392. Broad Needs, Narrow Desires

Our needs are broad and general. Some are very familiar to us and we know how to meet them, just as when we are hungry, we know to eat food. But others are not nearly so clear, and when our awareness is limited, we can struggle to see what we need and how to meet it.

When we feel an indistinct need that we cannot fully recognize, we tend to wander around aimlessly looking for something to fill the hole inside us. Such wandering can be helpful, as it provides us with new experiences that can expand our awareness and allow us to better see the need.

But what also usually happens is that we tend to jump at the first solution that presents itself. We identify a specific object or action that we think might resolve our nebulous need and we make attaining it our goal. Our need has then spawned a desire: we want this particular thing because we believe it will help us meet our need.

Given the strength of need, it is no surprise that we easily become attached to the new desire. We associate its satisfaction with meeting our need, and since we cannot escape from need, we feel we absolutely must satisfy it. The immediate consequence is that we begin to suffer. We do not yet have what we feel we must have, and this feels terrible. It might feel like stress one day, anxiety the next, and despair the day after, but we suffer.

Suffering is unpleasant and we want to escape from it, so we begin to restrict our attention and actions in order to reach our goal more quickly. Our attention is then distracted and our awareness cannot expand further. But it is precisely awareness of need that we must obtain in order to see how to properly meet it.

When we can see the full broadness of our need, we also realize that there are countless creative ways to meet it. This means we no longer feel tied to the narrow solution that we were desperately desiring. Not only do we then become capable of breaking free from suffering, we also discover what we can actually do to meet our need in the present moment.