6 Emotional Needs of Every Human Being.

Do you know someone who is always seeking attention from others by doing something irrelevant?

Why do some people always complain and criticize others?

Are you someone who constantly needs approval from others for their choices?

If you are facing such situations in your life, then I am sure you’re going to love reading my blog.

Think about this for a moment

Have you ever been in a situation when your behavior was considerably worse than expected and due to your emotional outburst, the situation went out of control?

Let’s admit it

We’ve all been there in situations like this.

Our whole life is governed by the way we behave in daily life situations. Our behavior is determined by the emotions we feel in any situation. Feelings are generated by the thoughts we think in a particular situation. So, feelings are responsible for generating our emotions.

Think about it in this way that Thoughts are language of your mind and feelings are language of the body.

 Feelings and emotions are two different entities.

Feelings are what you feel in the body and Emotion is energy in motion. Remember Einstein’s greatest equation, E = mc²

Let me explain it to you with some examples:

You can feel the air, but you cannot see the air. Similarly, you believe in God, but have you seen him?

Most of you will say no.

But many a times you have felt the Almighty’s presence.

Astonishing, Isn’t it?

For instance, when you feel happy, you will have a smile on the face, and you greet every person you meet with a bright smile. So, happiness is the feeling within, and you express it by smile on your face which is Emotion i.e energy in motion

Similarly, when you are feel sad, you want to shed tears and want to be left alone. So sadness is the feeling which you express by shedding tears.

All Human beings express themselves through Emotions. Emotions play a very important role in maintaining healthy relations. It is the emotions that keep us alive. Emotions are the driving force behind the actions we do in our day-to-day activities.

Feelings create Emotions and these Emotions create the state you are in at any given moment of time.

Now you must be wondering what a State is.

Let me explain a State and different types of States.

State means the way you feel at any given moment of time.

Just check yourself now with me at this moment, while reading my blog, how you are feeling deep within?

Are you are satisfied, calm and contended with situations or events going on in your life right at this moment?

                                     OR

 Are you unsatisfied, irritated, always expecting more from people around you?

Common be honest with yourself.

Now if you are in any of the above situation, then it is determining one of the states you are in. That means you are either in resourceful state or unresourceful state.

Let’s see the meaning of resourceful state and unresourceful state.

Resourceful state simply means that you are feeling happy, contented and grateful for events or situations in your life.

Unresourceful state means that you are feeling irritated, weak, drained out, too many expectations leading to frustration, anxiety.

Now let me ask you, after understanding this aren’t you becoming more aware of your present state?

 I am sure you are.

Now let me tell you the fact that you can’t remain in resourceful state every minute of every single day. Because every minute of the day situations are not the same. And you must act according to the situations that you face daily. But by being consciously aware of your emotions, you can change your unresourceful state into a resourceful state.

Before moving further let me give you a quick fix to come out of unresourceful state.

Change your physiology or body language and you will automatically shift from Unresourceful state to resourceful state.

Let me explain you with an example:

Whenever you’re feeling unresourceful, your shoulders are stooped, your face is frowning, and you’re facing downward.

Once you realize this, Immediately straighten your back, widen your shoulders, bring a smile on your face and start to move a few steps from wherever you are currently and say to yourself “ I am enough”. You can start to feel the difference in your internal state after doing this.

Now you have understood clearly that feelings generate emotions and these emotions determine your state of being.

Now let’s dive in and understand the 6 emotional needs and the way these needs drive and control your life.

• The Need of Certainty
• The Need of Newness or Uncertainty
• The Need of Significance
• The Need To be Loved
• The Need for Growth
• The Need for Contribution

Let’s understand them one by one:

The Need of Certainty

It simply means that you want to become certain or sure that

whatever your needs are that will be fulfilled during your life span. For instance, if you are getting food to eat, house to live and clothes to wear today then you will have to make sure that at least these basic needs will be present all your life. This emotional need drives you to work(business/job) for it.

For example, if your kids are getting good grades in their class, then you also want to make sure that they continue to do so in their coming years of further education. So, you make sure to provide your kids with good coaching class, good books, and good environment at home for his/her growth and development.

The Need of Newness or Uncertainty

Now, however certain, or sure you are about your basic needs in your life, but there is something that drives you to do something new or bring little newness in your daily life.

We as human beings, always want something new in our daily life. Life becomes quite boring when we perform same tasks day in and day out. This happens in our relationships too.

 You will agree with me, when I tell you that this happens specially in husband-wife relationship, where after spending few years together they both tend to get bored. This is where the need of newness arises.

Few more examples of this need of newness are as follows:

• You have many clothes to wear but you get a feeling that you want to buy new clothes.
• You eat a good home cooked meal everyday with your family, but you feel like going and eating out in the restaurant with some friends and have some leisure time with them.
• You have a good house still after a year or so you feel that you should change the color of walls or change few décor items or get the house renovated.

The Need of Significance

Significance is something for which baby cries and man dies

The word Significance here means being of importance to someone.

Everyone needs significance. The above quote means that many times a child cries to seek attention or significance and a soldier loses his life in a war to show his significance for the country.

Significance is the strongest emotional need that drives us.

In this world, everyone wants to feel important and significant.

Some people can feel important or significant by creating success, health, beautiful relationships, on the other hand

Some people will feel important or significant by creating failure, diseases, failed relationships and so on.

For instance, if some person becomes successful, he will be praised by family and friends. So, this person is gaining importance by creating success.

Similarly, if someone falls sick and family members and friends start taking care of that person, then this person is getting sympathy or significance from family and friends by falling sick, as they were not paying attention to him when before he had fallen sick,

If you have small children at your home specially aged 2-6 years, then you must have noticed that sometimes when you get busy in your work and you are not paying attention to them then they start throwing toys or start crying or start making loud noises just to seek your attention.

Can I be totally honest with you?

If this need is your strongest emotional need, then you are creating a painful life for yourself.

The Need to be Loved

We all want to be loved by others. This is the inner desire of every human being. You all will agree with me on this fact that many times we do so many things for our family members, parents, and friends and in return we expect only love and significance from them. But when we don’t get that love from them its hurts us deeply.

This is one of the strong needs for every person.

All these emotional needs generate feelings which in turn generate emotions that can give us pain as well as pleasure.

Why do I say this?

I say this because the responses you encounter after expressing these emotions depends totally on the other person or people.

Let’s consider the example of a housewife.

It’s a familiar story and it goes like this

She makes sure that the house is kept clean and tidy daily.

One fine day, she tries some different healthy recipe for newness. Now she expects her family members (in-laws, kids, husband) to appreciate her work and make her feel significant person of the house and she will feel loved by them.

But may be her husband had a bad day at work and her in-laws are facing some health issues they do not pay attention to the well-maintained house. No one praises her for new recipe she tried. Because of this behavior (emotional reaction) of family members, she feels less significant and not loved by anyone.

                                          OR…

Everyone notices and compliments her for the well-maintained house. She is praised for trying the new recipe by kids too. Due to this, she considers herself as an important member of the family who is significant and loved by everyone.

So now I say again that, these needs of certainty, newness, significance and to be loved can either generate feeling of pain or pleasure.

On the Contrary,

If your driving force is the Need of Growth and Need of Contribution, then your happiness will not be dependent on people, but it will be dependent on the process.

Let’s consider the same example of a housewife. If she feels that even if no one is praising me, but I am the important member of the family, I am putting my best efforts for overall well-being of all the members of the family. Then her happiness is not dependent on the reactions of the family members and she enjoys performing her roles and responsibilities.

Sometimes all you need is just accepting yourself and the situation as it is and not judging or expecting anything from anyone.  

I am sure you must have got the answers to the questions, I asked you at the beginning of the blog.

  Always remember this powerful statement by Wayne Dyer:

If you cannot keep yourself happy, then you are a burden on someone else.