective. Visualizing the team on a boat, steering past craggy rocks on a course to paradise—what’s not to like?

The Sailboat retro also offers the team the chance to do a bit of communal storytelling, with everyone pitching in to figure out how to make their journey successful. Plus, tying goals, hurdles, risks and responsibilities to rich imagery can make those things more memorable.

How to run a Sailboat retro with Parabol

From your dashboard select your team on the right and then hit that vibrant Add Meeting button.

Select Retro Meeting with the arrows, then use the dropdown to select the Sailboat retro template.

The Icebreaker box is checked on by default. You don’t have to do one, but we recommend it. They offer a chance to break the ice and get everyone in a chatty mood for leaving useful feedback.

Hit Start Meeting to kick things off!

Sailboat retrospective template prompts in Parabol

Start your retrospective with an icebreaker

If you’re doing an icebreaker , you’ll have a random question to answer. You can refresh it if you want another option, and of course you can create your own if you want.

Reflect, group, and discuss based on the Sailboat prompts

After the Icebreaker you’ll move on to the reflect stage. This is where you brainstorm what your island, rocks, anchor and wind are. Afterwards, you’ll group themes, do dot voting and finally set action items so you can chart a bold path forward.

Discover 35+ Retrospective Templates in Parabol!

COMMENTS

Sailboat Metaphor
A dynamic sailboat is a better metaphor for life than a pyramid because the key is not which level you reach, but the harmonious integration that you have within yourself, and how that interacts with the world. You are a whole unit moving around in this world, and part of becoming a whole person requires this higher level integration of your ...
The Sailboat Metaphor: Understanding the
The Sailboat Metaphor is a psychological tool designed by Hugo Alberts, a psychologist, researcher, entrepreneur and professor of psychology at the University of Maastricht. This metaphor beautifully illustrates how humans function by comparing human functioning to a sailboat. It's a very simple, yet multi-faceted perspective on the self and understanding this metaphor can help you ...
Sailboat Metaphor: Evolving Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Pyramid
The Sailboat Metaphor. "To use the sailboat metaphor, while we each travel in our own direction, we're all sailing the vast unknown of the sea .". "Note that you don't 'climb' a sailboat like you'd climb a mountain or a pyramid. Instead, you open your sail, just like you'd drop your defenses once you felt secure enough.
The Sailboat Metaphor
The sailboat metaphor compares human functioning to a captain with a sailboat and its journey. The metaphor revolves around three key concepts that are all related to well-being, autonomy, authenticity, and resilience. In this video, you will learn about the metaphor as a whole.
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Kaufman developed an alternate metaphor, the sailboat, which aims to help us better understand how fundamental human needs operate. The boat represents the security needs of safety, connection and self-esteem; whereas, the sail stands for the growth needs of exploration, love and purpose (Kaufman & Feingold, 2022).
Replacing the Pyramid of Needs with a Sailboat of Needs
Kaufman proposes three such needs: feeling safe, feeling that we belong and are not being rejected by others, and protecting our self-esteem. In other words, we need to feel safe both in the ...
The Sailboat Metaphor
The Sailboat Metaphor - A model of teacher-student interaction00:00 Introduction00:19 Who am I?00:52 What is Positive Psychology?02:17 The Sailboat Metaphor ...
PDF The Sailing Boat Metaphor
The Sailing Boat Metaphor. The function of this metaphor is in setting a context and a direction for the work. It contains elements of workability and creative hopelessness, values, acceptance and committed action. I have found I use it in the place where I might use the 'man in the hole' metaphor, though for me personally I find that this ...
Navigating Life Using the Sailboat Metaphor's Wisdom
The sailboat metaphor, created by Hugo Alberts, offers a powerful perspective on human functioning. It's not just a concept - it's a practical and transformative tool for people of all ages. Just like the elements that drive a sailboat forward, this metaphor showcases how different aspects of our lives come together. ...
The Sailboat Metaphor
The sailboat metaphor compares human functioning to a captain with a sailboat and its journey. The metaphor revolves around three key concepts that are all related to well-being, autonomy, authenticity, and resilience. In this video, you will learn about how the captain is the master of the boat and is a symbol of autonomy, as the captain ...
"Sailboat Metaphor"
All of your energy and focus is directed toward increasing the stability of the boat. The human needs that comprise the boat are safety, connection, and self-esteem — security needs that, under good conditions, work together toward greater stability.". Continue reading his updated metaphor to understand better how humans adapt to their ...
The Sailboat Metaphor
Fig. 1 The Sailboat Metaphor. A graphical representation of the 8 elements of the boat metaphor is shown below. The two lines in the central circle divide the elements in two differential processes: elements 2-6 refer to processes "inside" the self. Elements 1, 7, and 8 refer to processes "outside" the self. 5.
The Sailboat Metaphor Part 1
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Using Metaphor to Unlock Career Narratives: The Sailboat Metaphor
Metaphors are powerful. By dissecting this metaphor, we can understand the various parts of the sailboat that represent valuable pieces of our clients' career stories. The water — represents the reality and workplace environment in which clients navigate their careers. The water is not always calm.
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A good metaphor for change in the workplace is that of a sailboat. When you point your sailboat in the right direction and let the wind do the work, you will go to different and innovative places, sometimes breaking records in the process.
Boat Metaphor
Boat Metaphor. This is a hybrid of the Russ Harris' boat with monsters metaphor and weather as emotions metaphor to explain commitment to values. You have an indestructible ship that only you can steer. You have serveral compasses on your ship (that represent different values).
Sailboat Retrospective: How to Make One in 4 Steps
The use of the sailboat metaphor makes it far more approachable and digestible. A team doesn't need to be well-versed in agile concepts and terminology to understand how to make this technique work for them. Additionally, many retrospective techniques look mostly at what went well and what didn't during a sprint. This format digs deeper and ...
PDF This course is designed for those SAIL BOAT "SOARING IN YOUR METAPHOR
metaphor of the Sail Boat Metaphor to address the 8 essential elements. SAIL BOAT METAPHOR This masterclass in positive psychology is designed to help you become a strength based practitioner in your own ﬁeld of d church leadership. "SOARING IN YOUR STRENGTHS." Register : from 24th August 2020 www.vitalconnexions.org
All at Sea: Nautical metaphors in the English language
A mainstay was originally a rope that supported the main mast of a ship, but now is a metaphor referring to any person or thing that provides crucial support, as in tourism is a mainstay of the economy. The influence of sailing can also be seen in some idiomatic phrases.
Sailboat Metaphor Flashcards
The Sailboat metaphor can help us develop an accurate view of ourselves by comparing our everyday life to a sailboat. We need to start with self-awareness and begin to discover our true identity before we will be able to have a positive relationship with ourselves. Click the card to flip 👆. 1 / 13.
PositivePsychology.com Blog
More Than 1,000+ Science-Based Articles. Welcome to the PositivePsychology.com blog, home to a wealth of science-based resources for helping professionals. Learn and apply the latest insights in the field to help more people enjoy optimal wellbeing and a state of flourishing.
Sailing in Metaphors
By Sheila McCurdy If you are reading this, sailing has had or will have a profound influence on your life in some way. There is, of course, the physical aspect of sailing—that of making a complex vessel advance through water, harnessing invisible forces. There is the communal aspect of living and working with others in a confined space for extended periods. There is the practical aspect of ...
Sailboat Retrospective
The Sailboat retrospective template is swimming in metaphor. If you can get the whole team on board, it can be a lot of fun (okay, we'll stop with the puns now). The Sailboat retro is almost game-like in the way it turns obstacles into objects to sail past, and goals into tropical finish lines.

Sailboat Metaphor

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The guide to retrospectives – remote, in person, or hybrid

Master the sailboat retrospective in 4 steps

What is the sailboat retrospective?

The 4 steps to a sailboat retrospective

1. Rocks (risks)

2. Anchors (delaying issues)

3. Wind (helping teams)

4. Land (the goal)

Why the sailboat is such a useful retrospective

Keeping collaboration and confidentiality high with sailboat retrospectives

3 FAQs about the sailboat retrospective

1. Why is the sailboat retrospective so widely used?

2. Is a sailboat and speedboat retrospective the same?

3. What do anchors represent in the sailboat retrospective?

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All at Sea: Nautical metaphors in the English language

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Sailing in Metaphors

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Sailboat Retrospective

What is a Sailboat retrospective?

What are the Sailboat retrospective prompts?

Benefits of the Sailboat retrospective

When to do a Sailboat retrospective

For long journeys

To encourage unity

To have some fun

How to run a Sailboat retro with Parabol

Start your retrospective with an icebreaker

Reflect, group, and discuss based on the Sailboat prompts