I'm ruminating and I wonder what other people think. I've been thinking about the whole concept of needing someone. A friend sent me an email forward about a man and a woman where she asks him a series of questions and he says no to every single one, then responds with something even better. For instance, one of the questions is something like "Do you want me?" and he says, "No," then tells her, "I don't want you, I need you." (He also says No, she isn't pretty, she's beautiful. Along those lines.)
It got me thinking about the whole concept of needing someone. When I was with my ex, I needed him. But that wasn't necessarily a good thing. I needed him to be there for me and to build me up because I was incapable of doing it for myself. I needed him to tell me I was pretty and smart because I didn't believe that I was. I needed him to be my other half (a phrase we used often) because I didn't feel like a complete person without him.
I remember bursting into tears in my roommate's car one day because I could feel my relationship with the ex falling apart and I was powerless to stop it because he had stopped talking with me. I felt like half of me was being amputated because that is the power I had given him in my life.
Fast forward 2 1/2 years, with a year of therapy and anti-depressants under my belt, and I realize that I never want to feel that way again. Maybe it's self-preservation. I prefer to think that it's just me realizing how unhealthy it is to see myself as inextricably wrapped up in another person. I'm sure the ex wasn't destroyed when he broke up with me because despite his words, it wasn't really how he felt. I, unfortunately, did.
If Jason and I broke up tomorrow would I disintegrate into nothing, needing a couple of years to pull myself together again? I don't think so. I would be very, very sad, of course, because I do love him and love being with him and it would be awful if he didn't want to be with me anymore. But that girl who fell apart, it's just not who I am anymore. More importantly, it's not what our relationship is. I don't see us as two halves of one person, but two people coming together to create this (what I consider) pretty cool couple. We both have our individuality, and sometimes that strains things because we both have fairly strong opinions and don't always look at things the same way. But so far that's working, I think because we're both willing to compromise and we both want the other one to be happy.
So what does it mean to need someone? Is it ok to need a certain person? Is need in love the same sort of need as in, I need water or I need air? What is "need"?
5 comments:
I think you're entirely right, Kelly. I don't think it's healthy to need someone so much that you can't be a normal, balanced person without them. I do think it's healthy to recognize that you love them and need their influence in your life to help you be an even better person, which I think is entirely different.
So it depends on semantics, I suppose, but the way you usually hear the word "need" used, it's usually in the context of being unable to live without someone, which shouldn't be true. I would hope that if I have a relationship again someday that we'd both still be able to say that we didn't NEED the other to be a whole person, but that the other person was such an influence for good that we wouldn't ever WANT to live without each other. Does that make sense? But that's using "want" in a different way, as well.
I have no real insights, but this was awesome.
My one thought: if you "need" someone, you manage to convince yourself you're not whole/right without them. If you love someone, they teach you that you're truly spectacular regardless of who's around.
I think that 'need' can sometimes get in the way of love. Desperately needing someone in your life (and believe me, I've been there) keeps you not only from loving yourself but really being able to love the person you're with. You spend so much concentrating on your insecurities in the relationship that you can't really fully participate.
To me, love and need are not mutually compatible. Love is more proactive. That is, when you love someone you wantthem to be in your life; you wantto be with them all the time; you wantto know they're all right and having a good day, you wantto know that they are happy, etc. I see it as more of a positive choice we make when we love. Liturature is full of lovers who choose to give up their object of affection in order that that person will be ulimately happier. If you love someone enough to give them up, then that is making a rational, passionate choice. If you need someone too much to give them up (or give them space or time alone etc.) then your motives are selfish and not loving.
IMHO
I do think "need" and "love" can exist together, but I don't think it's healthy for a romantic relationship. It's more what a child feels for their parent (and maybe why children can resent their parents too). It's a terrible thing to feel needy.
And, having been on the other end of a co-dependant marriage, it's a terrible burden to feel "needed."
Much better to be with someone because it's where I want to be. To be married to them because I want to spend my life with them. Paul and I have been together for 8 years and married for 1. When we broke up (briefly) 3 years ago I was deeply deeply sad (and angry). But within 36 hours I knew I was going to survive losing him. In an odd way, that knowledge gave me the strength to offer to try again with him.
It's much happier that way. And who isn't attracted to someone who wants to be with them more than someone who needs to be there?
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