I have spent a lot of the past year or so learning about attachment styles and how they impact relationships. It started with me wanting to try and understand other people in my life, but it became more of a journey of self-discovery, where I finally landed on realising that I had a disorganised attachment style, also known as fearful avoidant attachment, which is like a mix between the other two insecure attachment styles – anxious (or anxious preoccupied) and dismissive avoidant. What this means is that I can relate to both of the main insecure attachment styles, and have reacted from both of those head spaces, depending on the surrounding circumstances. I came to this realisation about myself when I could identify that I had often exhibited dismissive avoidant tendencies with my ex-husband when he came at me with anxious attached type behaviours, but on the other hand I exhibited anxious attached behaviours with a different ex when he was exhibiting avoidant traits (and then I later realised I’d also exhibited avoidant behaviours with him, too).
What kinds of behaviours am I talking about? From the avoidant side of things, I might shut down emotionally and disappear. From the anxious side of things, I might lash out, criticise, or chase after what I think I need.
As I work to become more secure in myself, I’m finding that I notice these patterns more and more in other people too, and when I’ve been on the receiving end of those insecure attachment behaviours, it helps me identify more things that I want to make sure I don’t do.
This journey really started in full with me reading Secure Love by Julie Menanno, but I’ll include a list of different social media accounts I either follow or have shown up in my feeds multiple times that have helped me do the work on myself that I’ve needed to do at the end of the post.
I look at the world and see more people being willing to identify things they don’t like in other people, and that they want them to change so they can feel more comfortable around those people. It’s like they’re unwilling to learn that they cannot control what other people think or do, they can only control themselves, including their own mindset, feelings, reactions, and how they respond to the people around them. Self-reflection leads to self-awareness and the ability to identify the things you don’t like about yourself, and once you’ve identified those things, then you can begin to change those things. If you don’t know where to start, I’ve found that projection is a great place to help you recognise what you need to work on.
What do I mean by projection? Well, this is like that anxiously attached lash out criticism where you might accuse other people of doing things that hurt you or others. Or, if you’re avoidant, the things you think internally about what others are doing to hurt you and cause you to shut down. So, if you’ve identified things you don’t like in other people, instead of sending those messages out to other people or thinking about them being solely that other person’s problem, put a mirror up in front of your face and send the messages back to yourself. Newsflash: the things you’re getting mad at other people about might be some of the things you don’t like about yourself. Have you ever noticed this in someone else? When I was going through my divorce, I noticed a lot of the things my ex-husband accused me of were all projections of the ways he wasn’t measuring up, like when he described me as a bad parent even though I did far more for our kids than he did. Those accusations, those projections, stopped hurting me when I a) saw them as projections and b) didn’t believe the things he said about me because I’d built my self-worth and saw myself differently than the way he saw me (both are great things I recommend working on if you have trouble with taking the things people say to you personally).
I also took stock of the projections or accusations that did still sting, because I once had a therapist who told me that if I am hurt by something someone else says about me, or to me, then there’s probably a part of me that believes there is some truth to what they’re saying. When I can acknowledge that, then I can step back and self-reflect: is this something I do actually agree with and, if so, is it something I need to work on to improve about myself? When someone who cares about us says something about us that we take as a criticism, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re trying to hurt or criticise us. Oftentimes it’s more likely that they care about us so much that they’re trying to help us, but either they don’t have the tools to express their concerns in a way we can receive it well, or we’re triggered into reacting defensively because of previous negative experiences that remind us of the present situation (I have another draft blog post that I’m reworking to discuss this in more detail from my personal experience).
So if the things you need to work on internally are the things you’re projecting onto others, then you may also already have some idea about what to do to put in the work. Because the things you’re telling other people to do to fix the situation might be the things you could be doing to fix yourself, or at the very least are a good place to start. And if you don’t like the way those words are shared with you, when you send them back to yourself, there’s a good chance other people don’t like to be on the receiving end of them, either. Recognising that can help you learn to phrase your words more carefully when you speak to yourself and when you speak to others.
Once you’re able to start noticing what you’re doing wrong rather than blaming your behaviour on someone else’s actions that cause you to behave that way, you can start learning to take accountability for your choices. One of the psychologists I like watching on social media, Dr Sarah Hensley, talks about how lack of accountability is one of the biggest relationship killers. That video I just linked has some great tips about how to think about the issue. I know, it’s so hard to be willing to look at your own decisions and own up to the times you could’ve behaved better. We’re more comfortable with blaming others. You want to be accepted for who you are and what you do, including your mistakes, and yet you’re not willing to accept others the same way? If you focus inwards and think about what you need, then turn that outwards to offer that to others, you can build better relationships.
For example, maybe you feel unseen and unheard, and want people to listen to you. Well, you can first choose to ask someone about their experiences and be their active listener in the same way you need. Another example: if you think you need someone else to apologise to you for hurting you, have you taken a step back and thought about if you’re willing to do the same? Will you apologise for hurting others, and take that accountability? Sometimes it has to start with you.
One caveat I will add, though, is that you might find it harder to engage in those behaviours you want to receive (e.g. active listening, holding yourself accountable) with folks who don’t show signs that they’re willing to do the same, and in those cases, sometimes it is better to walk away. I’ve given far too many chances to people in the past when I’ve felt like the only person self-reflecting and taking responsibility for my side of things, and it’s only been over the past year of working with my therapist and following more psychologists and relationship personalities on social media that I’ve been learning to set boundaries in those situations instead.
When you start working on yourself more, and taking stock of the things you do have control over, you can become more acutely sensitive to the people in your life who are not also working on themselves in the same way. You might be more aware of what they could be doing differently to improve a conversation because you’ve been there before yourself, and so you can be empathetic to their plight, but that doesn’t mean you need to continue to engage with them if they’re not interested in hearing about how their choices and behaviour is impacting you. In such situations, where people who don’t seem to be working on themselves the way you are, it may be necessary to walk away from them until they are willing to put in the same kind of work. It doesn’t mean you don’t care about them, but protecting your peace is a valid reason to excuse yourself from someone’s life.
If you do find yourself in a situation where you need to walk away from someone you care about, then you also have to find a way to get comfortable with being seen as the bad guy in someone else’s story. Because that is probably how you’re going to be seen in that situation—those people are more likely to blame you for leaving than self-reflect and see how their choices contributed to your decision to leave. This is a really tough concept to learn, especially if you’re a recovering people pleaser and/or you find it really difficult to accept when people don’t like you, or something you’ve done. But you lose your authenticity when you care more about being liked than you do about self-respect and being yourself. No one in the world is universally liked. If someone is triggering something in you, causing you to feel hurt because they’ve identified something they don’t like about you, you have a couple of choices: a) see yourself as a victim and turn them into the bad person, or b) reflect on what they’ve said and, if their words ring true and you don’t want them to be, then congratulations, you’ve found an area in your life for you to work on.
Getting stuck in a victim mentality is challenging both for you and those you paint as the villains hurting you. I’ve encountered many of these types of people, and tried to help them through their issues in the past. But sometimes trying to help just makes things worse and, just like Morgan Burch from Good Morgan Therapy discusses in this video, sometimes the best thing you can do for someone with a victim mindset is to be their villain. My ex-husband is an excellent example of someone with a victim mentality, and it’s the one I lived with the longest. Living with it for so long helped me in a few ways ways: a) Helped me see what kinds of behaviours I didn’t want to emulate and found ways to take control of my choices in situations where I felt like I was leaning into victim mentality, b) helped me identify when other people have a victim mentality so I can better identify if it’s worth my time to keep investing in them or if they need to figure it out on their own like I did, and c) helped me get used to accepting when I had to play the villain. I know I’m still a villain in his story. It’s why he got so upset with me for not being compassionate towards him when he was met with serious (and preventable) consequences from his own actions. I’m sorry you didn’t listen to me when you had the chance? I’m sorry you’re finally getting what you deserve for the choices you made? Nah, I’m fine with being his villain, because I know it doesn’t matter how he paints me, the people who matter to me won’t listen to him anyway.
People with a victim mentality (not to be confused with actual victims) are always looking for signs that the people in their lives are the real ones to blame for their feelings and problems, rather than being willing to look inward in order to change the things they do have control over. I can speak to this from being in a place where I had a victim mentality whilst also being a victim of emotional and psychological abuse. Once I was able to separate the two in my mind, and I stopped blaming someone else for my unhappiness, I was able to work on the things that were within my control, like getting out of the house to meet new people and build community. I was still a victim of the same abuse, but I pulled myself out of the victim mentality by focusing more on the positive things that were happening in my life that I did have control over. Over time, that helped me escape the abusive circumstances I was in, too, by helping me build more self-confidence and self-respect.
From my experience, both internally and being on the receiving end of it, I think a victim mentality can come with an insecure attachment style, but the lashing out at others style is probably most commonly seen in anxious preoccupied and fearful avoidant attachers. That’s one of the reasons why I feel like it’s so important for people to start looking at attachment styles, to figure out their own, and then identify the tools they need to work on improving their circumstances. I’ve had to walk away from too many people I care about because they wouldn’t work through their stuff like I was. Everyone deserves love, but you’re more likely to find the secure kind if you can work through all your crap and stop projecting it onto the people you care about. That projection causes you to self-sabotage your connections and pushes people away. Again, I’ve been on both sides of this. I’ve been the self-sabotager, and the one who’s been pushed too far that I’ve had to walk away in the hope it’ll help the person I care about work through their stuff. And yes, sometimes that’s meant I’ve had to accept being the bad guy in their story.
As another person who often shows up in my social media feeds, Jason Smith, points out in this video, emotional intelligence means learning about your own triggers and how they impact others, and working through them so you can self-regulate and respond rather than react. Seeing this video in my feed right as I was writing this blog post, where he also talks about how it’s your responsibility to determine what parts of what people say to you is your stuff to work on versus their stuff to work on felt so timely that it seemed worthwhile to include sharing with my audience, too.
I know how hard it is to work through your triggers and defensiveness because I have been there, and I am still working on mine. But it is absolutely worth it for building better connections and relationships. Because you cannot control how other people treat you, or respond to you, but you can work on yourself to limit the way your behaviour might activate another person’s triggers or defensive state.
Instagram Accounts I Recommend Following to Learn More About Improving Yourself, Relationships and/or Attachment Styles
Julie Menanno / The Secure Relationship
Dr Sarah Hensley
Brian Yang / Awakening with Brian
Morgan Burch / Good Morgan Therapy
Jimmy Knowles / Jimmy on Relationships
Jillian Turecki
Therapy Jeff
Jason Smith / jbirdfit
The Sabrina Zohar Show
Dr Elizabeth Fedrick
Mel Robbins
Whilst these are the Instagram accounts for each of these people, at least some of them are also on other platforms like TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, and/or Threads, so if you don’t use Instagram, consider looking them up on your preferred platform.
