Ikea Psychology
How it's hard to see your own needs, but how important it is to build your own solutions. Oh, and a life-size chocolate moose.
I’m not so good at anticipating my needs. I stumble into anniversaries with little grace or forethought.
Mom’s birthday was April 5. On the first birthday after she passed (back in 2021) I didn’t think anything of it, ahead of time. I wasn’t planning to give myself any space for it, or for her.
Thankfully, others in my life saw and anticipated what I’d made myself blind to. My aunt and uncle scheduled a trip for my two closest cousins came to visit me. We took a trip up to Portland, Maine to get away.
It was a silly weekend trip, full of laughter and over-drawn comedic bits I couldn’t let go of. We went to visit Lenny, the world’s only life-size chocolate moose. Mom’s birthday wasn’t so bad.
But it was still her birthday. Even if I consciously ignored it, even if I confined its deeper recognition to my hazy subliminal thought—It was still her birthday, without her. I woke that morning from a dark dream. It was hazy and frightening and powerful.
I was standing in a one-room shack. It was night outside, though I remember no windows or doors, only the decaying wooden walls and thatched roof of the dilapidated space. I was waiting for my dad. I was scared. I knew something was coming.
I looked up into the upper left corner of the building, into the rafters (where I’ve always felt spirits reside) and it was there. An invisible presence that froze me with fear. It rushed down at me, gaining in speed and size like a current. As this energy passed through me, my mother’s voice rang out, clear and powerful and loud and righteous, as commanding as a god.
I LOVE YOU!
I’m not so good at anticipating my needs. Or rather, I’ll recognize them but can half-ignore them. I’ll neglect my needs for convenience or social cohesion or out of confusion—where do I even begin?
If I’m dissatisfied, if I’m struggling, I can actively turn a blind eye. I’m present with myself enough to recognize issues, to see what’s missing, but I’m human. Generally lazy, and frightened of change.
I do this now, just like I did when I willfully ignored the potentially upsetting anniversary of Mom’s birth. (I also have a pretty disastrous story of when I naively thought Mother’s Day wouldn’t be triggering for me, so I went on a date and nearly had a panic attack on a nature boardwalk with a perfectly fine human being.)
We all do this. We all half-face truths, then see how long we can go before actually needing to change something. Maybe the issue is small and negligible enough to feel avoidable. Or maybe it’s such a large, life-restructuring-level change that you feel it’s worth putting off for a better time.
Even though I ignored my needs, it didn’t change them. I still dreamt, and in that space I felt the full force of my longing, love, and fear for my mother. We can’t avoid things forever. Eventually, whatever it is comes to a head.
But we’re not alone. I had an aunt and uncle who saw my avoidance and anticipated my needs, sending me their beloved children and my closest friends on a day that could’ve been a lot more excruciating.
Sometimes it’s difficult when people witness you fully. Because they notice the gaps that you’re avoiding, they see the blinders you put on yourself. And then, if they’re brave enough, they’re the ones to call you out on it.
That’s one of the many reasons that family relationships can be so difficult. Or close, accountable friendships. Romantic partnerships, most of all. All of these people who love you fully and wish you to be well, but know that they can’t do much to help you except to try and address it, head-on.
I was held accountable this week.
I talk a big game when it comes to “community”—I say that my vision of a healthy relationship is one individual upheld by their community, and another individual upheld by theirs, coming together and leaning on each other by choice and out of love. They don’t stand alone, or rely wholly on the other. Each has a network, each has a community.
When it comes to family community, I am set. When my car broke down this week, a second cousin dropped me off at work and picked me up each day. My aunt helped me pick my car up during my lunch break. Then, as I ate a quick sandwich at my desk, another cousin called and we caught up about work, school, and relationships.
But I don’t have a network of friends yet in this city. I’m not engaged socially in this community as much as I’d like. I can make endless excuses about that—how tired I am after work most days, how I have an amazing network of college friends that I catch up with regularly, how I just don’t have time right now.
So when my partner gently acknowledged that he thought I should try to make more friends, I flipped my lid. I know that! Of course I know that! How could he think I don’t know that?
I try my best to not be, but I’m reactive. Another very human trait. But I do know myself well enough that, if you give me some space and time, I’ll circle back and own up to my reaction and perhaps be able to trace it down to a deeper level of hurt that made me blow up in the first place.
It was a hard interaction. But it made me more honestly acknowledge how I am feeling, what I’m needing, and take my blinders off to look at what I’ve been neglecting. I want more friends. I want to rely on him less. And (this was another facet of the conversation) I want to use my body more. My priorities have moved too far from physical engagement. I want to bring that discipline back.
I’ve known this for weeks. I’ve known things were off, I’ve known what I needed, even acknowledged it verbally. But I didn’t change anything out of simple complacency. It takes courageous conversations (and humility on our own part) to own that something needs to change.
There are better and worse ways to have those courageous conversations. I’m a big fan of non-violent communication (NVC) as a means for me to work out what I’m feeling and why, and maybe set me on track to address an unmet need.
On a basic level, these intervention-ish conversations are more open when they come from a place of curiosity. To “should” someone, like “You should do the dishes more,” or “You should stop drinking so much,” is perhaps objectively good advice, but it’s not going to get anywhere.
Asking questions is a more engaging way to have difficult conversations. “What’s your morning routine like?” could offer more insight as to why your roommates’ dishes are in the sink when you wake up. Or, “How do you feel your relationship with alcohol is right now?” could open a safe conversation for them to acknowledge it’s been a struggle. You might feel like a pseudo-therapist, but advice-giving carries an air of judgment that questions often don’t.
Once you know a bit more about how they’re feeling or what the issue is, the most important question to ask is, “How can I support you?”
Who knows what the answer is, or if it’ll be truthful to their innermost needs. But it’s powerful to let someone who is struggling initiate their own solution to ask for help. Whatever solution they might come up with, they’re more likely to take ownership of it than anything an outsider proposes.
I call this “Ikea Psychology,” based on how people are generally more attached to their Ikea furniture than furniture that comes intact. Having to assemble a bookshelf provides a feeling of ownership. I built that. And because of the afternoon I spent putting it together, I’m going to be less likely to let it go.
My Ikea-Solutions this week are nice ones. I am throwing a party, a potluck for my birthday, inviting everyone I know in town and telling them to bring friends. A friend-making party. And I’m committing myself to go to the local climbing gym, a 10-minute bike ride away, three times this week. (I also just bought myself a road bike!)
No matter what age we are or what context we live in, we’re all learning. We’re stepping on each others’ toes, and accidentally stumbling into triggers, putting up defenses where there don’t need to be any. It’s all we can do, then, to humbly take them down again. And give thanks. And say sorry. And try to learn better for the next go-round.
Thank you for reading Internal Alchemy. I’d love to hear from you! Leave a comment or share this with a friend. I’m glad to be in this process of perpetual change with you.
Wow, sending this to my partner, I feel like we have this convo daily. Anticipating and voicing our needs is the bravest act in the world. This also reminds me I have a wonderful friend to make friends with in Asheville and I’ve been hoping to connect y’all! Kenzie Bell, elem school teacher, recently moved back to AVL, and board game potluck extraordinare. Lmk how I can connect you 💜 my email: Elizabethwelliver at gmail.com. Kenzie’s IG: https://www.instagram.com/kenz7844954/