NEED
Only those who can take care of themselves are free from the two main obstacles to adult relating: being needy or care-taking others. “I will come to you, my friend, when I no longer need you. Then you will find a palace, not an almshouse,” Thoreau once said.
— David Richo
another eye opens 
December 2, 2010 at 6:21 pm
But what of us who are completely dependent on others for virtually all practical aspects of living. Those who are felled by disease and whose bodies refuse to work? Can we not love our caretakers? And cannot we accept, expect, love in return? Have I given up my rights to expect an equality in my relationships? Or should I just be grateful for whatever kindness I can get?
December 2, 2010 at 6:49 pm
These are excellent questions, Tom, in response to a provocative assertion. In the context of his book “How To Be an Adult,” I believe Richo is talking about emotional maturity and the challenge of taking responsibility for your own emotional well-being rather than making other people responsible for your feelings. What is the difference between need and neediness? What is the difference between needing and wanting?
December 2, 2010 at 8:29 pm
You’ve re-framed the argument nicely, Don. Without having read “How to Be an Adult,” my guess is that Richo is presenting a counterpoint to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince, and the example of his famous rose.
“One never ought to listen to the flowers. One should simply look at them and breathe their fragrance. Mine perfumed all my planet. But I did not know how to take pleasure in all her grace. This tale of claws, which disturbed me so much, should only have filled my heart with tenderness and pity.”
For me, Richo’s assertion, taken to it’s extreme, seems to be that adulthood equals the dispensation of one’s own neediness and that the desire to doctor others’ emotional wounds betrays a deficiency of maturity. I think, in practice, we are all by turns the emotionally needy and the emotionally needed. Adulthood is the ability to be, by turns, the compassionate giver and the accepting receiver. Adulthood is accepting that giving and receiving can’t be recorded and reconciled on a balance sheet.
“The fact is that I did not know how to understand anything! I ought to have judged by deeds and not by words. She cast her fragrance and her radiance over me. I ought never to have run away from her… I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little strategems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her…”
Now before I get myself in even deeper, I will go actually read the book instead of making whopping assumptions based on a short quote.
Thanks for engaging. This was fun.