However, change is what shapes our personalities and enhances our lives, but where do our needs come from? How can we liberate our relationships and selves from our irrational needs?
We have the ability and resources to change any aspect of our lives that we see fit, but we must learn how to do it first.
How Do We Determine Our Needs?
Everything about us is a result of our actions, attitudes, and goals, as well as our genetics, educational backgrounds, and environmental influences. Our personalities are shaped by the experiences and lessons we have as children, which affect how our brain develops and how its neurons are wired. Because of this, each of us has a unique personality as well as social and emotional needs that guide our lives and affect how we interact with others.
Psychologists confirm that negative past experiences produce a set of emotions and ideas that are hidden from conscious awareness and have an impact on our behavior. This causes us to develop a variety of unconscious defense mechanisms that stop us from acting on unfavorable thoughts. These defense mechanisms are the main cause of people's repetitive patterns, which lead to self-limiting beliefs and negative emotions.
People's needs can be summed up in two ways, either from the experience repetition, which typically arises in response to the need to have those experiences or feelings again, or from the deprivation of something, which makes us want to have it. This issue arises when we are in conflict with others and experience feelings of anger, sadness, or fear without understanding why we are experiencing these emotions or where they originate, which is known as an unconscious need.
We discovered how to meet our needs to survive during our early years. The first people to notice that we cry and kick to satisfy our needs are usually our parents. Children who have a caregiver or parents who give them a loving environment and financial security will simultaneously have different needs in their relationships compared to children who discover early on that the people who are supposed to be the source of their well-being won't satisfy their needs for care and attention. However, adults learn this lesson much later in life.
A set of unconscious needs govern each child's personality, which is shaped by their genes, upbringing, and education. These needs inspire the development of coping mechanisms.
The majority of a child's unconscious needs become conscious as they get older. Unfortunately, the fact that some of us occasionally experience mood swings, find it difficult to work out disagreements with others, and continue to have self-destructive thoughts provides enough proof to support the idea that some of us still possess unconscious needs for which we lack the means to satisfy them. However, the effects of these unconscious needs can be seen in relationships.
Own up to our needs
It is challenging to have a conscious, healthy relationship with others when our relationship with ourselves is so destructive. However, when something or someone provokes us, it will be reflected as negative feelings because our unconscious needs are constantly active and directed toward others—particularly the people we love most. Therefore, our interactions and moods have an impact on the things we do and think.
As a general rule, if we don't have compassion for ourselves, we won't ever have compassion for others; if we're not satisfied with our current circumstances, we won't ever be satisfied with our circumstances with others; and if we don't love ourselves, we won't ever love anyone else because all of our positive relationships are a reflection of how we feel about ourselves.
We can bring awareness into our unconscious state by being so accountable for our needs that we become aware of our projected needs and stop viewing our friends, family, and spouses as sources of our well-being or happiness, and start viewing them as they truly are, as well as vice versa.
We cannot see the other person's best qualities when we let our needs determine our interactions with them, and it prevents others from being themselves and from leading the lives they desire. While we may not be entirely accountable for our past, we are accountable for the things we can control including our present-day attitudes, actions, and our contentment.
Some questions should be replaced, such as: Why do they hurt me? Why don’t they do what I want them to do? What do I ask them to do for me that I need to do for myself? Or why don't I figure it out myself so I don’t experience this situation again?"
It is simple to point the finger at others, but challenging to look within. Relationships are the ideal means of assisting us in becoming conscious of our underlying needs, liberating ourselves from them, enabling flourishing and growth, and improving our relationships with ourselves and, ultimately, with others. Therefore, relationships are crucial for our emotional intelligence growth.
How Do We Start Talking to Ourselves Positively?
By analyzing daily motivations and looking at the relationships we have throughout our lives, we can make the subconscious conscious. Every emotion that you experience—whether it's sadness, rage, or fear—represents a self-limiting belief that leads to emotional and behavioral reactions that form unfavorable routines.
Anyone who wants to be happier can always follow these steps to activate their positive self-talk and recognize their needs, regardless of whether you know a frustrated parent who stops talking to their child because they chose to study a major they don’t want, an angry friend who tries to influence people who do things they don’t like, a jealous husband who controls his wife, or anyone else.
1. Self-Awareness
We grow when we become aware of our unconscious urges, needs, or desires. Therefore, we must be conscious of the times and ways in which these stimuli affect our daily activities. Three techniques can help us become more self-aware:
- We can become aware of undesirable thoughts by practicing mindfulness meditation, which also speeds up our recovery from amygdala-controlled states.
- Experiencing new things, which enables us to understand how we feel and how to behave in new situations.
- Feedback from those we love, no matter how painful or unpleasant, prompts us to become aware of our unconscious states.
2. Examining Past Experiences
It can be beneficial to comprehend where our needs arise once they become unconscious. So instead of spending as much time worrying about things that are out of our control, we use the past as a guide to help us advance in the present. Additionally, when our needs are met, particularly during times of conflict, we are motivated to show compassion to both others and ourselves.
To better understand our conscious needs we must ask ourselves, "Where do these motivating feelings come from?" and “What happened to us in the past or during our childhood that caused this need?”
3. Consider the Outcomes
After becoming conscious of our needs, we should consider the effects that our habits have had on those needs. We must ask ourselves, "What is the consequence of allowing my needs to control my thoughts, actions, and feelings?" and "How do my needs affect me and the rest of my relationships?" before deciding whether and how to change our habits. Also, we must ask."How different would my life be if I had control over my needs?"
4. Identify the Root Causes
If we decide to change a habit because it is not beneficial to us, we must be careful that the change will happen despite the challenges. Growth will never happen without realizing our motivation to change and without asking ourselves, "Why is this important to us?" or "Why do we even care?" By providing answers to these questions, we can discover the causes of our needs and motivational drives, which will enable us to achieve any goal and break any unwanted habits.
5. Developing a Strategy
After deciding to take charge of our needs, we must create a final plan to separate our needs from our relationships. We need to think of something to say, believe, or do when our negative emotions are at their peak so that it will help us feel calm during heated times. We can decide to run, take three deep breaths, consider another person's needs or other options in a particular situation, or remember the characteristics of our unconscious needs and motivational drives. Whatever approach we choose, as long as it prevents us from projecting our irrational needs onto others, it will be effective.
After a period of practicing positive self-talk, neural connections between regions of the brain, including those that are crucial for the growth of various emotional and social intelligence skills, will be strengthened. This will change our behavior and release us from our unconscious needs.
We must take responsibility for our thoughts, feelings, and actions if we want to free ourselves from our unconscious needs, wounds, and past. Also, this helps to free our relationships from suffering on the outside. We will never be able to have a better relationship with anyone else than we can have with ourselves.
Therefore, we will be able to love ourselves and others freely because we will be able to meet our needs without the assistance of our friends, family, and spouses. Instead, we will love them because they improve our lives and make us happier, healthier, and more content than we were before.
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