Needs VS Wants

To understand what I am trying to drive at differentiating needs and wants ay  para maintiendihan ng lahat kung ano ang gagawin once confronted with a situation where several needs and wants arise. This will help you settle once and for all which needs are to be given the TOP PRIORITY.

First thing you need to know is the definition of terms. A NEED is something that is necessary to live and function.  A WANT is something that can improve your quality of life. Using these criteria, a need includes food, clothing, shelter, and medical care, while a want includes everything else. 

A need is something to give you a new lease of life while a want is something that the individual desire but would be able to live without.

Needs represent the necessities while wants indicate the person's wishes or fancy. Wants are not as important as needs, because a person can live without wants.

Needs include air, food, water, clothing, and shelter.  Wants are something we would like to have ... like Apple's iPhone or a beauty queen girlfriend that will drive everybody envious.

Sometimes needs and wants overlap ... like food for instance a person needs a cup of rice and a viand because he is hungry but it doesn't need to be a samgyupsal otherwise you are an OPPA ... a Filipino trapped in a Korean body. A thirsty person needs water but wanting mineral or spring water is too demanding for comfort. A homeless guy needs to clothe himself to give him warmth ... but demanding a Versace item is just over the top. All of us needs shelter and a roof on top of our head for protection from the elements ... and wanting a mansion on the hill ... is just plain delusional.

Apply all this in your life and you are good to go.  Confronted with a situation where your last P100 will be spent on a kilo of rice for your family's dinner ... or a service repair fee of the same amount to your electric fan (who suddenly chooses to die when everything is humid and hot) ... which need is your priority?

Your answer depends on what kind of priority-setter are you. Would you rather starve the whole night and enjoy the cool breeze from your newly repaired electric fan? Or would you rather have a full stomach ... and agonized with the searing heat?

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

What is Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs? They are the five levels of needs ...from the bottom of the hierarchy upwards.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a model for understanding the motivations of human behavior. It maps different motivations onto a pyramid, with each level representing a different human need. These include physiological needs, safety, love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization.

The most basic level of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs covers physiological needs. These are the things that we simply cannot live without ... air, food, drink, warmth, sleep, and shelter. At the end of the hierarchy, all the needs are deficiency needs.  We need them because it is unpleasant for us when they are deficient.

Applying Maslow's hierarchy of needs in our life makes us understand that a person whose lowest-level needs have not been met (the needs at the bottom of the pyramid - the physiological needs) will act on that first before he attempts to attend to the other needs on top of the pyramid. It is our guide to priority setting - which one is deemed the most important, which need should be fulfilled first before attending to the other needs further up in the pyramid.

Simply put ... if you are confronted with the need for food or air, it doesn't make sense that you will attend to your need for love as the most important.  As they say ... you can live without love or companionship ... but you will die without food, water, or air.