Attachment Styles: Healing an Insecure Attachment Style (Part 2)

By striving towards improving your sense of self, your trust in others, and your perspective of what a healthy attachment truly entails, you will slowly shift to a secure attachment style. It will require trial and error, time, energy, and repetition, but you are SO worth investing in yourself.

Source: https://simplypsychology.org/attachment.html

Healing requires energy, vulnerability, and hard work. It’s a lifelong journey and it's never linear. Whatever season you're in on your healing journey, hold on to hope. <3

I hope you have a lovely rest of your day!
Love,
MacKenzie Mae


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Transcript

Welcome back fellow survivors and allies! I’m so grateful you clicked on today’s episode! This will be the second part on attachment styles, so if you haven’t listened to last week’s episode, episode 8, then be sure to go listen to that one first and then come back to this one! It’ll all make more sense that way. In this week’s episode of Trauma Chats, I will be building on what I chatted about last week on the attachment theory, the four different attachment styles, and the difference between secure and insecure attachment. Now in this episode you will learn how you can heal your insecure attachment style and shift to a more secure attachment style which will positively impact your view of yourself, of others, and of attachment itself. Discovering and exploring your attachment style can be incredibly helpful in better understanding yourself, your view on others, and how you navigate close relationships in your life. Shifting to a secure attachment style will transform your relationships with others, your feeling of self-worth, and feeling safe around the people closest to you. 

Quick reminder, I am not a mental health professional. I am using my personal experiences, what I’ve learned in my therapy, and sources I researched to create this episode. I will link the sources in the episode description if you’re interested in learning more!

So the biggg question, how can us with insecure attachment styles shift to having a more secure attachment style? Well, as I went over in last week’s episode, attachment styles result from the relationship we had with close adults as a child, so those rules and guidelines we’ve internalized have been solidifying for our entire lives, meaning it won’t be an easy feat to shift to a more secure attachment style. In fact, it may be safe to say we won’t ever fully shift, but we can 100% work towards that secure attachment style and significantly improve our view of attachment, ourselves, and others. Remember, attachment revolves around three aspects. 1. How we feel about ourselves 2. How we feel about others and 3. How we view attachment. So in order to heal our insecure attachment style, we have to approach each of those three aspects to strengthen our feeling of self-worth, our trust in others, and what a healthy view of attachment is. 

How We Feel About Ourselves

Starting with how we feel about ourselves, our self-worth, our self-esteem, trusting ourselves, and feeling whole as our own individual. As I come back to over and over in almost every episode, healing, shifting your mindset, creating new neural pathways all require you to embody self-compassion. In episode 3, I deeply explored self-compassion and shared my ideas on how to embody it. But truly, self-compassion is a key component in shifting to a secure attachment style. You must be your own best friend and continually forgive yourself because the endeavor to shift your perspective on yourself, others, and attachment will be challenging. You will struggle, you will think you’ve made complete progress in some areas then find yourself falling back into old patterns. You must expect these struggles, which is why it’s incredibly important to show yourself compassion to move past those struggles, to persevere, if you truly want to shift your attachment style. You must begin to internalize that just by existing, you are inherently worthy of love and respect. You are a unique, one-of-a-kind, beautiful being already. Always have been and always will be. I know this can be the hardest thing to internalize, I’ve gone through that. It’s a mindset shift that requires repeated positive affirmations, thought reframes, journaling, or other coping mechanisms that work for you to create new neural pathways so the new ones overpower the negative thoughts and neural pathways that have been strengthening for years and years. So yes, this will take a lot of time, but it is attainable. Start small, just by noticing and acknowledging any negative thoughts you have about yourself. Then, maybe try writing down one of those negative thoughts in a journal. Explore it. Be curious about it. Ask yourself why you think you’re thinking that thought. Is it serving you? It is actually true? Do you have evidence to support that thought? Is there another perspective that can be taken? How can you reframe that thought to serve you? For example, I’ve struggled with thinking that since I’m not fully healed from my trauma, I’m not worthy of being loved. I’ve thought, “no one wants to deal with someone who has panic attacks, struggles with self-esteem, and has so much trauma to still heal.” I’ve journaled about this. Physically written it down, and reflected on whether that is actually true? Well, my family loves me even though I’m not fully healed. I have close friends that accept my authentic self, including the parts of me that still aren’t healed. Maybe I’m wrong in definitively thinking that absolutely NO ONE will want to be in my life if I’m not fully healed. I also reflected on the fact that healing is a lifelong journey. I’ll never reach a point where I’m not working to improve upon some aspect of myself or heal from struggles. And then I thought, well actually everyone has healing to do on at least something? Why am I setting such a high expectation for myself even though I don’t expect others to be fully healed. Would I turn someone away because they struggle with self-esteem? No not at all. So through reflecting and asking myself questions about this thought, I was truly able to debunk it and reframe the thought to something like, “I will always be striving to heal parts of me and evolve into the best version of myself, and I want to be around people who accept me for who I am in the present moment and appreciate the work I’m putting in to heal.” And now, anytime I think that initial negative thought, I’m able to remember the journaling I did to debunk it, and then immediately reframe it to something that serves me and that aligns with me. I can also use that reframe as a positive affirmation that I say to myself frequently to start racking up the repetitions that my subconscious is always picking up on and continue to solidify those compassionate neural pathways that I’m creating. I hope that made sense! But you can do this with literally any negative thought. Everything in life has duality. There is the negative and the positive at the same time. Determine what the more positive side of that negative thought is and hold onto it until your subconscious picks up on it and it overcomes the negative to become the truth.

In terms of altering yourself to fit within the mold or expectations you believe you must meet to be worthy of love and accepted by a partner or a friend, don’t. If you learn one thing from this episode, I want you to internalize that you do NOT need to change ANYTHING about yourself for someone else. If someone is compatible with you, they will accept you EXACTLY how you are in the present moment. We all have pain and struggles, make mistakes and fail, and we are also constantly transforming and evolving into better versions of ourselves. Like I’ve mentioned in many of my past episodes, we are all human. We will make mistakes. So expect yourself to make mistakes. When you inevitably do make a mistake, reflect on it, apologize, learn from the mistake, and show through your actions that you are truly sorry and you are working to not make the same mistake again. Others will acknowledge that effort and appreciate it. If they can’t accept the mistake made or the apology you gave, they may have to let you go, and that just means they’re not the one for you. This may mean you or they have more growing to do as individuals or that person just truly wasn’t compatible with you. People in your life must appreciate your present authentic self, accept that you will make mistakes, that you have learning and growing to do, and that you will be evolving and changing constantly, because every human goes through this. In order to have a sustainable, genuine connection with someone, they need to fall in love with who YOU are at your core, not what you look like, not by being perfect, not by being a version of them. The worst thing to do in a relationship or friendship is lose yourself and your identity in hopes of their acceptance. Because then they aren’t falling in love with you, they’re falling in love with a manufactured version of you that in the long run, you won’t be able to keep up with because it will exhaust you to not be who you truly are. Your #1 priority must always be yourself, your well-being. By prioritizing yourself, you will give yourself the time and effort to heal, to better yourself, which will cause you to be a better partner or friend and you will find a genuine, sustainable connection with others who are compatible with your true self. I think a lot of times in the self-help, I guess, community, people like to say, “you need to work on yourself before being with someone else,” especially in terms of a romantic relationship. I think the intentions are good behind this statement, but I don’t necessarily agree with it. I believe we all are constantly striving to better ourselves, to heal from past traumas, etc. but saying you need to work on yourself before you can be with someone or be worthy of someone’s love, just doesn’t sit right with me. If you want to be with someone, go for it! The person who is compatible with you, like I said before, will accept you as you are in the present moment. Healing is a lifelong journey, so if you wait to be fully healed before getting into a relationship or making new friendships, you’ll never get into a relationship or make a new friend. You are worthy of love, care, connection, a healthy relationship whether or not you have things to work on. In fact, you will ALWAYS have something to work on, to heal, to improve. The key is you must ALWAYS prioritize yourself. Work on yourself when you’re single and continue working on yourself in a relationship. Trust and believe in yourself. Know deep in your core, that you are capable of feeling self-worth, of embodying self-compassion, of shifting your attachment style. Even if your mind doesn’t believe it right now, keep telling yourself that you do, because I’m telling you, your subconscious mind is always listening and eventually you’ll trick your mind into believing whatever you tell it. Do things that make you feel fulfilled, bring you genuine joy, and showcase the realest version of you, and you will attract likeminded people who have compatible qualities to you. Another important aspect to strengthening your sense of self-worth is determining what your boundaries are. If you’re like me, I never set boundaries in the past, so I had to truly reflect and journal about what I am willing to accept, what I’m not, and what my limits are. Take time to figure out your boundaries, practice setting them with people in your life, and stick to them. By setting boundaries you are showing up for yourself, and others will admire the fact that you set your boundaries and will respect them. 

How We Feel About Others

Next let’s touch on how we can shift our perception of others. To strengthen your trust in others and how you view their role in a relationship or friendship, consider the idea that others’ emotions, moods, and energy are their own. You cannot control them and frankly you are not responsible for them. Internalize that others are capable of setting their own boundaries and respect those boundaries when they’re set. I know for my fellow anxious attachment style people, we often assume that we are the reason for someone’s energy or mood shift, but we can’t assume that. We must trust that if we are the reason, they will bring it up to us. Until then, assume that everything is good between the two of you, because there is no point in spending your energy worrying about their shift in mood being because of you when you have no evidence to support that. You can ask them if there’s anything you can do for them, but try not to start interrogating them on if it was you who upset them or asking how you can fix it. A secure attachment style comes with believing that others have the capacity to let you know if you upset them and let you know what their needs and desires are. So let others tell you if they are upset with you and try not to overthink every step you took rationalizing that the blame is on you. Additionally, you can’t “fix” someone’s mood. Believe me, I have tried to so so many times. Sometimes people just need space or time to feel their emotions, to reflect, or just let them pass. As their partner or friend, you must give them that time or space, even if you upset them and are freaking out. If the relationship or friendship is meant to last, you will make it through. More times than not, it isn’t going to end over one argument or one instance that made someone upset. Oftentimes, we try to “fix” situations or try to make others always happy because we are afraid of abandonment. But we have to realize that not everyone is meant to be in our lives. Sometimes, others just aren’t compatible with us and we have to let them go to find others that are compatible with us. Just like you must expect yourself to make mistakes, you also must expect that others will as well. If you feel a certain way about that mistake, let them know. If you need an apology to move forward, see if they give you that, and if not maybe you’ll have to let them go. If you’re one of my avoidant or disorganized attachment style folks, commonly you have a hard time trusting others. Experiment with trying to take others at face value, meaning try to put aside your pre-conceived ideas of others and just take them for each present moment. Let them prove to you that they are trustworthy, and if they don’t prove that, then they’re not supposed to be in your life. I know that’s much easier said than done, but just try it with one person. See how it goes. Many times when I’m seeking out experiences where I have pre-conceived ideas or opinions, I find that my ideas or opinions are disproved. The more experiences I can have like that, the more data points of my idea being disproven, the easier it is to accept that maybe my idea or opinion isn’t true. I hope that makes sense. What I’m trying to say is let others let you down before you just assume that they will. And hopefully more times than not, others won’t let you down. I think it’s a similar concept to confirmation bias. If you already have an idea of someone, then you’re going to seek out any action that confirms your idea, even if it’s a really roundabout way of confirming it. For my fellow anxious attachment style people, we commonly put a lot of trust in others, maybe even before they earn it. I’m definitely guilty of that. What I’m learning though is trust is earned. We can’t automatically put all our trust in others if they haven’t proven to be trustworthy, but we also don’t want to never give anyone that opportunity to prove their trust. There’s a balance to be reached there in putting some trust in people, but not over-trusting people before they prove to you that they’re trustworthy. Overall, others are responsible for their own actions. Let them show you what they’re made of. 

Our Perception of Attachment

The last aspect that must be explored when shifting to a secure attachment style is our perception of attachment itself. Anxious attachment people typically view it as something they need to feel whole, they crave it and fixate on it. Avoidant attachment people fear it and commonly try to avoid it at all costs. And disorganized attachment people see attachment as inconsistent, are hot and cold with it, don’t know what to feel. It's taken me a lonnnggg time to get to the perspective I have of attachment, and I’m still solidifying that perspective. Attachment, whether romantic or platonic, is necessary to some extent. Humans do best when we work together. We can only do so much alone, and by working in community, we have been able to survive and thrive throughout history. People with a secure attachment style view attachment as beneficial, but it’s not the almighty, meaning they don’t 100% depend on it, and it’s also not something to fear, meaning they don’t avoid it. It's just something that they incorporate to supplement their life. Healthy attachment, relationship, or friendship consists of trust, communication, honesty, respect, and compromise. Both parties must earn each other’s trust through respecting one another, always being honest, and being consistent in their actions. Keep in mind, trust isn’t just automatically warranted, it must be earned. Like I mentioned in last week’s episode, I’ve found that I can be very all or nothing with trust. I either trust fully or not at all. But the truth is, trust is gradually earned. Again try to allow others to show you they are trustworthy before making quick judgements off of only a few interactions or even just a feeling. Additionally, with a healthy attachment, both parties must accept one another’s authentic, true selves and be comfortable being their authentic selves. If you can’t be your authentic self with someone, they are not the person for you. Like I said before, it’s too exhausting to be someone you’re not. A healthy attachment means neither of you expect the other to change anything, but at the same time you accept the inevitable changes you both with go through. If you find yourself wanting to change things about others, it probably means they’re not compatible with you. And since we are always changing, change is the only constant in life, if others change in a way that you don’t align with, it may come to a time when the connection needs to be let go, and maybe it’ll be rekindled in the future, you never know. You must continually reflect over your lifetime to decide what’s best for your present self. Another important aspect of a healthy attachment is having a sense of independence. Others do not complete you, because you are your own complete self. You both are your own complete individuals and need to have times when you are alone, working towards your own goals, fulfilling your own passions, hanging with others besides one another, etc. And the last aspect on healthy attachments I will touch on is compromise. You both must know that you will not agree on everything, and you will not be able to meet every need and desire of the other person. What you can do though is communicate those needs and desires and work to compromise to find a way that will be most beneficial to each of you. The leftover needs and desires must be met some other way, through other relationships with friends and family, through work, achieving goals, or chasing passions. 

Closing

Take everything I just covered, and analyze the patterns you’ve followed in the past, beliefs you’ve had of yourself, others, and attachment. Reflect on what has served you and what hasn’t. Determine what your ideal view of yourself, others, and connection would consist of, and don’t settle for anything less. By striving towards improving your sense of self, your trust in others, and your perspective of what a healthy attachment truly entails, you will slowly shift to a secure attachment style. Like I said, this is hard work and will take years. If you’re on this endeavor to shift your attachment style, I 100% encourage you to seek professional mental health support through a licensed therapy or coach. That’s where I began my journey. I’m only recently beginning to shift my attachment style, so I’m right alongside you all! Over the past year, I have started with just becoming aware of and analyzing how I view myself, others, and attachment. I’ve learned a lot about attachment styles and have been able to pinpoint what patterns I’ve followed, what has served me and what hasn’t. I’m also learning from my partner who has a secure attachment style, which has been extremely helpful for me. I still struggle with so many aspects of my insecure anxious attachment style, but I am trying my best to show myself compassion through this journey to shift to a secure attachment style. There are SO many aspects to shifting attachment styles that all require trial and error, time, energy, and repetition. Please don’t be discouraged by knowing it’ll require all of this. You are worth investing in yourself. If you invest in anything, YOURSELF should be at the top of that list. Healing an insecure attachment style will truly transform your life. So the time, effort, energy, repetition is SO worth it. I’m telling you, it is!! I highly highly recommend learning more about attachment styles on your own as it can help you analyze your own, raise your awareness of your patterns and beliefs, and help you begin to shift. Again, I’d also definitely recommend seeking out therapy or professional medical assistance for help in shifting an insecure attachment style to a secure one. I’ve found that to be incredibly helpful for me, as with many aspects of my healing journey.

That is all I have for today. As always, thank you for your time listening to this episode. If you found value in it, it would mean so much to me if you left a rating or a quick review! Also be sure to share this episode with anyone you think may benefit from it! Alright, have a lovely rest of your day. I look forward to chatting again next time!