This is an original speculative phenomenological model of subject‑formation. It is philosophical conjecture, not empirical psychological data.
Everyone forms two kinds of survival cognition in childhood. One is: if I lack something, I will die. The other is: if I lack something, I know it hurts, but I won’t die. This “something” is a spiritual need.
A person can have many spiritual needs, and they can be equal to each other. For example, being accompanied and having a sense of value are not means to each other. Getting value is not for the purpose of getting accompanied. That is what it means to have many equal spiritual needs.
The second type: one spiritual need dominates the others. For example, the need for companionship can be supplied by having value, or by being admired. That is one spiritual need leading all the others.
From here, we can divide people into three types.
First type: easily breaks down and cannot come back.
His survival cognition is: if I lack the spiritual need, I will die.
His spiritual needs are of the single-dominant type. For example, being accompanied is the dominant one. Only this need is bound to the survival belief: if I lack companionship, I will die; if I have companionship, I will not die.
Other spiritual needs, like value, being admired, etc., are just means to reach the main need of companionship.
This person usually bets all his sub-needs on the main need, trying to satisfy the survival cognition: “If I have companionship, I won’t die.”
Why does he always bet all his sub-needs? Because he only has one main need that can serve as the condition for survival. He has no choice. He must gamble.
This also explains why, after this kind of person breaks down, meaning the main need cannot be satisfied, his survival belief shatters and he cannot recover easily. It is a feeling of helplessness. He used up all his sub-needs but still could not satisfy the main need, and therefore could not satisfy the survival belief.
Second type: emotionally stable people.
I call them chronically suicidal people, empty people.
Their survival belief is: if I lack spiritual needs, I will die; if I have spiritual needs, I can live.
Their spiritual needs are balanced and diverse. For example: being accompanied, being loved, security, value. Each one can serve as a condition to satisfy the survival belief. Each one, when satisfied, gives their unconscious the feeling that “I can live.”
So they are the least likely to break down, because they have many paths. If this need cannot be satisfied, they have another need that can be satisfied, so the survival belief can still be maintained.
But they are also chronically suicidal, empty-hearted people. Why?
Because the underlying essence of all their spiritual needs is to survive. Their spiritual needs are kidnapped by the survival belief.
They chase many forms of satisfaction to fill a survival belief that can never be filled. Their goal is not to satisfy the spiritual need itself. For them, satisfying a spiritual need has become a tool, a means.
After a long time, they get tired, but they cannot stop. They get more tired, keep going, and then they don’t know what the meaning of survival is.
They never satisfy spiritual needs for the purpose of experience.
They will walk toward emptiness.
Third type: easily breaks down, but healthy.
This type is like the second type. They also have many balanced spiritual needs.
But the difference is: their survival belief is, if I do not satisfy my spiritual need, I will hurt, but I will not die.
So they satisfy spiritual needs for the sake of experience, not because they are being driven forward as slaves to a survival belief.
They can truly experience and truly invest in every kind of satisfaction. Because they genuinely invest, they break down when satisfaction cannot be reached. Because they really cared.
But unlike the first type, they are not people with no way out who have learned helplessness.
They can recover. The essential reason is… you guess.
Because:
All needs are optional loves, not insurance that must be bet on life.