 So today we're going to talk about love attachment styles and I'm going to share my perspective on this So if you're not familiar with love attachment styles highly recommend reading the book Attached by Amira Levine and Rachel Heller Okay, why is this critically important for those of you that are seeking a significant romantic relationship Is because based on this information There's a good chance that many of you are Experiencing either anxious attachment style or avoid attachment style What this means is how we attach to another person Beyond the physical attractiveness see many of us hyper focus on a physical attraction as our entryway into a Relationship and while there's some merits to that because you want to feel a sense of chemistry a sense of connection with someone Actually, there might be something underneath going on and what I mean by underneath in our subconscious that might be going on That's precluding us from having a significant relationship. In fact in many cases our love attachment style might be Sabotaging our romantic relationships. Okay, so from my perception I believe a significant percentage of women are what's known as anxious attachment style and a Significant percentage of men are known as avoidant attachment style Okay, what I mean by this is anxious often times gets Has a you know a fear of losing love of losing connection with someone and what happens is they internally there's so much Interconflict going on that they're almost becomes a point where they need their dependents upon attention dependent upon Security in the relationship that they oftentimes smother another person. Okay, they might overwhelm the other person They might incessantly text they might Be requesting to have their needs met on almost an in on a on a overwhelming perspective, okay now an avoidant person most likely in Well, I'll talk about their child and avoidant person when they're receiving You know attention from another person they wall up They they go inward because they have a fear of being overwhelmed. They have a fear of losing their autonomy Okay Now if it's true that women tend to be more anxious and men tend to be more anxious It doesn't mean that this doesn't go the other way around You know men can be anxious women can be a Avoidant and made me think of my own personal experiences because I am completely aware I have what's known as an anxious a love attachment style Now I think this was birthed out of a couple experiences in my life first off my mother had a propensity to Emotionally abandon myself and my my siblings and my father During the early stages my upbringing and what happened is she would emotionally abandon us and I would feel like I did something wrong So to to get my mother's attention I'd be like mom look at me look at me look at me and I'm saying this you know kind of not literally speaking and In that I became an anxious attachment style What I mean to say is I was you know There was an abandonment of love and then I kept chasing it So that became where I needed it to feel safe in that moment and it didn't occur So I have a propensity that the minute someone Stonewalls the minute someone isn't giving love from my perception of what that is I Oftentimes become anxious. Okay Now avoidant I believe one of the significant causes for being avoidant is the person the little child boy or girl Couldn't fully express themselves because when they did they were shut down They were told to like for men they were told to man up be a man Don't show emotions and for for little girls it could have also been something similar in other words They couldn't be their authentic self and they were shut down by one or both of their caregivers being a parent okay Now another thing that happened in my child and in particular That I think this relates to when you know because we have our relates to when we were in school When I was in school, I was picked on Significantly, I wasn't picked for games first So all of those emotions that happened in school started to rewire my brain not trusting love feeling anxious feeling, you know, un Unappreciated I mean the list of words can go on and on and on which which helped Kind of wire who I am as an adult and so ultimately where I'm at Or where I've been at is an anxious person Now, I know a lot of kids in school were probably shut down Ridiculed embarrassed for whatever reasons that this happens you get picked on I know you know when we're we're little babies We all play together, but at a certain point people start to form groups with one another in school and all of those experiences might cause someone to be Emotionally avoidant what that means to say is they are not necessarily as an adult Overly expressive because if they express to they were they were shut down for it. Okay, so I'm trying to give you kind of a Cliff note version of love attachment styles and how this might manifest as an adult is the anxious person tends to need lots of validation to feel security and safety and the avoidant is afraid to give security and Safety to another person because they don't trust the the connection. They don't trust love So this is this weird push-pull that happens within a lot of couples, okay Now I'm a keenly aware of this because I know that most likely my partner in my relationship There's a picture of my significant relationship. We live together She probably is what we classify as an avoidant and I'd classify myself as an anxious, okay? You know what I don't like about this I don't like the labels as if anxious or avoidant is something bad You know when you think about it I didn't choose to have these experiences growing up that caused me to become who I am and I'm sure my Sweetheart didn't choose her experiences that caused her to become who she is And so and there there's nothing wrong with it There's nothing wrong with being anxious or avoidant and I think we all would like to consider ourselves I didn't mention this in earlier stages. There's anxious avoidant and secure secure is that you feel a sense of safety and trust in the relationship Where you don't want to Flight and you don't want to fight. Okay, or freeze. Okay most in fact most everybody believes There are secure attachment style if you took the test online Most everybody answers the questions in such a way that they believe they're secure That's my perception anyway But I truly believe that we have a default or one or the other Okay, now could an anxious sabotage a relationship with a partner could their Their need for validation their need for Connection overwhelm the other person. Yeah, that could absolutely happen Here's what I actually think happens and I think it's why I Particularly understand my clients so well is because I tend to be as I said earlier an anxious attachment style I think what's happening is that we choose partners to trigger our wounds So we can actually heal that wound within ourselves Let me repeat that we choose partners that trigger our wounds and It's an opportunity to heal ourselves So if I did attract and again, I'm I don't want to characterize You know avoidant is bad But if I attracted someone who happens to be avoidant the from a spiritual perspective Why I did that was to heal that part of me that doesn't love myself that doesn't love myself and I think possibly why my partner chose me is to trust that you know There are there you can be your authentic self and that's okay You can be your authentic self and that's okay So given that women tend to attract more avoidant and we also understand that Men aren't necessarily all avoidant. They just might be slightly emotionally Constipated and what I mean to say is they have difficulty expressing themselves to their partner Okay, and it doesn't necessarily mean again that they're going to end the relationship because they don't trust love enough Yet. Okay, so with that said First and foremost is to recognize if you believe you're an anxious and if you're with an avoidant first off There's nothing wrong with the other person and there's nothing wrong with you. Okay, there's nothing wrong we are beautiful human beings on this journey of I believe learning to love ourselves. In fact, I wrote a book about it What the heck is self-love anyway a journey of personal development self-help and spiritual work? You can get it on Amazon. You can go to the link below to check out my book. I Often asked myself, why did I write this book? It's because we teach what we most have to learn This is something, you know, and I'm only sharing my experience because maybe you can relate to this this self-love is Really the capacity to give ourselves a big gigantic hug Whenever we're feeling fear whenever we're feeling in security when whenever we're feeling anxious whenever we're out of our Alignment to our inner peace self-love is just simply on Giving yourself an injection of love Whenever you're feeling You know not fully whole not fully present not fully Engaged in life because your thoughts start to overwhelm you And I say this from my own personal experience and this is true if you're an avoidant or an anxious love attach your So what can you do? first and foremost Awareness is 80% of the the path to healing being aware. Okay, number one being aware of what it is Okay number two is When you get triggered for whatever reason whatever make okay, like if my partner doesn't text right away as an example Okay, it's not that they've abandoned the relationship. You're not going to die So number two is to recognize that the trigger is an opportunity to go to the mirror and give yourself some love See that's what's really happening rather than trying to change the other person's behavior rather than trying to say You need to do this so I can feel good about myself go to the mirror and Just really look at yourself and say I'm giving me. I'm giving me some love right now. I Am the I I am the soother of my Anxiety I am the person who can heal this now I don't want to dismiss the fact that many of you could be in a relationship with someone who's just not aligned with you And they may not be able to be may not be capable of being on this journey with you And so it might mean that you need to end this relationship. That's certainly a possibility But the same time this person came in your life both of you came in your life to heal One another I think relationships have have two components to it I think one is the companionship component component that life is better with company and doing things together Whether it's physical intimacy with one another whether it's social activities hobbies mutual interests whether it's spending time with family and friends I think those are important integral parts in building a relationship with someone in addition, I think we choose Relationships to heal the wound within ourselves that happened in childhood and we choose partners that activate us So when you get triggered It's actually an opportunity To heal oneself How do we heal on selves? Certainly as I said before doing practices a mindfulness practice of recognizing that Whenever you feel triggered, that's an opportunity to go to the mirror and give yourself love. Okay Now what I want to encourage everyone to do is share these things with your partner See with an avoidant person if you begin to share that it's not their fault. It's not their Responsibility to make you feel good about yourself that you are aware that this is something that you work on within yourself If you do that by sharing this with your partner Actually, this can create a bond. This can create trust with your partner and if they're open to looking at their own Well, I was gonna say behaviors, but their own actions their own Inner dialogue that's going on if this if by sharing yours it creates an opportunity for them to look inside of themselves Maybe the two of you can begin to work on this together in a mindful practice by actually having deeper dialogue Now one of the challenges with people today is They're actually not forming an integrated relationship with one another I'm repeat that they're not forming an integrated relationship with one another these days dating is a long protracted casual type of Relationship because people aren't truly integrating each other into their lives. Okay In the case of my sweetheart and I we moved in together That's a big integration of with with one another into each other's lives when you're actually spending Months if not years living in your separate homes getting together on occasion You might be experiencing the anxious and void it together, but there's not enough roots of Integration to actually begin the process of saying let's actually work on this together. Many people are just living life on a Surface level what I mean to say is they spend time together then they go back to their respective homes Now for some for some it's actually Warranted because they're raising children. They don't want to integrate that with the other person. That's you know And that is understandable at the same time these part-time casual relationships Oftentimes don't build the deep roots of trust to actually work on This part of our lives where we need to heal That part of us That doesn't love ourselves This is this is what we're faced with, you know It's interesting. I was watching a video the other day and it talked about dating, you know 50 years ago. It's just all about playing with each other and having a good time And it's very surface level and today's dating is a questionnaire to find out how deeply wounded a person is Find out about their past Relationships because you're if you're basically vetting this person to decide if you want to go on this ride Well, is there some merit to doing that? Well? I think the merit for having deeper conversations sooner rather than the let's just have a good time and then figure this stuff out I think by having these deeper conversations earlier on you might find yourself Getting it getting building a relationship with someone because you're doing it from a foundation of vulnerability Authenticity and transparency. I'm repeat that you're building the early stage of relationship through vulnerability authenticity and transparency and and with that if it doesn't work out you actually can detach from the relationship much easier because you've done it from a Conscious perspective instead of this unconscious way. Most people are dating today Which is based on attachment? My coffee mug says I don't want to work anymore. I just want to be cherished put up on a pedestal taken care of this was a gift To me. Thank you so much to my friend who gave this to me. Why am I sharing on this today? I? Recognize that while many of you watch my content and you see the relationship I have there, you know every relationship has their I don't want to say struggles but they're areas for growth those areas within our individual selves that Propel us to another level of consciousness another level of enlightenment And here's the thing about relationships whether they last, you know A few weeks a few months a few years or a lifetime Every person that enters in our life is often a true benefit for us To heal a deeper part within ourselves That's right. Every person I believe who enters our life whether it's for a nanosecond or for a long period of time It's an opportunity to heal and when couples actually choose to work through this together They might find that they might find that they can do this for a lifetime or they might say wow I've healed and each one of us can go our individual journeys. That's a possibility to and that's okay Why I'm saying that's okay is when we get hung up that we have to be with someone forever You know, I think of my father who just turned 98 My mother passed away six years ago. They were together for 66 years, but he spent the last six years Not with her not with any other relationship. We you know the person who goes first gets off easy and This happens for a lot of people in younger years, you know Like in their sixth instead of my 80s like my father a lot of people lose people in their 60s And we still have another full rich life ahead of us You know for many people in their 60s, they can live another 20 or 30 years So if a relationship doesn't work out for you, it doesn't mean you can't find another person to do another Set of healing within your life another shared experiences with one another so my point of simply bringing this up For those of you that feel like there's nobody out there to make you feel good Well, it starts by feeling good within ourselves and just remember when you put yourself out there It is a risk. There's no doubt about it But it's only a risk if you see it as something bad It's a really good thing when you put yourself out there because it's an opportunity to grow and heal within yourself Is this sinking in is this resonating? Please let me know. I'd like to hear your thoughts on this Please post a comment below if you like my content, please share this video with your friends You may want to check out my group called midlife love mastery This is a group where you can have direct access to me on a regular basis I'm shooting this video for my group right now Send them send people to my or you can go to my website Jonathan asley.com Click that group coaching button so you can join our fantastic group and I'm gonna sign off this videos I always do first off give myself a big gigantic Jonathan bear hug of self love I'm gonna reach into the camera and give you a hug of love if that's okay I'm asking to turn to someone a pet a teddy bear pillow give either them a hug of love because hugs are a great source of love And let's face it. We could all use more love in our lives. Thanks a bunch. Bye. Bye now. Bye. Bye