Need Buckets Pt. 1

We talked about negative coping strategies in practicum.  We all have needs, Dr. Dickens said.  Say that you have twenty need buckets.  It's not a bad thing to have needs.  Humans are inherently needy, created that way by God to fuel community and remind us that we are, in fact, created beings.  To pretend we aren't needy is to pretend we are God.  So we've got twenty need buckets (let's just say), and our parents are able to fill up maybe fifteen of them if we're lucky.  That's 75%, that's a passing parent grade.

But there are still five need buckets that are empty.  Those needs could be the need for intimacy, the need for purpose, the need for security, the need for respect.  And when our needs are not being met, there are three general coping strategies people employ to get those needs met.  Moving toward people are people pleasers.  They help people in hopes that they will be helped in return.  These people look really good, but their motivation for kindnesses is selfish and manipulative.  Moving against people are aggressive.  They'll force you to meet their needs by steamrollering over you and demanding whatever they need before leaving you.  Again, selfish and manipulative.  Moving away people either pretend they don't actually have needs or else set themselves apart, pretending they've got everything figured out so that people will be drawn to them and meet their needs without them ever having to ask for it.

I am so a moving away person.  I have, quite literally, moved away.  One of my empty need buckets is the need for intimacy.  I crave vulnerable, committed relationships.  But I pretend this doesn't bother me, or I try to be perfect so people will be drawn to me because it's only if I'm perfect that people will want to be in close relationships with me (nevermind that by pretending to be perfect I've forfeited the authenticity needed for truly intimate relationships). 

So we all have needs, and we all try to meet them in sideways moves.  Oftentimes these coping strategies are effective; that's why we use them.  But inevitably they will fail, and even if they never do, they get so tiring.  We're smart; we know the difference between manipulating someone into meeting our needs and having someone meet them all on their own motivation.

As therapists, we're meant to 1) decipher what a person's needs are and 2) what their coping strategy is.  They will use this coping strategy against us, so that part won't be hard.  The tricky thing is that when they are manipulating, we're supposed to ignore their need.  They'll be shuddering apart, flailing for affirmation, and we just sit with them and let them flail.  It's only when they tire and let their guard down that we jump in and load them up with whatever their need is.  In this way, they'll learn that they don't have to manipulate people into meeting their needs.  It's possible for them to give up and stop trying and still be loved.

This is grace.

This is my epiphany:  I move away from people, and I move away from God.  These last few months (this last decade, more like), I've been ignoring God, trying to manipulate Him into helping me, caring for me, providing for me.  Because God chases us, right?  He pursues us?  So I've been really pissed off because HE HASN'T.  He's letting me hang.

But if God is a counselor, and I think that He is, then He's waiting.  He's not going to validate my coping strategy by rushing in to meet my needs just because I'm pouting and avoiding Him.  And this explains the wonderful moment I had a couple weeks ago.  I dropped my act, I opened my Bible, and Hebrews 12 jumped into my heart and comforted me.  God met me the second I stopped moving away and let Him in.

Of course, I've since returned to moving away, because that shit is deeply ingrained, and I didn't miraculously learn to trust God.  So.  I'm still working through this, but like, my brain has opened and I feel like I see what's happening, at least a little bit.