What You Really Need

First a quick update:

“Emotional freedom guarantees success:”
Many people have been asking for help, saying that they long to break away from the daily grind and start living a life full of abundance. The real breakthrough comes from emotional freedom and I have just finished creating a complete turnkey solution that allows anyone to create a complete “life makeover.” If you are ready to “unlearn” all of the negative programming and change the way you feel, then this is for you. I am offering this to only 100 of my subscribers and now there are only 22 left, so hurry.

“Teens burn boy – psychopaths & violent behavior”
5 teens were charged in the burning of 15-year-old boy. Michael Brewer was burned on 80% of his body after assailants doused him with rubbing alcohol and lit him on fire. The youngest boy was just 13 years of age. Why did these teens commit this crime? Are they sociopathic? What causes violent behavior in teens? Should they be charged as adults? Read the transcript of the radio interview I gave to Russ Morley WFTL 850.

Now, let’s talk about what you really need.

In the 1980s, Australian rock band, INXS, had a big hit with a song “What you need”:

Don’t you get sad and lonely
You need a change from what you do all day
Ain’t no sense in all your crying
Just pick it up and throw it into shape, ooh yeah

That’s why
You need
Ooh that’s why,
This is what you need, I’ll give you what you need

Of course, INXS was referring to love, romantic love, fun and escape. And as I reveal in my book, “Soul Mates”, love is one of our primary needs: 

“In his book The Science of Love, Anthony Walsh defines love as “that which satisfies our need to receive and bestow affection and nurturing; to give and be given assurances of value, respect, acceptance and appreciation; and to feel secure in our unity with, and belonging to, a particular, family.”

He identifies three types of love – parental, social and romantic – and says that maternal love (or similar) is a prerequisite for survival.

Anthony cites studies involving children who suffered love deprivation and lack of physical contact. The results indicate that they were vulnerable to a host of diseases, that their intelligence was lower and that their rates of criminal behavior and mental illness were higher.

An impressive example of the power of love comes from the study of dwarfism as observed in the children of alcoholic and abusive parents. Anthony demonstrated with research that these children began to grow normally when placed in more loving environments.”

So, what are our other needs beyond love?

We need air to breathe, water, food and sleep; without them, we die. These are our minimum physical needs (excluding touch and affection), but our emotional needs are much more complex.

In last week’s Success Newsletter on conquering depression, I mentioned “Human Givens Psychotherapy”. Under Human Givens theory, it is suggested that we have emotional needs that must be met by the environment to prevent mental distress. And these include:

* Security – safe territory and an environment which allows for maturity and development

* Attention (to give and receive it)

* Sense of autonomy and control – having volition to make responsible choices

* Emotional connection with others

* Feeling part of a wider community

* Friendship and intimacy with someone who completely accepts al of us, warts and all

* Privacy – the opportunity to reflect and consolidate experience

* Sense of status within social groupings

* Sense of competence and achievement

* Meaning and purpose (a spiritual need  – service to others)

When these needs are not met, we find mental and emotional imbalance in our lives leading to depression, unhappiness, disease and illness set in.

If you look at the above list, which needs are not being met in your life, and what action can you take to meet those needs? If you are a parent, are you ensuring that your child has these needs met? Even children can be taught, from a young age, about meaning and purpose – to serve others, to give, share when appropriate and extend compassion and caring.

One of the greatest causes of unhappiness, confusion and mental illness in our society today is the result of people confuse needs for desires. This past week, two examples of this became obvious.

In Florida, five teens doused rubbing alcohol on another teen and set him on fire. In various media interviews, I posed the question of the parents’ roles in the lives of these children:

“Where are the parents here? In most cases like these, the father is often not involved in the children’s lives. He’s not around; he doesn’t know what they are doing; he doesn’t have a good healthy relationship with them; he’s not teaching them manhood or morality. And in turn, children who are not getting the appropriate love, time and attention from their parents often suffer from deep-seated anger, deep-seated rage that then gets expressed onto other people…the challenge we have is that fathers are not playing the role of fathers.  They’re not teaching their kids about right and wrong. They’re not teaching them how to get in touch with their own anger or how to get in touch with their maturation and evolution.  And then we have the dangerous problem in society that both parents are often too busy with their own lives and too busy getting caught up in the pursuit of materialism, wanting bigger cars, bigger houses, you know, more, more  more, trying to hold down two or three jobs. Thus, they’re not even connecting with their children, so they have no relationship with their kids and are not giving their children what they really need. That’s why you see so much violence and so much anger in kids at such a young age throughout the entire country.”

At the same time, a study involving 500 Latino American children by Dr. Luis Zayas, a psychologist at Washington University, reveals that Latino teens have a high rate of depression and attempted suicides. In one example, Dr. Zayas cites the case of a Francisca Abreu a Dominican girl whose mother Isabel migrated to the US leaving Francisca behind. Francisca was 3 at the time, and she was devastated.

“I used to tell her, you always say you’re going to come but you never do. You always say you’re going to call but you never do,” Francisca says. “I used to be very depressed because I thought she wasn’t going to come.”

Four years later, Isabel returned to the Dominican Republic to get Francisca and her brothers to bring them back with her to the United States. But Francisca says life with her mother in the Bronx wasn’t what she thought it would be. Her mother worked three jobs, and Francisca barely saw her.

The point here is that while a parent’s intentions might be sincere, even making personal sacrifices to create a better life for the child – many parents forget about what the child really needs – love, attention, connection, guidance, affection, bonding, etc.

And those needs apply to all of us, regardless of age. Many female clients of mine complain that their husband has abandoned them emotionally by placing all of their energy and attention on work and meeting the bills. It’s easy to lose sight of what our partners and children really need and in the process, we also lose sight of what we really need.

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I wish you the best and remind you “Believe in yourself -You deserve the best!”

Patrick Wanis Ph.D.
Celebrity Life Coach, Human Behavior & Relationship Expert & Clinical Hypnotherapist
www.patrickwanis.com