YOGA + Life® Magazines
  • Partner With Us
  • Subscribe
  • Events Directory
  • SHOP — What We Love
  • “The Practice”
  • HOME
  • FEATURED
    • Community + Culture
    • Wellness + Nutrition
    • Products
    • Profiles
    • Yoga + Fitness
    • Events
  • ALL CONTENT
    • Community + Culture
      • Art
      • Books
      • Community
      • Culture
      • Family
      • Fashion
      • Food + Drink
      • Nourish Me
      • Motivation
      • Music
      • Outdoors
      • Travel
    • Wellness + Nutrition
      • Self-Care
      • Nutrition
      • Psychology
      • Recipes
      • Therapy
      • Weight Loss
    • Products
      • Product Spotlights
      • Roundups
      • Try It On – Reviews
      • Try It Out – Reviews
    • Profiles
      • Business
      • Partner Profiles
      • People
      • Spotlight Cities
      • Students
      • Studios
      • Teachers
      • Seva Story
      • Sustainability Story
      • Storytelling
    • Yoga + Fitness
      • Asana
      • In the Practice
      • Meditation
      • Philosophy
      • Physiology
      • Sports
      • Workouts
    • Events
      • Festivals
      • Retreats
      • Training Spotlights
    • Inspiration From Y+L Partners
  • Y + L COMMUNITIES
    • COLORADO
    • MINNESOTA
    • NEW YORK
  • CONNECT
    • Order A Magazine
    • Partner With Us
    • Contribute
    • Contact Us
  • LIVE CLASSES
Featured Posts
  • Our Travel Essentials
    • 2 views
  • Drishti beats festival
    Spotlight : Expand Your Senses At Drishti Beats Festival 2023
    • 18 views
  • Society Denver
    Society Colorado : Denver’s Newest Wellness Collective Opens This Summer
    • 22 views
  • Partner With Us
  • Subscribe
  • Events Directory
  • SHOP — What We Love
  • “The Practice”
0 Followers
0 Likes
Partners
YOGA + Life® Magazines
Subscribe
  • HOME
  • FEATURED
    • Community + Culture
    • Wellness + Nutrition
    • Products
    • Profiles
    • Yoga + Fitness
    • Events
  • ALL CONTENT
    • Community + Culture
      • Art
      • Books
      • Community
      • Culture
      • Family
      • Fashion
      • Food + Drink
      • Nourish Me
      • Motivation
      • Music
      • Outdoors
      • Travel
    • Wellness + Nutrition
      • Self-Care
      • Nutrition
      • Psychology
      • Recipes
      • Therapy
      • Weight Loss
    • Products
      • Product Spotlights
      • Roundups
      • Try It On – Reviews
      • Try It Out – Reviews
    • Profiles
      • Business
      • Partner Profiles
      • People
      • Spotlight Cities
      • Students
      • Studios
      • Teachers
      • Seva Story
      • Sustainability Story
      • Storytelling
    • Yoga + Fitness
      • Asana
      • In the Practice
      • Meditation
      • Philosophy
      • Physiology
      • Sports
      • Workouts
    • Events
      • Festivals
      • Retreats
      • Training Spotlights
    • Inspiration From Y+L Partners
  • Y + L COMMUNITIES
    • COLORADO
    • MINNESOTA
    • NEW YORK
  • CONNECT
    • Order A Magazine
    • Partner With Us
    • Contribute
    • Contact Us
  • LIVE CLASSES
Needy
  • CO YOGA + Life
  • Wellness

It’s Ok To Be Needy | By Jessica Heaney

  • YOGA + Life® Magazines
  • 318 views
  • 3 minute read
Total
22
Shares
22
0
0

Be Needy! It’s a Good Thing!

Go on, ask for what you want and, more so, what you need. Lay claim to what is true for you. Trust me, it’s a good thing.

So many of my clients share a fear of being “needy.” They believe, “I’ll lose myself if I lean on my partner too much. I also shouldn’t really need anything from them.” And I’ll be honest, I used to believe this too. I have felt that internal struggle of wanting to be close but cautious it would take away from being connected to just ME.

It’s plain out scary to depend on someone to support you and to show up for you emotionally. By relying on someone, we give up a sense of control and we become vulnerable to being hurt by this very same person. But the absolute 100% truth is that we are hard wired to first be dependent on others with our own individual independence coming in second. It’s not the other way around.

Let me explain.

Our culture has become obsessed with personal independence. Pulling yourself up by your OWN bootstraps is high-fived and celebrated. Standing on your own two feet is recognized as strength. But once you ask for help or support, you’re looked down upon as weak, incapable and definitely not self-sufficient. We’ve created a culture that is overly fixated on “my own personal happiness” and a culture that now believes that we are individually in charge of our own well-being. If you’re sad, that’s your problem. If you’re angry, go deal on your own.

We’ve somehow become completely disconnected from our core need to depend on others for emotional support so that we can truly feel seen, heard and loved.

The end result is extreme loneliness: a loneliness that we are seeing manifest through violence, a loneliness that self protects, a loneliness that craves a drug to escape the deeper pain. It’s a loneliness that conflicts with what makes us human beings.

Let me say this even more clearly: Dependence isn’t a choice.  Needy

This whole independent band wagon is leading us quickly astray and down a lonely, depressed and emotionally disconnected path. The only choice we have is effective dependence or ineffective dependence. We are just that hard wired down to our heart and soul to be in relationship with others and to DEPEND on others.

This revelation is often the biggest eye opening, a-ha, moment for my clients, especially the couples I see who are struggling to have their needs met in their relationships. They are often struggling because part of them is saying, “You shouldn’t need anyone. You should rely on yourself only. Otherwise you’re too needy!” While another part of them is urgently saying, “You need closeness. You need to feel understood through another. You need this person’s consistent love and comfort!”

We need relationship and genuine connection just as much as we need food and water every day. We each also have specific ways of how to feel closeness and to quench that thirst for true connection.

Working with my clients centers around how to move into prioritizing our needs for relationship and how to also have these needs for connection met. Being open about what these needs are and asking directly for what you want is a sure way to avoid any sense of clinginess. When we can honor and celebrate emotional dependency, we can find a truer more genuine independence in ourselves.

“Emotional dependency isn’t immature or pathological. It is our greatest strength.”
-Dr. Sue Johnson

Jessica Heaney, LCSW, is a Certified Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist based in Vail, CO. She is the founder of the Vail Relationship Institute where she and her team of clinicians specialize in healing relationships through counseling, training and events. Jessica is a dog lover and mountain explorer. Learn more about her and her work at www.vailrelationshipinstitute.com. 
Total
22
Shares
Share 22
Tweet 0
Pin it 0
YOGA + Life® Magazines

Previous Article
  • CO YOGA + Life
  • Nutrition
  • Wellness + Nutrition

Powerful Plants, Powerful You | By Angela Gaffney

  • Lexi Reich | Managing Editor
View Post
Next Article
  • CO YOGA + Life
  • Community + Culture
  • Family
  • Fashion
  • Outdoors
  • Products
  • Roundups

2018 Father’s Day Gift Guide

  • Lexi Reich | Managing Editor
View Post
More from Y+L
  • Sedona Yoga Festival

    Sedona Yoga Festival Celebrates 10 Years | By Kristen Grace

    • YOGA + Life® Magazines
    View Post
  • Cranial Touch

    Sacred Sister Collective Retreats | By Kaitlin Emig

    • CO YOGA + Life®
    View Post
  • Loveology Retreat

    Dr. Ava Cadell Opens New “Loveology Retreat” in Maricopa, California

    • YOGA + Life® Magazines
    View Post
  • Beyul Retreat Yoga

    Beyul Retreat Center Near Aspen Aligns Humans with Nature | By Kaitlin Emig

    • CO YOGA + Life®
    View Post
  • Yogi in front of sunset

    Why Taking Retreat is Essential to Renewal of Spirit | By Kali Basman

    • CO YOGA + Life®
    View Post
  • The Vail Wine Classic Returns This August

    • Lexi Reich | Managing Editor
    View Post
  • An Evening with Elizabeth Gilbert : A Revolutionary Woman Is A Relaxed Woman | By Rachel Glowacki

    • YOGA + Life® Magazines
    View Post
  • Telluride Yoga Festival

    Telluride Yoga Festival Makes A Move To Mountain Village | By Kristen Grace

    • CO YOGA + Life®
    View Post
  • Elizabeth Gilbert is Coming to Denver on May 4 | By Kim Fuller

    • CO YOGA + Life®
    View Post
  • Oars

    On The River + In The Flow : Balancing Yoga, Meditation and a Thirst for Whitewater at a Women’s Wellbeing Retreat | By Lisa Blake

    • CO YOGA + Life®
    View Post
Archived Posts!
  • Ojas : 5 Lifestyle Behaviors for Cultivating Sustainable Vitality | By Julia Clarke
    • 215
  • Sleepless in Colorado? : How to Get a Good Night’s Sleep | By Sharon W. House
    • 349
  • The Future of Water : WaveMakers – Raising the Standards of Sustainability
    • 368
  • The Science of Crystals | by Veronica Walters
    • 432
  • Try It On : FP Movement Dream Work Short and Just My Type Tank | By Lexi Reich
    • 297
Instagram

Join the YOGA + Life® Newsletter!

Events, Product Reviews, Promotions and More!

about
YOGA + Life® - an online community and magazine.
Recent Articles
  • Our Travel Essentials
    • YOGA + Life® Magazines
  • Drishti beats festival
    Spotlight : Expand Your Senses At Drishti Beats Festival 2023
    • YOGA + Life® Magazines
  • Society Denver
    Society Colorado : Denver’s Newest Wellness Collective Opens This Summer
    • CO YOGA + Life®
  • Kelsey Stoll - Compass Retreats
    Kelsey Stoll : Noticing What We’re a Part of | By Erin Phillips
    • CO YOGA + Life®
  • About Us + Policies, Terms
  • Online Columnists
  • Contribute
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
YOGA + Life® - All Rights Reserved

Input your search keywords and press Enter.

 

Loading Comments...