Needs and Values Worksheet
Most people cannot answer the question "what do you need?" and the reason is not evasiveness. It is that the honest answer usually arrives as a strategy rather than a need — "I need him to text me back in the morning" is a specific mechanism, and mechanisms are easy to refuse in a way that the underlying need is not.
The distinction matters practically. A need can usually be met several ways, so a partner who cannot supply your preferred mechanism may still be able to meet the need. A strategy has exactly one form, and asking for it puts the whole thing on a single point of failure. This worksheet takes what you already want, separates the two, and produces three sentences you could actually say.
Who this worksheet is for
You know something is missing and everything you come up with sounds either too small to mention or too much to ask.
Download the free PDF ↓Free, printable, no email required. Prints on A4 or Letter.
How to work it
Do this alone first, and about yourself. A needs inventory filled in as a description of what a partner is failing to provide becomes a grievance list, which is a different document with a different effect on whoever reads it.
Write more than you will keep. The first pass should be long and unfiltered, including the things that feel embarrassing to want — those are frequently the ones doing the most work, and a filtered inventory tends to produce three respectable needs nobody is actually troubled by.
Do not rank by importance until the end. Ranking early causes people to promote whatever is most inflamed this week, and the strongest need is often quiet rather than loud.
The exercises
Five steps, best done in one sitting of about forty minutes. The PDF has the full needs list to work from.
1. The long list
Twenty things, unfiltered, no editing.
Write twenty things you want from a close relationship. Do not organise, do not justify, and do not remove anything for being unreasonable — unreasonable is a judgement and this stage is a collection. Most people stall at about twelve, and the ones that come after the stall are consistently the more interesting. The PDF has a prompt list of common needs to push past that point, and the instruction is to use it only once you have run out.
Prompts
- ●Items 1–10, unedited:
- ●Items 11–20 (past the stall):
- ●Which of these did I hesitate to write down?
- ●Which would I be embarrassed for a partner to read, and why?
2. Need or strategy?
One question applied to every line.
For each item, ask: is there more than one way this could be met? If yes, it is a need. If only one, it is a strategy and the need sits underneath it. "A goodnight text" is a strategy; the need might be a predictable end to the day, or evidence of being held in mind. Rewriting strategies as needs is uncomfortable because it makes them harder to check up on, and that is precisely the value — a need can be met by someone in their own way, and a strategy can only be complied with.
Prompts
- ●Three items that are clearly strategies:
- ●For each, the need underneath it:
- ●Which strategy have I most defended as though it were a need?
- ●What else could meet that same need?
3. Where each one came from
A short line each, and it changes how they read.
Beside your top eight, write where the need came from if you can see it: something absent growing up, something a previous relationship taught, something temperamental. This is not to invalidate them — a need with a history is still a need, and the point is not to talk yourself out of anything. What it does is separate the needs that are load-bearing from the ones that are old alarms still ringing, and the two want different responses. One should be asked for; the other frequently softens once it is recognised.
Prompts
- ●Need one — where it came from:
- ●Need two:
- ●Need three:
- ●Which of these is an old alarm rather than a current requirement?
4. The top three
Rank now, and only three.
Three, because three is the number a person can actually hold about someone else. A list of eleven equally weighted needs cannot be met by anyone and functions in practice as a standard nobody clears. Choose the three whose absence genuinely damages the relationship rather than the three that irritate you most this month, and check the difference by asking which you would still name in a good week.
Prompts
- ●Top three, ranked:
- ●Would I still rank these the same in a good week?
- ●Which of the three is currently being met?
- ●What have I been treating as top-three that is not?
5. Turn each into an ask
One sentence each. Present tense, no history.
Write each of the three as something a person could actually do, without a preamble and without the record of previous failures. "I would like us to have one evening a week where neither of us is on a phone" is an ask. "You never give me any real attention any more" is a verdict, and verdicts get defended rather than answered. Then decide when you will make one of them. An inventory that produces no ask is a very well-organised way of continuing to go without.
Prompts
- ●Ask one, in one sentence:
- ●Ask two:
- ●Ask three:
- ●Which one, to whom, and when:
Values, and why they are on the same sheet
Needs are what you require from a relationship; values are what you want the relationship to be for. They get separated in most material and they interact constantly — someone who values independence highly will experience a reasonable need for contact as an imposition, and someone who values closeness will experience a reasonable need for space as a rejection. Most of what gets called incompatibility is a values mismatch being argued as a needs dispute.
The last page of the PDF is a short values sort for that reason. It is worth doing after the needs list rather than before, because values chosen first tend to be aspirational and values inferred from your own needs tend to be true.
Needs cluster by pattern
Anxious lists tend to be long and mechanism-heavy; avoidant lists tend to be short and to omit anything that sounds like needing someone.
What's Your Attachment Style?
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What is the difference between a need and a strategy?▼
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Worksheets for the other styles
- Anxious Attachment worksheet — You re-read messages looking for tone changes, feel panic when replies slow down, or find yourself doing things to get reassurance that you later wish you had not done.
- Avoidant Attachment worksheet — You need space when things get close, go quiet under conflict, find faults in partners as intimacy grows, or feel relief when plans get cancelled.
- Fearful-Avoidant Attachment worksheet — You crave closeness then feel trapped by it, end relationships you wanted, or feel like two different people depending on the week.
- Secure Attachment worksheet — You came out secure and want to know what to keep doing, or you are building earned security and want the target described in behaviour rather than adjectives.
Worksheets by situation
- The 8-week anxious attachment healing plan — You already know you have an anxious pattern, you have read the explanations, and what you are missing is an order of operations you can actually follow.
- Attachment triggers worksheet — You keep having the same fight, or you react strongly to things that seem small afterwards and want to know what specifically is firing.
- Attachment journal prompts — You want to write about your patterns but either end up spiralling or end up staring at a blank page wondering what you are supposed to say.
- Couples attachment worksheet — You are having the same argument repeatedly, in the same shape, and both of you can predict it from the first two sentences.
- Attachment styles handout for therapists — You are a therapist, counsellor, coach or student who wants a printable attachment handout for clients, or a client who would like the plain-language version to read between sessions.
- Healing avoidant attachment (8-week workbook) — You have read the explanations of avoidant attachment, recognised yourself, and still have no idea what to actually do on a Tuesday evening when your partner wants to talk.
- Healing fearful-avoidant attachment (workbook) — You want closeness intensely and then find it unbearable, sometimes within the same day, and you have stopped trusting your own read on what you want.
- Printable attachment style self-assessment — You want to work this out on paper rather than on a screen, or you are a practitioner who wants something printable to go through with a client.
- One-page attachment styles comparison chart — You keep re-reading four separate descriptions and losing track of which one you were comparing, or you want something a partner will actually look at.
- Deactivation plan (what to do while it is happening) — You shut down and cannot talk when it matters most, or you are living with someone who does and the silence is doing more damage than the argument did.
- No contact plan (a structured 30 days) — You have decided on a period of no contact and keep breaking it in small ways you then have to argue yourself out of feeling bad about.
- Breakup recovery plan (30 days, by pattern) — The relationship has ended and you are going over it constantly, or not going over it at all in a way that is starting to worry you.
- Pursue-withdraw cycle breaker — One of you chases the conversation and one of you needs it to stop, and you have both explained this to each other many times without anything changing.
- Early dating worksheet (first 90 days) — You keep ending up in the same kind of situation and would like to notice it happening this time, rather than in hindsight.
- Boundaries worksheet (setting and holding them) — You have read about boundaries, agreed with all of it, and still cannot work out what to actually say on Thursday evening.
- Conflict repair worksheet (after an argument) — You resolve arguments by waiting until they stop mattering, and you have noticed the list of subjects you both avoid getting longer.
- Self-soothing plan (written before you need it) — You know what you are supposed to do when the panic arrives and you have never once done it in the moment.
- Family of origin timeline worksheet — You recognise your pattern and want to understand where it came from without turning it into a case against your parents.
- Weekly practice tracker (photocopy and reuse) — You have done the reading and some of the exercises and have no idea whether any of it is working.
- Setback plan (for the bad week after a good month) — You have made real progress before and lost it, and the losing is what stops you starting again.
- Between-session therapy homework sheets — Therapists and counsellors who want structured attachment homework, and clients who want to bring something concrete to the next session.
- Printable conversation cards (cut out and use) — You want to talk about how you each handle closeness and every attempt to start it has felt like opening a case.
- Attachment at work worksheet — A short message from your manager can take your whole afternoon, or you handle everything alone until it is too late to ask.
- Parenting worksheet (your pattern, their security) — You have recognised your own attachment pattern and would rather not hand it on, and you are not sure which of your reactions are about them.
- Texting worksheet (the waiting, not their replies) — A delayed reply can take your evening, or you leave people waiting for days and have never really looked at why.
- Monthly relationship check-in (a repeatable ritual) — Things are broadly fine and you would like them to stay that way, or you have noticed that everything gets raised at once during arguments.
- Friendship worksheet (the non-romantic version) — Your friendships keep fading without anything happening, or you are always the one who arranges things and have started to resent it.
Or go back to all free attachment worksheets, including the one-page cheat sheet covering all four styles.
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