One thing I've learned through my coaching is that we all have more in common than our differences. An example of that is all humans have six basic needs that they need to have met. These six needs fundamentally drive us and serve as people's primary motivation for doing what they do because they're always trying to get these six needs met.
Whatever people do, they do it for a reason. They may have a million reasons for doing what they do, but there are only six, and those are the six human needs.
The six human needs are:
Certainty
Everyone desires stability in areas such as food, shelter, and money. Everyone wants to avoid pain and only have comfort. However, when you're not certain, nothing else functions. Consider this: if you have uncertainty about your health, relationships, job, or life, all you can think about and focus on is regaining control of that aspect of your life.
What would it be like if you had certainty in every moment of your life? At first, it gives you a big advantage, and it might be pretty cool but then you'd start to feel bored. This brings us to the next human need:
Uncertainty
We can also call this variety or surprise. People would become bored if everything remained the same all of the time, so they require change. They need variety. As they say: variety is the spice of life.
Significance
Everyone wants to feel special and important in some way. In an intimate relationship, if a partner starts to think someone or something is more important than you that's when relationships start to break down (even when that other thing are your kids or your partner’s work). Examples of significance include: You can give more than everyone else, be meaner than everyone else, and be more violent than everyone else. It can also be a different way of dressing, doing the best at work, having lots of money, being more spiritual, creating more problems, and so on. And as you may be starting to see there's a positive and a negative side to each of these.
Connection and Love
We all crave love and connection, even if it isn't romantically with another person. Most people want love, but some first feel the need to be significant enough to feel like they can allow themselves love or deserve love. Others express love where they suffocate the other person… like an overbearing parent demanding love from their child.
Now, most people end up settling for connection because love scares them too much. You can have a connection and love through a fun conversation, friendship, sports, community, prayer, or a walk in nature. It doesn't have to be a romantic situation, it could be a sense of belonging in a community or a spiritual connection.
Growth
Personal growth makes people feel happy and fulfilled. We have to grow, but the reason we grow is so we have something to give and to keep feeling alive.
Contribution
We all have this deep need to go beyond ourselves and to serve.
(Side note: If you have something in your life that only fills one of these needs, it'll be okay. But if you can meet at least 3 of your needs through it, you'll become addicted to that thing, thought, action, feeling, etc. And we're talking positive addiction as well as negative.)
Now, what makes people different from each other is that each person prioritizes these six needs differently. One person might make certainty and love/connection their top two needs. What kind of life do you think that person lives? Do you think they would mesh well with someone whose top 2 needs are uncertainty and significance? Probably not. Because they have different values and desires based on these needs.
If you value one need, you'll move in one direction. If you value another need, you'll move in another direction. Direction determines your destination, outcome, life, and destiny.
Each of these has both a positive and negative way of meeting your needs. Another thing that differentiates us is that people can have the same top need but they might meet that need in a different way.
You can meet them in a positive or an empowering way, a neutral way, or a negative or disempowering. Some people get certainty by making something wrong - like they'll value their certainty more than their dream. Some people will break their values to meet their needs like lying and being dishonest if they think they will lose love if they are honest. People value their needs more than their values.
For each of these needs it’s a great journaling exercise to write down how you’re meeting each of these needs in both helpful and harmful ways because we all have both.
Once you realize what drives you, you can look at your top needs and decide if they are truly serving you. What have the consequences been in your life of valuing those needs over other needs? Because if you're thinking about the person you want to become, that person might prioritize different needs.
This is similar to what I've taught in previous episodes when I talk about how you can't create your dream life from the level of your current life - they aren’t a vibrational match so you need to level up and create the frequency of your dream life and vibrate at that level.
Ask yourself, what would the future version of who you want to become prioritize as their top needs? And there are no wrong answers here. This isn't about feeling shameful or guilty of anything. Every single person on earth has these six needs. But you can craft your dream life, and you get to choose which of the needs the life you're designing will prioritize. What would the version of you who you're in the process of creating prioritize.
What helps is to first decide what your goals are. And if you’re not sure how to do that then listen to the episode of my podcast called “Your Manifest Memoir” where I walk you through it.
Once you have your manifest memoir, where you craft the life of your dreams, you get to decide what kind of person would have that life. Who would you need to become to step into that dream? Would that person be confident? Would they be generous? Would they be loving? Would they take risks? Would they try new things? Would they join a new community? Would they stop going out as much?
I think you’re starting to get the picture here. You get to reinvent yourself. You’ll still be the essence of you, of course. But as you create your dream life you also get to create your dream version of you.
So which two needs would the future version of yourself prioritize the most? And how would making that change transform your life?
Special thanks to Tony Robbins for teaching me about the six human needs!