Understanding Attachment Styles: Enhance Your Relationships
Welcome to our attachment psycho-education series! If you've been following along on social media, you're already familiar with the different attachment styles in attachment theory. For a quick review, there are four attachment styles: secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized. Here’s a key to remembering each style:
Secure Attachment Style
Core Characteristics: Comfortable expressing emotions openly, positive view of self and others, dependable in relationships.
Core Desire: Intimacy
Core Fear: None
Anxious Attachment Style
Core Characteristics: Negative view of self, positive view of others, often needs reassurance of love, highly sensitive to partner’s needs.
Core Desire: Intimacy
Core Fear: Abandonment
Avoidant Attachment Style
Core Characteristics: Prefers emotional independence and self-sufficiency, positive view of self, negative view of others, maintains distance in relationships.
Core Desire: Independence
Core Fear: Emotional vulnerability
Disorganized Attachment Style
Core Characteristics: Exhibits both anxious and avoidant behaviors, finds relationships both desirable and frightening.
Core Desire: Intimacy and closeness
Core Fear: Depending on others
How Attachment Styles Impact Relationships
Each attachment style shapes how individuals perceive themselves and others, influencing behaviors that affect their partners. What happens when your attachment styles clash? Here’s a guide to harmonizing your relationship:
Step 1: Identify Your Attachment Style
Discover your attachment style by taking this quiz: Attachment Style Quiz.
Step 2: Reflect on Your Behaviors
Consider how your attachment style affects your mindset and actions in your relationship.
Step 3: Evaluate the Impact
Use this framework: "When I do X, it probably makes my partner feel Y." Determine how your behaviors influence your relationship, positively or negatively.
Step 4: Adapt to Your Partner’s Needs
Modify negative behaviors to better meet your partner's emotional needs. Ask yourself how you can adjust to support your partner effectively.
Empower Your Relationships
Knowledge is power. By understanding your attachment style, you have the ability to move towards a more secure attachment and build stronger, healthier relationships. Take the quiz, dive into research, and start a meaningful conversation with your partner about meeting each other's needs in light of your attachment styles.
Additional Resources
Attachment Style Quiz: Take the Quiz
Book: Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How it Can Help You Find - and - Keep Love by Amir Levine
Podcast: LET'S TALK ATTACHMENTS by Jessica De Silva
Therapy: Meet with an attachment specialist at Pollema Counseling Center to dive into the deeper work and experience transformative healing. Reach out via email today!
Amanda Snyder, LPCC --- asnyder@pollemacounseling.com
Elyse Dunham, Masters Level Intern --- edunham@pollemacounseling.com
Written by Amanda Snyder, LPCC
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