Attachment

What is your attachment style? 

Have you discovered patterns that arise in your relationships?

Are you aware of the deep-seated stories of how you see yourself, your world, and the people you love?

What is Attachment Style?

Attachment style refers to the patterned behaviors that arise when you are relating both interpersonally and with yourself that arise from your early childhood experiences. Becoming aware of your attachment style opens the space for deep healing within your relationships–with your partner, your friends, your children, and your family of origin, and expands your capacity to love yourself. 

4 Attachment Styles

  • Secure

  • Avoidant

  • Ambivalent (or Anxious)

  • Disorganized

You may identify strongly with one or have a mix of all four. Perhaps in certain situations, you find yourself in the role of Secure, at certain times Avoidant, other times you may be in the role of Ambivalent, and you may also fluctuate from one to another in what seems like a random manner.  The goal is not to define yourself as Secure, Avoidant, Ambivalent, or Disorganized, and therefore create another identity; these are simply tools to tease out what is driving self-sabotaging behavior and preventing you from getting the Love you are yearning for. 

Our attachment styles begin to take root from the time we are in our Mother’s Wombs. Each experience is taken in, recorded, and stored in the body, and in certain areas of the brain.  You do not need to remember specific traumas that may be catalysts for your particular style(s) of attachment. You can begin in the present moment to notice and track your bodily sensations, thoughts, and actions.  The place of power is always in the present moment and you do not need to comb through your entire history in order to benefit from Attachment healing.  If you are working with trauma and your memories of trauma, this will be useful information to support your process, but it is not necessary. 

Discover Your Attachment Style(s)

  1. Prepare your space in a way that feels nurturing, quiet, free from distraction, and safe.

  2. Allow your breath to become long and smooth and close your eyes gently.

  3. Bring your awareness to your Heart and Womb.

  4. Call on your Deeper Self to guide you and to show you your patterns of relating, where you are protecting your core wounding, what you are deeply longing for.

  5. Notice images, thoughts, bodily sensations. 

  6. Spend time allowing yourself to feel into all that arises.

  7. If you begin to feel overwhelmed, gently open your eyes, softly gazing at one point in front of you.  Squeeze your hands into fists and hold for a few moments, then release. 

  8. Begin again when you feel calm, safe, and ready. 

  9. Take as much time as you need with each image, thought, sensation that arises.

  10. Notice if there is a pattern. Do you feel generally secure in your relationships? Do you find yourself reacting in anger when what you truly need is to be seen? Do you find yourself isolating when what you truly desire is to be held? Do you find yourself vacillating from one extreme to another? 

  11. Invite a spaciousness to your experience, trusting your Wisdom Self to reveal what you are ready to see. 

  12. Take your time and explore at your own pace.

  13. Once you feel complete, allow your breath to move in its own rhythm.

  14. Gently float your eyes open, with a soft focus on one spot.

  15. Allow the room to come to you through your peripheral field, without looking around or moving around.

  16. Place one hand on your Heart, one on your Womb.

  17. Offer gratitude to your Wisdom Self.

  18. Acknowledge your courage.

  19. Journal for at least 10-15 minutes and record your discoveries and insights.

  20. Close in a way that feels good to you. (Sacred smoke, prayer, song, dance…)

May your Life be filled with Love, Truth, and Beauty,

Glenna

Mary Plummer