I would like to talk to you about your needs…
But I’d like you to pause for a moment before I do that. I’d like you to pause and focus your attention inward for a moment, and see if you can notice any thoughts, ideas, emotion or images that this sentence initiated in you…your reaction to being asked to talk about your needs.
Even if it was not a word-based reaction, try now to put some words to what you’ve just noticed. If your reaction did have words, be with them for a moment and try to let them develop.
Ok.
Now, if you’re the type of person that might forget what this response was through the course of reading this article, (and I’d attest that would be most people!) I’ll encourage you to write down what you noticed and what your reaction was.
Got it? Great.
You now have a reference point for what some of your automatic ideas, notions and sensations are in response to the concept of your ‘needs.’ This will be helpful later on, for you to check back to see if you’d like to consciously or actively amend any of these after reading what I have to say. Or just to see where you are at with this topic presently.
I’d also like to acknowledge that if you actually did this check-in exercise - and I hear you if you were tempted to just keep going and not actually engage with the question ‘experientially’ (this can be difficult I know!) - that you just took a gentle and preliminary step towards self-needs work. You took a moment to notice and listen to yourself and mindfully engage with your inner experience. Even if just briefly.
This is where it all starts.
This how you start to figure out what you’re made of and what your being, your physical and emotional self, require for you to be well, fulfilled and whole. It’s often how we also better understand what’s not working, why we’re feeling out of sorts, what’s clanging around inside us in a way that won’t seem to go unnoticed.
‘Simple, but not easy’ is the adage that comes to mind.
So, what do I mean when I say I’d like to talk to you about your needs? I figured a definition could help bring some focus to the start of our chat here.
The Oxford Dictionary defines a need as, ‘to require something because it is very important.’[1]
Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary offers several points of meaning, in the affirmative, describing a need as, “a physiological or psychological requirement for the well-being of an organism” and in regards to a state of deficit, “a condition requiring supply or relief.” [2]
It would be hard not to conclude from these descriptions, that a need is something essential. Something non-negotiable. Something rather vital to our existence.
And from a biological, psychological and developmental point of reference, this is certainly my understanding as well.
We are born with needs.
Everything we are compelled to do comes from a need. Needs are our source of motivation, drive and perseverance for the challenges of growth and development life presents us with. Sometimes a want, desire or obligation may seem a more fitting descriptor, but ultimately these too can usually be distilled at their core, to needs. If we have the sense that something is more so a want or preference than a need, what I’ve learned is that this usually points to a more core priority or need being in competition with the need that is seeming like a preference. Or this may be a sign we are going about meeting our needs in a way that disrupts other needs, for a sort of net neutral effect. But I’ll get into that more later on.
Whether these be needs of physical or biological sustainment or replenishing, emotional, cognitive, spiritual, social fulfillment, or needs of our selfhood and identity system - (what I’ve just listed is in matched, ascending order of how our needs appear on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, a succinct diagram and article of which you can find here if you’re unfamiliar: Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Explained (thoughtco.com) ) - everything that we are as human beings, everything that sustains us, that allows us to continue to exist, is based in a need being met.
You could say that essentially needs are our fuel. They are the building blocks for life.
Further more, we do not have choice in having needs. To be alive is to have needs.
My sense is this discussion of needs, at the abstract and theoretical level, could seem obvious and straightforward enough. Yeah, we have needs, what’s the big deal?
Well, what I’d like to propose, and what my work as a therapist has showed me, is that our needs, and not fully understanding them, realizing them or having them met, might actually be one of the biggest deals of all when it comes to our experience as human beings. At least when it comes to our mental and physical health. And if we don’t have our body and our minds, what do we really have? There – broad generalization justified 😊
While I’m not often an advocate for broad sweeping statements, I can say with confidence that people come to counselling or are struggling with mental health difficulties, because one or more of their core needs are unmet, and have been unmet or are in a deficit state, and might have been so for a long time. Yet often times we don’t realize we have an unmet need or collection of neglected needs, until suffering, emotional or physical, make it almost impossible to ignore that that is indeed the case.
Unmet needs, especially ones that have retreated or been pushed out of our conscious awareness, and all the more if unmet chronically over long periods of time, can result in states of depletion, deprivation, illness, confusion and/or dysregulation that have significant impacts on our mental health and life potential. These states of need depletion are ones of marked vulnerability, and are often recognized through collections of thoughts, symptoms, distresses and pains that get labelled as anxiety disorders, mood disorders, personality disorders, or trauma reactions.
I’d like to pause here for a moment to do some guided acknowledgment work. The repair strategy I will offer and discuss at the bottom of this article has acknowledgement as one of the first steps to an intentional needs healing program.
But it’s hard to do the acknowledgement work without some reference points for how to acknowledge. That’s where information and insight come into play.
You being willing to read about your needs fits the knowledge step, now let me help you out a bit with the acknowledgment piece. If these are not relevant to your situation feel free to scroll past.
From a trauma-informed perspective, the following mental health concerns can be described in terms of their unmet need or needs deficits accordingly:
Depression – marked by deficit states in regards to supported mood, sense of purpose or motivation, energy, physical regulation (eating, sleeping, self-care), hope or enjoyment, sense of belonging or connection to others.
These deficit states are connected to unmet needs for safety (physical or psychological), deprivation of adequate access to resources (material or psychological, support or help), unmet emotional needs (hope, interest, capability, possibility), unmet needs for the biological, unmet needs for agency, autonomy and or/freedom (control, confinement, oppression), unmet needs for identity fulfillment, foundations for self esteem or trust being absent or not met.
Anxiety – marked by deficit states in regards to fear or uncertainty tolerance and regulation, support or sense of safety, options for overcoming challenges or difficulties, ability to concentrate or be present, resulting in difficulty making decisions and emotional pain.
These deficit states are connected to unmet needs for safety (physical or psychological), deprivation of adequate access to resources (material or psychological, support or help), unmet needs for agency, autonomy, self-determination, unmet needs for relative certainty/stability or predictability, the need for developmentally matched obligations not being met, foundations for self esteem or trust being absent or not met
PTSD and CPTSD - marked by deficit states in regards to absence of relief from recurrent psychological and emotional pain, flashbacks, nightmares, triggering or reexperiencing the emotions related to the original trauma/threat, perception of inadequate resources to deal with similar threats, fear based beliefs about the safety of the world and other people.
These deficit states are connected to unmet needs for safety at the time of the trauma (physical or psychological), deprivation of adequate access to resources (material or psychological, support or help), unmet emotional needs for validation, support, relearning of agency and autonomy, expectations for independent resolution or not being in pain leading to repression, reactivation and unmet needs for healthy processing of the original trauma
Substance Abuse - marked by deficits in regards to an active ability to control (despite perhaps intention to) the context and quantity of mood altering substance ingestion, despite impairments to relationships, goals, responsibilities and health needs.
Addiction can be seen as a secondary symptom or reaction, or attempt to address more core unmet needs for safety (physical or psychological), deprivation of adequate access to resources (psychological, support or help), unmet needs for novelty, sense of self and identity development, unmet emotional needs for expression, validation, sense of support, learning of agency and autonomy.
If unmet needs can have this powerful of an effect on our wellbeing and functioning, then figuring out what our needs are and meeting them, would seem like a pretty important thing to do. Furthermore if it was just a matter of seeing and then meeting our needs to have a full and well life, then it seems like we essentially have a recipe for health and thriving right in front of us – need understanding + need fulfillment! But what I think we all know on some level, is that getting our needs met, at least the full spectrum of them, is rarely as straightforward a matter as having a need and then meeting it. Aside from perhaps the select few humans on this earth with ample supplies of privilege and ease of access to resources (financial, social, gender or ethnic privilege included), most of us will have to at some point wrestling with meeting certain needs over others, or forgoing some entirely.
And if it’s not as simple a matter as knowing what our needs are and then meeting them, fine, but given how important it is, wouldn’t this mean we’d at least all be dedicated to sorting out what going on there?
Again I wish it was as simple as this, but before we can even get to needs problem solving, most of us first have to face and deal with the confusion and backlash our needs can provoke. Hence the exercise at the beginning of this article.
I’ve heard the mentioning of, or mere suggestions related to ‘need’ acknowledgment elicit responses (in and out of the counselling room) from controversy and protest, to confusion and shutdown, to shame and self-hate, to helplessness and hopelessness.
We don’t want to be ‘needy.’ We don’t want to need too much, or at least not more than it seems like other people are satisfied with. Needs and selfishness, or others being deprived for our benefit might be a concern that gets triggered when the notion of our needs arises. Sometimes even so automatically that we don’t even know what the ‘bad feelings’ related to our needs are (guilt, shame, embarrassment, anger, sadness).
Or maybe our needs only become relevant based on what we ‘deserve’ or have ‘earned.’ Other times need awareness might provoke jealously, anxiety or worthlessness to notice others have access to resources or need options that we don’t.
Sometimes we want our needs to be private. Other times it feels lonely and isolating to be the only one who can meet our needs.
So what do you need? Does it feel like you could accept the answer even if you had it?
There is good reason for this level of complication and contradiction when it comes to our needs.
This is what I have learned, and what I understand to be going on here:
Facing, let alone meeting, our needs requires so much more than what meets the eye or gut reaction. It involves facing our worth, our social, familial, cultural, and/or spiritual narratives and beliefs when it comes to having and not having, of value and deservedness, and it can often (at least for chronically unmet needs) involve facing intergenerational trauma.
I’ve realized, in coming to the above acknowledgement, that this post will need to get split into two parts. With a 2nd part focused on how chronic needs confusion and deficits arise, and in turn what understanding we will need to heal this challenging system that can be getting in the way of everything from having our basic physiological needs met, all the way up to our core needs for selfhood and identity.
I’m left feeling at this point like I want to say more and everything on this topic all at once. It really matters to me, so I want to do it justice. Yet I know I must unpack these ‘hidden need truths’ in a way that creates more clarity than confusion if I’m going to make any meaningful headway on my original talking point of what incredible bearing adequate and balanced need fulfillment has on our lives; on therapy, on growing, on being even the most basic semblance of ok. On this writing project. On being Mind in Body. It’s all based in our needs.
Again simple, and this time, as I’ve noticed in my own response to trying to write about this topic- potentially overwhelming. Yet herein lies a powerful answer. Because there exists reliable approaches for tending to and resolving overwhelm. These as I understanding them are grounded in getting present, noticing the components of the overwhelm, and then prioritizing and reordering the components in a way that aligns with our competencies, available support options and any relevant timelines or urgencies. This returns us to a state of self-leadership and lets us move forward without disorganization and distress.
I had an emotion (a need) – overwhelm – and I noticed it. And it gave me an answer = that needs healing can be so big and extensive that it would benefit from some structure.
And I listened, so now I can give that answer to you.
Conveniently it is an answer that aligns with my intention for what this project was meant to offer: information and guidance. I’m going to post it separately so it doesn’t get lost in this more exploratory chat, but it’s a framework for recognizing and repairing unmet needs.
I’m calling it, The Needs Reunion and Repair Framework.
In as much as I love musing about all the ins and outs of a topic, answers and some form of guidance is what actually helps repair the need that was worth discussing in the first place. And I’ve intentionally made it general enough that it is mere as the name suggests - a framework. That can be used to generate your own answers for yourself.
What I would like to close with is an urging. And I do believe it to be urgent, with the cost of need deficits having such potential for toll on our lives, individually and collectively. Please take some, much needed for all of us in this busy and demanding world, time and space to understand more about what your needs are and which of your unmet needs are impacting your mental and/or physical health. Your deficit states are an answer with a direction for repair and healing.
A call and response, so to speak. I use this phrase often in therapy.
Are you tired, worn down, exhausted even? You have a need for rest. Or perhaps for better or more sustained energy throughout the day, in the form of nutrition, hydration, breaks, exercises, mental and emotional boosts of meaning or purpose. Your needs system will call out for attention with a deficit signal (pain, uncertainty, confusion, freeze or slowing down) if there is a lack until you answer it with acknowledgement and a repair act.
Are you struggling with symptoms of depression, anxiety, trauma reactions, substance misuse - refer again to the acknowledgement section and see if any of the unmet needs mentioned are going on in your life. Then seek the support of therapist or counsellor who can help you uncover what these deficit states are pointing to and what needs need to be prioritized for remedy - this is often less obvious to the untrained eye with these mental health difficulties.
Or are you stressed, confused, unsure of yourself, in a state of doubt and anguish about your life decisions or upcoming choices - there are likely some unmet needs for identity and selfhood understanding, acknowledgment and fulfillment that have gotten to the point that they won’t go unnoticed any longer. This is your chance to listen. There is an answer in the distress and discomfort they are showing you.
This is a really great visual summary of the needs call and response system I’m referring to (for some of our core emotions): WholeHearted School Counseling (@wholeheartedschoolcounseling)
Whatever it may be, listening for and making sense of your need deficits is an essential task for coming home to yourself, for understanding your current mental health difficulties and for being everything from ok, to living in a state of your full potential.
In the mean time, if you have found this topic/discussion thought provoking, imagine you might not be in full awareness or acceptance of all your needs, or just want to know more about what your complete needs picture could be, have a look here: SCW-LARGE.png (1093×1406) (olgaphoenix.com) This Wellbeing Wheel is one of my favourites for a clear outline of our 6 core wellbeing needs (or self care needs as the graphic describes them), as well as tangible examples of how our core needs may present themselves/how they can be met.
I will follow this up with an On Needs Pt.II - a discussion of how our needs come to get lost, repressed, unacknowledged and unmet, as well as how to work with this understanding for more compassion and patience and skill in the process of relearning and nurturing your core self-needs back to their full potential.
In encouragement and care,
Carly
