People cannot live without a sense of ownership of another person’s life. We all need to feel loved, needed. Everyone wants to be taken care of, showed sincere attention. Attachment is one form of manifestation of love. Everyone knows that a sense of well-being is born out of an unconscious need to be needed by someone.
This article addresses the origins of attachment. Perhaps this material will help someone understand the difficult relationship with a spouse, child, parents and make the right decision.
Definition of a concept
Attachment is a need for another person's love. How often do we begin to not only expect such manifestations of feelings in our direction, but we are even offended, angry when attention is not focused on our person. These are fears of a self-doubt person who does not know his value. Attachment to a person, in fact, reflects our own attitude to ourselves and to life in general. It is noticed that the more a person loves himself, the less he feels the need for other people. That is, a strong attachment is always a synonym for personal dysfunction, insecurity in their strengths and capabilities.
How is this feeling formed?
The sources of any manifestations of trouble should always be sought in childhood. If an adult suffers excessively without the presence of a spouse or child in his life, is afraid to separate from his parents, this means that there is some problem. Perhaps when he was a child, his parents did not pay enough attention to him. And now he is trying to compensate for this dislike, trying to be needed by everyone who can only: the second half, his own child. But such an omission cannot be corrected over time: everything must be done on time, and love too. It is very important to go through all the stages of love gradually, so that later you don’t mix relations, do not add unnecessary insults and misunderstandings there.
A painful focus on someone impedes development, the formation of prospects for the future, and impedes personal growth. Attachment to a person sometimes infringes on their own interests, forcing them to look for ways to preserve relations. There is no need to unnecessarily “stick”, it is necessary to have some personal space: to live for yourself and let the other build their own destiny.
Bowlby Attachment Theory
The British scientist revealed 4 types of predisposition to the development of the inability to live without another person. John Bowlby mainly considered the relationship of mother with child, but this model makes sense to consider in the light of the interaction of adults with each other. He called the first kind of affection safe. Its essence is as follows: in relations, reasonable boundaries have been reached between the adult and the needs of the child. A parent does not infringe on the personality of his child, allows him to grow fully, to obtain the necessary knowledge. It must be said that this type of attachment is the most constructive of all, since it does not impede development, does not cause suffering.
An anxious-avoiding line of behavior demonstrates the child’s dependence on the parent, forms deep feelings in the event of separation from him, the inability to be alone for even a short time. Emotional attachment is very strong. Due to the fact that the parent shows little emotion, the child is afraid to express his own feelings out loud, there is a fear of intimacy. Getting older, such children experience significant difficulties in building personal and friendly relations, because they constantly think that they are not interesting to others, which leads to doubts about their significance.
The dual-resisting position is manifested by a great fear of the unknown. Man puts obstacles in the way of self-knowledge and self-improvement. Uncertainty and shyness are the result of upbringing in childhood, when the parents did not recognize the child’s obvious merits, did not praise him for his courage, so he became extremely shy.
Disorganizationally-controlled position includes all of the above manifestations and is characterized by inconsistency of actions, frequent mistakes, non-recognition of one’s value, fear, obsessive states. Bowlby’s attachment theory demonstrates the origin of such a phenomenon as painful psychological dependence on another person. Such relationships always destroy feelings.
Affection or love?
When does love become addicted? Where is the line separating true relationships from those that make a person act as a beggar? Understanding this issue is not as easy as it might seem at first glance.
The most difficult of all are human relationships. Affection, whatever it may be, sometimes brings great suffering.
A lover constantly needs a partner to assure him of his boundless love, to demonstrate infinite tenderness and fidelity. If this does not happen, doubts, suspicions, unfounded accusations, jealousy begin. This happens only because a person is extremely unsure of himself and somewhere in the depths of his soul doubts that he can be loved at all. The true feeling is free from demands, arrogant talk and fear. Love wants to give itself, to manifest itself in the endless care of a loved one and does not require anything in return.
How to recognize an unhealthy relationship?
Painful attachment is always limited self-perception. It seems to people that they are not loved, but in fact they themselves do not show interest in themselves, do not use opportunities that could benefit them, bring them to a new level of development. A person experiencing a state of acute attachment does not value himself as a person. Therefore, he needs another in order to compensate for his own drama in this love.
It turns out a vicious circle. Often this is used the phrase: "I can not live without you." In this case, you always want to ask: “How did you live before meeting your loved one? Did they really vegetate, endure hunger and cold? ” Even if you owe something to a specific person, you need to learn how to live on your own so as not to feel led by your whole life.
Negative consequences
We have already figured out how excessive attachment can interfere with personal growth. Negative phenomena like self-doubt and low self-esteem are mandatory consequences. And what is the result? A person is lost in the stream of his own fears, and at some point it simply becomes impossible for her to move forward. And it all starts with self-dislike. If a person is able to think about his well-being, to engage in self-education, then his life is changing for the better.
How to overcome unrequited love?
Such a fate, most often, befalls precisely those who have not learned to value their own personality. It’s like these people are given a test, as a result of which they must find their lost personality, learn to understand what is important to them.
Many unhappy lovers are interested in how to get rid of the attachment that brings only suffering? The tips here will not help, you must definitely go through a comprehensive pain that literally tears your heart in half. When the tears dry, people come to the realization that they didn’t really like it, but it seemed to them because life without this drama had nothing to fill. All that needs to be done is to find a new meaning for existence.
Why is it important to love yourself?
Adequate perception of self is the key to success in any undertaking. Self-love gives many advantages and, above all, a powerful inner core. Then, no matter what happens, a person will know that any problems are being solved, there is no global catastrophe that could not be fixed. A person only then becomes truly free when able to take responsibility for everything that happens to her.
Thus, a painful attachment to other people is not an indicator of strong love for them at all, but a consequence of a serious flaw, an omission in the formation of one's own personality. To live happily, you need to be independent, to gain inner freedom. And only then the opportunity arises to fall in love for real.