What if the simple linguistic habit of saying "I really need to" is actually limiting your potential and causing you to neglect your own desires? I'm your host, Sean, a performance coach and Special Operations Combat Veteran, and I'm convinced that our language behaviors influence our actions and wellbeing more than we may realize. In this conversation, we're taking a deep dive into the potential pitfalls of this phrase, the resistance it can create, and how it can unintentionally assign undue importance to wants rather than needs.
We'll go further to probe the potential burnout that can result from the constant pressure of feeling the need to serve others. But it's not all doom and gloom! We'll also recognize situations where this phrase can help in simplifying complex issues. Wrapping up, we'll tackle the importance of controversial conversations, the potential for meaningful dialogues they incite, and the essential role we all play in taking care of each other. Drink in these insights and let's navigate the tricky terrains of language and desire together.
Are you an executive, entrepreneur, or combat veteran looking to overcome subconscious blind spots and limiting messaging to unlock your highest performance? Feel free to reach out to Sean at Reload Coaching and Consulting.
What if the simple linguistic habit of saying "I really need to" is actually limiting your potential and causing you to neglect your own desires? I'm your host, Sean, a performance coach and Special Operations Combat Veteran, and I'm convinced that our language behaviors influence our actions and wellbeing more than we may realize. In this conversation, we're taking a deep dive into the potential pitfalls of this phrase, the resistance it can create, and how it can unintentionally assign undue importance to wants rather than needs.
We'll go further to probe the potential burnout that can result from the constant pressure of feeling the need to serve others. But it's not all doom and gloom! We'll also recognize situations where this phrase can help in simplifying complex issues. Wrapping up, we'll tackle the importance of controversial conversations, the potential for meaningful dialogues they incite, and the essential role we all play in taking care of each other. Drink in these insights and let's navigate the tricky terrains of language and desire together.
Are you an executive, entrepreneur, or combat veteran looking to overcome subconscious blind spots and limiting messaging to unlock your highest performance? Feel free to reach out to Sean at Reload Coaching and Consulting.
Welcome to the Reload, where we help unconventional leaders craft the life they truly want by questioning the assumptions they have about how life works. My name is Sean and I'll be your host on this journey. As a performance coach and Special Operations Combat Veteran, I help high performing executives kick ass in their careers while connecting with deeply powerful insights that fuel their lives. Alright, nice to see you back. If this is your first time, welcome. And today I thought we might talk about one of my coaching pet peeves. Now, I'm going to do my absolute best not to get too high up on my soapbox here, but there is something that everybody with whom I have worked has gravitated towards this linguistic tick, if you will, or this habit, and I find it very destructive, and the fact that it seems to happen with everybody that I work with, and the fact that it seems to show up so frequently in my other sort of regular conversations as well, makes me think hmm, yeah, this might be actually something worth talking about. So let's dig in.
Speaker 1:What is this linguistic pet peeve of mine? That is when someone, especially a client, says I really need to dot, dot, dot, or worse, I really just need to dot, dot, dot. Now why is that so frustrating for a coach? Well, for this coach maybe there are other coaches out there that don't get frustrated by it, but this coach and since you're listening to this show, I assume that you have at least some curiosity about what I think and what I've seen and how what I've seen and what I think seems to impact people's success, their happiness, their fulfillment, their relationships and so on. Now, when somebody uses that phrasing I really need to, or, worse again, I really just need to well, first and foremost, they are coming at this construction from a place of neediness and you might say no, no, no, sean, that's not what they're doing, they're just being clear. Okay, we'll unpack that here in a little bit. But what I have seen, and the reason that this is top of mind for me, is that when people say what they need to do, most of the time I see them not do it.
Speaker 1:And this, again, is true also for individuals who are not my clients, just friends of mine, colleagues, things like that and so it makes me wonder if that phrasing actually is sort of a I don't know, maybe it's a bit of a mental buffer that we pull out when we want to express that we have a sense of what direction we ought to be going, but then we want to give ourselves a bit of an out so that we don't actually have to go do it. I don't know, I'm not quite clear yet on why it is that so many humans pull out this little device, but I can talk to how I've seen it be ineffective. So most people and if you pause this recording for just a moment and give yourself a chance to kind of think about your own mental, emotional state, I think that you might find that this is true for you as well is that most people feel resistant to being forced to do something, even when they put it on themselves. Think about all the New Year's resolutions that get broken or that don't even last two weeks. Right, I mean, one of the common examples that are in no end of blog posts and YouTube shorts and etc, etc.
Speaker 1:Around the beginning of the New Year is going back to the gym. Yeah, you know, I really need to lose a few pounds. I really need to go to the gym Not gonna, but I really need to. Okay, what are we doing there? What is the purpose of making that statement, that declaration that we really need to do something and then it doesn't get done. It'd be a totally different story if you know humans around the world were using this construction, this device and then actually going and getting it done. I mean that would be pretty cool, but it doesn't seem to happen. And I believe that a big chunk of that is connected to where it is that we create our own internal resistance to the force that we're putting on ourselves. Additionally, when we say I really just need to and the reason, I think that that construction is worse than the other construction of I really need to, so we're, you know, in that second instance, omitting the word just.
Speaker 1:But the word just has this insidious minimizing effect. And when people say I just need to, or he or she or they just need to, we often put ourselves in this unconscious minimization of the difficulty of whatever the thing is, whether it's a task, whether it's confronting someone, you know, in a difficult conversation, you know, maybe there's something going on in the relationship that is quite challenging. And then when we say, well, I just, I just need to go have a frank conversation with that person, I just need to bring this to their attention, I just need to clear the air with that person. In part, we're attempting to psych ourselves up to go do the difficult thing, but most of the time, what I've seen in terms of the impact that it has on clients and if you think I work with stupid people, you would be incorrect I work with really intelligent people who are in positions of power and who are highly educated and highly experienced, but when they are facing something difficult, especially when they throw the word just in there, then they minimize.
Speaker 1:Now, another difficulty here, when we see this word just pop in, is that it distorts what you would actually need to overcome in order to take action, because typically they oversimplify the scenario. Let's take some sort of crucial or critical conversation or a crucial conversation that involves criticism either giving or receiving yes on its face. On the surface, all we need to do, all we just need to do is go talk to the other person and lay our cards on the table and really just be transparent. Just be transparent. But what's happening under the surface? Especially in these contexts where there's criticism that's most likely going to be involved, especially on something that we value, then we have a high degree of sensitivity. We're worried about judgment, we're worried about the final outcome or final disposition of whatever the thing is that we value. So there's a lot more being wrapped up in this scenario than simply just laying your cards on the table because we're afraid of outcome, we're afraid of judgment, we're afraid of irreparably harming the relationship and not knowing what the future would hold in that scenario. And this is just one example of how people tend to oversimplify with this word just and then the other word need.
Speaker 1:The other hurdle here when it comes to just, is that oftentimes it introduces this self-judgment, and it also, along with that self-judgment hand in hand, is kind of an erosion of trust in self, this notion and this is something I've heard from a lot of clients I can't even accomplish this one little thing. That's how they phrase it Men, women, all the above I can't even accomplish this one little thing. So part of the work, then, is for them to understand that it's not a little thing, that there's a lot more involved there, to get them to a place of recognition and, hopefully, acceptance that when we are emotionally charged about something, that it's unlikely for it to just be a simple little matter of accomplishing one little thing, but the more that we say and if you think about it in your own experience. Or maybe let's go back to those New Year's resolutions. Whatever your New Year's resolution might be or might not be, I mean, some people have gone away from resolutions entirely because too many of them fail or just kind of evaporate. But for the sake of the show I don't know let me just stick with that whole weight loss thing.
Speaker 1:Go into the gym If you tell yourself that it really needs to happen, that it is a requirement. And so if we look at the word need, that it needs to happen, then the need, whatever the need is, is a requirement. And so then if the requirement goes unmet, then it must clearly not be a need. Now you might say, oh well, it's a need in order to accomplish something, a certain something. Okay, that's fair. But then it's a requirement to accomplish a certain end, which means then, if you don't go forward with that, then your assessment of how important the goal was or the end was, then that's probably inaccurate.
Speaker 1:So you get to this place in either case, of really not being able to trust your own language. Is losing a few pounds really that important If somebody just needs to lose a few pounds and they just need to go to the gym in order to do that which, arguably there's way more than just going to the gym but for the sake of demonstration. When we look at that language and the person who then does not go to the gym and who then ostensibly does not lose the weight, where are they? Where does that place them in terms of their own ability to trust what they say they commit to? So we end up in this place where we can't actually really trust ourselves. We can't trust our word, we can't trust our judgment or discernment, if that feels like a better, more accurate phrase.
Speaker 1:Additionally, this phrasing around need erroneously promotes a want to a need, and here I'm probably going to piss all kinds of people off, because and this is one of the things that I talk about with prospective clients and then again with clients who have signed on is that there is only one thing that the human organism needs to do at some point, and that is end die. In case that wasn't clear, that is the one thing that is unavoidable. Do you need to be a parent? No, you don't. There are plenty of humans on the planet that never create children. Do you need to breathe? Well, you need to breathe if you want to live, but you can die and therefore don't need to breathe. It's not inescapable that you breathe. The only inescapable thing in the human experience is death and, as one of my clients liked to joke, death and taxes, but ultimately it's death. Death is the only thing that you cannot avoid and therefore everything else becomes a choice.
Speaker 1:There are people every day on this planet who choose to kill themselves. Their current reality is so difficult for them that they choose to leave it forever, and so when we use the word need, we're conflating desires and needs, and one of the knock-on effects of this which I think is quite corrosive actually, and what I try to express to the people that I'm working with is that it unintentionally causes you to discount desire, to discount what you want. Most of my clients view their entire existence through the lens of need, have, to, must, should, and it's almost as though the thought of wanting something, especially if it's something they want for themselves, they're just themselves, right? Not, oh, I want to be a better parent, or I want to be a better partner, or I want to be a better boss, or I want to be a better save the world entrepreneur, or whatever, but just for themselves, and my female clients who have children are probably the worst at this. The thought of wanting something for themselves, wanting not needing wanting something for themselves is almost morally wrong in their book. Now am I saying that humans should try to avoid being of service to other people? No, I mean, especially if you've listened to the show for a long time you know that my background is littered with service service to the United States of America during my time in the military, service to clients.
Speaker 1:This podcast, by the way, is a service. Yes, some of that service is to yours truly, because you know, before people hire me, they want to kind of have a sense of, well, what are we going to talk about? And it's like there's a whole podcast with 180-some episodes that you can go listen to, at least at the time of this recording. All right, so there's some service to me, but then there's also service to you. I'm not getting paid for this. I mean, if you want to pay me, feel free.
Speaker 1:But where it is that we are blindly in service and where it is that we are unable to recognize our own desire and to actually allow ourselves to have desire, that is when I start throwing red flags, those individuals who think that they're somehow morally bankrupt because they want something for themselves. Those are the individuals that I try to help. Those are the individuals also who, by the way, are getting incredibly burned out, always being of service to other people. Their cup ran dry a long time ago and somehow they're still kind of scraping by. And my argument is that when your cup is full your metaphorical cup and when your cup is spilling over, you can still be of tremendous service because the cup is spilling over, but that we have to maintain an understanding of what it is that allows us to be healthy, to be restored, to be tuned in, and that if everything is this need to need, to need to must, should. It's like this warning siren going off. It just sounds so intense and, truth be told, most of the people that come to work with me are feeling that sense of burnout from that intensity that everything feels like duty and obligation.
Speaker 1:Now, before the pitchforks and torches come my way, with everyone up in arms about me, assaulting this need to language, there are a couple places in which this I really need to thinking can be effective, and first is when it helps you distill down a complex topic to the next actionable step. So there are times when people engage that linguistic device as a way to simplify right, oftentimes when they're sort of in paralysis or analysis paralysis, excuse me and they're not able to put the car the metaphorical car in drive and get on the action, because they're constantly just sort of ruminating on all these different factors and, oh well, how do these different things play together? And et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And there can be a high degree of effectiveness in saying what do you need to do next? Never mind what the grandiose vision is, what is the next step? So that is one really effective place to use this linguistic device.
Speaker 1:Another place where it can be really, really handy is when you're helping yourself identify why, if the next step is relatively simple and straightforward, you are feeling resistance to doing it. So we can use that phrasing I just need to, you know and kind of flip that minimization around and say okay, yeah, sure, if it's really that simple, why aren't you going and getting it done? If it's so simple a child could do it, then why can't you? A fully educated, mature, ready-to-go-kick-ass adult is unable to do it. And in that we get into deeper conversations. We begin to recognize. Oh yeah, all right, this is more complex than what I was thinking. There are more elements to this that I have not acknowledged or that I have been unconsciously burying. There are certain elements of myself that feel triggered, whatever the case may be. So those are two of the ways in which I think that this quote unquote, I really need to thinking can actually be effective. But most of the time, without those two use cases, most of the time, from what I've seen, all it ends up doing is corroding the person's willingness to actually move forward.
Speaker 1:Now, what might we do instead? Instead, I recommend and obviously you can do whatever you want, don't let me force you but what I recommend is that we try to look at our desire and we try to make desire okay, that it is okay for us to have desire. It is okay for us to communicate desire to other people. It's okay for us to pursue our desire Without artificially promoting it into a need. It is okay to want something. I promise you you're not going to be some sort of hellish person who is terrible to other people simply because you want something.
Speaker 1:Now, clearly, there are narcissists out there, clinical narcissists, who want everything to be their way. If you are listening to this show, chances are you are not that person and chances are there are a lot of ways in which you do compromise and in which you do put other people first. And, as I said, if you are like my clients, you put other people first too often. And so getting right and, one might say, getting in balance with your own sense of desire, your own sense of self and what it wants, what are its boundaries can be tremendously rejuvenating, and it can free you up in ways that you currently cannot imagine. Moreover, when we operate from this false sense of need, there is something deep inside of us that knows that we are being untruthful and untrue to ourselves and it gets really resentful. And again, I guess you're going to have to take my word for it, unless you happen to be one of my clients who is listening to this, which many of them do, because they've seen it. They've seen it themselves the ways in which the false use of need eventually starts to crumble and crack and feel so distasteful to them.
Speaker 1:So then, let's transition over to want. What do we want? Are there certain things that come with pursuing our desire? Maybe? Yeah, that can be quite legitimate, in order for me to have the thing I want, I need to do certain things, and that's totally fair. But in that case, in that case where you have recognized that there are certain needs that go into your want, then be happy about it.
Speaker 1:This reminds me of a guy that I worked with years and years and years ago, and he was a wealth advisor and he hated his job. He hated having to schmooze clients, he hated having to travel away from his family all the time, he hated, basically the core requirements of his job function. And I asked him well, if you hate it so much, why don't you just get another job? Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no way, no way, because this job pays a lot of money. And it did, and in reality, it had the potential to pay millions of dollars per year, which, I would argue, anybody in the world would probably think is a lot of money. And money by itself is not evil. Some people do evil things with money, and the people that get corrupted into thinking that money is the only thing yeah, they probably have a pretty rough time and put that rough time on other people as well, but having money is by itself, not necessarily evil.
Speaker 1:And so, looking at what his choice was, his choice was to earn a lot of money so that he and his family would be financially very well off, and of course, it wasn't just about saving for a rainy day, but it was also about the lifestyle that they could then afford the quality of life. So then I said, okay, well, I mean, if that's the thing that you want, if it's really truly what you want and it's really a powerful desire inside your heart and soul, and it's got you in its grip and you feel good about it, and, by golly, you're just going to go out there and you're going to, you're going to wealth. Advise your ass off. Well then, be happy about the things that come with it. Make your choice with open eyes and be happy about the choice you've made. Otherwise, make a different choice. Don't call it a need when choice is involved and choice is almost always involved, except when it comes to death. Yeah, I think I'm going to leave it there for now.
Speaker 1:Hopefully this wasn't too antagonizing for you or inflammatory. The goal with these episodes really is to try to help you live a better life, but to do so in a way that causes you to look deeper into the things that you have in your life, from your material possessions to your relationships, to your experiences. Because everything that you have in your life, the things you like and, more importantly, the things you don't like which, again, things are not just material things, but they're also people, relationships, experiences, jobs, everything that you have in your life is a product of your making or, at the very least, your tolerance, and I want you to have the best experience that you can possibly have, and in order to do that, I believe you need, oh boy, to look deeper. Okay, I would absolutely love it if I have not totally pissed you off or even if I have, I guess, but you found value in it, if you would like subscribe, follow all of that jazz and also share it.
Speaker 1:Share this with people that you think could use it, or share it with people that you think this would antagonize but that it would lead to a discussion I don't want to just antagonize people, just to antagonize them but that there is a meaningful discussion that could come out of this, because, again, it's not. In fact, I don't know. I mean, I could be wrong. The experiences that my clients have had over the years could also be seeing it from the wrong angle, or just because they see it from an angle that's right for them doesn't mean that it's right for you, but often it's in the friction that we cause ourselves to really look and to really scrutinize and to really determine what would work for us. So I hope that that's what this has done for you and yours, but you don't have to, so totally your choice. Until next time, take care of each other.