We all need to be held in mind by others, especially by our caregivers early in life, at a time before we have words- or the capacity to think about ourselves on our own. Being held in someone else’s mind makes us […]
Guest Post By Michal Goldman
Relationships are built through many small moments of connection, and they are also shaped by many small moments of disconnection. These moments of disconnection are often subtle. Someone says something and does not […]
Many of us now understand the self not as a single, unified identity, but as a system of parts or sub-selves that can be in conflict or in harmony. The idea that a person has only one unified self is no longer […]
I remember a teacher in graduate school telling us something that’s stayed with me ever since: people’s problems are their solutions.
This may seem counterintuitive. After all, people come to therapy with “symptoms”, with patterns that make them suffer, […]
Lately, I’ve noticed something in my sessions; that often, just after the moment a client and I discover a new pattern they have (or insight about themselves), the client immediately asks: “Okay, well then what should I do about it??”
For some us, when we were little, we felt unseen, irrelevant, excluded, or unimportant. We may have wanted to prove ourselves to those around us- and maybe even to have defied those who saw us as small or insignificant.
Sometimes we overcompensate for our insecurities in how we present ourselves to others. We try to hide how needy, shy, embarrassed, fearful, or uncomfortable we feel by putting up a guard or masking. We may feel shy, for example, but look standoffish […]
Sarah found herself feeling bored by her husband, even though he always treated her with kindness and respect, and was a steady soothing presence in her life. She longed for more excitement which somehow felt elusive. Her dilemma boiled down to fear of letting herself get excited by someone she found so safe. […]
In the love affair between infant and mother, the mother playfully teases the infant into connection, expresses delight, responds with a kind of knowing pleasure that feels spontaneous to the infant, but that she was waiting for all along. There’s mutual gazing, a back-and-forth, a dance. It’s a blissful time in their mutual […]
So here’s the thing about avoidant attachment: it’s a style of coping with vulnerability or distress that masks or minimizes one’s need for connection, soothing, or support.
