wellness
44 CalmMoment.com
we are likely to experience in relationships,
each corresponding with three different
attachment styles. In using the same
statements, listed below, we too can identify
which category we fall into:
I find it relatively easy to get close to
others and am comfortable depending on
them and having them depend on me. I don’t
worry about being abandoned or about
someone getting too close to me.
I find others are reluctant to get as close
as I would like. I often worry that my partner
doesn’t really love me or won’t want to stay
with me. I want to get very close to my
partner, but this sometimes scares people.
I am somewhat uncomfortable getting
close to others and find it difficult to trust
them completely and difficult to allow myself
to depend on them. I am nervous when
anyone gets too close and often others want
me to be more intimate than I feel
comfortable being.
The School of Life (theschooloflife.com)
writes that in the first option, ‘love and trust
come easily and signals a secure attachment’.
While the second statement shows an
anxious attachment pattern, ‘where one longs
to be intimate with others but is consistently
scared of let down and can precipitate crisis
in relationships with counterproductive
aggressive behaviour’. The third statement
refers to what is known as avoidant
attachment, where it might ‘feel easier toavoid the dangers of intimacy through
solitary activities and emotional withdrawal’.
It is thought around 40 percent of us fall
into either the anxious or avoidant
attachment categories. Although a large
percentage of people are also securely
attached, in times of stress – such as during
an argument with our partner – our survival
triggers can come out on an emotional level
and we may err towards anxious or avoidant
attachment. While in an ideal world we
would all feel securely attached all the time,
we can’t help which attachment style we
naturally fall into.
Pam explains: “Our attachment style is like
the colour of our eyes. It just is. Attachment
styles occur across the world, whether you
live in downtown Manhattan or are from an
Inuit community. It does change with our
surroundings and situations and may get
slightly tampered as we grow. Most of us are
often in a continuum between anxious
attachment and secure, or avoidant
attachment and secure. To help ourselves
and our relationships, we simply must try to
understand how we operate ahead of time.”“We can’t help which
attachment style we
naturally fall into”