Relationships Matter: 6 Levels of Healthy Relational Safety and Depth

Relationships matter.  And to riff on the old adage, it’s not who you know; it’s how well you know them that counts.   Nothing happens outside the context of a relationship.  At the very least, we have (or had) parents, we have (or had) siblings or peers, we have coworkers or customers, and we have neighbors (even if we don’t know them).  It is in the context of these relationships that we give and receive things we need and learn about ourselves and our world.  And in our fast-paced technology connected world, it is hard to maintain relational depth.  

Even when I’m working with individuals who are not interested in working on their relationships, we have a relationship with ourselves.  How we talk to and how we feel about ourselves perhaps matters the most!  How well we know ourselves and how we relate to ourselves is the foundation of our ability to enjoy life and engage effectively with the world. 

One of the useful theories or lenses to use in talking about relationships is attachment.  In simple language, attachment is a way to describe how able we are and how safe it is to connect with another human.  Attachment begins at birth and changes throughout life.  If we are well supported and attuned to, it is easy for us to connect with others and easy for us to be alone.  If we hit roadblocks along the way, we can face various challenges in connecting with others.  This is most obviously seen in intimate relationships. However, peer relationships are also effective by our attachment styles.  This can impact everything from finding an intimate partner to having friends and social support, to parenting, to being successful in our career.  So if you have had struggles in any of those areas, read on to see where you might be able to heal and strengthen your relational abilities.

Attachment starts with a solid foundation, or solid roots, if you will.  With healthy, secure attachments, we can still stand tall in the strong winds and storms of life. And we can be at peace when the storms pass.  Without solid, healthy attachments, we get rocked, blown around, and are unable to rest and be at peace when there are no immediate challenges.  With unhealthy attachments, it is easy to turn to unstable comforts to feel better, like alcohol, drugs, unhealthy sexual behaviors, unhealthy people, screens – media, social media, video games, and more.  With a secure, stable attachment, we can use these things in healthy, appropriate ways and turn to ourselves or appropriate people for healthy connection and comfort.  

Attachment theory describes attachment as being either secure or insecure.  A secure attachment means the person is stable on their own AND can connect deeply with others to receive and give various forms of support or nourishment with appropriate levels of intimacy.  Insecure attachment can manifest as anxiety (anxious attachment style) if someone gets too close or too far, avoidance (avoidant attachment style) of getting close to someone, or a combination of anxious or avoidant (anxious-avoidant attachment style) feelings or behaviors.  

Dr. Gordon Neufeld has gone further to describe six levels of attachment that happen during our key developmental years.  These six drives can also demonstrate themselves in adulthood when we look at the types of relationships we have and how we connect or avoid our adult relationships.  Each of these six levels builds on the one before.  That is, if we are underdeveloped at one level, it is harder to move on and have healthy relationships at the later levels.

The six levels are:

Drive to be with – Attachment to physical proximity.  Being close to an individual. This is the most basic.  Being with someone in their physical presence.  Teenagers often like to hang out even if they are not doing anything in particular.  It is comforting to just be with someone and be able to see, smell, hear, and touch them.  This reassures us of our physical safety.  We need a home base, touchstone, and resting place, which serves as a compass point to navigate the greater world.   When this physical attachment is suitable, we can feel safe in the middle of chaos.  If not, we become armored and cannot be physically close, hug, or touch others.  

Drive to be like – Attachment to the identity/personality of an individual.  Once we feel safe enough in our body, the next level is the desire to be like or the same as someone we like or respect. As part of our identity formation, we emulate, identify with, imitate, and model after them learning behaviors, our core identity, preferences, dislikes, and social norms to fit into society.  We do this with our parents at an early age and friends or partners later on.  This serves to enable us to feel close while apart because we are acting like and remembering them (even if not consciously).  

Drive to be part of – Attachment to belonging and standing with a group.  Once we are secure enough in our individual identity, we want to belong to a bigger group.  Whether that is a nuclear family, extended family, class, school, sports team, peer group, political affiliation, national affiliation, ethnic affiliation, religion, profession, or any group of “like” people.  To feel like there are lots of people like us and on our side helps us feel secure and that we belong to something greater.  It creates a feeling of loyalty and the desire to serve, obey, or even defer to the will of the group.  

Drive to matter – Attachment to being valued by a group.  Once we feel connected to and part of a bigger group of people (or more than one), we need to feel like we are important to and worthy of care, respect, love, or esteem.   This is the drive for greater success and achievement.  Perhaps it is this drive that video games are tapping into for some, but often is incomplete, and people keep playing at excessive levels because it has to be had in personal relationships, not just with a score or standings board on a screen.  We all need unconditional positive regard – that is feeling that people value us no matter what we do or what we are.  When we feel this way, this frees people from a lifelong search for value, always trying to prove their worth which can then opens the person to further levels of intimacy and fullest potential rather than just trying to be important.  Without this value, people endlessly chase value externally through achievement, peer recognition, consumerism, unnecessary degrees, and more.

Drive for love – Attachment to being loved and emotionally intimate in our full authentic self.  Once we know that we belong, we are important, and we matter no matter what we do or how we are, we are available for true intimacy or “attaching at the heart.”  Again each of the previous stages has to have at least some level of health or intimacy can be superficial or motivated by seeking simple physical closeness (like just living together or having disconnected sex), identity, belonging, or value importance.  It is possible to have some intimacy without, but true intimacy with be limited by our needs to feel those prior levels.  This level of attachment requires a secure sense of self, identity, belonging, value, and the ability to be present with limbic attunement to the other. To be open and receptive to another and able to feel (all) emotions, give and share heart enables this level of attachment. The risk of course is that this opens us up to big vulnerability.  With healthy attachment, we can feel safest in long-term relationships (family or committed relationships).  But without healthy attachment, we have the paradoxical effect that the longer the relationship, the more threatening vulnerability becomes.  

Some studies are suggesting early digital intimacy undermines this need for this emotional intimacy.  In a long-term relationship, healthy attachment at all these levels of attachment enables us to weather storms of disagreement and difficulty and stay attuned, committed, and attached to work through problems rather than separating or avoiding.  Knowing we are connected and attached at this level helps people remain caring and open toward someone despite periods of distance and separation due to hardship or travel. It can set the stage for deeper levels of psychological and sexual intimacy that are not possible when there are missing pieces in any of the lower levels.  Knowing we are securely attached in this way we can be shielded from wounding from the world, less reactive to hurts from our partner, and able to keep a soft open heart in face of wounding and stresses of the world.  Without this, we blame, attack, withdraw, close off, and seek to control, change or manipulate to keep ourselves safe.  I think this is essential for full psychological development and maturity, especially with the state of the world today.

Drive for psychological intimacybe fully known to – Attachment to our full authentic whole self.  At this level, we are secure and have no secrets that divide us from ourselves especially, but also with a few select others. We can be fully honest with ourselves about our most hidden shameful thoughts, feelings, desires, or experiences, and we are able to share secrets with appropriate, trustworthy others, and we are not shamed for those secrets.  This is important for children when considering the previous states of attachment needs and the need for connection with a parent. What your parents don’t know about what you did won’t get you in trouble, but those secrets cause a divide and distance, making love and acceptance inaccessible.  Even if parents could love and accept the transgression, the personal feeling that it must be kept secret causes a psychological separation that takes a toll. This level of secure attachment makes known what you normally keep hidden, allowing greater ability to accept yourself and others. This is different than just knowing about (indirect/impersonal) or being exposed to it secondhand or intellectually.  We must be the ones that shares the thing we fear to share.  With an intimate partner, we have to be the one to physically or metaphorically take our clothes off, be seen and witnessed, and have the experience of still being loved despite the secret.  This happens after one has shared from their heart and has the ability to reflect on one’s own thoughts and feelings and behaviors.  We all need to be seen fully.  Social media and  capitalizes on this need, but ineffectively because it is impersonal incomplete and does not address the need for physical presence, attunement, mirroring, validation, touch, and seeing the person’s care and acceptance. 

So much more could be said about this as it is an in-depth and complicated topic.  Simply knowing this is only the first step to repairing and living from these six levels of attachment and relational depth. But I wanted to at least sketch this outline as I’ve found it helpful for many of my clients in identifying and understanding relationship challenges.  Being able to have a healthy attachment at these six levels builds strong roots to weather the stresses and storms of life.  And our attachment strengths and weaknesses don’t just show up in our relationships with others, these factors all show up in our relationship with ourselves! 

It’s hard to thrive in the world without a solid foundation, and without deep roots, we get blown over easily.  I also believe that being able to have a solid foundation through these deeply rooted levels of relationship helps us to create togetherness and relationships that can be healthy and solid despite differences, which is essential to resolve the extreme polarization that we’re experiencing in our world manifesting as us-them divisions, increased racism and  nationalism, gender and culture wars, or further separations in our relational and community lives.  When we have solid attachments as described above, we can have a solid sense of self, to become our own person, belonging in the community, aware and nurtured by the ways we are the same, celebrating the ways we are different, and can talk about any and all of it honestly and vulnerably without it devolving into a battle and more separation.  We can be different and still securely attached, connected, and rooted rather than blown away in the storms of our inner world or our outer life. 

For more information:

Chuck Hancock, M.Ed, LPC is a Licensed Professional Counselor in the state of CO. He has completed comprehensive training in the Hakomi Method of Experiential Psychotherapy, a mindfulness mind-body centered approach and is a student of depth psychology. Chuck guides individuals and groups in self-exploration providing them with insight and tools for change. He also incorporates nature as a therapy tool to help shift perspective and inspire new patterns.

New Therapy Group for Teens

 

 

 

Join us for a new first of its kind hybrid group therapy and wilderness therapy group for teenagers locally on the Front Range based out of Fort Collins, CO.  This outdoor group was created to offer the best of coaching, therapy, and wilderness adventures to adolescents without the cost and time commitment of traditional backcountry programs.

This group is open to all teens of all genders regardless of “issue” who are simply looking for personal growth by getting outside and joining in a community of peers, connecting with themselves, others, and nature. Through exploring themselves, overcoming challenges, developing new skills,  and being guided by expert facilitators our participants learn to bring the best of the lessons and experiences of the outside…. in.

For more details, click here and or contact Chuck directly at [email protected] or 970.556.4095.

Download a pdf version of the flyer to print, email, and share with someone who could benefit.

Outside--in flyer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First Day of Kindergarten

Starting (Continuing) School – For kids big and small

I just left my son after spending the first hour of his public education experience with him.  I was surprised to feel the immense emotions and tears that came flooding in as soon as I left him.  When I was there, I was the rock.  I was solid, reassuring, gently guiding and encouraging, acquainting him with the room, teacher, and other kids he’ll be spending over 1,000 hours of his life in.  But not a cold heartless, detached rock.  I could feel him deeply – his simultaneous apprehension and strength in being immersed in his new environment.  Hearing all the advice handed down to me from other parents, I started to dismiss everything I felt as “normal” or just part of it, but as soon as I walked away, it hit me.
The teacher is good, kind, professional.  She invited him and the other students to choose their own dot to sit on for whatever was next.  I gave him one last hug and kiss for the day and he went over to join the other kids, but in his own way, at the far edge of the mat.  Looking a little sad, a little scared, then – a little angry?  It shocked me.  I didn’t see it coming.  But again, I dismissed it as “normal,” just part of the experience.
I’m tempted to just ignore it, pick up my smartphone, post only the sweet happy picture, move on with my

day and ignore these feelings.  I could just call this “normal” and move on.  But as I sit with these feelings, not avoiding but feeling fully and exploring with curiosity, they talk to me.

I realize that today marks the first real day of his experience in the “system” – the overburdened under-resourced system in charge of taking care of and educating our kids.  The system that despite the level of skill, training, and care of the teacher, cannot possibly provide the same level of understanding, knowing, and individual connection that a sensitive child needs to feel safe and thrive.
I saw today how much like me my son is, and there are so many parts of me I wish he didn’t have to inherit.  He is strong and capable of doing what is asked of him, but it comes with a cost.  The cost of ignoring his feelings and his truth.  The cost of ignoring and overriding what we really feel to “fit in.”  The cost of separating a little more from our self.
As I dig deeper I feel into the parts of me that have been so wounded in school.  Feeling shy, awkward, not fitting in, afraid to introduce myself to new people, wanting to play and have fun, but being unable to due to all the things I feel.  I feel into the parts of me that know what I want, and feel it is not available there.  As I feel  in deeper I touch the places in me that were made fun of by other kids, the parts of me that felt like I don’t belong, the part of me that was made to feel bad by teachers when I spoke up for myself, and the parts that felt stupid, awkward, nerdy, out of place.  Maybe it was just projection, but it felt as if I could see and feel all of those things in him.  I felt like I had cursed him to relive all of the hard things I experienced in school.
In the moments before I left, we went out to get his water bottle from his back pack.  He said he wasn’t really thirsty, but hungry.  I told him it wasn’t time to eat now, that he would have to wait a bit.  I felt him sink.  It wasn’t the school or the teacher who committed the first act of violence, it was me.  I was the one who took him there and I was the one asking him to ignore his needs to fit in with the system and obey the schedule.
I could go on and on about countless transgressions throughout my school experience that shaped how I show up in the world, but I don’t want to sound like a drama queen.  You may think I’m blowing it out of proportion. (Heck, there is certainly a part of me that does.) Besides, what’s the big deal, I got over it.  I found ways to make friends, develop coping strategies (some healthy, some not), and be successful.  I made it out ok.  Today I’m fine (mostly).  But these experiences matter.  They shape us – and don’t want to ignore these things so often brushed off and not spoken of.
Before I started really looking into myself with the lens of mindfulness, therapy, and personal growth I dismissed these things I felt and told myself they were no big deal and I was being too sensitive, dramatic, or even worse names I won’t repeat here.  Of course I drank a lot from age 16-30+, and was unhappy, but hey, that’s what everyone else does too, right?   But I’m sharing these words because they are my truth. And I’m sharing now, because I didn’t have the awareness, words, or people who would listen then.
I’m feeling tremendous grief.  For all my past hurts, for all the ways I was rejected by others and the ways I rejected myself.  I’m feeling tremendous sadness for introducing my son to the beginning of this system that has the potential to cause him so much suffering.  But my point is not to dwell in the pain and sorrow, but to give words to and acknowledge it, as part of the experience of living in our world today.  But my question is, “Is it necessary?”
So many parents feel mixed emotions on this day, and this is my attempt to name some of them specifically, at least from my experience.  But my wish is not to dwell on the hurts of the past (mine) and the future (my son’s), but to acknowledge they exist and move on with a wish for something different for our children.  I hope to give voice to those children that may look like nothing is wrong on the outside, but have been deeply impacted. And to forgive myself for my role in bringing my child there and dealing the first blow.  I know that no matter how much I have tried to prepare him to do things in a better way than I did, he still has to have his own life and his own experience.  And I hope that I can trust that when things are hard for him.
My wish is that the children, their needs, and their feelings are honored, even and especially if they are inconvenient to the adults.  I hope and pray that they have the support they need to help them through the hard times, and that with the guidance of attuned parents, teachers, neighbors, friends, and family members they are able to have and remember more moments of joy, play, love, curiosity, innocence,  and excitement about life.   That our differences and awkwardness are treasured rather than made fun of.  That our children are able to live lives that are better than we did, and we are the ones that empower and help create this for them.  That children can learn to value and trust themselves, even when it is in opposition to others, especially those in authority.  But not that they are reckless anarchists, rather they learn civility and respect of all people, especially those that are different than them and in opposition to them.   My wish is that our children are given the love and support they need to not have to struggle, but to feel safe, welcome, and empowered to thrive in this world bringing their unique gifts and talents fully to the world.  That they never have to question it, they can just be it.
I don’t know exactly how, but I know it starts with listening to the children, valuing them, valuing their feelings, treating them as equals rather than lower than us.  By helping them rather than punishing them when they are feeling scared, angry, or in any way overwhelmed.  By creating an environment where children can really be known, not just told what to do.  It is harder, it takes more time and resources than we currently give them, and requires a radical paradigm shift, but don’t you think our children are worth it?
On this day, the first day of school, I hope are able to change ourselves and our systems to really (not just in a cheesy mission statement kind of way), but really truly authentically support, empower, and get out of the way, so our children can lead and create a better world, for all of us.

~chuck

What do you think? Better yet, what do you feel? What do you experience? Let’s continue the conversation! You can find me at www.innerlifeadventures.com or email [email protected].  Want to meet?  Here’s how.

Chuck Hancock, M.Ed, LPC is a National Certified Counselor, Licensed Professional Counselor, and a Registered Psychotherapist in the state of CO. He has completed comprehensive training in the Hakomi Method of Experiential Psychotherapy, a mindfulness mind-body centered approach. Chuck guides individuals and groups in self-exploration providing them with insight and tools for change. He also incorporates nature as a therapy tool to help shift perspective and inspire new patterns.