Category: Questions

Wanting vs. Needing

What’s the Difference Between Want & Need?

A friend of mine asked me this question last night. My first response was that need seems to be more associated with survival and identity than want. Want can have a sense of expansion, but I don’t notice that with need.

Of course, we are talking mostly about emotional and psychological issues around want and need. But, anytime we talk about deep psychological and emotional content, we have to bring in the body because there is a deep connection between the body and survival issues – even when they are figments of our imagination.

The dictionary says that want is to need, to feel need, to desire or wish. Etymology of Want: Middle English, from Old Norse vanta; akin to Old English wan deficient

The same dictionary says need is a lack of something requisite, desirable, or useful – a physiological or psychological requirement for the well-being of an organism. Etymology of Need: Middle English ned, from Old English n?ed, n?d; akin to Old High German n?t distress, need.

The energetic dynamics in the body/mind seem different to me around want and need. Want seems to have more of a reaching or grasping quality to me than need. Need feels more connected with necessary or required than want.

I can want a new pair of shoes even if I have 5 pairs, but if I only have one pair with holes in the soles – I need a new pair of shoes. If I just bought a new outfit and don’t have shoes to match – I need a new pair of shoes to match the outfit, but I don’t necessarily need them to survive. Of course, if my identity is deeply tied to the image of me in the new outfit and a projected outcome of wearing it, my survival needs might be very high around that pair of shoes that I absolutely need.

I may want love or approval, but if I see the lack of it a temporary, it doesn’t necessarily threaten my identity or existence – if it does, then I may feel a desperate need, a deficient emptiness around it at the core of my being that feels like a survival need.

What say you about want versus need? Am I splitting hairs?

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April 10
Missing My Pocket Parents

Critical Bitching from Pocket Parents

Years ago, when visiting friends in Boston, I wandered into a toy store and found a set of “pocket parents.” Each pocket parent was about the size of a pack of cigarettes and came with five buttons, but no battery.

With the battery installed, I could push a button on “Mom” and hear “You’ll put your eye out with that!” in a screeching voice reminiscent of George Castanza’s mother. Or I could pull out “Dad” and hear “I’ll give you something to cry about!”

Each parent had four bitches most of us heard thousands of times in childhood. If I really wanted a blast from the past, I could push the 5th button and get a litany of reprimands.

I purchased those pocket parents to use as teaching aids in some of the work I do with the superego. A little levity can go a long way in making a point while keeping things from becoming too heavy and depressing – an easy rut to fall into when working with the inner critic.

A quick search on Google failed to lead me to replacements for my vanished pocket parents – I think they missed the move to California from Utah a couple of years ago.

If you happen to locate a set of pocket parents, let me know – I’d love another set.

Disengaging from the superego is some of the most beneficial work we can do. How’s your superego work going?

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March 23
Survivor: Berkeley California

Survival Instinct Explored in Berkeley, CA

This past weekend, I attended A.H. Almaas’ winter retreat in Berkeley. The retreat focused on the survival instinct and most agreed it was a timely presentation.

Two years ago we worked on the social instinct and last year we explored the sexual instinct. Almass explores the instinctual drives in relationship to the Enlightenment Drive – the dynamic quality of the soul that impels it toward awareness of its true nature and freedom from limitation and the past.

The way we’re approaching the question of instincts and their drives is not a question of being free from them, it is a question of freeing them to be what they can be, and evolve and develop in a way that can become part of our realization, support for our realization. – A.H. Almaas

Almaas sees nothing wrong with the survival drive or the other instinctual drives. They are natural components of animal existence and evolution. The challenge for human beings, who have the capacity to muck up the natural functioning of the drives, is how to help the drive do its job most effectively.

Our capacity for reflective consciousness brings with it the capacity for projection and distortion of what is really happening. The past gets projected onto the present situation and, the drive which can’t tell the difference between what is real and what is imagined, kicks into gear with its fight or flight response.

The current economic situation is raising a lot of safety and security concerns in people. Recessions, property, money and wealth are really not the types of dangers our instinctual drives evolved to engage. We’re hardwired to respond to actual immediate physical threat, not the imagined consequences of Bernie Madoff ripping us off or the consequences of job loss or a dwindling 401K.

We have become so identified with our possessions, that we connect them very strongly to our survival. Survival now has a strong connection to money – and it’s partly true, but mostly not. A downgrade in lifestyle or having to eat beans instead of beef is not about survival. It’s about comfort, preference and self-image. The self-image is what becomes threatened – and – since the hard wiring can’t tell the difference between the body and the self-image, fear, anxiety, worry and even terror result.

The direct connection to money is something we all need to explore – what it is, what does it stand for, what it means personally, how to work with it and relate to it. This holds true for all of our possessions. This type of exploration will help to reveal the distortions that are interfering with the free functioning of the drives and thus the potential of the consciousness aligning them with the drive for enlightenment.

A very interesting three days.

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March 9
I Doubt It
When in Doubt, Doubt Wholeheartedly

I’ve been observing the phenomenon of doubt lately. The recent elections, the economic melt down, the housing market blues, and the increasing unemployment seem to be adding to the global doubt index.

I could be that behind every doubt is a cynic.
1. A person who believes that only selfishness motivates human actions and who disbelieves in or minimizes selfless acts or disinterested points of view.
2. One of a sect of Greek philosophers, 4th century b.c., who advocated the doctrines that virtue is the only good, that the essence of virtue is self-control, and that surrender to any external influence is beneath human dignity.
The Cynics were an influential group of philosophers from the ancient school of Cynicism. Their philosophy was that the purpose of life was to live a life of Virtue in agreement with Nature. This meant rejecting all conventional desires for wealth, power, health, and fame, and by living a life free from all possessions. As reasoning creatures, people could gain happiness by rigorous training and by living in a way which was natural for humans. They believed that the world belonged equally to everyone, and that suffering was caused by false judgments of what was valuable and by the worthless customs and conventions which surrounded society. – Wikipedia

Doubt seems habitual. Most habitual doubting is conditioned negation, a lazy ego’s way to successful pessimism. Suspicious minds, scarcity thinking, self-centeredness and survival seem to walk hand in had with doubt.

When in doubt, doubt yourself. What’s that doubt all about? What’s at the root of doubt?

Doubting wholeheartedly means questioning the very premise of doubt, not the content – what we doubt, but the activity – why we doubt. Wholehearted doubting is a trip into a real wormhole.

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November 23
Freud’s Psyche – Psyched on Freud

How Neurotic was Sigmund Freud?

There’s no doubt that Sigmund Freud has made a huge contribution to the evolution and well being of mankind. Freud’s insight into human nature and his exploration of the human psyche laid the groundwork for most western psychological theory and understanding in the world today.

From Object Relations Theory to Depth Psychology and Self Psychology to Transpersonal Psychology, Freud’s influence is seen throughout them all. Margaret Mahler, Heinz Kohut, D.W. Winnicott and every other pioneer of human psychology owe a debt to Freud.

But, the question remains – how neurotic was Sigmund Freud? I don’t believe there are very many people on the planet free of some degree of neurosis. Many of Freud’s theories and postulates have come under scrutiny and challenge. This is normal for those pushing the envelope of human understanding and Freud was certainly pushing the envelope in his day.

Freud and Groucho Marx would have been a great YouTube video. A 4 minute dialogue on cigars could have been one of the great viral videos of all time.

I think it was my last post that mentioned penis envy that got me to thinking about Freud and his neurosis.

When it comes to our personal growth and unfoldment, keeping an open mind about our possible blind spots is an invaluable asset. Using our friends to identify these doorways into deeper self-knowledge is great blessing – something Freud seems to have had a problem with.

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November 14
Does Size Matter?

Is a Big Penis Really Necessary?

Aggression, fast sleek cars, machismo, steely eyes – 007 is back.

James Bond – Quantum of Solace – and it has me wondering about penis size, phallic identification, self-esteem and homophobia – given that Prop 8 passed in California.

Oh, I left out football or sports in general. What is it with guys, aggression and penis size. The term “penis envy,” as Freud envisioned it relates to the female of the species unconsciously longing for one of her own.

I don’t think Freud ever hung out (no pun intended) in a locker room or worked with a bunch of blue collar studs where the penis jokes and references are part of the daily trash talk.

I’m planning on seeing 007 in action this Friday, I like Daniel Craig as James Bond – even better than Sean Connery. I didn’t think anyone would replace Sean Connery in my mind as 007, but Craig’s edgier, more explosive Bond seems to have that extra dose of testosterone needed to tip the scales.

I like what Ken Wilbur says about testosterone – I don’t mean to be crude, but it appears that testosterone basically has two, and only two major drives: fuck it or kill it.

How’s it hanging?

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November 12