How to look after your emotional health

Need to know

The human givens (HG) approach to therapy was developed in 1997 by the psychotherapists Joe Griffin and Ivan Tyrrell, who were struck by the fact that so many different models of therapy exist. To them, this indicated a lack of consensus about how people can best be helped. They decided it made sense to go back to basics – to the needs that all living organisms must meet in order to flourish. In the case of humans, that includes our emotional needs.

The key organising idea driving HG therapy is that if these essential emotional and physical needs (the ‘human givens’) are not sufficiently well met, it can lead us to suffer from problems with mental health. Most of us readily accept our physical needs, such as for air, water, nutritious food, sleep and shelter. It’s our emotional needs that we tend to overlook. In this Guide, I invite you to use the human givens framework of needs and resources to take a look at your own life and see what is working well for you; and to identify where perhaps you are falling short and could make some changes, large or small, to improve your wellbeing.

The basic emotional needs we all have

Many decades of social and health psychology research have identified several basic emotional needs that are critical for our wellbeing. These include:

• security – ‘safe territory’ for us to live and work in, without undue fear;
• autonomy – a degree of control over what happens in our lives;
• attention – giving and receiving it, which enhances our development as human beings;
• emotional connection – a loving relationship with at least one other person, intimate or not;
• community – belonging to social groupings beyond our family;
• status – feeling accepted and respected as the people we are;
• privacy – having sufficient time and space to reflect on and learn from our experiences;
• competence and achievement – recognising our capabilities and seeking to build on them; and
• meaning – the sense that our lives are purposeful, and matter.

If one or more of these basic needs are not met, it can be harmful to your mental health.

For instance, an ongoing study of thousands of civil servants in London, which began in 1985, has shown that those lower down the hierarchy, who had heavy workloads but little control, status or support, suffered much higher levels of physical and mental illness than those higher up the ranks, who were able to make their own decisions.

A study of more than 60,000 people from 123 countries consistently found that wellbeing depended on how much people felt respected by others.

Many studies have revealed significant adverse effects of loneliness on mental and physical health, clearly showing the importance of connection with others.

It is a similar story for all the essential needs listed above – in each case, research suggests a failure to meet those needs can have negative consequences for your emotional wellbeing.

The role of your innate psychological resources

Another important element of the human givens approach is that unwittingly misusing your innate psychological resources – such as your memory, imagination, empathy, rational thinking and learning through metaphor (called ‘pattern matching’ in HG therapy) – can also contribute to poor mental health.

For instance, say you are going on a holiday and you begin to imagine terrifying possible outcomes (such as the wings falling off your plane, or drowning at the beach), fuelling an anxiety-provoking loss of sense of control; or you have a work presentation to deliver and you ‘pattern match’ to the one occasion when a presentation went badly, instead of to all the times your presentations went well, thus sending your sense of competence plummeting and provoking a fear of giving presentations. Similarly, too much empathy could turn you into a resentful people-pleaser, damaging your sense of autonomy and status.

Applying this approach to mental health symptoms

Looking at things from this perspective, troublesome states, such as depression, hostility, excess anxiety and so on, can be seen to reflect the fact not that there is something deeply wrong with a person, but that something – or some things – aren’t working for them. Either their basic needs aren’t being met and/or their innate psychological resources have gone awry. This can even be the case for conditions such as schizophrenia, eating disorders or so-called personality disorders, where unmet needs may be causal or else exacerbate symptoms; and learning to fulfil these unmet needs in healthier ways can bring improvement.

Thus, in HG thinking, rather than symptom control, such as taking antidepressants for depression or using management techniques to handle anger, helpful though these may be for some in the short term, the best way to get back on track is to identify which important needs are not being well met and/or which innate resources we may unintentionally be misusing – and address these.

Consider the postgrad student Michael, who was devastated when his two-year relationship with Pearl broke up; he thought all was going fine and just didn’t see it coming. He gave up studying and stayed alone in his room, getting more and more miserable.

Using the ‘needs and resources’ lens for making sense of symptoms, any HG therapist working with Michael would recognise that, after his relationship break-up, he would be feeling a sudden loss of intimate emotional connection; he might feel control was taken from him, because what happened was not what he wanted; he might even be questioning his status as a loveable person – whether he was ‘good’ enough. These needs would need restoring.

Imagine too that, during Michael’s therapy, it became clear that while he had felt fulfilled in his relationship, he had not recognised Pearl’s needs (for more attention, acknowledgement and emotional connection) and so part of his treatment would involve him learning how to be in a successful couple relationship, as well as encouraging him to re-engage with his studies and with other friendships to help get important needs of his own met.

In short, HG therapists see not a diagnosis but a story reflecting different unmet needs. For instance, if someone’s depression started after a mugging in the street or a sexual assault, the person is likely to be feeling insecure and untrusting. If someone can’t write their essay or job application and depression sets in, they are probably feeling inadequate and struggling with any sense of competence and achievement. People in a deep state of depression commonly suffer a catastrophic loss of meaning in life. They lose hope that anything can ever be better – and, in HG therapy, this must be addressed immediately, so that they leave their very first session with the expectation that positive change can happen.

Even if you do not have a serious psychological problem, looking through the lens of human givens therapy can improve your self-understanding and help you to identify problem areas in your life that might be sliding under the radar or causing you a vague sense of dissatisfaction. This Guide will give you pointers for identifying your unmet needs and using your innate resources more effectively to address them.

What to do

Take the emotional needs audit

The easiest way to take your own emotional ‘temperature’ is by completing an ‘emotional needs audit’ (ENA). The audit sets out all the main emotional needs in a list and you are invited to rate yourself from 1 to 7, where 1 means that you feel the need is unmet and 7 that it is satisfactorily met. If you score any item at 3 or lower, that lack is likely to be affecting your sense of wellbeing.

The ENA asks whether you:

• feel secure in important areas of your life;
• receive and give enough attention;
• feel sufficiently in control, in terms of what is happening in your life;
• feel a sense of belonging in the wider community – but can have privacy too;
• have at least one person you are close to, and other emotional connections;
• feel acknowledged for things you do;
• enjoy a sense of competence and achievement; and
• have a sense of meaning and purpose.

You will need to think about your life in the round when completing the ENA (you can download the full version from the website of the Human Givens Institute). For instance, one person might feel extremely secure in their job but return home to a partner who criticises them constantly or makes them feel fearful for their safety. Someone else might enjoy a loving relationship but feel insecure at work, where they are being bullied by a colleague. Or maybe you have financial insecurity or you have become uncomfortable in your home because difficult neighbours have moved in upstairs or next door.

The idea is to arrive at a score that reflects your overall sense of security. If someone is in a toxic relationship, for instance, where they feel fearful for their safety, no amount of security elsewhere can balance that, although it can certainly help and become a strength to draw on.

Next, think about who and what you give attention to. Do you routinely put more energy into meeting someone else’s needs than your own? Do you feel celebrated or neglected by someone who matters in your life? Do you shine or feel shy when in a large group? Are you genuinely interested in a particular person or just in what they think of you? And might you give too much attention to particular things, such as social media or even bodily symptoms – focusing on depression and pain, for instance, could make the experience worse.

When thinking about control, consider whether you have too many or too few demands on you; whether someone has too much power over you; whether events such as taking retirement, having a baby or developing a serious illness have affected your sense of control over your life – and so on.

For community, do you help neighbours, belong to any local groups, engage in any voluntary work, sit on any committees, belong to any political or religious group, etc?

Also, spend time identifying the loving relationships you have in your life. Privacy is also important which means having enough mental space for yourself, so reflect on whether you are too much at someone’s beck and call (such as a sick relative, needy children, a demanding boss who emails late into the evening) and don’t forget to factor in emotionally arousing information from social media feeds. When we get highly emotionally aroused, we can’t think straight.

In the case of status, do you feel appreciated for what matters to you – for instance, what you do as a parent, a friend, a colleague, a boss? Do you have achievements that you are proud of or do you constantly question your competence and avoid challenges?

Finally, do you have meaning in your life? The three most common ways we achieve meaning are: through feeling needed (by children, elderly parents, work teams, other people we may help, pets or even plants that depend on us); through challenging new activities that stretch us; and/or through commitment to something larger than ourselves, such as through political, environmental or spiritual beliefs and involvement.

Get more out of the audit

If you know that you have a tendency towards depression, anxiety, addiction or some other psychological difficulty, it can be helpful to consider your answers to the ENA with that in mind, as it may throw light on why you are behaving in particular ways or feeling the way you do. For instance, you may find you use addictive behaviours to push away worries that make you feel insecure; maybe you spend less time with other people so that you can feed the addiction; or you spend time largely with people who share the same addictive tendency, such as drinking a lot.

If you get angry easily, might it be because you feel highly insecure in certain situations and lash out to disguise this? Have people become less keen to spend time with you? If your issue is chronic pain, do you feel you receive sufficient attention from doctors, or do you feel unheard and dismissed? Have you lost your sense of control and connection because of disability?

And are you forgetting what is working in your life? Depression, particularly, distorts our sense of who we are, our recognition that others love us and our perception of what we have achieved, so try to be as objective as possible as you fill in your form. For a richer perspective, consider what boxes someone else would tick, if they were completing the audit on your behalf. That’s not to say their answers are the right ones, but considering their perspective might bring depth and nuance to your responses.

Consider whether you’re meeting some needs in an unhealthy way

At first glance, it might seem that some or all of your needs are satisfyingly well met. In these cases, it’s important to probe a little deeper, and be as honest with yourself as possible, to check whether you’re meeting these needs in a potentially unhealthy way. If you are, it is important to include these needs in the next step that’s about ensuring your emotional needs are met in a beneficial way.

For instance, let’s say you feel very secure only because you rarely take a chance or do anything unfamiliar. In this case, your high score could mask that you are missing out on new challenges, which could bring a renewed sense of achievement or meaning and purpose.

Or perhaps you have a strong sense of control and you pride yourself on being firm and directive as a boss, supervisor or parent. In this case, you might be satisfying your own need for control at the expense of others, suppressing their individuality, creativity and ideas, and maybe masking a deep-seated insecurity in yourself.

When you give attention to someone else, does it come from a genuine wish to be doing what you are doing or is there an ulterior motive? For instance, someone in a new relationship may take up hobbies their partner enjoys (but they themselves don’t) in an unconscious attempt to garner more attention.

Similarly, the need to belong can sometimes lead to buying ‘acceptance’ within a particular group by ostracising or abandoning others who are important in our lives. Even fulfilling your need for meaning could come at the expense of your relationships – for instance, if you over-prioritise time spent training for a marathon, writing a book or helping out at soup kitchens.

Find healthy ways to meet your emotional needs

When you have completed your needs audit, it is time to think about how you might make changes to improve any low scores (or to address those needs you identified in the preceding step, but in a healthier way).

Be solution focused about this. For instance, brainstorm with yourself, or someone you respect, all the possible ways that you might satisfyingly get low-score needs better met. For instance, if you are low on sense of achievement, you might consider studying for a qualification that will enable you to get promotion or pursue work that is closer to your heart. Or you might decide to accept that your paid work will never be truly satisfying and that you are going to put your energy into doing something outside of work that you enjoy or would like to learn.

If you are feeling bullied or undermined at work, you might consider learning assertiveness skills and investigate self-help books, classes or online courses; or you might think about changing your job, and look into the possibilities for that. Approach everything with an open mind, even if your ideas seem daunting or initially impractical. As you start to follow a new line of thought, options for making it reality may begin to present themselves.

Or maybe you have identified a lack of emotional and community connection, and realise you need to make some new friends, but perhaps you are shy. Maybe think about ‘safe’ local activities, such as litter picks or voluntary work, where the focus is not on you. Dog walking for a neighbour can result in easy connections with other dog-walkers.

As mentioned, you may have found, while taking the audit, that you identified needs that are not met in the healthiest ways. Say you realise that you are secure only because you don’t take risks; you might think about trying something appealing but outside your comfort zone, and see how that feels. If you tend to want to be in control, consider whether there is something you can ‘let go of’ – for instance, let children take responsibility for a small task, even if the end result isn’t perfect, or delegate more to staff at work. You may find they feel more empowered and so cooperate more – win-win.

If you often give attention just to earn attention (going to hated football matches, for instance), try to identify genuine ways to give attention, such as listening or helping out more. Try to ensure you get your sense of belonging from group activities that are truly meaningful to you – and make sure you leave enough space for the people who matter in your life.

Address any clashes of needs

In any relationship between two or more people, there will be clashes of needs or different needs requiring priority at different times. Sitting down with your partner or members of your family and going through how well your needs are met in the context of your relationships can help you arrive at better solutions. Getting everyone to complete the audit for themselves first will give you a clearer focus.

For example, one partner may feel hurt when the other is too distracted by work to pay even brief attention to some simple domestic issue that needs an immediate solution; or maybe one partner feels that they are given too much or too little affection (suffocating or starving). Children in the family may resent not being trusted enough, wanting more sense of control over things that they can manage.

Once everyone’s unmet needs are identified, it makes it easier to work out ways to shift the balance, so that everyone’s needs are better met. For an idea of how this can work, consider the lives of Candace and Angus.

Candace had a well-paying job in public relations, while her partner Angus took care of their young children, doing his work as an artist while they were at primary school. When Candace arrived home mentally exhausted after a stressful day, Angus, equally stressed, couldn’t wait to hand over responsibility for the children’s bath and bedtime. This led to daily rows, leaving both resentful.

However, when they sat down together and discussed which of their needs didn’t feel sufficiently well met, they recognised that they were both desperate for some private time by early evening. So it was agreed that Candace would have 30 minutes of ‘downtime’ before taking over the childcare reins. She had time to adjust, while Angus knew that his own downtime was coming shortly.

Make better use of your innate resources

Imagination

Sometimes we unwittingly misuse our innate psychological resources. For instance, imagination is a powerful resource, but it can be misused to catastrophise. The human givens approach teaches how to use your imagination to visualise positive outcomes instead of bad ones – in HG therapy, we call this guided imagery.

One way to try this for yourself is to find a moment to close your eyes and take some deep breaths to instil calm and relaxation. To deepen the relaxation, you might imagine yourself in a lovely peaceful outdoor setting. Then imagine using your breathing to calm yourself down in a difficult situation that you struggle with – for instance, giving a presentation. ‘See’ or sense yourself in that situation, enjoying the opportunity to communicate your knowledge to others, and taking deep breaths at any point that you might otherwise struggle. Really sense enjoying yourself and feeling in control of the situation – what the brain focuses on is what it is more likely to get.

Rational thinking

When we get extremely anxious or angry, the high emotional arousal can colour our judgment and so we may do or say things we regret. You can turn this around by using breathing techniques to help bring down anxiety and anger levels, so that you can think straight again. You can also use your rational abilities to deal with negative thinking – questioning whether there is evidence for things going wrong, and using linguistic techniques to deliberately distance yourself from unhelpful thoughts (eg, by turning the thought ‘I am stupid’ into ‘I am having the thought that I am stupid’), which takes the power out of them.

Empathy

Empathy is another powerful resource but, if we over-empathise, we may agree to do things for others that we don’t really want to do, leaving us feeling powerless and resentful. It is important to find a caring way to say ‘no’ that acknowledges the needs of both of you. For instance, in describing your opposing positions, using the word ‘and’ rather than ‘but’ doesn’t negate the other person’s position and instead gives equal weight to both: ‘I realise that this is very important to you and I am not going to be available on that day to help. I do hope we can find another solution.’

Pattern matching

It is a human survival characteristic that we tend to think negatively before we think positively. It’s therefore no surprise that we so often remember the one time we did something poorly rather than all the times we did it competently; or remember the one partner who hurt us badly, instead of those who treated us well. In HG therapy, we see this as an unhelpful form of ‘pattern matching’ (another innate resource), which in these cases could hold us back from taking on new challenges or relationships, and prevent us from meeting our needs.

One way to let go of unhelpful pattern matches is by making a list of all the times that an activity went well and why; or all the ways that a new potential partner is different from the previous one.

We can also pattern match to things unconsciously, such as the sound of a train whistle bringing on a panic attack in someone who was seriously assaulted at a train station. HG therapists use the ‘rewind detraumatisation’ technique to stop this happening, putting a bad experience in the past where it belongs and thus enabling you to stop reliving it (for more about this technique, see the Learn More section, below).

Hopefully I have given you the flavour of the human givens approach and you now have an idea of how you can use it to help yourself better meet your emotional needs. If you feel deeply stuck and just can’t get yourself moving – for instance, you are feeling depressed or experiencing debilitating social anxiety – seeing an HG therapist could help you make a shift (more on this in the Learn More section below).

Links & books

The Human Givens Institute has more information about this approach to mental wellbeing, including on the growing body of supportive research findings. You can also find audios, CDs and digital downloads relating to many of the areas covered in this Guide (including one on the therapeutic power of guided imagery).

I write a regular blog for Psychology Today on using the human givens approach in everyday life.

The Good Mental Health Podcast is full of interesting and entertaining interviews with experts, all in line with HG understandings.

If you would like professional help, you can find a human givens therapist here.

The newly updated version of the book Human Givens: An Empowering Approach to Emotional Health and Clear Thinking (2024) by Joe Griffin and Ivan Tyrrell is a fascinating read that fully explains HG thinking.

Or you might be interested in the shorter self-help books in our Essential Help in Troubled Times series covering various psychological difficulties from depression to anger.