Ezekiel Solesi: The 6 basic human needs (Y! Superblogger)

Nature itself teaches us that we must grow. If we’re not growing we’re dying. However growth requires conscious effort.

In life we all have NEEDS. These are deeper than our desires, in fact that control our desires. Desires alone are not enough because we sometimes attain some of our desires and and wonder why we don’t feel as  great as we thought we would.

Therefore, at the basic level we all have needs.

According to Anthony Robins; renowned author, trainer and life coach. Humans have six basic needs and each one opens the desire to fulfill a higher need level. I intend to explore with you these needs so we can all understand ourselves and why we act the way we do, then beyond that to understand those around us. This is important because with an understanding of this needs we can no just make ourselves better, but we can help others become better.

6 Basic Human Needs

1- CERTAINTY

Everyone wants to be at least certain that they’ll be fine. It’s a basic need. If you’re not certain a building would holdup you won’t go into it, if you’re not certain a chair is strong enough you won’t seat on it. This singular fact affects our world positively and negatively because every human is on a constant race from what they perceive to cause them pain to what they are certain would give them perceived pleasure.

Certainty or financial security as we know it in the financial world is what drives people to seek a safe and secure job

However, if we become absolutely certain about everything; what would happen, how, where and when it would happen we become BORED. So God gave us a second need.

 

2- UNCERTAINTY

To keep Our lives interesting our second basic need is uncertainty.

So the guy with a safe and secure job gets bored and probably seek entrepreneurship or probably seeks a different job or whatever. He wants something new because in something new is the possibility for adventure. That’s why we all like surprises. However, we only like the surprises we want, the ones we don’t want we call problems, but we need them. We can never tell how much we can do if life doesn’t present us with “negative” uncertainty.

 

3- SIGNIFICANCE

Every human needs to feel significant. Many of the good and evil we see in society today stems from this need. The fastest way to achieve significance if a person has no training, background resourcefulness or values is VIOLENCE.

If a man puts a gun to your head how significant would he be to you on a scale of 1-10?

10 of course.

However, everyone has a choice. We can choose our path to significance, we can become significant doing what we love.

 

4- LOVE/CONNECTION

Everybody needs to feel loved or at least needs to have some sort of connection with somebody else. This is the reason why the world has always been built from a connection perspective. We have countries, states, societies etc. However most people settle for connection because love is too scary.

The first four needs can be achieved by anyone positively or negatively. They are referred to as the needs of the personality. The last two are called the needs of the Spirit and can only be achieved by people who seek a higher expression to their life’s purpose.

 

5- GROWTH

Nature itself teaches us that we must grow. If we’re not growing we’re dying. However growth requires conscious effort. Unlike the first four needs which can be achieved instinctively without deliberately applying yourself to any kind of improvement growth requires you to deliberately strive to be better. The reason it requires deliberate actions is so that you can track your success.

We live in a society where most people can hardly explain how they ‘made’ it in life. First I think it’s because of our ‘mystical’ world view as a people. However we don’t realize that without deliberate actions our success can’t be progressively documented and without accurate documentation every generation would have to keep reinventing the wheel, which is what we as a people have done all our lives.

The reason why you must grow is to achieve the 6th and last basic human need

 

6- GIVEContributing beyond ourselves.

The highest form of living is giving. People who contribute beyond themselves often find that the feeling of fulfillment can hardly be explained and is best experienced. This is the point where the human self consciously feels ALIVE and not just in existence. It’s not about the magnitude or type of giving, it’s giving. Not giving for significance but giving to contribute beyond yourself. That’s what life is about.

So as a business owner, corporate professional, poet or whatever, ask yourself, how am I contributing beyond myself to my world?

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Ezekiel Solesi endeavours to simplify issues so for anyone to understand and make informed and deliberate decisions about their future. He blogs at www.limbsimple.com and tweets from @limbsimple.

 

Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.

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