Working with couples day in and day out, helping them with their problems, has given me a bird’s-eye view of the struggles they have while trying to make love work. Love isn’t always easy! One of the most common situations I see is partners unhappy over something that existed before they committed to each other. By discussing it, I hope to save you future heartache. I want to help you follow the number one rule when it comes to relationships: choose wisely and carefully!
Attachment in Dating
The field of neuroscience informs us that our brains naturally scan for “danger” in romantic relationships. This means you are alert to threats to the relationship that affect connection, intimacy, and closeness. When you have a date with someone with a secure attachment style, you will not sense these threats. Your date will be calm and predictable. You should not confuse attachment system activation with love, as many people do. When there are no immediate alarms or bells and whistles, your brain may not “code” it as love. Securely attached people have a positive mind-set about intimacy and relationships. They expect things to work out for them in the end. They anticipate meeting their match and falling in love.
It’s probably not surprising to hear that those with secure attachment styles most often end up in happy and prosperous relationships. The good news is that your attachment style is not set in stone. It can be reshaped throughout your life. It can change in a positive or negative way, depending on the partner you are with. Therefore, you will have the best chance of growing in a secure direction yourself if you pick as secure a partner as possible. Alternatively, you can choose a partner who at the very least recognizes his own insecure pattern and wants to grow and change with you.
The Healthy Relationship
Healthy and successful relationships have several core characteristics in common. These relationships are defined by the couple’s sense of safety and security, empathy for each other, responsiveness to the other’s needs, and attitude of we-ness. Each partner is attuned to the other, and they both openly communicate. There is a profound understanding and awareness of each other. They count on each other and believe firmly that each has the other’s back. They also take emotional risks with each other — they are not afraid to be vulnerable. They have the courage to show each other who they really are. Trust and safety is built slowly and gradually from the beginning of the relationship. In fact, this trust and safety is the foundation the relationship is built on. When it isn’t there at the start, the relationship is built on a faulty foundation and often never fully recovers.
In a healthy relationship, there is open, assertive, and effective communication. There are no games. Communication is clear and direct. When healthy couples get stuck or start arguing, they tend to address what is underneath the surface. When attachment-based triggers are activated in such situations, an emotionally unavailable partner will typically use deactivating strategies — distancing thoughts and actions — that cause him to turn away when you need him the most. An emotionally available partner will express his fears, longings, and vulnerabilities to you instead of shutting you out. In turn, it will feel safe for you to do the same. When partners tap into their vulnerabilities and share them, they can come together to work through the problem. They can both use coping skills to effectively reduce their reactivity and overwhelming emotions so that they can stay present and engaged with each other and talk calmly. When partners communicate in a healthy way, they are able to get back on stable ground relatively quickly after an argument. Their equilibrium returns, and they carry on without holding grudges.
Emotional Intelligence
Some of the characteristics of healthy relationships embody what is known as emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is about being adept in several core areas involving emotion within yourself and in your interactions with others. The areas of personal competence include self-awareness and management of both your emotions and your behaviors in response to them. Accurately perceiving your own emotions and positively channeling those emotions are key to becoming personally and socially competent.
The other component of emotional intelligence is how accurately you tune in to the emotions of those around you and assess what might be going on with them, and whether you use this knowledge efficaciously to mediate your interactions with them. As you can imagine, emotional intelligence is something you want to develop and something you want to look for in a partner. Emotionally intelligent people experience much more successful platonic and romantic relationships, greater academic achievement, more positive interactions with their children, and greater success at work.
In your search for love, you will be rejected (at least once!). Moreover, you will reject other people you meet. You may find someone to take a chance on, someone you believe has “potential.” But if you keep trying to change someone to fit the mold of what you desire, and it isn’t working, examine your motives and behavior. You must be realistic about a partner’s willingness to change. Don’t keep trying harder to fix him. Instead, move on and declare yourself open to finding someone capable of reciprocating love. There is nothing like sharing your life with a partner you can count on, one who is emotionally available to you and more than willing to love you back.
Copyright ©2019 by Dr. Marni Feuerman. Excerpted from the book Ghosted and Breadcrumbed. Printed with permission from New World Library www.newworldlibrary.com.
