What We Mean by Basic Needs

We all have basic needs, physical, mental and emotional. By ‘needs’ we don’t mean needs for survival, but rather the needs required to overcome anger, fear and sadness so that we can have peace of mind, and acceptance of self, others, and circumstances.

Examples of physical needs are the need for food, water, air, shelter, safety and lack of harm, exercise, movement and biological functions like sneezing, coughing, laughing, etc.

Mental and emotional needs include the need for love, acceptance, appreciation, respect, kindness and passion. We need friendliness and a sense of belonging and connection. We want joy, happiness, compassion, and freedom. We have a need to find inspiration and to be productive and creative, making good use of our insights, skills, talents and gifts. We need to express ourselves in our own unique ways.

The mind wants understanding. It wants to make sense of things. In social contexts, we want to be heard and understand, and we need to hear and understand others. Further, we want to feel justified in our thinking/beliefs. That is to say, in order to have peace of mind, we need to believe we have accurate information and understanding.

In a word, we need Positivity, within ourselves and among ourselves.