Your Needs or Mine?
The headline might sound like a pun of an awful pickup line, but to be completely honest it’s what we should be asking ourselves when engaging with others. Is the next thing out of my mouth (or the next action I take) going to be about my needs, or theirs. A few months ago I saw a video that highlighted how different people give and receive love differently. Some like to give presents to show their love, but they might never actually verbalise their love. Others will use signs of affection to demonstrate their love, and so on. The key point here is that in relationships it’s vital to understand how your partner likes to receive and give love, because understanding this will have an immediate positive impact on your relationship.
Last week I was fortunate enough to be involved in a conference that included people of various ages and professions, to discuss positive mental health and various ways to improve mental health in youth. We spoke about many things during the conference including how helpful it is to take a timeout if a discussion is getting too heated, rather than try to continue in a stressful situation. We discussed how insightful it is to know which textures stimulate your senses in a positive way, and by that I mean that some people feel good when they smell lavender but for others pomegranate is a more positive scent. When it comes to the role that textures play in calming yourself down after a stressful situation, some people find it helpful to use a soft stress ball while others might prefer to handle something spikey. It’s all about finding the right texture to touch or the right sense to stimulate for you and your positive mental health, so that you can take a moment to slow things down and take the appropriate action for the best possible outcome.
Afterwards we spoke in small groups with Jess a psychologist, and she was fantastic. I could tell that Jess genuinely cares about her role in helping youth to improve their mental health, and for the long haul not just short term bandaid fixes. While in a discussion I responded to an issue that another guest raised, and Jess replied to me with a question that really floored me. “Are they your needs or hers?”. In that moment I realised that the outcome that I was trying to achieve was based on what I would need in that situation, rather than what the other guest might need.
What I learnt from this is that in our high pressure, multitasking, fast paced world, it’s very easy for us to focus and respond to situations based on what we need for ourselves rather than where the correct need should be focused. We need to approach every conversation and every situation with the intent to focus our attention, on who or what needs it most. Everything from a meeting, to teaching or coaching, and phone calls. While it’s always easy to put our own needs first, we also know that when we look out for each other and strive to do the right thing, everyone succeeds more often and certainly feel more heard and connected. So, whose needs are you attending to?
