As definitions go, these two concepts have very different meanings. Needs are usually defined as necessary for survival or things you cannot live without – for example food or sleep. Wants are nice-to-haves desires that are not necessary for survival – for example a house with a garden and a dog. However, as correctly pointed out here, not satisfying our wants may also have negative effects on a person’s emotional or mental health. I would like to argue though, that mental health issues are very much going to affect our survival potential as well!
I find Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs a much better model of talking about things we may need or want. Here, I suddenly see much less difference between wants and needs because our wants often relate very closely to our needs. If I use the example mentioned above, a “want” for a house with a garden and a dog, I can clearly see how that want is actually a disguised “need” for appropriate shelter, access to plants / healthy environment, and a companionship of a pet friend.
My personal story includes hearing at (almost) every meal: are you sure you need to eat this? My parent’s assumption was that because I was an “overweight” child (as defined by flawed the BMI calculation), I really did not “need” to eat so much. After all, if the purpose of eating is purely for physical survival, then a minimum amount of food should be consumed to only ensure that survival. I watched my mother torture herself with this logic and I rebelled against being tortured in the same way, because I felt very strongly that YES, I needed to eat this!
I needed to eat it because, despite whatever the BMI charts showed as appropriate body weight for my height, my body needed that energy to grow. Yes, I needed to eat it because I was not taught any other ways of dealing with my emotions and any display of negative emotions was unacceptable at my home anyway. Yes, I needed to eat it because being fed made me feel loved, safe, and satisfied. Yes, for a long time, I was meeting my needs by eating.
Today I am grieving the fact that eating was the only method in my toolkit to meet my diverse needs. I wish I were taught better life-management skills in my youth. It is never too late, however, to learn satisfying our needs in a skilful way at any stage of our life. The first step is to recognize that our “wants” are always our “needs” in disguise. Always!
Once we find out which need is unmet, we can choose to apply a concept of self-compassion to satisfying that need in the best way we have available. We might not have time or means to get a massage, but we may be able to take a short nap to relax for a bit if we recognize that we need some relaxation or rest. If we need food, we might not have time or energy to make ourselves a nourishing meal, but we can grab a snack and eat it mindfully sitting in a car between appointments.
Every single want – even that “want” for an ice-cream on a hot summer day, is a need. We can be compassionate to ourselves and meet our basic needs by both having a cold ice-cream treat and by finding a shaded space on the grass to rest for a bit. Sometimes, we may even notice our thirst and enjoy drinking some cold water instead of eating the ice-cream, as we recognize our need to hydrate as more important in the moment.
This level of attunement to our needs requires a bit of mindfulness – learning to stop and ask ourselves both: what do we want and what do we need? Once the connection between wants and needs is established, it is so much easier to satisfy them both! Sometimes we will not be able to meet all of our needs – and sometimes we will cause suffering when trying to satisfy our wants. It is always a learning process and in our relatively short lives, we can practice by being mindful, approaching our needs and wants with self-compassion, and forgiving any inevitable mistakes made on the way.
Would you like to chat with me about your needs? I would be happy to hear from you!
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