The Lifesaving Work of Understanding Emotional Needs
This might feel a little harsh, so hear me out...
There's nothing that more clearly demonstrates to me a lack of emotional awareness - and the presence of emotionally neglectful and abusive behavior - than someone showing that they don't believe emotional needs exist.
The easiest way to pick up on this is when we notice people casually dismissing big feelings as small deals, "dramatic", "weak" or "nonsense".
When we casually prioritize emotional needs over physical and material needs.
Or when we don't recognize emotional fulfillment as a need at all, and put things like affection, appreciation, connection, acceptance, belonging, vulnerability and intimacy in a bucket of "wants".
A bucket of "optionals" if you have the time & privilege after the bills are paid.
And if someone had said any of this to me a couple of years ago I would've written them off as dramatic...so if that's you now, I get it.
I was in this camp. A lot of us were raised in this camp.
We can't help our conditioning. We didn't choose it. And it makes sense for us to think feelings are no big deal when alllll of the evidence shoved in our faces our entire lives supports this.
But I think you're reading this to grow, so it's my job to point out that any time we want to come to a true, whole, grown conclusion, we have to be responsible enough to check for the evidence we missed.
And the truth is, this "feelings aren't important, they're just feelings" conditioning is hurting us all, and it shows.
We hurt ourselves with how we dismiss our own emotional needs. And we hurt others when we project those beliefs onto others.
But the more important thing is this:
We have the power to stop the pain by learning the truth.
And I mean really learn this. Let it sink into your bones.
The Reality is That Emotional Needs Exist. And Understanding Them is Lifesaving Work.
We know emotional needs exist because we all turn desperate or belligerent when ours are going painfully unmet. Nobody's above this truth.
We know emotional needs exist because we all seek to know and be known, love and be loved, respect and be respected, like our lives depend on it (because they do).
We know emotional needs exist because we thrive in loving community and fall apart or harden in isolation and lovelessness.
But if all of that isn't enough, we know emotional needs are real because suicide rates don't exist in a bubble of materially impoverished communities.
People can "have it all" materially and physically and still fall victim to clinical depression and suicide.
People can live physically and materially safe-ish lives and still fall victim to depression and suicide.
We treat this like it's a mystery. The math is staring us in the face.
People who fall victim to depression and suicide have critical emotional needs that have gone grossly unmet for extended periods of time.
This includes the emotional needs of feeling safe and secure that go unmet in material instability.
And when our emotional needs go grossly unmet for extended periods of time, we lose our lease on life.
If we don't get our needs met - if we never get a chance to feel that lease on life return to us - we stop feeling a burning desire to live.
Then, eventually, many of us surrender.
But only after fighting like hell for those emotional needs to be met. Even if the fight most days is a fight to get out of bed in the morning.
Maybe it would help for us to accept that these needs exist.
Emotional needs exist.
We recognize material neglect because we acknowledge that we have material needs.
To recognize emotional neglect requires us to acknowledge that we also have emotional needs.
They're not basic "wants". They are not "luxuries".
They are not optional.
These needs are the food and water of our spirit and without them we whither.
If we accept this, then maybe we can accept that educating ourselves on our emotional needs will actually help us learn to meet them in healthy, constructive, life sustaining ways.
Then everyone is happier, loving, feeling loved, thriving, and able to live.
What Are Our Emotional Needs?
In my work I stumbled across a list of Universal Human Needs.
It surprised me how many of these needs were purely based on emotions instead of material and physical survival.
Look:
Acceptance, belonging, consideration, trust, choice, spontaneity, authenticity, presence, joy, humor, clarity, ease...
The list goes on.
Like the screenshot mentions, this list isn't exhaustive nor definitive, but as a starting point it feels really true to me.
Imagine a life without ever feeling accepted.
Imagine a life without ever feeling considered.
Imagine a life without ever feeling belonging.
Without ever feeling joy.
A life where you've never felt inclusion, closeness, empathy, support, or warmth.
Imagine that life.
I don't know about you, but these sounds like painful lives to me. I know firsthand because I've lived seasons of life without these things.
They were far more painful than the seasons I spent broke, yet laughing.
Financially struggling, yet loved and supported.
My lease on life diminished the longer these emotionally famished seasons went on.
But the more aware I become of my needs, the more I accept them as true, real, and necessary, the more I'm able to stop calling myself "too emotional" and focus on finding constructive, healthy solutions for getting those needs met...
The more I love to live, and live to love.
Because while living a life where your material needs are met might be a "good life" - living one where your emotional needs are met is a life that feels good to live.
And a life that feels good to live will always be a life that's worth living.
Identify Your Most Critical Emotional Needs (Activity)
You want to really get clear on something that will help your mental health in the short term and long term?
