The tribe is our source of strength, and anyone who says otherwise is mistaken. We depend on each other for physical care, emotional connection, knowledge, harmony, creativity, friendship, reproduction, and much more. Those who learn to cooperate and communicate effectively with others reach high levels in life.

Some of us need others too much. We may desperately need their approval, attention, or appreciation. We live with an insatiable hunger, debilitating anxiety, and unbearable pain in our hearts.

When we are in the company of certain people, we feel the balance gradually tipping in their favor. Our energy is drawn to them, and we become anxious and irritable. We are preoccupied with upsetting them and doubt everything we say. We watch their every move and feel resentment and fear when they speak to others. We think about them constantly and dream of how wonderful they are.

What is happening?

Attachment: The Path to Love

Attachment is the psychological expression of our need for others.

Attachment is like an invisible, reciprocal emotional umbilical cord. The more positive experiences two people share, the stronger and deeper their bond becomes.

Attachment takes time to develop and profoundly transforms our relationships. When you become attached to someone, you become completely connected to them. Their well-being becomes your top priority, and you do everything you can to ensure their health and happiness. Their opinion carries significant weight, and their rejection hurts. Their growth is your growth. All of this is crucial for human survival and flourishing.

Related : Paranoia: An Ally Turned Tormentor

Attachment becomes an integral part of us, like one of our organs, which is why losing a loved one is incredibly painful. Their absence, whether temporary or permanent, is like losing a limb. The pain of attachment to someone who is gone can haunt us for months, even years.

The pain isn’t limited to physical absence; it also includes emotional absence. When someone is present, emotionally resonant, and caring, our connection with them flourishes. But when they are distant, emotionally detached, and contemptuous, we experience a psychological rift in that connection. This leads to a fear of abandonment, as well as feelings of inadequacy in that person’s eyes. If this happens at a young age, it can negatively impact our emotional development.

Anxious Attachment: The Root Cause of Over-Attachment

Not all attachments are created equal. In childhood, our first attachment is to our mother. If she is consistently present, calm, understanding, and attentive, we develop a secure attachment to her. Using this attachment as a model, we communicate smoothly with others and develop fulfilling relationships over time.

However, if our mother is inconsistent in her presence, calmness, understanding, and attention, we will experience frequent ruptures in this attachment, during which we may feel scared and ashamed. Many mothers do their best but face difficulties due to abusive partners, stress, mental health issues, and addiction.

Most mothers try to be understanding and loving, instilling hope in their children that they can develop a secure attachment. Over time, a mother’s capacity for understanding and attachment weakens, and the child may not understand why. All they know is that their mother is sometimes present and affectionate, while at other times she is cold, quick to anger, or even furious.

There is no logic, reason, or predictability to this mother’s behavior. Her love and presence are random. This results in anxious attachment, because the child doesn’t know when this attachment will be taken away. Like a slot machine, the mother provides the anxious child with intermittent reinforcement, rewarding the child with love at random moments, before suddenly depriving them of it without explanation.

Understanding_and_Managing_Anxious_Attachment

A child with anxious attachment tends to project an anxious pattern onto all their relationships. As a result, they constantly suffer from two fundamental wounds:

Chronic Shame: Individuals with anxious attachment suffer from an inferiority complex. They constantly feel inadequate, unworthy, and incompetent.

Abandonment Trauma: Due to their feelings of inadequacy, individuals with anxious attachment remain in a state of heightened alertness and fear of being abandoned. The traumatic experience of emotional abandonment by their mother in childhood remains deeply ingrained in their psyche, haunting them constantly.

Because of this childhood abandonment trauma, individuals with anxious attachment have an intense fear of loneliness. The intermittent reinforcement they experienced has also left a lasting impact, preventing them from ever feeling completely secure in any relationship. They are always on high alert, looking for any sign of rejection or abandonment.

A person with anxious attachment disorder resorts to a solution for their anxiety and shyness: ensuring they remain perfect, never making mistakes. At the same time, they monitor the other person’s every move and never leave their side, fearing abandonment. Much of this happens in their imagination, as they project their own traumas and anxieties onto someone who is likely experiencing a completely different relationship.

Living in this state is exhausting and destructive. The more attached you become to someone, the more they distance themselves. The more they distance themselves, the more ashamed you feel. The more ashamed you feel, the more inferior you feel, and the more certain you are that the other person will leave you, which only makes you cling to them even more, perpetuating the vicious cycle.

To break this destructive cycle, you need to confront the root causes directly. This requires delving into the depths of loneliness, as well as facing and eliminating the core of your anxiety: the inferiority complex linked to shyness.

Enter the Void: Confronting the Fear of Loneliness

Anxious people cling to others because they are terrified of being alone. Even if they only experience emotional abandonment, the dread overwhelms them. Therefore, they try to maintain physical closeness with their emotionally attached partner, taking care to behave in the best possible way, hoping to gain harmony, attention, and affection.

The most powerful way to deal with this fear is to consider the worst-case scenario and then fully immerse yourself in it.

In the case of an anxious person, they might imagine that their emotionally attached partner hates them intensely and abandons them forever. What would happen then? Would they suddenly die? Would the terror and shame leave them devastated and penniless? Would the whole world find out, and then everyone would mock and ostracize them?

This is unlikely. But experiencing emotional or physical abandonment from your emotionally attached partner can feel like the end of the world. Even just thinking about it can be terrifying.

The first step to breaking free from this state is to isolate yourself, spend time alone, and reflect on the resulting panic attack. This might involve going for a long walk, spending a day in your room with no contact with the outside world, or even traveling alone to another place.

Related : Why You Keep Choosing People Who Hurt You

Immersing yourself in solitude may seem impossible when you are deeply attached. At first, it will completely paralyze you. You might even experience panic attacks. The idea is to start with something you can control and then gradually increase the difficulty. Perhaps instead of traveling to the ends of the earth on a one-way ticket, go to the movies alone or take a walk somewhere you’ve never been before.

When practicing solitude, minimize contact with the person you are emotionally attached to and try to keep your phone off or at home. You shouldn’t have any “aids” to rely on. It should be just you and the abyss. This requires a warrior’s mindset and a willingness to dive into the depths of fear. If you can manage the accompanying stress and discomfort, you will transform your anxiety into inner peace and resolve. It is a wonderful spiritual practice.

No To Inferiority: Dealing with Shame

Cleanliness can be so overwhelming, consuming an anxious person’s entire being, that they completely lose sight of the root cause.

Shame is the feeling you get when you fail to meet a standard you consider important. If those close to you are disappointed by what you do, you feel guilty. If they explicitly reject you based on your personality, you feel ashamed.

It’s not just people who can cause you shame; arbitrary standards can too. If you want to be thin, you might feel ashamed when you gain weight or if you meet someone who appears slimmer than you. Ultimately, shame is the feeling that reminds you that you’re not good enough, regardless of what “good enough” means to you. It’s largely a personal matter that varies from person to person.

People with anxious attachment live with a constant feeling of inadequacy. They are consumed by shame, and to avoid the agony of this repressed shame, they go to great lengths to prove their worth. They please and cooperate with others to demonstrate their deserving of love. They flatter and praise others, which makes them feel secure in their attachment to a “superior” person.

To overcome anxious attachment for good, you will need to let go of the other-please behaviors and then allow the shame to overwhelm you. At first, it will be a terrible experience. A lifetime of accumulating shame can lead to debilitating episodes that last for days, or even weeks. You feel lethargic and depressed. Your mind shuts down. A critical voice in your head attacks you, telling you how worthless you are. You begin to constantly compare yourself to others, searching for ways to prove them superior. Your shoulders slump, you look down, and you avoid eye contact. You are overcome by an overwhelming urge to hide from the world and never show yourself again.

This is shame. It’s a feeling shared by everyone who struggles with anxiety and attachment, but one they rarely acknowledge. Like the trauma of abandonment and the fear of loneliness, the only way to overcome it is to confront it. The longer you allow yourself to feel shame without reacting, the sooner you’ll be able to let go. It may take months or longer, but it will fade. You may feel strong for weeks, then the shame will return. Everyone goes through this phase.

Shame is more likely to surface when you’re alone because you’ll feel isolated and unappreciated. If you resist it or turn it into thoughts, it will come back to haunt you. If you can live with it without reacting to it, it will gradually disappear. Your desire for it to disappear will keep it there. It’s enough to live with it lovingly and without expectations, even when you feel the urge to react.

When shame becomes overwhelming, a way to release it is to share it with someone else. Perhaps you have a therapist, a close friend, a relative, or a support group. It might be as simple as saying, “I feel ashamed,” or “I feel inferior/unworthy/unable to love.” This is different from cleanliness because it’s honest, and it means you’re taking responsibility for your feelings. By sharing your shame, a loving look from another person can help you heal it. When shame builds up in secret, bringing it into the open can heal it. So remember, you don’t always have to carry it alone, especially when it feels heavy.

Feeling your fear and shame without distractions, without “doing” anything, is the foundation for healing your anxious cleanliness. The process is challenging, but it’s worth it. There are no shortcuts. But when you get through this ordeal, you’ll be changed. You’ll have the option to be alone if you want, and you’ll stop comparing yourself to others and feeling superior to them. You’ll become calm, confident, and content.

Only from this state can you build genuine relationships based on mutual respect, instead of a hierarchy built on cleanliness and neediness. Only in this case can you move to a permanently secure connection.