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have
fun
playing tennis, but it’s starting to rain, you don’t have to wonder if your need for fun is frustrated; your disappointment tells you immediately that it is.
    Once you learn about the needs, you can usually recognize which are frustrated when you feel bad and which are satisfied when you feel good. It may not be as obvious as in these clear-cut examples, but you can usually figure it out if you take the time.
S URVIVAL
    All living creatures are genetically programmed to struggle to survive. The Spanish word
ganas
describes the strong desire to engage in this struggle better than any word I know. It means the desire to work hard, carry on, do whatever it takes to ensure survival, and go beyond survival to security.
Ganas
is a highly valuable trait; if you want a job done, hire someone with a lot of it. If you are looking for a mate you can count on to help build a family and a life with you, find one with
ganas
and treat him or her well. Try not to criticize this motivated mate; you don’t want the
ganas
turned against you.
    The other aspect of survival, the survival of the species, is based on sexual pleasure and, from a genetic standpoint, has been highly successful. There are few places where there is a shortageof people. Sex is, of course, involved with our other needs beyond survival; sex for pleasure is very often on the minds of many people. Whether or not love is combined with sex, birth control is an easy way to increase this pleasure, perhaps one of the best ways that human beings have figured out to eat their cake and have it, too.
    One of the differences between human survival and the survival of animals is that early in life, humans become aware of the need to survive, both now and in the future. We make an effort to live our lives in ways that lead to longevity. Many people exercise, diet, and even buy bottled water in the hope of living healthier and longer lives. Unfortunately, fat, which is readily available but is harmful to survival, tastes good because our distant ancestors survived by eating it. Some of us give up our lives for cheeseburgers, but usually not until our children are well launched. So the genetic pleasure associated with eating fat is still with us and has to be overridden if we want to be healthy. But since we are conscious of the future, many of us are not comfortable eating fat, and this discomfort helps some of us avoid it.
    I recognize that there are millions of people who suffer continually from hunger and disease because they do not have enough food or medical care. These people are not choosing to go hungry or without medical care. The pain of hunger is automatic, built into our need to survive, but this book does not deal directly with this kind of involuntary deprivation. I do, however, cover voluntary deprivation in some detail when I explain why so many teenage girls choose to starve themselves, a few even to death. Their doing so is an example of the ability to override one need, survival, for another, power. If survival was still the single basic need, there could be no anorexia and, of course, no suicide.
    Choice theory can be applied to all human activities, including survival, but this book focuses on social activity: how giving up external control can help us to get along better with each other. However, it is interesting to note that in our violent society, getting along better with each other may have a lot to do with survival. For young men, gunshot wounds, not disease or accidents,are the leading cause of death. That many more would survive if they could get along better with each other is obvious. In our prehistoric past, survival was the single basic need, as it is with almost all animals today. But gradually, those who loved gained a survival advantage and, as this advantage continued, love began to separate from survival and became a basic need on its own. The same happened with power. As time went on, those who succeeded in achieving power had a much