The 6 Human Needs - Part 2/6

Part 2 – The second of the 6 human needs – The need for Uncertainty/Variety

Welcome back to part 2 of the 6 human needs. Today we are talking about Uncertainty or Variety. These 6 Core needs influence all our decisions and actions – the needs that, if unmet, can produce some rather interesting behaviour in us all.

In direct opposition to certainty, is the need for variety and uncertainty. So, we want certainty, we also crave change, excitement, and new stimuli. Variety allows us to feel alive and engaged.

The need for certainty is what calls us to look for the things we know for sure – the constants. It’s what drives us to seek control, stability, comfort, and predictability. Certainty is what grounds us and allows us to go forward with confidence.

Balance is the name of the game and too much of a good thing would mean we’d never get off the couch. Too much certainty leads to boredom and lack of reason to live, and so in our humanness, we seek variety – something to make our hearts beat a little faster. You’ve heard the expression “Nothing grows in a comfort zone.”? Well, the need for uncertainty is how we counteract stagnation.

Too much uncertainty will bring us fear, and not enough will cause boredom. People with a high need for variety may come across as risk takers and may also seek out conflict and crisis situations to make them feel alive.

As Humans, our need for uncertainty or variety is what elevates our heart rate and excites us about life. Too much drudgery and we fall asleep at the wheel of our lives. In a normal daily scenario, the balance of certainty and variety isn’t too hard to satisfy. We like to know some things for sure because it satisfies our need for control, but we also like to have choice when it comes to other things so that we can balance.

If you’ve ever tried to control every aspect of a toddler’s day, you’ll understand that they push back against that control and seek the balance of uncertainty that satisfies their curiosity for life. This isn’t something we grow out of, it’s just that we do it differently as we get older.

When our lives become too certain, this can result in conscious or subconscious behaviour in our attempt to regain balance. That behaviour can look like anything from a slight restlessness and irritation with your environment, to procrastination (because it means you’re loading your own deadlines and therefore creating your own pressure / uncertainty), to acting out, to behaviour that destroys the status quo – be that meddling in work affairs or creating discord in your family.

Making sure that our need for uncertainty is met in healthy ways is vital, or we may subconsciously start to create uncertainty in less healthy ways.

If you feel yourself turning inward, losing energy, getting snappy, unable to make decisions or in some way feeling paralysed, you may be subconsciously trying to balance an overallocation of uncertainty. Stress is designed to get us off the couch – we all need a little stress in our lives.

Stress helps us flex and grow. But in order for stress to do this for us, it causes a chemical reaction in our bodies that we can’t control – a release of certain chemicals that allow us to meet that stress.

Millenia ago, these chemicals helped us escape a sabre-toothed tiger by elevating our heart rate, dilating our blood vessels to allow more blood to flow, increasing our rate of breathing to ensure that blood flow was oxygen filled, and by directing the blood away from our less vital organs and processes toward our muscles so that we could flea or act.

Now, we know that it’s possible for life to create that same degree of stress in us and that, if prolonged, the effects of those chemicals constantly coursing through our bodies can be detrimental to our performance and to our health. Stress is a chemical reaction, and over time, it numbs us, dulls us, beats us down and paralyses us. Worst case, it physically incapacitates us.

Manage your behaviour. Manage your lifestyle. Be aware of the balance you need and fight to meet it. You can’t help others if you’re incapacitated yourself.

Resourceful behaviours: Taking on new challenges, playfulness, embracing adventure, changing the meaning of an event (reframe), different hobbies, creativity.

Unresourceful behaviours: Overwhelm, substance abuse, intoxication, channel surfing, self-sabotage, creating drama and problems for ourselves so we have something to do.

NOTE: Certainty and uncertainty/variety are both part of the same pie. If someone’s need for certainty is 70%, then their need for uncertainty/variety is 30%.