.12
Emptiness Is Just Space, It Need Not Be Painful
Needs are a fact of life, whether we acknowledge them or not. The truth is, we all have them—and it really is okay. The trouble is, many of us grew up not knowing this, and if we tried to express a want or need, we might have been told something like, “You’re selfish” or “You’re more trouble than you’re worth.” When I heard things like that, I’d tell myself I was too worthless to have any needs. Not only did my needs not count, but I managed to discount myself as well.
You may have been too busy during childhood taking care of everybody else, and there was no time for your own needs. Maybe you were the parentified child, the responsible one. You may have felt needed by others but often didn’t get what you needed from them. Perhaps you got the message that there was no space in your family to have needs. Maybe you were made to feel ashamed if you had needs, and now you’re afraid you’ll be ridiculed for having them. Somehow having needs was labeled bad or shameful and got relegated to existing in an underground manner, with ploys and manipulations. If you couldn’t put words to the need there could be little clarity about it, creating a kind of desperateness about getting it met.
There was a big hole there that just wasn’t getting filled. You felt needy, and that wasn’t a good feeling, so you began to confuse having needs with neediness. How could you find words for something you weren’t even supposed to have? How could you even begin to define your needs? And if you didn’t have words for them, how could you ask for what you needed? You probably never learned how. “I don’t remember anyone ever hugging me when I was a little girl,” one woman recalls. “Sometimes I really want a hug from my boyfriend, but I don’t know how to ask.”
If you can’t be direct, how do you go about trying to get what you need? You might go underground, trying one ploy after another, hoping something strikes gold. Because this approach is indirect, it appears manipulative. Remember in chapter 2 how Jane wasn’t aware of what she needed from Larry, but tried to maneuver him into offering to drive her where she needed to go? She desperately wanted him to read her mind—to her this meant he cared about her.
If you’re not able to define your needs, to give them form or color or texture, then you don’t have anything tangible to hold on to. It’s as if there’s nothing there—a space, a void—a hole that wants to be filled but doesn’t know what it needs to fill it. You may not be very comfortable with spaces—they make a lot of people anxious—so you struggle to fill them up. Yet musicians will tell you that it’s the spaces, the silences between notes, that make music. You may not know how long the silence will last, but you do know another note will come.
If you can’t be direct, how do you get what you need?
Empty Spaces: To Fill or Not to Fill
We try hard to fill that space inside ourselves—that hole that feels like neediness. Gena recalls, “I didn’t get emotionally fed enough in childhood, and I’m hungry all the time.” She goes on to describe a “gnawing pain,” a huge, empty space inside of her. “I look to other people to fill it up. I pick a man to try to extract what I need. But I wish I could take it from inside myself.”
We did some visual imagery about this empty space. Gena visualized a big brass wine goblet, with a wide base and substantial rim. But as the wine flowed in, she could only see the bottom filling. “I want the cup to fill up faster and faster,” she explained, “but then I do something to stop it before it gets half full. There seems to be a membrane on top of the wine, a barrier. I think it means that other people have to fight to get past my barrier.”
Gena came into the next session all excited and told me, “I decided to visualize pouring the wine from the metal goblet into a smaller, delicate crystal wine glass. It’s much easier to fill. The same amount of wine appears to be more because the glass is smaller. Now the glass is over half full.” We realized that in fact, wine is usually poured half full, leaving room for it to breathe. Gena brightened. “Yes, of course. If the glass were all the way filled with wine, I couldn’t breathe! Yes, indeed. It needs air and light to intensify its potential. There’s more than just the wine, there’s the light and the bouquet. Yes, I think I could learn to appreciate the unfilled parts of me. After all, emptiness is just space, it doesn’t have to be painful.”
Of course it would be nice if that ole hole would disappear forever, but there are times it reappears, and it may feel especially big and drafty. One woman, wanting to find a good way to deal with that space, visualized creating a patchwork quilt around the hole. She imagined herself adding on different sizes of patches representing the love of the people around her—her mom, her dad, her roommate, her favorite teacher. Then she designed some patches to symbolize how she was learning to think of herself. “Being more sure of myself, more comfortable with myself fills up the empty space.” As the patchwork piece took shape and became defined, that hole seemed smaller and more manageable. I guess you could say she stitched a layer of wholeness around the hole.
You may want to try your own visualization sometime to see what images may arise for you. You just might catch a tiny wisp of something that will be useful to you. Find a quiet place and sit where you’ll be undisturbed for fifteen or twenty minutes. Close your eyes if you’d like, and as you sit quietly let the sound of your breath escort you into an internal realm of discovery. What can you learn about that place of need inside of you. What does the space look like? Is it large or small? Does it stay the same or does it change size? Can you discern details or is it opaque? What is the shape? Color? Temperature?
Do you want to alter this space? What would you like to do to make it more manageable? Give yourself permission to let possible ideas come to you during the next few days. And you can always make some time again to sit quietly and see what images come to you. Sometimes nothing comes up, or the images are illusive. That’s okay. You might try again later or even have someone trained in guided imagery lead you through this process.
Confusing Needs with Neediness
What about the times when that hole feels huge? These are the times you might confuse having needs with feeling needy. Perhaps you try to hide your needs from others to appear strong, like Stephanie, who had to be the “big girl” in her family. She is still afraid to identify her needs to others because the floodgates might open and she’ll become vulnerable and needy in other people’s eyes. So she has stopped identifying her needs—even to herself. If I’d ask, “What do you need, Stephanie?” she’d lower her eyes and answer in a barely audible voice, “I don’t know.”
If our needs weren’t met very well when we were children, we tend to become afraid of them as adults. We fear we’ll overwhelm people with this gnawing hunger, this bottomless pit, this gigantic cavity. We either pretend to be self-sufficient and/or we fear our neediness will gush uncontrollably all over everybody and everything! We may come to believe it’s an either/or situation with no in-between choices. But there are choices.
Having needs isn’t the same thing as being needy. It’s okay to have needs, to try to identify what they are, and to find ways to ask up front for what you decide is important to you. It’s okay to need something from someone. And no matter what the big people told you when you when you were little, it really is okay to consider yourself and your needs.
The studies mentioned in part two about preadolescent girls describe how they become influenced by cultural demands and lose their sense of self and sense of direction. The resulting confusion follows them into adulthood and they often don’t know what they’re sensing, feeling, or thinking. Nor do they know what they need. When asked, they’re quick to say, “I don’t know.”
Having needs doesn’t mean you’re needy.
There’s no question that there is a fine line between too much self and too little self. Let’s take a look at some of the self words. “Don’t be so self-centered,” someone might say. We were taught it wasn’t okay to be selfish, self-serving, self-indulgent or to have self-interests or a sense of self-importance. These words infer too much concentration on the self without concern for the interests of others. But do these terms have to be mutually exclusive? Holding oneself in esteem and with love does not have to be at the expense of others. By loving and honoring ourselves we can love and honor others. Interestingly, two words that are defined as unselfish are self-effacing and selfless—both connoting an invalidation of the self. What about the term self-centered? Why couldn’t self-centered mean being centered within yourself—being in touch with what you need and what you want, with your feelings and your thoughts. In fact, as Elaine Aron writes: “[Highly sensitive people] are less likely to mention being aware of the world around us, and more likely to mention our inner reflections and musings … thinking about our own thoughts is not self-centeredness.…”
“Taking care of myself doesn’t mean I’m selfish!” enthused one woman. “Now I’m able to ask for what I need.” This has been a struggle for her from the time she was a child. She saw having needs as asking for help. “My family was poor and often without food. My mother would send me over to the neighbors to ask for sugar or milk or eggs—and sometimes money. So, to me, ‘asking for help’ means begging.” It’s no wonder that as an adult, she crosses her fingers and hopes someone catches her hints.
If you can find ways to be direct, you don’t have to be manipulative. If you can find the words to express your needs, you don’t have to hope someone will read your mind. Then you don’t have to be disappointed or feel rejected. A clear request most likely will get a clear answer such as “Yes,” “No,” or “I can’t do that for you, but this is what I can do,” or “I have to say no this time, but try me again.” Even the “nos” don’t feel so rejecting if the request has been straight forward
The idea of interdependence, or mutuality, in relationships is an important one. This means finding a comfortable place between independence, dependence, and codependence—a place of interconnectedness, where each person is able to ask the other for what he or she needs. You can be you, yet at the same time be connected to the people and things in your world.
“Go Away a Little Closer”
Another area of frequent misunderstanding has to do with needs for space versus needs for contact. Frequently one person feels the need for contact and wants to share space, while the other person needs his or her own space. This can certainly cause problems for couples. For example, Eddie wants to touch Deena when they sleep, in fact, he wants to sleep with his arms around her. But she feels stifled and complains that she can’t breathe freely. Clearly Deena needs some space, but how much space does it take to reduce her anxiety? How much touching does Eddie actually need to feel he’s making contact with her? What would it take to reassure himself that Deena is close by his side? Deena suggested touching with their feet only, and it worked. This turned out to be enough contact for Eddie to feel secure, yet it gave Deena the space she needed. By paying attention to what each of their bottom line needs for closeness were, they were better able to communicate these needs to each other and work something out.
Sometimes couples have different ideas of the type of closeness each wants. One may want more physical closeness while the other wants more emotional closeness. Often neither gets what he or she wants or needs and each may feel hurt and misunderstood and take it personally. Have you experienced these kinds of feelings of rejection?
Let’s move on to emotional closeness—no doubt much more complicated to deal with than physical contact, but let’s give it a try. What’s the bottom line for trusting that you’re both making an attempt toward emotional closeness?
Jill has trouble communicating her needs to her partner. She often can’t put words to something she wants or needs. Without form or shape, the needs become overwhelming to her. This is when she goes into a childlike demanding place where she wants what she wants when she wants it. “It seems like I’m four years old again with a child’s perception of time. When Ronnie says ‘I’ll be downstairs in a few minutes and we’ll leave for the movies,’ the minutes seem like hours.” When Ronnie practiced being specific about time, for example saying, “I’ll be available at 6:30 and we can go out then,” there were fewer misunderstandings and incidences of taking things personally.
One woman expressed how left out and rejected she feels when her husband wants to read or space out in front of the TV. She wants contact with him; she wants to touch and talk. In couples sessions we speculated about what it would be like sharing space but not time. In other words, I asked if they could be with each other and still stay connected but not request or expect the other person’s direct attention. What are the bottom line needs that would enable her to feel secure in the relationship? For example, could she be with him in the same room while he reads and work on a project or read a book of her own?
Les and Frannie have worked out a way to do this. Les has an open invitation to check with Frannie about whether it’s okay to join her in her home office while she’s working at the computer—not to talk, but to read or write or whatever—to share space but not time. Of course Frannie has permission to say “no” when she feels Les’s presence will interfere with her concentration. Once in a while Les might take her “no” personally, but usually this has been a good arrangement. They wonder why they never thought about this option during the first five years of their relationship—it would have prevented so many fights and hurt feelings.
Remember Jane and Larry from chapter 3? She felt left out whenever Larry retreated to his study for hours at a time when he needed to be alone. What are Larry’s bottom line needs for a breather? What if he took space for himself for thirty to forty minutes instead of two hours? Is that enough time for him? Could Jane tolerate this time alone without feeling left out and rejected by Larry?
How do you find some common ground with your partner? You’ve made a good beginning by realizing that you both want different forms of the same thing—contact. Try putting words to the kind of physical or emotional closeness you really want. By assessing and defining individual needs, a workable deal can usually be negotiated. Maybe you could even get some of those needs met, but you’d have to know what they are first. What do you want from the other person? What do you really have in mind? What do you want him or her to do or say?
So if you’re one of the people who tends to say “I don’t know” if someone asks you what you might need, what can you do about it? It’s true that sometimes it is hard to be specific. You may only have a vague idea of what will make you feel better—perhaps some kind of psychological chicken soup. But the more undefined the hole is, the harder it is to fill. It’s pretty hard to let someone else in on your needs if you don’t know them yourself. How could you know when the need is filled if you don’t know what you’re filling?
“When you know what you want, you’ll know when you’ve found it.”
—Steve Bhaerman and
Don McMillan
I give my clients the following questions to ask themselves each day upon awakening. For many, this is very difficult at first:
• “What would make me feel good today?”
• “What do I want? What do I need?”
• “From whom?” (Yourself? Someone else?)
• “In what way? What form would it take?”
You might also ask yourself how you would know your want or need is met. Defining these needs, putting words to them, may be a brand new experience for you because no one gave you permission to do it before. Don’t be surprised if you struggle with it at first. Try to have patience and keep practicing. Doing this exercise regularly could change your perspective on life. Practice checking in with yourself throughout the day about how you feel and what would make you feel better. You will develop a more defined sense of yourself—and new respect for both yourself and your needs.
Now that you are beginning to recognize your own wants and needs, how do you go about communicating them to another person? Here are some possible ways to phrase your request:
• Sometimes I find myself hinting around about something I want or need from you. I’d like to just tell you directly. I need for you to .
• I have a request to make of you. It’s important to me that you 
.
Hearing yourself speak your needs out loud works wonders. Be aware that it’s often much easier to say what you don’t want from someone than what you do want. Negatives always seem to be on the tips of our tongues, don’t they? For example, it’s easier to say, “I don’t want you to keep reading the paper when I’m talking about a problem.” Instead, emphasize what you do want: “I would really like to make eye contact with you when we talk. Could you please put the paper down while we’re speaking?”
You can practice doing this by standing in front of a mirror, making eye contact with yourself, and saying the words out loud. Start out with small, inconsequential requests; they can be real or hypothetical. Just listen to the sound of those words coming out of your mouth. You can practice with a therapist. If you can corral a friend or partner for a practice session it’s even better. By practicing with someone else, you get the added bonus of hearing a “yes” or “no.” You can take turns, too. Have the other person ask, and you can practice accepting or declining.
How many times have you cringed when somebody said to you, “Go ahead and take a chance. What have you got to lose?” And you say to yourself, “Take a chance on what? Possible rejection? Embarrassing myself? Feeling stupid for asking at a bad time?” All those old fears start bubbling up, don’t they?
So what to do about it? To tell the truth, learning to ask for what I want or need has been a bumpy ride for me. I’ve plugged away for years on this challenge—gaining ground to be sure, but all too slowly. I must have been ready to turn the proverbial corner the day I heard motivational speaker and author Patricia Fripp point out, “The answer will always be ‘no’ if you don’t ask.” Wow. I got it. And what a difference that motto has made to me. Asking for something takes on a whole new coloration now. I made a choice to no longer set up a situation where the answer would always be ‘no’. I could see I was cutting off all my options by not asking. Now it’s as if an internal dialogue takes place, and the feisty part of myself counters with, “I’ll show you that I won’t take ‘no’ for an answer without asking first.”
“The answer will always be no if you don’t ask.”
—Patricia Fripp
Identifying needs and asking for what you need are only part of the picture. What if your attempts at asking are successful and someone actually offers you warm, loving, comforting gestures—can you accept them? Can you take them in? Can you trust they are real? Or do you tell yourself that in spite of getting up your courage and asking for what you want or need, that if the truth be known, you “don’t deserve it,” or “they must have an ulterior motive,” or “they’ll only take it away again.”
Suppose however, you could let yourself just say, “Thank you.” I’m talking about the same “thank you” I suggested earlier in the book when someone gives you a compliment. You may find with a little practice at accepting yourself, you can choose to take in compliments and caring gestures. The key is letting yourself make that choice.