The Six Human Needs

This post re-iterates something that Tony Robbins is famous for sharing in his books and seminars. Tony talks about humans as having six fundamental needs. In our day to day lives we need these six things and, if they are ever missing, we change our behaviour until we get them. He goes so far as to say that all human behaviour is driven by the instinct to fulfill one or more of these six fundamental human needs.

Certainty/Comfort

Certainty and comfort are things that nearly all humans move towards. You get cold? You do something to warm up. You feel like you might lose your job? You either lift your performance or find a job that is more secure. Because the truth is that we all want comfort. And the easiest source of comfort is certainty. Certainty about what we can expect, certainty that the sun will rise tomorrow, certainty that we have a job to go to and certainty that there will be food in the fridge. If you stop for a moment and imagine those things not being true for you… it may not feel very comfortable. If you didn’t feel certain there would be food in the fridge tomorrow do you think you would be doing something about that? Yes, that is because certainty/comfort is a strong human need!

Variety

So the flip side to certainty is variety, and we need variety to feel alive. Without variety we feel dead inside. Humans can get variety by doing drugs, we can get variety by eating (Eating gives comfort AND variety.. interesting!). You can also introduce variety by setting goals, working towards challenges, starting a new job. Without variety in our lives we lack a source of adventure in our lives and things get boring and humans HATE being bored.

Significance

We all have a need to feel significant, important, special, unique – the feeling of being needed. Every single human has this need, the difference is how we go about it. Some of us pursue it by chasing material wealth, others pursue it through their spirituality while others gets significance from having more tattoos and piercings than anybody else they know! You can get significance in a positive, neutral or negative way. Some people even gain significance through being sick or having a major illness, while others fulfill their need through becoming a politician or leader of a local club. If you’ve ever heard someone say “They would never be able to cope without me” they are likely to be fulfilling their need for significance through their involvement.

Connection/Love

There is a fundamental need for people to feel part of a community. Even though there is a difference between connection and love, most people just (sadly) settle for connection. Connection is so much safer, you’re putting so much less at risk. But ideally we need love, and if we knew that we could have love without risks or dangers then we would grab it with both hands and embrace it. Not only do we want to be cared for, we have a need to care for those that are important for us too.

Growth

Humans have a need to feel like they are growing, like they are getting better and like they are advancing. This ties in beautifully with our need for variety as growth is a great source of variety. In fact, through gradually increasing the challenges involved in what we are doing, in order to grow, humans are most likely to experience the optimal human experience, flow. Anybody who has ever trained to win a sporting event, or indulged their competitive streak, has experienced the joy of fulfilling our need for growth and the challenges that brings.

Contribution

When humans feel like they are contributing it adds immensely to their experience. Whether they are contributing financially to a charity, by volunteering their time with a community group or even doing paid work for a worthwhile organisation the intangible feeling of ‘contributing’ can be so rewarding. The need to feel like they are a part of making the world a better place can be found in all of us.

So why is all this important?

Most people will pick one or two of these that are much more important to them than the others.You can probably think of someone who has a focus on Growth and Variety – maybe they are a sportsman constantly changing from one sport to another? Or someone who has a focus on Contribution and Certainty/Comfort that never really pushes their comfort zone yet gives a huge amount to their community… There are lots of combinations, but regardless of the combination, people are fulfilling some of these basic human needs with pretty much everything that they do.

When you look at that list can you think of the two that are most important to you? And, although prioritisng those two things will be getting you mainly what you want, is it possible that if you were to prioritise other needs you may open yourself up to a greater experience?

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