Outsmart Your Brain: How To Make Success Feel Easy – by Dr. Marcia Reynolds – A Sample Chapter

2. you think someone is denying you this need or

3. it appears that you have an opportunity to earn this need, even if you have to fight for it.

Be honest with yourself. Which five needs, when not met, will likely trigger a reaction in you? Identify the needs that you hold most dear.

It is critical to note that needs are not bad. The reason you have these needs is that at some point in your life, the need served you. For example, your experiences may have taught you that success in life depends on maintaining control, establishing a safe environment and having people around you who appreciate your intelligence. However, the more you become attached to these needs, the more your brain will be on the lookout for circumstances that threat-en your ability to have these needs met. Then your needs become emotional triggers.

At this point, you must judge the truth of the situation. Are you really losing this need or not? Is the person actively denying your need or are you taking the situation too personally? If it’s true that someone is ignoring your need or blocking you from achieving it, can you either ask for what you need or, if it doesn’t really matter, can you let the need go? The steps for getting your needs met or for releasing your needs will be further described in Chapter 4 on Choice.

Without consciously acknowledging the need that is triggering the emotional reaction, we become enslaved to the need. On the other hand, if we honestly declare our needs—that we had expected people to treat us in a particular way and had hoped events would unfold as we had planned—then we can begin to see life more objectively. From this perspective, we are freer to choose our reactions.