Getting Judicious, Self-Aware With Emotions: Distinguishing Needs, Wants, Likes

“At the centre of your being, you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want.” Lao Tzu

Our emotional lives are often caught in a maze of gravitational forces. Sometimes, it is a long-cherished desire that pulls us, at other times, a sudden craving and in some other cases, a circumstantial requirement. All these pulls can be powerful and can seem urgent. However, given our limited resources and time, we can only attend to a select few and the inability to choose can cause our inner peace to descend into mayhem. Accordingly, there is a need to look closely at these forces that impact our inner lives and know them better. Using extremely rudimentary parameters, we can think of them as needs, wants and likes and to have a judicious grip over our emotional selves, we must learn to distinguish them from each other and deal with each of them specifically. 

The dichotomy between needs and wants has been part of popular discourse for a long time now. As per general consensus, needs are linked to survival and functioning. Wants, on the other hand, are luxuries of sorts, something one strives to have over and above one’s prerequisites to subsist. However, there are complications that are seldom addressed in this simplistic binary. Going by these basic definitions, needs are things we must have and wants are things we would like to have. Yet, do we always end up liking what we want? Do we like the needs we have? A truly self-aware individual must be aware of his/her/their likes to look critically at their needs and assess their wants in order to have a healthier life. 

When we look at needs as natural and linked to survival, they can seem irrevocable. However, it can be argued that some needs develop over time and are neither ethical nor healthy and sometimes needs have to be monitored and oriented towards better ends. For instance, if you have been a student who has always received praise for your work, to the extent that this validation has become a need for the existence of your social life, you might find yourself in a difficult circumstance upon the completion of your student years where the opportunities for such accolades would be fewer. In this case, while you might certainly like validation, you might want to ask if you like being dependent on validation which has become a need? In this case, perhaps validation would have to be moved from being a need to a want. 

Similarly, wants and likes have to be looked at in relation to each other. For instance, you might want ice cream on a freezing day, despite having a history of contracting cold. However, if you contrast whether you would like the short-term thrill of consuming ice cream or the long-term bliss of staying well, you might end up choosing the latter upon careful consideration. In this case, despite wanting something you were supposed to like, you realize that you would not have liked the consequences of having it. Therefore, wants may not necessarily amount to things you would end up liking. 

The differences between these three categories can be nuanced and confusing, but in short, they are based on a long term understanding of what we like. When we are aware of what we like, we can shape our needs accordingly, instead of being powerless in the face of emotional pulls, creating a bar for survival that is beneficial for us. By the same method, we can control our wants to make healthier choices in the most immediate contexts. Needless to say, on this path, several mistakes can be made and it is only through a period of learning and self-observation that we can get to a position of actively identifying and shaping needs and wants, based on a conversation with our inner selves about what we like. However, upon attaining this judiciousness, our internal lives can be tranquil and powerful and propel us to wonderful achievements. 

Marianne Williamson said, “It takes courage...to endure the sharp pains of self-discovery rather than choose to take the dull pain of unconsciousness that would last the rest of our lives.” It is our time to be courageous and embrace self-awareness and knowing our needs, wants and likes can take us to summits of wisdom and growth.