Nepesh

"I have needs."

This is a favorite phrase my friend and I use to describe our need for lots of hugs.  It's meant to be funny, but as I'm reflecting on my classes this year--I realize this phrase is not quite right.

In my Systematic Theology class this semester, we have talked a lot about our body, soul and spirit.  Often, we say "I have a body, I have a soul, and I have a spirit."  Theology and culture often treat body, soul & spirit as three separate things.  However, in our class we discovered we are body, we are soul and we are spirit." 

Sounds like semantics, right?  Who cares?

Today, I care because of this word: Nepesh.

It is a Hebrew word that is used in Scripture to refer to many things--but it is most often translated as "soul."

It is not translated as something that is an "idea" of a soul, but it has a location: in our throat.  Yep, your soul may very well be your throat.  But before I even attempt to get into all the details of this, just journey with me for a moment.

Nepesh also is the word used for needs (not just appetites).  The need to be needed, the need to have food, shelter, safety, sleep, water, the need to be loved.  These (and others) are the constant cries of our nepesh.

But, many of us have been trained not to "have needs."  We have been trained to be self-sufficient, and to regulate our neediness so that we are not burdensome to anyone (especially God).  Often, we think we are "weak" if we have needs.  Our world seems to think: "No one likes a weak, needy person."

And, while I am definitely in the U.S. culture camp of growing in emotional maturity so we do not break community..I have to say:

We are all needy people. We always have been, and we always will be.  There will never be a day you do not have needs.  You will always need sleep, food, water, shelter, and community, imagination, dreams, music..and to be loved.*  When God made us this way, God said it was "very good."  It's good to be needy!  Really?  If there were no needs, would we ever have community?  Isn't the very act of saying: "I need a hug" an invitation for souls to meet?

In light of  being "nepesh" or being "needy souls,":  

What would happen if instead of saying "I have needs," if we started saying "I am needs."?  

Would that change the way we relate to each other, to God, and to ourselves?

*When I say "to be loved" I do not only mean romantic forms of love.  There are lovely and wonderful people who may not ever need romantic love. Still, we all need unconditional love.  All of us need to experience what it is like to be loved so deeply that someone might die for our needy selves.