Relationship needs can turn deadly

Which 7 Relationship Needs Are You Guilty Of Pursuing

Relationships needs can be healthy, or not so much. Healthy needs include having a loved one who’s compassionate, empathic, patient, supportive, caring. Being able to listen, not talk over someone is a precious quality to have. But what about you? How do you feel during your interactions and relationships? Are you the trouble maker who just can’t give up the need to be in control of everything, the judger, the green-eyed monster of jealous? The seven deadly needs listed below can get you in the same kind of trouble as the 7 deadly sins. You don’t have to know everything, judge everything, fix everything, measure everything. Here’s how to think about letting go.

3 Deadly Relationship Needs To Drop Right Now

1. The Need to Know

It may make you feel smart to know lots of useless facts. With technology you are able to access unlimited amounts of information anytime anywhere. Would your life be less fulfilling if you didn’t know how deep the Atlantic Ocean was? Wouldn’t your serenity be better served if you could simply relax and not have to know all the details of everyone else’s life on Facebook and Twitter? What if you let it go and moved through your life seeking silence and calm instead of facts and gossip? In family situations you may want to know every detail to make a fair judgement. What if you suspended your need to judge and therefore didn’t need to know all the dark details of the latest family drama? That would end the need for judgement and ease the tension in family relationships.

2. The Need To Be Right

This deadly need causes so many battles that threaten healthy relationships. Why do you need to be right and the other person wrong? It’s a relationship red flag, for sure. Adrenaline flows and feeds the brain when you’re fighting. You actually feel high. But when you can corner someone and get him or her to admit you were right and he was wrong, it hurts him or her or them. What does does hurting do to relationships? In her book 100 Tips For Growing Up, Lindsey Glass offers the advice to say, “You May Be Right,” even if you think the other person is wrong. It’s the fastest way to end an argument and cool things down. Want to be right or loved? We pick kindness and love. It works every time.

3. The Need To Get Even

This is a sad need that causes so much harm. Your ego demands revenge. It can lead to disaster.

People are motivated to seek revenge — to harm someone who has harmed them — when they feel attacked, mistreated or socially rejected. Getting an eye for an eye, Old Testament-style, is thought to bring a sense of catharsis and closure. A growing body of research suggests it may have the opposite effect.

Wanting or seeking revenge is not a healthy emotion. This emotional relationship need can take you down to a dark place. What can you do to let go of the desire to hurt back? Take a breath, remember that everything is not about you. Your ego may be bruised, but the other person may not have intended to hurt you. Can you follow the recovery advice to “Let Go and Let God?” You’ll feel so much better.

4 More Destructive Relationship Needs

4. The Need To Look Good

This one only hurts you. How many times have you felt less than because you weren’t wearing the right clothes at a party or driving the right car? You might have a self love, or self-esteem problem getting in the way of enjoying events and work. This need to have a great facade was born in your insecurity of not being good enough just as you are. We have learned in our recovery that our value is the same no matter what we’re wearing or driving. See Why Self-Love Is Healthy.

5. The Need To Judge

Do you judge some people as being better than you, and some as worse than you? Then you may be living on a ladder of always trying to find someone less than you to make you feel better about yourself. Ugh, not cool. How freeing it is to learn that we’re all in the same boat of trying to get along and feel all right. You don’t have to judge anyone. When you simply accept people as they are, it saves time and energy. It also builds better relationships when you can decide that you want someone in your life because they lift your spirits not because they are better or worse than you.

6. The Need To Keep Score

Keeping score is great for sports, but not when applied to healthy relationship needs. When you try to keep everything fair, it isn’t going to work. Some days your emotional needs will be fulfilled, and some days it’s just not going to be your turn. Are you going to be a grump every time things don’t go your way? The same is true with work remuneration, getting and giving gifts. Scoring can be counter-productive when you’re trying to get along and be happy. You don’t have to find the fairness your life, only self-acceptance and acceptance of others.

7. The Need to Control

This emotional need to control drives us all crazy. If you have a controlling person in your life, you may feel like a child directed by an overbearing parent. It’s maddening. If, on the other hand, the controller is you, you’re annoying others around you. If you’re particularly fearful and anxious, you may feel that when you’re controlling things, you will be safe. It’s not true because you’re not perfect. And neither is your controller. You don’t want to be helped, so you may need to create some simple boundaries to get some independence. If you’re the controlling one, always trying to help your loved ones, you will better enjoy your life if you detach a little and let everyone go with the flow.

Hard needs to alter, we’ll admit. It takes practice to cool down and feel good, but it’s worth it to improve relationships with those you care about, and even those you don’t.