Years ago, I delivered a keynote talk at a conference on the topic of human needs. I asked the audience if they could tell me what five needs drive all human behaviour. They were only able to identify three of the five. This is an activity I have repeated many times since, and the results have never been any better.
When I go on to list the five needs, everyone agrees with them. If we meet our needs, it feels good and over time we become happy, when we don’t, it feels bad and we become unhappy. Knowing what our needs are and how to successfully meet them, without hurting others, is essential. So, what are these five needs?
The first need is survival, we need food and shelter, we want to feel safe and secure, both physically and emotionally.
We also have a need for love and belonging, usually to people, but also to place and sometimes to pets. We need to feel we are connected and belong.
We need to have some degree of freedom, to have choices and some control over what we do and how and when we do it.
We also have a need for fun. Fun drives growth and learning. At its simplest fun is about enjoyment and pleasure, but more importantly it is about learning and growing as a person.
The final need is for personal power. This not about controlling others, it is the desire to achieve and do something of value and worth. The power need drives all performance.
If we are unaware of what we need, we are not going to be very successful at meeting those needs. True happiness is the result of meeting our needs consistently.