Maslow's hierarchy of needs

I learnt about Maslow's hierarchy of needs during my university when i was taking Management and Organization module i believe. Basically, Maslow's hierarchy of needs reflects on the needs of human beings to achieve happiness. More can be found on the wonderful wikipedia about the topic.

So this pyramid suddenly came up to me when i am evaluating my life. I have no problem with my physiological and safety aspects just because my parents have provided for me a relatively comfortable life. I am still trying to come to a conclusion about the upper levels, to what extent does the factors affect my happiness. Because i believe that the factors are based on personal preferences, like if one is happy with just having one good friend, no reason he/she should be any more unhappy than one who is not content with hanging out with like ten friends or something.

All i know is, my esteem level of happiness apparently have regular recession like the semi-conductor industry. In fact i think now i am going through some low self-esteem phase, which probably have to be overcome by some self-pampering or some sort. O well, what to do, even though i know that i am really quite lucky in various aspects of my life, i always wonder if anything i can do to make it better. But then again, i do not know what is better...