The need to be needed
On a recent warm summer evening, I had the opportunity to sit with a bondhu (friend) and ruminate on the currents of life. We talked of many things, as friends often do, but eventually our conversation turned toward the writings of the Jewish philosopher and theologian, Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972). Heschel had suggested, with characteristic clarity, that one of the deepest yearnings of the human condition is the need to be needed. My wise bondhu expanded on this deceptively simple idea with a precision that was at once philosophical and painfully practical. His words left us both in a silence that was not empty, but heavy with recognition. Later, as I drove back through the dusky warmth of the summer night, Heschel’s claim began to throb within me. The yearning to be needed seemed not merely a distant insight from a philosopher’s pen, but a reality woven into my own life — and into the lives of all of us. Often, we are reminded that we are not needed. Sometimes this comes bluntl...