Attached Pdf

ISBN: B004HKBG4S
Title: Attached Pdf The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find - And Keep - Love

Is there a science to love? In this groundbreaking audiobook, psychiatrist and neuroscientist Amir Levine and psychologist Rachel S. F. Heller reveal how an understanding of attachment theory - the most advanced relationship science in existence today - can help us find and sustain love.

Attachment theory forms the basis for many best-selling books on the parent/child relationship, but there has yet to be an accessible guide to what this fascinating science has to tell us about adult romantic relationships - until now. Attachment theory owes its inception to British psychologist and psychoanalyst John Bowlby, who in the 1950s examined the tremendous impact that our early relationships with our parents or caregivers has on the people we become. Also central to attachment theory is the discovery that our need to be in a close relationship with one or more individuals is embedded in our genes.

In Attached, Levine and Heller trace how these evolutionary influences continue to shape who we are in our relationships today. According to attachment theory, every person behaves in relationships in one of three distinct ways: "anxious" people are often preoccupied with their relationships and tend to worry about their partner's ability to love them back. "Avoidant" people equate intimacy with a loss of independence and constantly try to minimize closeness. "Secure" people feel comfortable with intimacy and are usually warm and loving. Attached guides listeners in determining what attachment style they and their mate (or potential mates) follow. It also offers a wealth of advice on how to navigate relationships more wisely, given a listener's attachment style and that of his or her partner. An insightful look at the science behind love, Attached offers a road map for building stronger, more fulfilling connections.

I do therapy for a living. I was very ... As a counselor, I give this book to people (most usually women) who are in abusive relationships where their physical and emotional safety is on the line and who need to empower themselves to flee, but I do not give it to anyone else. One of the main principles of therapy is that, in order to grow, a person first has to locate the problem as internal to the self, i.e. be able to take ownership. This book is in many ways simplistic and misleading in that it seems to confuse maladaptive relationships with abusive ones and reads as though it is helping a victim get out of a trap, reinforcing a lack of ownership that is a prerequisite for any form of personal or relational growth.The deeper issue is that the book, perhaps in an effort to present an oversimplified version of attachment theory to the layperson, does not make it clear that “avoidant”, “secure” and “anxious” are patterns of relating *between people* rather than something that lives within people as an essential identity. These are dimensions, not categories, so people can locate their responses along a continuum on the avoidant and anxious dimensions depending on many contextual and relational factors. It is common, perhaps expected, for relationships to suffer from maladaptive patterns over time (it's like a car that needs maintenance) and these are fixable when both partners own their piece and do the work. Unfortunately, this book discourages partners who have taken on a more anxious role in a pattern from locating any internal ownership and suggests that if they roam the world and find one of these magical partners called “secures”, all their problems will be resolved. This is not any different than the trite self-help advice we have heard before about finding a partner with x,y,z characteristics as a solution to internal problems, just dressed up in the sexy, recently prominent language of attachment theory. Rather than locating the problem in the pattern and suggesting that changing your relationship to a partner is possible with ownership on both sides, the book suggests that the problem lives in the partner.I have sat with many couples during therapy where one partner has taken on a more anxious strategy and the other a more avoidant strategy. Many of these couples love each other deeply and are able to fix the pattern between them. This book seems to suggest that these roles are somehow essential traits rather than strategies that can be modified, and discourages a focus on fixing the pattern. This book further seems to suggest that the attraction between such partners rests on a confusion of chaotic feelings that come from attachment distress with genuine love, which is very misleading and does not do justice to the meaningful and deep connection partners in this pattern have to each other.Another very puzzling and simplistic suggestion in the book is that through conscious intention, you can somehow cause yourself to be interested in partners who do not register to your unconscious mind as exciting or familiar in any way. Every person has an early imprint or working model of what they find attractive and exciting, based on experiences with those closest to them. People who register as boring and unexciting to us do so for an important reason—they are people whose “crazy” does not fit our “crazy” in a way that has the potential to heal us and teach us the most important lessons about ourselves that we need to learn. For example, if one tends to take on anxious roles in relationships with partners who then respond more avoidantly, there are a host of important questions to work through that won’t be resolved, but simply replicated, by switching partners. Such a person, to grow, needs to own that connecting to loving and desiring emotions is only possible for them at a distance, and they need to look inward to figure out what that is all about in order to stop acting in those ways. Could such a person take in affection and care when a partner tries to come close to them, or will such a person in turn react avoidantly themselves? How many times have we seen an anxious person turn avoidant when caring and available partners come their way? In this way, the book fails to address that there are deeper dynamics responsible for attraction that cannot be resolved by switching partners and that “anxious” and “avoidant” are surface presentations of underlying dynamics that need to be worked through to be resolved. For example, if one felt unloved and constrained by a controlling parent, happiness for that individual comes from finding a partner who at once resembles that familiar parent yet who is willing to expand and offer autonomy. What’s crucial is that the person in question does not simply desire autonomy from any random person— they desire autonomy from someone whom they experienced as controlling. And you can bet your life that this individual will keep reenacting this scenario by picking controlling partners and then struggle to twist autonomy out of them. Both pieces are important— the familiar and the missing quality. The best chance for growth and contentment comes when partners who are excited by a familiar unconscious bond both own their part of the pattern and agree to do the work together, something this book barely encourages.Eye-opening overview and introduction, but simplistic if you crave in-depth information. I have been in therapy on and off with different providers for almost 3 decades, and been in many failed relationships. Yet not one therapist ever mentioned the words "adult attachment theory" to me until I decided to see a new therapist at age 55. My new therapist recommended this book in my first session and it opened my eyes to what really happens in relationships. However, it is a somewhat simplistic book. It is very accessible to a broad audience, but leaves a lot of unanswered questions, including why we are the way we are and what we might do about it. I read most of it in one day. For anyone craving more information, I highly recommend Mindsight by Dan Siegel, which is a much denser book about the science and complexities of adult attachment issues, how they play out in real life, and what can realistically be done to resolve them. It took me weeks to finish. In particular, I think Attached does a disservice to what it calls "anxious-avoidant" attachment types--with no information at all on this type. Siegel calls this type "disorganized," and people with this type of attachment are in particular need of helpful, concrete information. To take the issue a step further for practical information for resolving relationship issues pertaining to attachment, I recommend Getting the Love you Want by Harville Hendrix.

Tags: B004HKBG4S pdf,Attached pdf,The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find - And Keep - Love pdf,,Walter Dixon, Amir Levine, Rachel S. F. Heller, LLC Gildan Media,Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find - And Keep - Love,Gildan Media, LLC,B004HKBG4S

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