Dynamics

In recent years I did a family constellation and we left at a very confusing point. My practitioner asked me if I was “the big one or the small one” in relationship to my mom, and my unconscious had a really hard time answering that. I said, “I’m the big one” my mother felt so small to me in that moment.

But there was clearly some confusion and my practitioner said it was time for us to stop, but that it was worthwhile to investigate this. I put it away for a few years because I always felt in some ways older than my own mom, but it made no sense to me consciously.

It clicked today that a crucial element of our dynamic when I left home to go to college was my mom constantly texting me to ask me advice on how to parent my younger siblings. And of course I would always give it to her because in some senses, I recognized that I knew better and she did too. That was normal to me, I never realized how strange it was until just now as I’m healing through deeper layers of my family dynamics.

The thought, my parent asked me for advice on how to parent. That sits awkwardly. How could a parent ask their child how to parent after having been their parent? Isn’t this hard evidence for the fact that she didn’t know how, didn’t learn from parenting me, and was never willing to learn? Isn’t this evidence for the fact that she didn’t parent me? These realizations cut through me in such painful ways because I was gaslit all my life to believe that I was wrong, that they knew better, that every time I called them out on how they were abusing me that it wasn’t actually happening and I was just oversensitive and crazy and that it was all my problem.

It makes me see that I was always supposed to be the little one, and it wasn’t a failure on my part that that dynamic between a child and her mother was never developed for me. When I try to readjust my size, visually, I feel like I don’t trust her. I don’t feel safe as her child. I’d rather be the big one- my parents’ parent.

I think it can be such a strange wakeup call for those of us who were put in the position of caring for the people who were supposed to care for us because it shifts our relationship to the world. I remember that for the longest time I always attracted these people who were supposed to care for me- whether they were mentors, teachers, or therapists or the like, who actually ended up needing my care. I didn’t understand why I was caring for people I was paying to help me, how come no one would help me? These imbalanced and strange relationships made me cringe, yet they were so much of my reality that for a period of years I realized I was better alone and not seeking help. Help came with too many strings and too much of an outpour from me.

It wasn’t until a point in my life when it started to clear, and I found myself seeking help from people who could actually help me and didn’t break boundaries or didn’t insert themselves into my healing. I found that I experienced a lot of distrust because of past experiences, and operated from a place of defense which gradually dropped over a long period of time. There was usually a phase of resistance at the beginning when in my mind I tried to convince myself they couldn’t help me, but I usually stuck through it and gave them more chances. This to me was fear, because they were unfamiliar to me (and for those like me, unfamiliar is usually the safer option) and not intuition. This was another moment in which I needed to learn to distill the two, because there is sometimes intuition in fear too. I notice that pure fear comes from my mind, where as instinctual fear comes from my gut.

These people were safe because they didn’t tell me how to be, didn’t tell me what to do, and didn’t get caught in self indulgent and self absorbed emotional dumps that had nothing to do with me. They actually listened to me and wanted to know what was going on, and paid attention, they responded. This at the outset felt so scary to me because I’d never experienced it before. In these experiences no one is the big one and no one is the small one, they’re meeting me on equal footing and they’re here to guide and support, not be my authority.

That of course shaped a lot of the way that I practice too in my integrative sessions. There’s an interesting dynamic that forms that’s so particular, because I can sense when the inner child needs a gentle authority and is at the forefront of the healing. Sometimes the child needs to be seen, heard, and encouraged, sometimes they need to be attuned to in ways that were needed but never given. This is often before the adult and the child have established a healthy connection. Then at other points in time, I’m relating to the adult, and the adult can then liaise with their own inner child. Some clients need a parental energy at the start, and some others need a fierce advocate where they’ve never had one before to initiate and reinforce their developing security.

For those of you who are unaware, I studied power and gender dynamics extensively for many many years. What’s most interesting is in our imbalanced society we think that power is something that is taken, because so many of us actually feel powerless internally as the world is ruled by narcissists and sociopaths. If someone had an internal sense of power, they’d realize they didn’t need to take it from a source outside of themselves, but that’s just the codependent framework of the world at large. Oppression, suppression, taking.

What I came to realize was that power is something that’s received, if it’s given. Everyone has their own sense of power, and if they surrender it freely then that’s when it can be received. I notice these points when people try to do it in my healing practice, and I gently say no. I remind them of what they’re doing and that they have power, and I ask them to take it back.

I think that practitioners are in positions that can be very influential. That’s why I’m so careful about who I work with, especially energetically. Even if I’m not declaring my power, it’s a soft power. That’s what hypnosis and all of these modalities are- they’re exerting influence for change. No one ever saw a healer because they wanted to stay the same. I think it can be dangerous when someone’s ego gets involved or they’re not sensitive enough to the power dynamics at play because they can convince you to do things for self-serving reasons and not reasons for your, or for the, highest good. It’s something that’s always in the back of my mind for me, and for people that I personally hire.

In relating to myself, I’m the big one and the small one simultaneously. As I grow, I learn more about how to parent, and thus parent myself. There are some tangible things that can’t be changed, like how I grew up, but there are elements that can be healed continuously and presently. The dynamic between ourselves is always changing and always has room to grow. That’s where I’m coming to in recent times, is that my relationship to me is the most important relationship I’ll ever have. I may not be able to change what was the dynamic between my mom and me, but my relationship to me is in my full control and I can be hyper aware of the dynamics that I co-create, now.

Chasing Unavailable Partners

We’ve all at one point in time chased unavailable partners. Especially if you lean towards the anxious attachment style, the avoidant type may seem very appealing. Part of the development of the anxious attachment style has to do with having needs met inconsistently, which the avoidant type does so well. Sometimes the avoidant type is there, other times, well most times, he/she/they are not.

It’s likely a pattern, but there are different ways unavailability shows up.

They can be:

emotionally unavailable (distant, cold, emotionally cut off, secretive)

married, or in a “committed” relationship

workaholic

drug user

physically distant (always traveling, or live in a different place)

All of the above reveal something: that the unavailable partner is investing the majority of his/her/their time already in a relationship with something else, whether that be substances, work, or another person. They’re physically, emotionally, mentally not engaged with you and most likely, this is an offshoot of them being unavailable to themselves, deep down, too.

The thing is, when we choose unavailable partners, most of the time subconsciously there’s a need we’re chasing after to fulfill. This need can be deeply unconscious, and be something that we’re seeking to resolve from a childhood attachment wound. For example, my father was largely unavailable my entire life. He was physically always traveling, emotionally, didn’t have the capacity to be vulnerable or present, not to mention I didn’t meet him until I was 3. What this created was an unconscious need and desire for a certain type of male validation, attention and love. I found myself in repeated cycles with the same type of man: unavailable, secretive, self-absorbed and in pain— but.. high achieving, successful and very similar to my dad in temperament (aka domineering and angry)

The interesting thing is, all of the men were in the position to offer me what it was I wanted. I think that when we seek out these unavailable partners, they all have an inkling of potential to satisfy that/those specific needs we have. All times, I left these situations disappointed because most of these relationships function on the basis of your projection of unfulfilled desires and desire for unconscious resolution. There were times when I was offered what I had been seeking the whole time. Some of these men fell in love with me. And you know what I did, after spending so much of my time and energy trying to "convince” these men I was worthy of their love and attention? I suddenly came to the realization I never wanted it in the first place! That’s right. When it’s presented to you, you most likely will come to the realization you do not want the relationship. It was never about them even though it seemed it was so much about them. You may have devoted everything to them. No, it’s about you.

The reason being is, the thing that we crave, the thing that almost feels like we can’t live without.. well the truth is, we never had it. So, we never needed it.

That stark truth sets in when we’re presented with it. That’s why some people who want unavailable partners actually avoid available partners. We all do this in some ways. We want the people who don’t want us and shy away from the people who are way too obvious about their affections— that’s why hard to get is such a widespread tactic, after all. The underbelly of the anxious attachment style IS unavailability. The reason why people seek unavailable partners repetitively is because it’s safe. There’s no risk of real vulnerability and attachment, because it can never form into a real healthy relationship.

Once you start feeling more emotionally ready and start doing the hard work around intimacy, love, attachment style and need, these patterns dissipate. You’ll find yourself more secure in your attachment, more ready and willing for real partnership, and therefore will attract matches who are much more available. Just be careful when you do find that familiar feeling of uncertainty and “thrill” and find yourself wondering how the other person feels, because more likely than not, if you have a lot of questions and doubt about how someone feels about you, they’re likely unavailable and unhealthy for you.

Some Thoughts about Modern Day Dating

This is a bit different for me— but I’ve had many conversations lately about my perspective on dating. I’ve made many clients who talk about the power structures in dating, and because there’s so much on this topic I thought to share my own thoughts.

I would be lying if I said I didn’t ever have my own neurosis about “doing things right” in the courtship ritual. I do care what my potential partner thinks of me. I do feel pressure to posture or play into the “game”, but this is how I truly deep down think about empowerment, in dating, from a cis-gendered woman’s perspective.

Shadows in Intimacy

I’ve been thinking a lot about what emerges with deep intimacy. A lot of our deepest fears and feelings come out in romantic relationships, especially, since our partners take over the position that our parents once held. They become our primary support, someone we’re bonded to, and often times, as humans, someone we need. This realization of the popular ethos of love and bonding became even more apparent as I was singing Stevie' Wonder’s “For Once in my Life” on a shoot recently- the lyrics go, “as long as I know I have love I can make it. For once in my life I have someone who needs me,” there seemed to be a consensus that this is our model of relationships. We want to be needed. We want to need.

I’ve always felt that evolved, conscious love is less about needing someone or trauma bonding, but more about wanting them. We are complete, as human beings, and we can take care of ourselves- our basic requirements become less about what another person can take responsibility for and fulfill, but more about them being an additive. As my friend says, people like me are difficult to date because we’re so good on our own. If you’re curious, the reason is, since I was young I was my own primary support in a fear-fraught, unstable environment- I had no one else, and even when I lacked the capabilities to self-soothe or self-regulate (often times, this becomes the first seeds of dissociation), I had to figure it out (this now, leads to friends pointing out- “if there’s one person who I trust can heal themselves, it’s you”) This type of behavior makes partners feel uncomfortable, as it seems like I don’t need them at all, and as one told me, “it’s like you’re just as happy if I leave”.

It used to be a bit of avoidant attachment because my needs weren’t met, mixed in with some anxious ambivalent attachment, but as I’ve grown, I’ve come to settle into the idea that, I’m great on my own. I love it.

I started to wonder though, aside from attachment patterns, was there something else I was avoiding? If my partners all mentioned that the evidence was in my body language, why was I subconsciously pushing them away? I knew that there were shades of fearing vulnerability, and intimacy, and it wasn’t until recently that I really saw it during a three week vacation with a romantic partner- little fragments of pain, triggers, volatility, the signs of the wounded child. Sometimes I regressed, sometimes I felt weak, sometimes I felt exactly how I felt in the moments of my childhood that scarred me the most. I thought I’d grown past this, I thought I’d evolved after so much self-work, but there are always deeper layers worth investigating. This is further elucidated by our love-maps, which are imprinted with different types of personalities that we’re programmed to fall in love with. It’s an amalgamation of our primary caregivers as well as models of love- it’s so deeply wired in us and that’s why our partners will often have similar traits to our parents, or drive us to react in similar ways they did.

I recognize that one of my biggest life challenges is learning how to respond, rather than to react. Most of the time, I respond. But some of the time, in intimacy, I react. We’ve all had that friend that gets so emotional and detaches from all rationality and it gets so difficult to deal with— that friend is a part of us. We get triggered because the pain of abandonment is at the forefront and the part of us that gets activated is the part that says, “I won’t survive without you here. I need you,” But, the reality is, we don’t… we’re adults.

This incongruence is also found in sometimes wondering whether to stay or go, in a relationship. Part of us may want to stay, part of us may want to go. Even more specifically, our minds might tell us one thing, our hearts another, our energy, and our lives, yet another. It’s rare to find love, to find a strong connection, and isn’t it a human trait to want to hold on to attachment, to enjoy it while it lasts? But what if it becomes a set back and you can feel it impinging on different parts of YOU- as in, you need to sacrifice something of yourself, or your life, to stay. And finally, where, and what, are you willing to compromise, if your needs aren’t fully met and your values are encroached upon? So many books about relationships advocate for staying, committing, connecting to a partner, because we’re so often moving on and restarting this same pattern with another partner, even though the “issues” are within us, not the dynamic. Yet, what if we know that something’s not right for us- it doesn’t resonate, and everyone around us knows too? When do we know that we’ve learned all that we need to learn, and that it’s the best thing for both parties to end?

When I’m on my own, there’s no room for regression, or doubt. I’m in touch with myself and I live my life according to my own needs. When I’m with someone, my decisions impact them too, and our energies intermingle. They can, and do, affect me. I believe firmly that we don’t “need” that, yet, we can want that, and make an active choice to commit day to day. There are no guarantees with any relationship- we can defer to senses of security like promises or vows, but even still people are subject to changing their minds. The only security we can have is within ourselves and in our renewed choice and desire. Sometimes, we choose to move on.