What Do You Need?

Since coming out as a healer in addition to being a writer and staring to integrate the Happiness Corner blog feel into more of my social media, I’m going to be posting things on Facebook that I post here as well. So if you follow me you might see it both places. Hope that’s okay. 🙂 I don’t have an easy solution to that right now, but I’m working on it.

Here’s what was on my heart today…

Can we talk about this for a minute? It seems like a simple question, but until a beautiful friend asked me this a few years ago, I don’t think anyone had ever asked me before what I needed.

All I had as a reference was “is that a want or a need?” And usually that was a shame tool someone said to me to shut me down from reaching for what I wanted—usually because we couldn’t afford it.

Yesterday, I ran into a new friend here in a parking lot, and we had this discussion. I’ve been introducing this question to other people in my life since it had been taught to me.

But lately, I’ve realized I’ve been forgetting to ask it of the person who needs it the most: ME.

I’ve gotten so busy and wrapped up with the people I love and their needs, I’ve been putting off the question for me.

Why am I doing this again? Am I still really afraid someone will withdraw their love if I don’t support them?

Being someone who’s especially sensitive to people’s needs makes this especially hard for me. You know that phrase: I feel your pain. Well, with me as a healer that’s literally true frequently. I want to help them. It’s my natural tendency.

But what this new friend and I were able to help each other remember yesterday is that supporting other people at the expense of ourselves isn’t the right thing to do. It’s not our responsibility. We need to speak up more for our own needs and ask ourselves this question more. And we need to expect that the people who love us will give us what we need as well so there’s balance.

I’ve realized true happiness comes from giving myself what I need in the moment.

I haven’t been as happy because I’m not doing that. I’ve been juggling the other stuff and supporting other people too much at the expense of me.

Mostly after a lot of reflection, I realized I need to trust that the people I love are supported by someone and something other than me. Including themselves. And that they won’t take advantage of me and will support me back somehow.

But mostly I want to believe we can all live happily ever after, giving ourselves what we need moment by moment.

This note in the picture is now on my bathroom wall so I can ask myself this every day.

What do you need?

Join me in asking.