A 6 year-old girl is sprawled out on the floor playing dolls with her little sister.

It’s one of those obnoxiously adorable scenes that I’m only paying attention to on a subconscious level.

You can only watch little kids play with their toys for so long before you either grow bored or envious.

They hadn’t busted out the Legos, so my envy was in check…

But then something happens. Something amazing.

Big Sis swipes a toy from the heap of technocolored playthings and Lil Sis loses her mind.

Lil Sis gathers her most eloquent argument and pleads her case, “It’s mine. Give it back!”

Big Sis appears unswayed. “I had it first.”

Lil Sis tries a different rhetorical angle, “But I need it!”

Big Sis must’ve studied under Aristotle or something, cause she gives zero ground, “You don’t need it, you want it.”

I snap to attention. Did I really just hear that? From a 6 year-old?

Oh my…that is maybe the most priceless thing I’ve ever heard. A real doozy of an argument from which Lil Sis just did not have the cognitive wherewithal to withstand.

Poor Lil Sis just didn’t have the mental faculties to distinguish between a want and need. Therefore, in one masterful stroke, Big Sis had just dominated the argument.

But this got my brain spinning, considering how many times I’ve uttered those same words while working, say…with a client wanting to get their finances back on the right track.

Or maybe it was that gal who really, really wanted to learn how to more effectively communicate her thoughts during work meetings so that her boss and coworkers would respect her.

This is an important question to ask, because your answer will dictate how hard you are willing to work. By and large we will work far harder to acquire a need over a want.

Regardless of context, I’ve uttered the words, “Is it a want or is it a need?” more times I care to admit.

And to be clear, this is a question I ask myself roughly 32 times a day, so it’s not as though I’m just screaming into a bullhorn at other people.

To me, Is this a want or a need, is one of the most important questions a self-disciplined person can ask themselves.

How you answer it on a case-by-case basis directly determines the trajectory of your life in pursuit of your goals.

But here’s the tricky bit…

How do you know when something is just a want versus a full-fledged need?

Sometimes it’s quite obvious. Other times…less so.

To understand the distinction between want and need, you’ve got to first understand The 9 Universal Needs as suggested by famed psychologist, Manfred Max-Neef. This is a framework of understanding the filters through which all human behavior can be analyzed.

The thing most people don’t realize is that behind every single want there is a need you are trying (and usually failing) to fulfill.

Buying that expensive car might be an attempt to fill your need of Freedom, or Affection, or (most likely) Identity.

When we view our wants through the lens of our needs, we can more accurate diagnose the real underlying problem, and, if we’re intentional, we can treat the disorder, rather than the symptom.

Before we dive into The 9 Universal Needs, it’s important to point out that in the structure we’re going to discuss, there is not a hierarchy, so to speak. Some needs might precede others, but these needs form an interconnected system.

When all 9 needs are met, we are in balance. We achieve a state of equilibrium and a boost to overall life-satisfaction.

Compromise one need in favor of another, well… that’s where you start running into problems. That’s where you start getting off-kilter.

That’s where things start falling apart.

So, as we now dive into The 9 Universal Needs, always remember that balance is required. You cannot strive to meet some needs at the expense of others.

They must work in harmony, only then can you achieve maximum your full-potential.

The 9 Universal Needs

1) Subsistence

If you’ve ever heard of Maslow’s Hierarchy, this one will be familiar. Simply put, Subsistence deals with our most foundational needs revolving around physical and mental health. Most often this manifests itself in the form of food, shelter, and work.

When you go back for a third round of all you can eat french fries, you’ve probably surpassed your body’s need for subsistence. Now you’re in full-blown want, territory.

Do you need to live in a million dollar McMansion? It certainly fulfills your need for shelter… but if you have to work 1,000 hours/week just to afford it, that shelter comes at the expense of another universal need: Leisure.

2) Leisure

Humans need to work. That’s not a bad thing. Work allows us an opportunity for continual growth and a platform to display our achieved mastery.

Growth is an integral part of happiness.

In today’s hustle-bustle world, we often overemphasize this aspect of our nature, most frequently this comes at the expense of our need for Leisure.

When we think about The 9 Universal Needs, Leisure might seem like the most expendable, but it’s not.

Leisure revolves around the development of imagination, tranquility, and spontaneity. We might implement this through games or parties, but the ultimate end state is an increase in our overall peace of mind.

If we do not make time to address our Leisure need, we quickly become out of balance, stressed, and ineffectual.

So don’t skimp on Leisure. It’s during this time you can recharge your batteries which’ll allow you to go further in pursuit of your other universal needs.

3) Creation

Creation and Leisure play well with one another, because the latter informs the former and visa versa. Through Creation we develop our imagination, inventiveness, and curiosity.

By making time for Creation and ensuring this need is met, we grow our skills and abilities.

Remember, growth = happiness. Creation is the need where we see this played out in real-time.

4) Identity

Today’s digital interconnectedness has bridged countless gaps of understanding and communication, but it has lead to what some psychologists refer to as loss of self.

That is, we have access to such a diverse wealth of connections that we’ve begun to lose touch with who we are as an individual.

This poses a number of critical issues, namely that a strong sense of self is a basic human need.

When we have a strong Identity, we have a sense of belonging, solid self-esteem, and internal consistency. All important aspects of a well-adjusted human.

Historically, Identity has been developed through cultural mechanisms such as language, religion, or geographical customs/values.

As the borders between you and me become increasingly blurred thanks to the deluge of information available through social media, these cultural mechanisms become watered down.

The result? A weakening of our sense of Identity.

5) Participation

Humans are social creatures. Though we might need to occasionally cloister ourselves away from the hubbub of life, studies show that the effects of prolonged isolation on the individual have pronounced effects on mental health.

This is where the universal need of Participation is realized. To fulfill this need we must feel connected to something beyond just ourselves. Work or sports or community gatherings are where this need is most typically expressed, which is why, though you may hate your job, at the end of the day, you need it for more than just money.

Don’t believe me?

Ask a retiree just how bland their life has become since exiting the work force.

The individuals who successfully transition into the post-work life are inevitably the ones with strong community ties in other areas (whether that be church, sports, hobbies, or extracurricular activities).

6) Freedom

Though we just discussed how important it is to remain interconnected, humans are nothing if not a walking bag of contradictions.

Our universal needs are no different.

Freedom is nothing less than the need for autonomy and passion. This relates closely to Identity and Participation, as these three universal needs create a constant push-pull for our attention. The trick is to create a balance between our need for a community based identity (Participation and Identity) and a self-based identity (Freedom and Identity).

Don’t sacrifice one aspect in favor of the other. Seek harmony.

7) Understanding

We are curious animals. It’s one of the reasons our ancestors so successfully navigated the evolutionary ladder. Our desire to learn and express our Creativity fostered inventions the rest of the animal kingdom just could never muster.

It’s through Understanding that we exercise our critical capacity, curiosity, and intuition. This is the entire foundation for our education system, and why as a culture we so greatly value the concept of genius.

If we deny ourselves the opportunity to learn and understand ourselves or the world around us, we become complacent, bored, and dissatisfied. These are not positive markers for overall life satisfaction.

8) Affection

Many of The 9 Universal Needs revolve around the fact that we are interconnected and thus interdependent on those around us. Cooperation proved an important component of our forefather’s survival, and it remains true to this day.

Affection plays an vital role in the dynamic of cooperation. Through Affection we feel respected, generous, and cared for (which plays a significant role in the final universal need). We have our need for Affection realized through friendship and family.

Remove Affection from a child’s development, and the ensuing psychological trauma is staggering.

Humans need to love, and, by and large, they need to feel loved. That’s why there are so many neurochemicals floating around your brain whose sole responsibility is to make you feel good in the presence of others.

Nature didn’t evolve that quirk on a fluke.

9) Protection

To achieve our full-potential, we inevitably need to feel safe. That might be safe in a physical sense (shelter), financial sense (work), or relational sense (family/friends). If we don’t feel Protected, then it becomes quite difficult to forge Affection, Leisure, or Creativity.

This, like the very first universal need, Subsistence, are foundational needs, but that does not necessarily mean it is any more important than the subsequent needs.

Again, there must be balance.

Without balance, you will inevitably seek fulfill unmet needs with superficial wants. This is where we short-sightedly fixate on items or relationships that temporarily bandage the symptom of an unfulfilled need.

This might work for a time, but it never lasts. If you’ve ever felt buyer’s remorse after purchasing something you later discovered did not fill that void in your heart, then you’ve experienced this truth firsthand.

So to avoid ineffectually treating symptoms, you need to filter your life choices, activities, purchases, and relationships through the filter of The 9 Universal Needs.

Ask yourself:

“What is the underlying need this thing will fill?”

This isn’t an easy task, but once you get in the habit of asking and answering this question, you’ll awaken to a greater understanding of just what exactly you need in life.

As a pleasant consequence, you’ll probably discover you don’t actually need all that much.