Transcript: Secure Attachment - The Broken Family Dance

Video Transcript: Secure Attachment – The Broken Family (Part 02)

Kristine Koetje-Balder  

Welcome back to the attachment class. And I am extremely honored that one of my colleagues is going to be joining as he has a specialty in working with folks with attachment issues, and bringing them in a fuller relationship with the gospel and with attachment to Jesus, and then attachment to each other. This is going to be given by Mr. Aaron Goodrich. And He is a licensed professional counselor, that also works with compassionate Christian counseling. And he will be teaching the second and third class of this class on attachment. So enjoy. 

Aaron Goodrich  

Hi, my name is Aaron Goodrich. And I'm excited to talk with you today about attachments and how they play into not only our family of origin, but also the new families that we create. And I am not only a licensed counselor, but I'm also a church planter. So I get to try to figure out the study of people and the study of God all at the same time. So you'll probably see some of that bleeding into this presentation. So I want to do a quick overview again, of attachment theory. So that we're all on the same page, because I think this plays into a lot of why we do what we do. And the inner boxes that you see there are John Bowlby his work. I know you've been familiar with this already a little bit. But the secure attachment is where people have a healthy relationship with self and a healthy relationship with others. And they're able to relate with other people in a very, very healthy way, only about 10% of the population falls into this. And really, if we get down to it, there's only one perfect person that was perfectly secure, and that's Jesus. The rest of us all have attachment tendencies, if not attachment disorders, and if we look at the avoidant, and the anxious, preoccupied, which some people call ambivalent, about 80% of the population fall into tendencies in those two and or disorders. And then 10% of the population fall into the disorganized which is poor view of self poor view of others doesn't don't know how to trust often. The homeless population has a lot of disorganized relating a lot of bipolar, borderline personality, disorder and schizophrenia. And so it becomes very complex with that. 

So with the avoidant, something that is really been interesting to me, as I've been studying this is they they put too much of their identity in themselves and too little and other people. And I like to look at the story of the prodigal son as it relates to this, that the younger brother put too much of his identity himself too little of his identity and others, you can see it by him saying, dad, I essentially wish you were dead. I know what I want, I want to now and I'm out of here, and he ignored community, ignored everybody, just did his own thing. And his elder brother was the exact opposite was more anxious, preoccupied, and was low on truth and high on grace, which sounds really awesome, especially in our culture. There's a desire for people to be passive, but in reality, it's a selfish focus on grace, it's me pleasing other people so that other people can like me. And so today what we're going to focus on the book how we love they talk about these in a little bit different ways. So I wanted to show you the basics of it and then show you how we're going to be looking at it the avoidant is the avoidant what we call it avoider. The anxious preoccupied is what we call the pleaser, the people pleaser, wanting people to be pleased with them. And then the vacillator vacillates between the two very quickly in order to have power relationally. And so wherever they need to be in order to have power in the relationship, and those are the three primary styles of attachment, and we're going to see how that ties into the biblical story. 

We see the younger brother in the story, being more of a vacillator avoider. And we see the elder brother being more of a pleaser avoider. And what's really interesting about this story is theologians, especially Jewish theologians think it's a retelling of Jacob and Esau. The story of Jacob Esau, the younger brother takes the inheritance from the elder brother goes off to a distant country eventually comes home. Very similar story just the difference is the relationship with the father. And both the elder brother and younger brother are looking for the inheritance and they're missing bonding intimacy with the father. And so we're going to be talking about other parts of the story but notice the avoider vacillator please those are the primary we're gonna be talking about the controller victim is in the disorganized part. And the controller is kind of like the vacillator on steroids. It's out of control vacillator and they start controlling everything being the victim is like the pleaser on steroids becomes very passive and gets run over by other people. And the avoider can go either way can either be a controller or a victim. So this summer I came in contact with poison ivy, and I am highly allergic to poison ivy. And so I may have not even touched it, I can just walk near it and get it. So I ended up getting it on both of my legs. And as I got it on both of my legs, I knew better than to itch it, so I worked really hard not to itch it, because I know if I itch it, it gets way worse. So one night, I went to bed and I was sleeping, I woke up from sleep, horrified to find that I was itching it in my sleep. And I knew what was coming next that it would become even more of a nuisance, the poison would seek seep out and I would be itching. And so I got up and started to do a little bit of dance trying to keep myself from itching it and started to look all over the house for anti itching cream, because I felt like I couldn't even avoid itching this poison ivy, I ended up waking up my wife, which you really love that and asking about that found the cream and put it on and was still working to resist this. And I tell you the story because poison ivy, I think is a direct result of fall. And so our bug bites all those things. And we we have a tendency to want to itch those, we want to dig into those and get our fingernails in there and just dig at it because it itches so bad. And it gives temporary satisfaction for a minute it feels so much like a relief. 

But eventually, we end up being in a much worse place than we were before it spreads, it gets worse. And we wish we would have never done that. And as I look at attachments and the temptations of Jesus, I see a ton of correlations that these are ways that we've been tempted by the enemy, to look to ourselves to the guard to find our own solutions. And for a moment it gives satisfaction. But before we even know it, it becomes a part of our hardwiring, it becomes a part of the way that we do relationships to the point where it causes all kinds of brokenness not only for us, but also for others. And so as I've investigated these three attachment styles, I'm seeing them very much in line with the three temptations of Jesus and also with scriptures all throughout the Bible so and as it relates to avoidant attachment style.  Avoiders tend to really struggle with their appetites. And here's why they avoid their emotions. They put off their emotions in order to try to control things in life. But what happens is they're they're unable to control their other urges. And so their appetites kind of come out sideways. Notice in Genesis three, five and six that it says so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, this is this is appetite, she was hungry for something and she thought it would satisfy her. And then Matthew Four, Three through four at the temptation of Jesus, the first temptation, the tempter, came to him and said to him, if, if you are the Son of God, commands these stones to become loaves of bread. The answer to it is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God, again we see appetite. And then in first John 2:15, and 16, it says, do not love the world or things in the world of anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him, for all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh. And this is the internal cravings of the flesh. This is the appetites that we have. So this isn't just one passage. We're seeing this all throughout Scripture, and the avoiders really desire internal comfort and control. They avoid intimacy by looking to activities and addictions. This could be there's a pendulum on this, it could be just somebody that's a doer, they do stuff all the time. They're always moving. And it could be the extent of it for them. Or it could be people to the extreme of having sexual addictions, heroin addictions, all kinds of different addictions. And what's really interesting is anybody with a full on attachment disorder, has an addiction. I think that's because we're all meant to be addicted to God's love. That's how he's created us. So notice, again, in this avoidant attachment style, they passively do not trust other people. They trust self by ignoring feelings, but feed internal needs. So I kind of view it as like a teeter totter. They ignore their feelings, but then they don't have control over some of their appetites, their impulses.

So avoiders grew up feeling very good about self because they were able to care for one or both of their parents. They avoid their own emotions and others until their feelings come out sideways and as children they can feel better than others and can be the golden children and their family of origin. In the book, how we love they talk a lot more extensively about this. I'm going to read just a little bit from this because then it helps us understand this avoidant attachment, avoiders often busy themselves to distract from the uncomfortable emotions. One thing they need to learn to do is learn to not minimize their feeling,s avoiders grew up in families who are unable to attend to their feelings and as a result, their emotional life is ignored and underdeveloped. Their answer to life is self sufficiency. When asked how their day was or how things are going, they often say, Fine. avoiders are the ones who respond to lack of comfort and nurturing by disconnecting, an avoiders homes the focus is on the physical tasks of life politeness, performance are highly valued. Children should be seen and not heard as the common if unspoken household rule. Politeness and performance again are highly valued recognition is given for achievements and strong work ethic stands in for deeper connection. Tragically, having fun and enjoying the wonder of childhood are foreign and threatening concepts to these parents. The child may enjoy being physically cared for but very little bonding occurs. The predominant messages your fine grow up. Avoiders have learned to comfort themselves and non relational ways to exercise, food, shopping, work, sports, gambling, alcohol, drugs, to name only a few. 

Letting oneself be vulnerable is an important growth goal for them. Avoiders have learned to make decisions on their own and as a result, it does not occur to them to include others in their decision making. They can assess the situation come to a conclusion resolve problems without even feeling the need to consult other people. Childhood pets may have made met the avoiders need for affection. And as a result as adults they may lavish attention on animal but have difficulty enjoying similar touch and affection with their spouse. What I find really fascinating about this is the more I've looked into this, there's articles that are written about how the Shema level with all your heart, soul and strength is actually tied to the three temptations of Jesus as well. And the first one is Love the Lord your God with all your heart. That heart word is better translated mind or brain. And the word in Hebrew for heart is generally “lev”, and it's levab in this one and some commentators have said that they are talking about they're highlighting the two impulses of the heart, that there's the good impulse of the heart. And then there's the bad impulse of the heart. And what's really fascinating about this is there's a lot of research by Bernie Brown, Dan Siegel, many other people on this about the importance of wholehearted living, that we need to have not just part of our mind, part of our brain engaged, but we need every part of our person engaged and often avoidance over emphasize one aspect of their brain. 

And I want to explain this a little bit. The left brain is something that is really big in more of the Western societies. I think the right brain tends to be a little bit more emphasized in eastern perspective. But the left brain is really over emphasized for avoiders. They tend to be highly analytical, highly logical. They tend to look at information, facts, mathematics and overemphasize that and they ignore the right aspect of the brain. That's where the feelings, the imagination, the wonder, the metaphor of stories, music, all of that is there. But by ignoring that, they also don't know how to deal with the impulses that come out sideways for them. So they have the ability, it's almost like a teeter totter to shut off the part of their brain, but then they're out of control at times with certain impulses that come out. And it could be as simple as them doing a bunch trying to suppress their emotions. It could be them, having different addictions, trying to suppress their emotions, but they're working hard to suppress their emotions. And oftentimes, the result is that there's a lot of anxiety. 

When stressful situations hit avoiders want to run they have a tendency to hide from others and God, one of the areas they need to grow isn't expressing their emotions. What's really interesting as well, if we look back at the slide, is we have tendencies to flight, freeze and fight in really difficult times and avoiders tend to flee, they tend to hide and if we go back to the Garden of Eden, we see that they did those three things they hid from God they covered and they blamed. So these three things are a part of the thread of who we are apart from God, and we have to learn as avoiders. We'll talk more about this in next session, how to express emotions we have emotions that are happy, sad, afraid, surprised, angry disgusted, but avoiders tend to focus primarily on happy and joyful and they try to suppress all the other emotions. The problem with this is we're not truly bearing God's image and we're not being wholehearted or whole minded people. And so we'll talk more about how to work on that. But what ends up happening when we are avoidant, we end up looking like I do with my poison ivy in this awkward dance relationally. And, and we itch and things don't work out, right. And it just isn't things aren't the way they're meant to be. Were left disappointed oftentimes. 

When I was younger, I was on a trip to camp, and we were on a bus ride. I was very excited about this. And for whatever reason, I don't know what it what it is, I always forget things I forget warm clothes I forget. Still to this day, I forget warm clothes. If my wife were sitting here should be laughing because I always forget warm clothes. So on the way home, it was cold summer, but it was cold. And we had the windows down on the bus and I was freezing. And one of the leaders decided to offer me his sweatshirt, very tall leader, very big sweatshirt, but I was like, hey, that's warm, that'll work. So I put it on. Having a good time hanging out with my friends, we stop to go to the bathroom, I run into the bathroom. And as I'm going, the sweatshirt falls, and I end up soiling the sweatshirt. And I'm devastated because I have to hand this back to the leader on the way off the bus and it is now soiled. And I'm trying to rack my elementary brain to try to figure out how can I cover this up, because I just want to do everything I can to cover it up. So I have a brilliant idea. I decided to wash it out in the sink. And then I decide the best thing I could do is fold it up and sit on it the whole way home. So that was my plan. I folded it up, sat on it the whole way home thinking of course if you sit on it, it will dry much better than if you did anything else. And you know probably where this is going to end I unfolded it and it was soaked. It was drenched still because that was the worst thing I could have done. The best thing I could have done is left it out in the air and let it dry. And I tell you the story because pleasers people pleasers love to cover things up their impulse is to cover to pretend like it's not really that big of a deal to ignore things. And it's it's what they naturally go to. But it's not what they need. What they need is to expose and to be vulnerable. But that's so counter intuitive, apparently like it was for me to put it in the air. And so as we look at pleasers pleaser, are especially notorious for covering things up by focusing on others. people pleasers start as parent pleasers and then they grew up feeling fearful of saying no, and of being alone, they often find themselves stuck in relationships really give more than they get. And many times have a strong work ethic. They are preoccupied with what others think and feel. You can always tell a pleaser by how they look at others eyes to see if they are okay. If they're not going to be abandoned. They're fearful of being abandoned relationally. So they will look around and say am I okay? Whenever I'm in a group, I can always tell people pleaser after they say something they look at everyone's eyes to make sure they're okay. 

So notice what the scripture says about this. This is the second temptation of approval. But let's look into Genesis chapter three, verse six, it says so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes. So this is big on the eyes, you're looking around, will this food protect me? Will this food give me what I need? Notice Matthew four or five through seven, it says when the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, if you are the Son of God, throw yourself down for it is written, he will command his angels concerning you and on their hands. They will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against the stone. Jesus said to him, again, it is written You shall not put the Lord your God to a test. Now let me explain a little bit of what's going on here. Jesus is on the pinnacle of the temple, the temple was seen as the place of God's divine protection. And the enemy is saying throw yourself off of the temple and prove that God is the one that protects you. It says he will. And Jesus references in Deuteronomy six. The time were, the Israelites were in the wilderness, and they didn't think they had enough water or food and they were grumbling against God saying you're not protecting us like the people in Egypt even protected us. And so Jesus is saying, I don't have to test to see if the Lord is my protector. I already know he's my protector. And then look in first John 2:15 and 16 it's talking about the desires of the eyes. Will you approve of me to make sure I'm okay that I'm protected relationally the number one thing for pleasers is they are fearful that they are not going to be protected. So on this sheet that we have pleaser attachment reduces fear by pleasing others highly approval oriented. The external desire is for approval and love and they look at people's eyes, they look at certain things to make sure they can get that protection that they need. So they seek intimacy by pleasing they sacrifice. They please others selfishly, to try to get their needs met. And they blindly trust others they don't trust themselves. And as I shared before people pleaser start out as parent pleasers. Again in the book how we love it outlines this a lot more. But here's a little snippet from that in adult relationships. The underlying motivation for being in the helping role and focusing on the needs of others is to reduce one's own anxiety by keeping people close content and satisfied. After pleaser spent a number of years chronically worrying over giving, often resentment emergence. Parents who worry excessively however, rarely see themselves as fearful, but rather concerned. People pleasers are used to constant underlying levels of anxiety and keep these feelings submerged with busy lifestyles. They call themselves by focusing on the needs of others and making them happy. adults with an imprint of please may feel anxiety when a partner wants time alone with their friends. Perpetual pleasers need someone to take care of. Since they calm their own anxiety by focusing on caring for others, they can feel quite lost. If no one is available. Quiet moments often make them uneasy. They crave constant connection and fear the loss or absence of their partner. They can be very possessive and make others feel smothers they often don't feel realize their own potential, and disagreement and conflict can alienate people. So anger is often an underdeveloped emotion for pleasers, saying no can indeed cause conflict and disapproval. So please struggle with boundaries, especially when they feel someone will be annoyed with them. pleasers are good givers but lousy receivers, they tend to ignore their own needs altogether, but constantly focus on others. Pleasers care a lot about protection and caring for relationships. And they tend to in stressful times, not in traumatic times. But in stressful times. They tend to freeze, they cover themselves by looking to others. What's really cool is they also each of these image God well as well. And we will be talking about that a little bit more in the next. In the next teaching. They're characterized by a lot of fear relationally, and they don't know what to do if people are looking if the people are looking to don't come through for them. So they have responsibility to keep others happy with them. They're always looking to keep others people happy. So that's the second temptation. 

Let's look at the the third temptation. That's the vast later tendency, tendency and relational power is the name of the game. vacillator grew up with a parent who's sporadically connected, and they're left in a constant state of wanting they grew up looking for consistent attention. If they cannot trust others to truly provide it. They want to bond but then they pull away in fear. They can over emotion and focus too much on their own feelings and needs. And they constantly are looking for intense, consistent connection. Vacillators often idealize relationships and love the early stages of relationships because it feels like they have what they often been aching for longing for, and they want to be in powerful relationships so that they can make sure they're getting their needs met. Notice in the story, it says in Genesis three, and you will be like God, knowing good from evil, and at the tree helps them be wise desired to make them wise that's something they were really looking for it gave them knowledge which gave them power. And we notice when Jesus is tempted it says again, the devil took into a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. All this I will give you said if you bow down and worship Me, Jesus said to him away from me, Satan, for it is written, worship the Lord your God and serve him only. So the enemy is tempting and saying you can have all the power of the world you can have the power that you really longed for. And then we see in first John 2:15 and 16, the pride of life. Again, we're seeing this connection throughout the whole story. Each of these passages has to do with power and possession. Come through knowledge that puffs up knowledge puffs up love builds up. Knowledge is power, so his possessions and when it says to love Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul with all your strength, strength is your muchness your power, your possessions. And so vacillators tend to look for intimacy by pushing and pulling relationally they tend to be higher on truth and a little lower on grace, which is not really truth. And if you've ever met anybody that says their truth teller and you think, well, actually, I think you're kind of a jerk. But often those people are the people that are more aggressive relationally and vacillators tend to be that way. They strongly don't trust people. And they've because they've been deeply hurt and wounded. And when stressful times come, they tend to fight others and blame by pointing to others. 

Again, we see this in the Garden of Eden, and how we love it talks about bass leaders a little more. It says, bass players desire for and long for connection. They idealize new relationships and hope for satisfying their longing for love and attention. They vacillate back and forth, first pushing others away and then wanting them to come back. I don't want you but I'm mad because you aren't meeting my expectations. So I do want you they've pushed poll style relating usually creates greater distance rather than desired connection and anger increases. The vacillators devalues the relationship and focuses on the hurts and disappointments, seeing little good or redeeming value. Unable to achieve the connection they desire, they feel unwanted to some degree or another, quit to feel neglected and unwanted vacillators experience of building tension as their fruitless waiting and desperate wanting bring them closer to familiar childhood pain. a burst of anger may provide temporary release of the tension so the underlying anxiety and shame remain unnoticed by them. Also, because of their underlying sensitivity, vacillators have difficulty calming themselves down and anger will dominate their interactions until they recognize their past hurts. 

We often tell vacillators, they need to get sad not mad to share the hurt under their anger. They have mastered the art of tuning into those around them their ability to intuitively read others, combined with their strong desire for connection make them magic magnetic connectors, they have difficulty seeing their part in destructive patterns and more readily focus on the ways others have heard them. Sadly, whether vast leaders are mamas or papas they characteristically dictate the emotional climate of the home, and everyone else adapts to their mood. So this is outlining the broken dance and symbolizes ways that we attach to our early family of origin and how the enemy tempts us to get a foothold in our hearts and minds. So these aren't just the temptations of Jesus, there's temptations of Adam and Eve. They're all of our temptations. And they aren't just temptations one time, it's a way of getting a foothold in our life. And then we learn this imprint or this pattern in such a deep way that it changes all of our relationships. As a matter of fact, we're watching the Olympics right now. And Olympian determined, it takes about 10,000 hours to develop a dominant habit. And most of our dominant habits come from our family of origin. And I believe that a lot of these attachments, these these temptations, and being dominant habits, that the enemy has a foothold into our lives. And God wants to build a new dominant habit. As a matter of fact, next time, we're going to talk about how Jesus spent about 10,000 hours or three years, three and a half years with the disciples to build a new dominant habit that was all about him. So I look forward to talking more with you about the beautiful family dance as opposed to the broken family dance.