Welcome back. It's your friend Mel Robbins, and you are here with me and Thais Gibson, and we are digging into attachment styles. And Thais, I have a question for you.

How exactly can you figure out your attachment style now that you're an adult?

Great question. So part of it is definitely understanding some of the childhood context, but then it really goes into the biggest body of work that we developed on top of traditional attachment theory was about our core wounds. Each attachment cell has very specific core wounds. They also have very specific needs, and they have very specific issues with boundaries and how they communicate. So we can unpack those things. Let's do it. So securely attached people, they tend to communicate healthily. They don't really have many core wounds that are specific to relationships. They can have insecurities because they're human beings, but we won't see too much of that as a whole. They tend to have healthy boundaries. They want to resolve things right away.

Is anybody securely attached? I was laughing as I was preparing to talk to you because as I was looking at the definition of secure attachment, I thought, Oh, is this like you thinking you're a good driver? 90% of us think we're great drivers, but we're really not great drivers. Do most people think they're securely attached?

It's actually very interesting. So traditional research will show about 50% of people are securely attached. That many? 51% is the actual number, yes.How.

Is that possible?

I completely disagree. In my practice, what I saw over and over again is people would come in. The first session, I would take them through some of this stuff, and they'll be like, Oh, I'm the secure one. And then by session two, I was like, There's no way that they're So you're not secure. And I think that people... When we self-report, things are skewed, right? And those numbers, that 51 % is based on self-reporting. Obviously, I have a biased sample size of people because they're people who are going through struggles and are reaching out for help and support. But I just found so many times that more than half the time people would say I'm secure, and I'm definitely not secure.

I'm making a joke about it, but as a parent, right? And having three kids, 24, 23, and 18, as I'm listening to you describe the four different attachment styles, I was listening both as a parent thinking, Oh, shit. I really probably created the anxious, preoccupied It's interesting. Attachment style. By working a lot. The second you said daycare, I thought, Oh, gosh, that explains it. Our two daughters were in daycare. There you go. You really blew it. Then, of course, I'm listening for myself. What was interesting is that I always presumed that I was probably anxious, preoccupied. Interesting. But as we have this conversation and I am listening in real And at the same time, I'm wondering if I'm going to see that I'm more in the fearful... I can't even say it. I'm so nervous. Fearful avoidant. When you said a chaotic environment, including being narcissistic behavior, I was like, ding, ding, ding, ding, When we get into this concept of core wounds, what are the core wounds of the three insecure attachment styles?

When we get into the insecure attachment styles, this is where we can really see the nuances that haven't been developed before. So anxious attachment styles, their biggest core wounds are, I will be abandoned. I will be alone. I'll be excluded, disliked, rejected, not good enough, and unsafe. And what we'll see is they tend to feel this big trigger of unsafety when people pull away, because in childhood, we're very reliant on our caregivers. We literally cannot survive without them. And so what happens is as children, the anxious attachment style, when their caregivers pull away, they actually have a trauma response. Like, will I survive without them as they're gone? And so we really easily confuse and intertwine survival with approval as anxious attachment styles. And that becomes really prevalent in childhood. And as adults, the anxious attachment style, they'll have a full nervous system reaction when somebody pulls away. That abandonment will really trigger also this deep feeling of being unsafe.

I'm just sitting here selfishly, processing and thinking about my family and my relationships, as I'm sure as you're listening, you're doing the exact same thing. There's no doubt in my mind that our daughter, Kendall, has anxious attachment style, because I often say, I feel like you're human blanky. And if she has a situation that is anything that would make her nervous or anything that would make her slightly uncertain, there's a phone call, and you know that the attachment style is kicked in because then there's a second one, and then there might be a third one. Yes. And is that a classic indication that you feel this sense when you can't get a hold of somebody, this alarm bell goes off inside you and you're firing off the text or you're calling them again, or you're checking their location? Is that a good example of the type of behavior that somebody with anxious attachment?

Absolutely. And so what you'll see is that these core wounds, if you were to trail them across, you'd see that core wounds When we feel like I'm abandoned, we start thinking thoughts about they're never going to come back or what if I can't get my needs met? And then this sparks emotions. And then we'll feel those emotions. And neuroscience has actually proven that every single decision we make is based on our emotions. So then these actions happen at a subconscious level where the anxious preoccupied will cling. And part of what's happening is they're terrified of losing proximity to people. And they also, as children, didn't ever learn to self-soothe consistently enough. So they really rely on other people to soothe. And when they can't It will suit through other people, it will create problems in terms of their ability to regulate. And so some other things you'll see beyond core wounds is the needs anxious preoccupieds tend to have. Is they need a lot of validation, reassurance, consistency. Certainty is a huge one, Especially in their romantic relationships. And one of their big love languages is around physical touch. They want to be close. They want to be nearby.

You'll see a lot of those sorts of patterns. Anxious, preoccupied attachment cells are the sweetest. They are so kind. They're so thoughtful. They really think about people. They really They spend a lot of time focused on the people around them. And so some of the super powers of the anxious attachment cell is that they're very loving, they're very warm, they're very kind, they're thoughtful, they're supportive. They really go out of their way to think about the people in their lives. So they have all these beautiful characteristics they bring to relationships. But Because their subconscious comfort zone is to be so focused on other people, the primary casualty in that relationship becomes the relationship to themselves. And so they will constantly deprioritize themselves, put their needs last, not speak up for their needs because they get into people-pleasing behaviors. Actually, all of those things that they're doing are the crux of why it's so difficult to self-soothe, because if you don't know your needs, you can't meet your own needs, and you have all these core wounds, it becomes so difficult to self-soothe, and they'll constantly try to maintain that closeness and sooth through others. But when other people are not available, that's where it becomes really tricky.

When it comes to trying to change your behavior or trying to achieve something or trying to achieve a goal, how does having this anxious attachment style and the core wound of abandonment show up in terms of sabotaging your ability to either be consistent or to do the work to change yourself?

In so many ways. So one of the biggest things is, let's say it's something in your workplace. Yeah. Anxious attachment cells in the workplace, they'll often put themselves last. They'll put themselves on the back burner. They'll take on other people's work and not set healthy boundaries. And all of a sudden, they're behind on their things because they're people pleasing others. And also, if they have this huge fear of abandonment, what happens is we abandon ourselves. Whatever our core wounds are also become the biggest things we reenact in the relationship to self because the subconscious mind wants to maintain its comfort zone. So if you see somebody with an abandonment core wound, they're so worried about getting abandoned by others that they will abandon themselves to please others. And that's actually how the wound stays alive. If we ask ourselves, Hey, those wounds came from childhood 30 years ago. How are they still alive in me now? Oh, because I am reenacting them in relationship to self through repetition and emotion on a daily basis. And if I wasn't doing And that they actually wouldn't still be here. It's not possible. So that's how the subconscious keeps these things.

And so what the anxious preoccupied has to do is learn to meet their own needs, reprogram their subconscious core wounds, and then be able to actually consider themselves equally to others, take their own boundaries into consideration as much as they do with others. And those things become a huge part of the healing process. And we can talk about subconscious reprogramming in a little bit, perhaps. But those tend to be some really important things to recognize in terms of the patterns. And then the very last thing I'll say is just anxious attachment styles as well. If they have a goal, and then it's not even in the workplace, it's a personal goal. And then their friends say, But I need you. Or then they want to make social plans or commitments. They'll be so preoccupied with that that they struggle to actually balance the other areas of their life. They'll be so focused on relationships. Career can be on the back burner, finances, mental growth, emotional growth, spiritual. All those things can take less precedence, which, of course, they'll feel later over time because they're always deprioritizing the self.

That makes so much sense. If you look at the anxious attachment style from a standpoint of needs, what are their core needs? Yes.

The biggest needs that they have. And interestingly enough, these have to be the needs that they give to themselves. This is part of how they heal through repetition and emotion of giving these needs. So the big needs are reassurance, validation, encouragement, support, to be seen, to be heard are really, really big. People being present with them, and then really that certainty and consistency. Those are the big ones.

Hey, it's Mel. I want you to stop thinking about what you want and actually do something about it. What can you do? Jump into my new free training called Make It Happen. This training gives you the tools. It's packed with science. It comes with a free workbook. It's exactly what you need right now. More than half a million people are taking it. You have the power to change your life. Together, let's make it happen. All you got to do is click on the link in the caption, melrobinds. Com/makethappen. It's free. I created it for you. Why wouldn't you take it? Don't miss out on the life you could be living. Let's make it happen together.

And I think once we discover that, the real discussion has to become, well, if for any number of reasons I didn't get access to that as a child, part of healing is to repetitively give that to myself now because I'm leveraging principles of neuroplasticity. Same thing, repetition and emotion that fire and wire neural pathways. And if I'm leveraging those principles, then by giving those things to myself, not only do I learn to self-soothe, but also because if I have those needs met, the bucket is halfway full. So I'm not panicked without somebody else meeting them. I'm actually soothing myself. I'm able to get there. And then it also heals and undoes the past because we're changing the programming at the subconscious level.

I want to ask you one scenario. So let's go back to the example of somebody who's anxiously attached, and they say to themselves, All right, I'm not going to bother my significant other at work today. And then they find themselves getting that wave of emotion and wanting to send 15 texts. What do you do in that moment if the solution to reprogramming your subconscious is to give yourself what you need? What would you do as you're standing there with the phone?

Yes. Amazing question. So there's ways to reprogram that are proactive so that we can actually recondition those wounds to begin with so they stop coming back. That's the real crux of everything. But in the moment, until we've done the reprogramming, which takes about 21 days, what we want to be able to do is make sure that we are in a position where whatever it is that we are needing from that person, we want to isolate. So if you're needing from your significant other, what are you reaching out for? What are you hoping to get as the result? Are you needing encouragement? Are you needing certainty? And if you can look at that and realize, Hey, I, as a human being, have the capacity to give that to myself, you can literally think of, if I could paint a picture of what that encouragement would look like from my spouse or from my friend or whoever it is, how can I give that to myself inwardly? And what's really interesting is the subconscious mind really wants a comfort zone. So it doesn't like unfamiliarity because ultimately the subconscious is survival-wired, which means anything unfamiliar, it tends to reject.

It's part of why we end up in the same types of relationship patterns or the same types of situations so often. So what happens is originally when an anxious preoccupied tries to give the need that they would want from others to themselves instead. If I want to encourage myself, let me write out three of my wins, or let me journal about why I will be okay, or if I need certainty, let me schedule out what I'm needing or create structure in my life. At first, it feels a little bit foreign. This is always the thing for anxious preoccupieds. They have the hardest time meeting the needs themselves, more so than the other insecure attachment styles. But as we start doing it repetitively, We start creating these neural pathways where it becomes more comfortable. So basically what happens is over time, through the repetition and emotion of building that into our comfort zone, we usually have to essentially use our conscious mind to recondition our subconscious mind. So at first it's more mechanical for the first little bit. It definitely helps to soothe in that moment, but it won't feel as soothing as what an anxious preoccupied is seeking from somebody else.

But by about day seven of doing this behavior repetitive, we start to build a subconscious comfort zone around it. And by day 21, I have seen at this point thousands of people who are anxious, preoccupied, really afraid to even be alone and spend time alone, who now come and say, Oh, I actually love spending time alone. I feel comfortable with myself. I've built this relationship to myself. I don't panic anymore when my partner is not available. So this is something that's very feasible. It just takes that really first seven days of commitment to start feeling comfortable within it. And by day 21, we see a tremendous difference.

That's incredible. So So one other question before we move on to the other attachment styles. If you're in a relationship with somebody who has that anxious attachment style, what is the best thing for you to say or the Is there a best way for you to show up to, I guess, create more security for the person? Can you change somebody else's attachment style in how you show up?

So in theory, yes, because Anything we're exposed to through repetition plus emotion has the impact to reprogram. So yes. And if you're dating somebody who's securely attached, there can be a benefit. However, there's a big caveat to this, which is that our subconscious mind, because it wants to maintain its comfort zone, It means to not be attracted to people who are very secure if you're insecurely attached. I have heard countless fearful avoid an attachment sales, just as an example, say things like, I started dating somebody and there wasn't chaos and it felt boring. And anxious pre Preoccupieds as well. If somebody is too present or too kind or too sweet or too loving, often they will sabotage it because, again, at the end of the day, the subconscious mind is like, I want what's familiar. Familiarity equals safety, which equals survival. And so if they grew up with a lot of push, pull, a lot of hot and cold and inconsistency, the anxious preoccupied will often reject somebody who's really secure. It's quite rare that they'll actually invest. And so I don't want to take away from the idea that, yes, in theory and in principle, that happens.

Rarely have I seen that actually be the case in For the years and years of client practice, I've been focused on this. But what I have seen is that when we do that work in the relationship to ourselves, we get this two-pronged benefit, which is on one side of the equation, when we build a secure attachment in the relationship to ourselves because we start to meet our own needs, because we reprogram our core wounds, all of a sudden, now we are securely attached to self. And so now we are actually attracted to securely attach people who will show up for us in a way that feels safe and familiar to our subconscious mind. And the second part is that there's tremendous benefit. I mean, doing the work helps you feel healed, helps you feel more confident. And because it's really about the relationship to ourselves at the end of the day, that will spill out into all other areas of life, be it career, financial, friendships, family relationships, et cetera.

Thais, that was a master class in Anxious, Preoccupied. I can't even say it. My head is spinning so much. And I know as you've been listening to Thais, you've now basically put half of your family into that category. But I want to hit pause. Let us hear a word from our sponsors. They allow me to bring this to you for zero cost. But when we come back, don't you be anxious. I want you to stay attached. I know I'm making stupid jokes, but we're going to go in-depth into the two other insecure attachment styles. One is the dismissive avoidance, and the second one is the fearful avoidance. Stay with us. Welcome back. It's your friend Mel. I am so happy you're I'll fill here because we are just scratching the surface on what you're about to learn about attachment styles. We've already covered everything you need to know about the anxious attachment style. We've got two more to cover. First up, dismissive avoidant attachment. That's a mouthful, Thais. So how about you tell us who is that person?

So because this person grows up with that childhood emotional neglect, they tend to really not want to emotionally attach to people. They tend to want to keep their space. They basically, as children, adapt to the discomfort of emotional neglect because we're all wired and attuned for deep connection, right? So they adapt by going, Well, I don't need that. I'm just going to not need it, so I stop feeling this pain and shame of rejection from it. Because if you grew up as a child, yearning for that connection, yearning to be seen, and we're literally biologically wired for that, just yearning for it all the time becomes counterproductive. Eventually, that yearning is so pervasive that the person adapts by going, I'm going to reject the connection that's rejecting me, and that's how I'm going to feel safe. So their big core wounds because of that become, I am defective. They definitely have this core wound of, I am shameful. That's why I couldn't get my needs met. They're very sensitive to criticism, although they will not show it. They're too stoic to show it. Very sensitive It's a criticism, though. And they'll really withdraw. And they self-soothe by literally pushing everybody away and icing everybody out because they really go inwards.

And they usually rely on different creature comforts for soothing, like binge watching television or eating a lot of food or video games or these things that they can- Smoking pot, drinking. Yes, exactly. All of those things, 100 %.

What are the core wounds for somebody with a dismissive avoidant attachment style?

So dismissive avoidance, their big core wounds are, I am defective. I will be unsafe. They really tend to not like conflict. They'll try to retreat from conflict. A lot of the time until it reaches a threshold, then they may get involved. They tend to feel trapped, helpless, powerless, afraid of being weak if they rely on others. And they actually tend to, especially people who grew up in a more severely neglecting environment, tend to have this deep wound and fear that I do not belong, like I'm an outsider. Because as a child, if you grew up in that environment, you're not getting to deeply connect with other people. It will really foster that wounding. So this individual as an adult becomes a person who can be very charming, charismatic, wonderful early on. But when things get real, they often get afraid, and so they will push people away.

Or withdraw. Is that like the other... When When you say push people away, it sounds very active and purposeful. Yes. But is withdrawing an isolating?

Yes. That's actually a really beautiful nuance that you pointed out. So essentially, there's this nuance that I think is an amazing nuance, Which is the pushing people away versus pulling away. For sure, the dominant pattern with dismissive avoidance is to pull away and to withdraw and to really retreat, like a turtle going into their shell. But we will definitely see dismissive avoidance, especially in the earlier dating stages of relationships, actively push people away by sabotaging the relationship by leaving early. If they feel like their feelings are too real or it feels too raw for them, they'll often say, Okay, I have to get out of here. That's it. We're done. And there can be that push away dynamic. But when they're When you're really in a committed relationship, you'll see a lot more of the pulling away, the withdrawing, the retreating.

So what are their needs? Because I'm married to somebody who is always in his head. Yes. He's very, very kind-hearted, and yet isolates so quickly and is absolutely checking the box on absolutely everything that you just said. And he has often said, I really I'm not sure what I need.

Yes. That is the dismissive wouldn't slogan.

But what do they need if they don't know what they need?

It's an amazing question. And so what you'll see is the big needs that they have are number one, they really They need to feel safe in their relationships. This element of feeling that sense of safety and consistency is really important because as children, they didn't feel safe when they had that neglect going on. And so they tried to develop that sense of safety just within themselves, but they often don't feel too safe relying on other people. Beyond that, they really need, even though they will never show it, they really need acknowledgement and appreciation. Now, they don't want like, Oh, you're the best partner in the world. They don't want these grandiose forms of it. They want the little things. They want, Hey, I see that you're really trying here. Thank you. Dismissive avoidance respond extremely poorly to negative reinforcement. They respond extremely positively to positive reinforcement. And what you'll see is if you ask a dismissive avoidant for a need to be met, and then they do it and you say, Hey, thank you. I see that you really showed up for that. They get this sense because you have to remember, right? If you grow up as a dismissive avoidant, then you don't get modeling for healthy exchange in relationships.

You get modeling for neglect, for everybody being ships passing in the night. And so they often feel really disempowered and incapable of doing relationships in this way.

You are literally describing my husband. I wish I had known this year one in our marriage. I mean, we're at year 27 and are finally unpacking the fact that, and what you just said is incapable, that he was so conditioned to be on his own, ships passing in the night, fend for yourself, is the word that he used about his childhood. Yes. Fend for yourself. Totally. And also this sense, because it's been very frustrating at times to go, you're so capable in every other area. Why the hell can't you just think ahead about us or about the family. A lot of things have changed, but this makes so much sense.

And dismissive avoidance often, like you said, they're so capable. They're very capable because they had to mentally and intellectually develop to fend for themselves, but they didn't really emotionally develop. Not the exchange in relationships because that wasn't there. So they're almost stunted in their growth emotionally there. And that's part of when we go to needs, that appreciation and acknowledgement gives them this idea that, Oh, I can do this. I am doing this right. And they respond so positively when they get that acknowledgement and appreciation. Now, beyond that, some other needs that they really have is they really tend to need empathy. They really tend to fall into infatuation or lumerence. If somebody is really empathetic and supportive of them, it goes a very long way because, again, these are deeply unmet needs from childhood. And so that sense of supportiveness, that sense of empathy, that sense of appreciation, acknowledgement, safety, all of those things, harmony, tends to be another huge need in relationships. But I would say those in Rumbus their biggest needs. The really interesting thing, the dismissive avoidance has the subconscious comfort zone. So because of this, what you'll see is they grow up, they get neglected.

Who is the biggest neglecter of the dismissive avoidance emotions?

Themselves. Themselves.

And so part of their healing, just like for the anxious preoccupied, is to learn to give to themselves what they didn't get access to in childhood repetitive. So when they can actually start tuning into their feelings, doing some work to be in their body, practicing meditation or breathwork or things that are going to anchor them into parasympathetic or rest and repair nervous system mode, what you'll see is doing that, getting their feelings back online, actually being okay with their emotions, not being afraid of them, realizing that their feelings are just feedback, they're just guidance mechanisms, building that relationship back to their feelings is actually the very thing that gives them emotional bandwidth in their relationships to others.

Wow.

So that becomes a huge part, along with giving themselves appreciation, giving themselves a sense of support. All the needs that they had that we mentioned are going to be really important for that.

Well, what's interesting is that if you're in a relationship with somebody who has this dismissive, avoidant attachment style, you tend to get very frustrated.

Absolutely.

And so you, in your frustration, are giving a lot of negative reinforcement, which makes them only pull away more and act more confused and more ashamed and more avoidant of you. And it makes sense that the small, specific, consistent, positive, Thank you for this. I see that you're doing this. I appreciate that. Thank you for remembering this. You're creating this reciprocal exchange that they never got in childhood. In the context of goals, so you have somebody who is dismissive This is a dismissive avoidant, and they have personal goals. How do they sabotage their ability to take new actions, to be consistent, to put themselves first?

Great question. So often what you'll see is their subconscious comfort zone because there's a lot of this wounding of shame. They often don't want to be seen. So they can avoid putting themselves in the spotlight. They can absolutely avoid asking for help. It's such a big dynamic where they'll think they have to do it all on their own all the time. And I'm sure you've probably noticed this in your life as I have is it's sometimes comfortable to do it all on your own, but you get so much further ahead in life when you're working with other people, when you have people you can learn from and learn with and support each other. And I think one of the biggest pain points is that they will literally get into a place where they won't be open to that. And they can struggle to work in teams sometimes. They can silo themselves out a lot. So that would be a big saboteur in regards to work. But then And so their personal goals can be that because they have such a subconscious comfort zone of needing safety, needing comfort, sometimes they can be ones to avoid stretching themselves as much as other attachment styles because they want to just retreat into that safety and comfort zone in their spare time.

And part of what's happening is they're actually dealing with a fairly dysregulated nervous system throughout the day. They're in low level fight or flight a lot of the time. And so when they finish work or these commitments that they have to do or have to show up for, they will often retreat and go into just soothing by themselves, doing their own thing at the end of the day, which, of course, then you're not putting that time into stretching into growing yourself in other areas.

That makes so much sense because you're right. If anxious attachment is high levels of that fight or flight energy, which I think We all know somebody who's anxiously attached, who is a friend or somebody that we're dating or somebody in our family. You can feel that vibrational energy. Absolutely. I also very much relate to the description of a low level of that fight or flight. They may not show it on the surface, but they are up in their heads withdrawing, dealing with it. Absolutely. Now, one more scenario for the dismissive avoidant. Can you give us one with regard to texting and reaching out to somebody you're dating? And what is the conflict that a dismissive avoidant would have if the anxious attachment person is, okay, I'm not going to text them today. I'm not going to be clinging today. And then they're texting. What does a dismissive do?

Dismissive avoidance is almost the exact opposite. So they tend to get afraid of people relying on them to various degrees because they feel like, okay, I'm just here to take care of myself. They feel like it's a big commitment, and they also feel like it's a bit of an injustice in that commitment. I shouldn't have to do things I don't want to do. The really interesting thing is that exactly what each attachment style needs to do to become secure is essentially, if we could summarize it in a very high-level umbrella term, it's like we are striving for interdependency. Anxious attachment styles are super codependent. I should meet all of your needs. You should meet all of mine. We never meet our own. Dismissive avoidance are very counter sender dependent. I should meet all my own needs. You should meet all your own needs. And we'll just sometimes come together. What they each need to do is to come to center. I can meet my needs, and I can rely on myself to meet my needs and feel empowered to do so, and I feel safe and comfortable expressing and receiving from you and vice versa.

And the dismissive avoidant, when it comes to texting, they have this idea that I shouldn't have to text you if I don't feel like it. But part of their growth is to allow people to rely on them, and they will They'll actually do better at that when they learn that, Hey, I can rely on other people, too. There is an exchange, and there's something beautiful about the exchange. And what we'll see is on the path of dismissive avoidance, becoming more secure. They'll start to rely on other people a little more first, and then they'll actually feel good about it. And then they'll realize that they want to do that with others and allow others to rely on them. And then when they get that positive reinforcement, Hey, I see you showing up. Thank you. And they feel capable and they feel encouraged, that's where they start to really move into interdependency, and they won't feel like texting if they feel like it is a chore, and they'll be more mindful and more consistent.

This is so amazing. And you're right, it is an incredibly helpful framework to really understand why some people are the way that they are. And we've covered a lot. So let me just recap where we are. We've covered what people with a secure attachment style are like. You have described anxious, preoccupied attachment. We've now just covered dismissive, avoidant attachment styles, and we got one left, and that is fearful avoidant. Thais, who are these fearful avoidant attachment style people, and what do they show up like in life? And can you tell us about their core wounds?

Okay, so fearful avoidance, because of growing up in that chaos, usually their primary wound is actually to struggle with trust. And it may not be trust in this really overt way the way you would think, but fearful avoidance are the most hypervigilant. They notice everything. Reading between the lines on everything. Little tiny micro expression change, they thought they saw at first. Little tiny change in a pattern of behavior, they noticed it. And fearful avoidance actually have the most core wounds. They tend to have the core wounds of the anxious. They can fear abandonment. But what we'll see a lot for fearful avoidance is they can want this connection. They can feel afraid of being abandoned or not good enough or disliked or alone. But if people get too close too fast, they can also go into their very avoidance side, feel very afraid of being trapped, helpless, powerless. And then that's combined with this struggle to trust and to feel safe, opening up and relying on other people. So they really have both sides. What's interesting as well is that as you date somebody more avoidant, because the fearful avoidant has shared attributes of both sides, It will polarize you more into your opposite side.

Make you more anxious. Exactly. They tend to have a little bit more intensity, a little bit more fire and spice. So we will generally see that fearful avoidance, they tend to be fairly high achievers, hard workers. They tend to be a little bit of overcompensator sometimes. Sometimes this idea of if you grew up in a childhood where nothing was ever good enough, you can actually struggle with a deep unworthiness core wound as well. And so really struggle to overcome that by showing up in all these different ways. Obviously, there can be super powers to that. That can be super beneficial. But again, the casualty in it can be the relationship to self because it can be so much about the outside world, how you have to show up for others. Fearful avoidance show up incredibly well for people in crisis, but they're so focused on other people, concerned with other people, but again, they lose that relationship to self. And the funny thing as well is that with a fearful avoidant, dismissive avoidant, this is something I noticed so in touch with my own husband, is I, in the early stages, realized I was much better communicating my needs because I had done a lot of work on that.

But I realized that I still had this element of expecting him to know my needs when I would become critical or negatively reinforced. Like you were mentioning it was because I would hold in my needs, not make space for myself, put myself last, prioritize everybody else, and then I would hold it in, hold it in. Anxious preoccupieds can do that forever. If you're a full The avoidance cannot. They hold it in, they hold it in, and then they become the volcano erupting eventually, and they will say something harsh with their words, or they'll cut a little bit with how they speak. And what happened, and what the learning for me was, was, okay, I have to be so good at communicating my needs proactively. And that was actually part of my healing as a fearful avoidant was to learn to consider myself as much as I was considering everybody else. And so fearful avoidants have this dynamic of being very on, very intense personalities. They've had to struggle through chaos. So sometimes that subconscious comfort zone is chaos. They make very good entrepreneurs because they tend to do well outside of their comfort zone in the chaos.

But part of the healing is learning to be balanced and centered, learning to keep the relationship to self. And of course, we have to do the healing on the abandonment wounds and the trapped wounds, both the anxious and avoidant side. But the real dynamic is to learn to trust.

Could you say more about the trust? Because I think when you say the word trust, it To me, I just think of, Oh, do I trust you? Do I not trust you? And I think on the surface, I think I trust people. But as you're talking, I'm feeling like when I don't I know what my needs are, I get very overwhelmed and chaotic internally. And how does that relate to trust?

Because there's this element of not trusting your environment to be okay. There's this element at a deep level of the trust isn't just, and it can be, of course, that I don't trust somebody won't lie or betray me. The thing that's really important to remember, too, is that our attachment wounds become the loudest and the most real for us when we actually attach.

So we may- What does that mean?

It means when we actually build an emotional bond and start developing feelings or open up or developing real closeness. So you may feel like, Oh, I trust the stranger on the street or the person I just met. But when we really let somebody in, that's when we'll feel afraid that they might leave us or they might betray us by lying or through infidelity or through not showing up in a pinch when we really need them to be there. And so you'll see that those elements can really represent trust. But at a deeper level, because it really is the relationship to ourselves first, we'll also see that trust shows up in the way of us not trusting the outcome, trusting the environment. Sometimes we'll try to hyper control things or be five steps ahead of everything to make sure. And so the real healing for that trust wound actually becomes to look at all the places we betray ourselves. And a lot of that can be that we don't show up for our own boundaries sometimes, or we say it's fine when it's not actually okay, or we agree to things and we say yes when it's really a no, and We don't protect our space, or there can be ways that we betray or lie to ourselves even.

This is completely an okay situation. Meanwhile, you're just floundering. So there can be these dynamics where we do that. And part of the healing around trust is to understand it in that context. And then as a result of that, to be able to be better in the relationship to ourselves around those things. And as we do that better, we'll learn to trust other people because we'll also learn that people are not perfect. They're never going to be perfect. People will hurt us. But the real building of relationships doesn't come from people being perfect. It comes from when somebody does hurt us, we can be vulnerable and say, ouch, that hurt. That didn't feel good for me. Can we work on this together? And allowing people that chance to build that trust with you by working on it. And that's where we really build those deep roots around trust.

As I'm sitting here listening, it almost sounds as if the anxious and the dismissive avoidant attachment styles, it's typical for somebody to be trapped in it and not really know their needs and to be completely hijacked by their emotions. And if I'm reading between the lines based on what you just said about the fearful avoidant that you do know when your boundary is being violated, you just don't do anything about it.

It's a really nuanced thing, but it's really a powerful question. What tends to happen is that fearful avoidance can be a little bit dissociated from themselves. They can be a a little bit so focused on the external world and their commitments and their things they have to do that they can be a little bit disconnected. And generally, what happens is fearful avoidance will feel their emotions very strongly when they feel them. And it will usually look like holding things in, but it's You may have to reach this pivotal threshold where the emotions become strong enough because the frustrations and the experiences are big enough. But now you reach this threshold, and it's almost like the fearful wouldn't will go, Oh, this person's violated my boundaries. Wait a minute. They did this three weeks ago and four weeks ago and five weeks ago. And then that frustration will really come to a head. And so, yes, there can be a pushing down and a repressing, but it's almost so subconscious that it's not even in the periphery. And when it does come to the threshold, then the emotions can be a little bit stronger.

So when it comes to personal goals, how does a fearful avoidant sabotage their ability to change?

Great question. They tend to put so much pressure on themselves and take on so much that eventually they can scatter themselves and be pulled in too many places. They also tend to put the goals and the interests of other people, sometimes ahead of themselves. And again, it's not that we should be always putting ours ahead of everybody else. We want to get into equilibrium as much as possible. So considering ourselves equal to others as much as possible. Whereas fearful avoidance tend to be like, put everybody first to a fault until they're really frustrated and reach that threshold. So that can be a saboteur. And then also, fearful avoidance core wounds can get in the way. We You can come to believe, okay, I'm not worthy of my goal, or I don't deserve it, or I'm not good enough. Or I know for myself, something I learned on my own journey to being secure was that I used to run a business on my own, and I wanted to control things enough because I didn't trust that other people could do it properly. And it was that trust wounding, right? Like, Oh, but if I give this to somebody else or delegate it, they may not be able to do it, and they might make a mistake.

And so learning to rely on other people with our goals, learning to reach out for that help and support and to delegate can be a really important part of building that trust as well.

Hey, it's Mel. And you know what? I want you to stop thinking about what you want and watching videos on YouTube and actually go out into your life and do something about it. Because action is the answer, and the first action you should take is jump into my brand new free training. It's called Make It Happen. This training gives you the tools to go from thinking to doing. It's packed with science. It comes with a free workbook, and it's exactly what you need right now. More than half a million people are taking it. And the fact is, you do have the power to change your life, and I want to help you. All you have to do is click in the link in the caption or go to melrobbins. Com/makethappen. It's free. You jump right in. I'm going to be your coach. I created it for you. Why wouldn't you take this opportunity to make your life better? Go do it. Do not miss out on the life you could be living. Let's make it happen together.

We've gotten to this point, especially when you look at content on social media, where there's so much of a push to cut people out of your life, to label that stonewalling is the word that you just use. But if you think about it from the standpoint of somebody that has trauma in their past, or they have just an avoidant attachment style because of what they experienced as a child, and that it's just overwhelming to feel those emotions. If you can come at it from a sense of compassion, I love what you're teaching us because through understanding, you might be able to keep somebody in your life instead of just being like, That's it. You're out. You don't talk. You don't go deep. You're stonewalling me. You're ghosting me. When really there's another side to this coin, which is, no, this is a person who, through their childhood, gets very overwhelmed by these emotions and by intimacy, and they protect themselves by removing. This isn't about hurting you. It's about them protecting themselves. Am I processing this the right way, Dr. Franco?

You are, certainly. I think if you want to be in a relationship with someone who's avoidant, it's important that you try to get your needs met in another relationship. Not trying to depend on this one avoidant person to meet all of your needs. The more that your needs are met elsewhere, the more you can be flexible with the person that's more avoidant. So the more that I feel like in another relationship makes me feel secure, another relationship I can be really vulnerable and deep, another relationship I feel really loved and valued, then you have your cup full enough to be able to be more flexible with that avoidantly attached person who's like, We had some intimacy, now I need a breather, and I need to pull away for a while. But I do think that we should challenge avoidantly attached people to say that it's okay that you need boundaries around intimacy, and it's okay that intimacy scares you, but you also need to fill people in. You have to just be able to say, Hey, I'm a little overwhelmed right now. I need about a week, and then I'll come back, and we talk about this, right?

Instead of not communicating anything and just of ghosting on people because that hurts people a lot. I think on both ends- Does it hurt the person who's avoidant when they ghost?

Does that contribute to shame, or is that just a way to just... Sorry, go ahead.

What we see, the pattern being is anxiously attached people think too much about other people and not enough about themselves. And avoidantly attached people think a lot about themselves and their own needs and not as much about their impact on other people. So the anxious person being willing to completely sacrifice their sense of self and do whatever their partner needs, and they're not actually happy, but they still feel like they're in a relationship with another person, which is not actually the goal, right? The goal isn't to be in a relationship at all costs. It's to be in a relationship that elevates you and helps you express who you are and makes you feel happier. But the avoidantly attached person, it's like when you're negotiating with someone and they have all the resources and all the power. It just tends to be the anxiously attached person who's adjusting to the avoidantly attached person because the avoidantly attached person is like, well, I'm okay alone. I'm okay independent. I don't really need these relationships with other people. But you will find that avoidantly attached people, they tend to have a phantom ex, where while they're in a relationship, they don't appreciate it.

But then when it's over, they look back on it. Once they're avoidant, they call these deactivating strategies, which is basically at some point this avoidant side of them really takes over and all they can think about is needing space and feeling suffocated and needing boundaries. It's like crisis mode. But once they have that space, that deactivating side moves away and they tend to look back on these relationships and miss them and feel lonely and realize that they do also really need connections. So The avoidantly attached person is in this very stuck place where it's like, one side of me really needs connection, and another side of me is so afraid of it. Afraid of it because I think if you get too close, you're going to harm me. That is what the avoidantly attached person sees. I think if you get too close, you're not actually going to like who I am. You're going to see me as less than and deficient, end of failure. They can't decouple intimacy for its beauty and its feelings of connection and meaning from intimacy as a threat, as a sign of betrayal, as a sign of being judged, as a sign of being ultimately rejected.

So once that piece of threat takes over and they ghost, and they might actually feel relieved from being separated from the relationship at first. But then as that deactivating part melts away a little bit, they start to grieve. They'll have a more delayed grief process around the relationship.

Can you have more than one attachment style?

Yeah, you can. Like I said, in each different relationship, you can have a different attachment style. It makes sense, right? Because if someone is very anxious and is like, I need all your time and attention, and you need to be showing me that you love me all the time, right? You're going to be like, I need some space. I need some me time. I'm losing myself to try to reassure you in all these ways. And And if someone's super avoidant and they're very distant and you're trying to connect with them and they're always pulling away, you're going to feel pretty anxious, right? Where it's like, oh, my gosh, I feel insecure. Do they actually like me? So it is a dynamic. And in different relationships, we can see different parts of our attachment style coming out. There's also a really fascinating theory called internal family system theory, which is this idea that we all have multiple selves within us, like our sixth Self that was bullied is still within us. Our inner child self that was five years old and going through what he did in our family life is still within us. At different moments, each of these selves can come out and take over.

And if you follow that framework, each of yourselves can have a different attachment style. But the goal of internal family systems is to be led by your highest self at any given time. Your highest self is your most adult self that is most centered and stable and loving and compassionate. And that self, that highest self within all of us is secure. I do believe all of us have a piece of us that is securely attached. The more we can access that self, the more we'll feel secure in our relationships.

Well, that sounds like good news. So it sounds like within each one of us is a person or a self that is capable of secure attachment. Are you saying that if you can start to identify your default attachment style and see it as a lens and an opportunity for growth and improvement, that it is possible to change your default attachment style and become more secure?

Yes. I guess it's called internalized secure attachment, where you have to start treating and talking to yourself like that secure secure attachment figure that you maybe didn't have. So when you're feeling a strong emotion, being able to tell yourself, It's okay that you feel this way. I'm right here with you. And what are you feeling and what do you need right now? Almost being on your own side and being really, really loving toward yourself is like, that's part of the ways that we heal. Part of the ways that we find secure attachment is we think about... I'll even... This is different things I've done to find more security is singing love songs to yourself. And when you're activated and triggered, realizing that that's not all of you and that there's a piece of you that is still grounded, and what does that grounded part of you want to say to the triggered part of you? What love does it have to give in this moment? It also takes what's happening with the insecure attachment styles. Is they're reactive. They're getting really emotionally overwhelmed, and they're acting based on that sense of emotional overwhelm. So the anxiously attached person is like, clinging, clinging, clinking.

And it's almost like, reflexive. They're not acting with intention anymore. They feel like they're almost hijacked. And the avoid The attached person is also very hijacked, but instead it's to pull away, pull away, pull away. But if we can just pause and feel those uncomfortable emotions Oh, my gosh, I feel so So rejected right now. I feel so abandoned right now. Where do you feel that an emotion in your body? How can you lean into feeling it more deeply? Allow yourself to feel it, right? Because fundamentally, this acting out behavior is a way to try to cope with a very difficult underlying emotion. And you can instead of using this acting out behavior, like the anxiously attached person, demanding things of the other person or clinging to the other person or the avoidantly attached person suddenly pulling away, you can develop have your own tolerance for that feeling or emotion that's very uncomfortable so that you don't have to act out in your relationships to protect yourself from it.

I want to focus on avoidant or disorganized right now because I really identify personally with anxious attachment. And since you already said that somebody with an anxious attachment style is prone to self-diagnose and want to fix it and always be thinking, I'm thinking about avoidant now, and I'm thinking about disorganized because as you go sing a love song to yourself, I personally am like, Oh, that sounds beautiful. But Dr. Franco, can we talk to the Person who's listening right now who just had a visceral... That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. No, I'm serious because I think that for people who are already like, Yeah, I'm sick of being hijacked by my emotions. I am married to somebody who is avoidant. I realized in researching this show, Dr. Franco, and getting ready for this interview, I didn't understand attachment style, and yet I have been talking about it in couples therapy for two years because I'm anxious and my husband is avoidant. The shame piece that he feels and puts onto himself is something I was unaware of. I've been griping Oh, I'm married to this guy. He's really quiet, and he doesn't... And trying to draw him out.

Could you first explain to somebody who's having a... I'm not going to tell myself, Why the hell would you do that? Could you explain why it is so important for happiness and confidence and success, these things that we all deserve, to learn how to change and grow toward a more secure attachment, particularly for somebody who's avoidant or disorganized?

Yeah. Here's the thing about avoidantly attached people. They think they're super independent and don't really need anyone. But that's a defense mechanism against an underlying need for a connection that they don't think they can actually fulfill. I think if you're being really honest with yourself, no matter what your attachment style is, you'll see that a part of you really does create safe connection. And if you felt like you could find it and feel comfortable and safe with it, it would feel a lot safer for you to admit it to yourself. And I'll also say that you will not know how beautiful connection deep, profound, sustaining connection is until you find it. That's the only way that you'll be able to judge whether you need connection in your life or not, right? Because you're thinking you don't need connection, but fundamentally, mentally, you don't even know what connection is because avoidantly attached people, when they're in relationships, they're not actually vulnerable. They're not sharing anything about themselves. They're not very authentic, to be real. And so they're connecting in a very shallow way. And they're saying, I don't need connection. It's like, I don't need that, which is arguably not true in deep connection, right?

Because it's not revealing and you're not actually being known by other people, and they're not knowing you, and you're not There's not this giving and receiving of love that's happening. It's just like we're two people that are in each other's presence, right? And so I think there's this... And what I'm saying is that there's this disjuncture between what the avoidant person doesn't think that they need and what connection actually is, and what connection actually can be, and how connection can make you feel alive, and seen, and centered, and grounded, and supported, and lighter. Those are all the things that true connection will give you that you will miss out on if you're very avoidant.

Dr. Franco, if you've never experienced that, and here you are, and you're decades into your life, and you've always had this experience of being on the outside, and keeping your distance, and not trusting people because both both your childhood taught you that you shouldn't and can't trust people, right? And that your own behavior of opting out because of your attachment style has only reinforced that because you're never stepping toward people. How on Earth do you begin to change this if you've never experienced this?

You have to reconnect with your own emotions. You You can't connect with people if you're always suppressing your emotions, which is what avoided people do. And it starts... I mean, obviously, therapy. I think therapy, really, there's therapists that focus on attachment style, specifically. I think a lot of male therapists who see a lot of men tend to do a lot of avoid an attachment work because this is part of how we socialize men. And there is a gender difference when it comes to attachment style, where women are at least slightly more likely to be anxious, men are slightly more likely to be avoidant. So therapy can help. But when we start allowing people to reconnect with their emotions, at first they might feel it as a sensation. Do you feel a tingling anywhere in your body? If you had If you had to turn that tingling sensation, you have to find a feeling label for it, and we take out the feeling wheel.

Can you walk us through this? So let's just say for somebody listening right now who literally, Dr. Franco is about to go, Okay, I'm turning this off. We're talking to you. For everybody who has somebody in their life like this, and I'm glad you said the piece about the research showing that women tend to be more anxious and men tend to be more avoidant. And the only reason why I'm saying this is because as you're very well aware and you wrote about in your book, when it comes to friendship, women are way better at naturally forming communities. And men, every year that you get older, you actually get further and further and further away from those connections of sports teams and fraternities and work friends. And men become more and more and more isolated. And we tend to be better as women, connecting and staying in friendships where we're airing emotions, and men typically do not. And so I want to speak directly to somebody who may be hearing and learning about attachment theory for the very first time. They are considering, Holy cow, I think I'm avoidant. I don't like to talk about my feelings.

I don't have a lot of friends. Other than the person I'm dating or family connection, I don't have this intimacy in terms of emotional support. What is an exercise, and can you and I role it for somebody that's listening right now to just dip your toe into the water of trying to experience this connection to your own emotions that you're talking about?

Yeah.

Yeah, we can definitely do that. One thing that I also just wanted to share briefly for avoidant buy-in, because it's hard to get avoidant people to buy into this, is the physical health implications of your attachment style. That securely attached people, both anxious and avoidant, more likely than secure people to suffer from mental health issues. Anxiously attached people have the highest rates of mental health issues. Avoided attachment Avointantly attached somewhere between secure and anxious. Some insecure people have the best mental health. Physical health, right? Because avoidant people don't access their emotion, it manifestsates physically. So if you're avoidantly attached and you're experiencing migraines, headaches, you don't know where you where they came from, gastrointestinal issues, stomach ulcers. And there's really no... You have no idea where this is coming from. And you're like, what is happening to my... Why am I in chronic pain? That's connected to emotional suppression and not releasing your emotions. So that is my last plug for finding secure attachment is your health, really, your physical health and how long you live. That's in part, predicted by your ability to reconnect to human connection.

One other thing I would love to add in my own experience, and then you can talk about it, Dr. Franco, clinically, is just seeing that my husband is now very clear that he was not only suppressing his emotions, he was numbing them with a daily weed and alcohol habit.

Yep. You will definitely see that.

I'm really excited. I'm I'm going to teach you how to create and use what I call a confidence anchor, not only when you're about to fly and you're nervous, but for any single situation where you're nervous to do something. Okay? Are you ready? Yeah. Awesome. It's super cool. For you listening, I want you to just hold that situation that you're nervous about. Maybe you're nervous to give a presentation at work, or maybe you have a son or a daughter who is getting recruited for a and now there's all these big team matches coming up and they're starting to get nervous. This confidence anchor is exactly what you need. Step number one is you're going to think about this situation that makes you nervous. We've already talked about that, Cameron. It's this flight to Portugal. Step number two is come up with something about this situation that actually makes you excited. Describe for me, Cameron, what What are you excited to do when you get to Portugal?

I think the thing that I'm most excited for is to see my sister. I haven't seen her in a couple of months. She's been in London. I don't know. When I think about Portugal, there's a lot of things I'm excited for, but probably the biggest thing is just to spend time with her. I love it. Yeah.

That's perfect. Okay, great. You now have something related to the situation that makes you nervous that you're actually excited about, okay? Now, number three is the most important part. Number three is now that you have Something that you're excited about. I want you to close your eyes, and we're going to bring it to life. I want you to imagine the moment that you lay eyes on your sister for the first time in several months. Are you imagining the airport or a cobblestone street? What is the scene? Describe with your eyes closed. What is she wearing? What happens? Describe it for us.

Well, first of all, she's probably... I don't know. She's probably mad that we're late about something. But when I think about it, we're in probably Lisbon, where we're going to land, and probably right outside, the first glance of a new city, something that is always really exciting When you leave an airport, I think that's the best part about flying, is getting to somewhere you're anticipating seeing. So I picture that. I picture her standing there, probably in some black sweater, because that's usually what she's wearing. I think seeing her face reacting to my mom, me and my brother, that's going to be the best part because I know even if she won't admit it, she does miss us a lot.

Awesome. And who is she going to hug first?

100% my mom.

Okay, awesome. And how amazing. I'll probably be last. And as you stand there and watch her in her black sweater with Lisbon in the background, hugging your mom, what are you feeling?

A sense of comfort, a sense of wholeness, and just a really good feeling to have us all together during a really hard time of the year. It's going to be really special.

Yeah. And that's What's your confidence anchor? That moment that you just described in detail, the black sweater, Lisbon in the background, her reaction as she sees you, her hugging your mother first, the wholeness, the comfort, all of that that you just felt in your body, that is your confidence anchor. Now, here's how you're going to use it. From now until that moment happens, the millisecond that you feel any nerves or any fear or any negative thought come up related to this thought, you're going to close your eyes. You can use my five-second rule to interrupt the worries. Just count backwards with me. Five, four, three, two, one.

Three, two, one.

Yeah. That is a starting ritual that will signal to your brain that you're not going to think about a plane crash. You are starting to think about something else. And then you are going to bring to the forefront of your mind that image, that feeling that you just described. And that is how you drop a confidence anchor on these bullshit nerves and worries that have been hijacking your life. That's what a confidence anchor is. You're using your own excitement about something that normally makes you nervous to shatter the grip that fear and nerves has on your body and your mind. That's what you're going to do. When you head to the airport on the way to the plane, you are going to use this same confidence anchor. When you get on that plane and your thoughts go, Uh-oh, you're going to go, Nope. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and you're going to drop that confidence anchor. When you take off in the middle of the night and the pilot says, We might experience a little bit of turbulence, because pilots often say that, you're going to drop that confidence anchor, and you're going to come back over and over and over again to this image of your sister and the black sweater and Lisbon behind her and her hugging your mother.

That's exactly what you're going to do. You're going to be shocked because This is a technique that they studied at Harvard Business School called Reframing Performance Anxiety, was the name of the study. Reframing Performance Anxiety. And it's a way to flip moments that make you nervous into moments that make you excited and to keep control of your mind, body, and spirit so that your fears don't hijack and torture you.

Wow.

What do What do you think?

I mean, it makes sense because I think in the moments of panic, the last thing I'm doing is thinking about anything that brings me happiness. It's always the darkest feelings, the heaviest emotions emotions versus even just closing my eyes just now. I feel so different sitting here. I feel like even thinking about that moment makes me happy. And I'm I'm excited to use it because I know I'm going to be anxious all next week, week after.

So you want to know why this works?

I do. It seems too good to be true, honestly. It seems too good to be true.

Well, the reason why it works is because it taps into your body's automatic systems. If you look into the neuroscience on this, scientists call this an autonomic response. That basically your nervous system has a autonomic response to stressful situations. If you're a normal person like me, you just say, Oh, yeah. If we're in a stressful situation, we automatically feel all kinds things, right? And so what I want you to understand is that when we're in situations that make us nervous, everybody, whether you're giving a speech or you're going into an interview, or you're on a first date, or you're running a track meet, or you're getting on a plane, or you're breaking up with somebody or you're going in for a job interview, it is going to be automatic that your nerves take over because you're about to do something that makes you stressed out a little bit. It's requiring you to feel... It makes you feel a little bit vulnerable. But here's the cool thing. Even though you have this automatic response, because you're right, there's no way over the next five weeks, you're not going to feel anxious because that's the autonomic response that your body has to this stressful thing.

But here's the cool thing. Cameron, you can control this. Here's the secret. The secret is understanding that your body's reactions to fear, so your automatic reaction to a fearful situation situation is the exact same as your body's automatic response to an exciting situation. We're going to use this truth that your body's automatic reaction to fear is the same as your body's automatic reaction to excitement to your advantage. Tell me about a situation that makes you excited, just something in your day-to-day life. Give me a situation that makes you excited.

In my day-to-day life that makes me excited?

How about this? Who's your favorite musician?

I really like the Lumineers.

Okay, great. Guess what? The Lumineers are playing a private concert at the new private venue at the Fenway Park. You, my friend, not only have front row seats, you're going to meet them before the show.

Okay.

It's five weeks out. How do you feel?

Jittery a little bit. The same feeling I would have if I was playing a big soccer game or running an important race. When I was younger. The clammy hands, the pit in your stomach.

Dude, we're walking into this venue. You're walking up to the front row. How are you feeling?

My heart's beating fast. I'm going a million miles an hour. I don't know. Probably feeling really on edge.

Yeah, the usher is coming up to be like, Okay, they're ready to meet you. How are you feeling?

I'll be like, Okay, let me collect myself. Yeah, probably really flustered and I don't know. A little bit anxious, probably.

It sounds like a situation like that where you're about to meet your favorite band, which I would say, is that a positive or a negative experience?

Yeah, that'd be amazing. I mean, a positive one, obviously.

Well, it sounds very similar to the way that you experience the thought of flying to Portugal.

Yeah, I guess that's true.

Yeah. You want to know the only difference? When you're in this situation that's positive, that makes you excited, and you're about to meet the lumineers, your brain is telling you you're excited. You're Your brain is telling you the jitters in your stomach are butterflies, and that's a good thing. Your brain is telling you your hands are clammy and your heart is racing because something good is about to happen. The only difference between that and what you experience as you think about flying to Portugal is what your brain is saying about the flight. When you start to experience butterflies in your stomach as you are about to board the flight, your brain's going, Uh-oh, there's something wrong. This is negative. The plane's going to crash. You're experiencing in your body, Cameron, the exact same physical and physiological symptoms when you meet the lumineers as when you board a plane. And the only conference is what your brain is saying about it. And so the reason why a confidence anchor works is we are going to shut your negative brain down and drop this confidence anchor right on it like a sledgehammer, and we're going to replace your narrative that something's wrong with, Holy shit, I'm about to see my sister.

This is so exciting. It's as exciting as meeting the lumineers. And when your brain starts to say the butterflies are positive, you won't escalate into a panic attack, you will have taken control. How cool is that?

That's pretty cool.

So do you have any questions about the confidence anchor and how you're going to use it?

It just honestly seems still a little bit too good to be true. I don't know. I can just conquer all my fears just by flipping the way I'm thinking.

There's a scientific reason why this works. They research this at Harvard Business School, and what they did is they put people in control groups and put them in situations that made them nervous. They put one group into a control group where they had to run a track meet, another one had to sing karaoke, another one was in a debating competition. They taught one group of people to use this reframing tool where you think about something related to the track meet or the debating competition or karaoke that you're excited about. This group was taught to say, I'm excited. I'm excited to run this meet. I'm excited to get up there on the stage and conquer my fears. I'm excited to go and debate because I prepared. The people who use this simple reframing tool outperformed the people who didn't. They felt less nervous, and there's a scientific reason why. Earlier, we talked about the fact that there are these automatic responses that our body has to situations that are exciting or stressful. In our case, Cameron, we talked about the lumineers and how that's exciting meeting the lumineers and getting on a plane to Portugal, which used to make you nervous.

Just talking about those two situations created an automatic response in your body, didn't it?

Yeah.

That automatic response is nothing more than a series of chemicals firing and messages firing between your brain and your nervous system. The reason why you and I get butterflies is because when the brain sends a message down to your nervous system that, Holy cow, we got to get on a plane, or, Holy cow, the lumineers are about to walk in, your nervous system goes, Oh, got it, and immediately starts changing up the chemicals in your body. Adrenaline fires, the blood races to your head and to your heart. That's why your heart starts pounding. That's why your thoughts start to race. Now, you get butterflies because the signal in your brain going to your gut just changed the chemicals in your digestive tract. That's why we all get butterflies. That's it. And so in the situation with the lumineers, you flipped your thoughts. I'm excited to meet them. And so that explains all the reasons reasons why you have all these changes going on in your body, why your heart is racing, why your butterflies are in your stomach. This automatic response doesn't scare you because you're thinking positive thoughts when it comes to the lumineers.

Now, when you get on the plane and your brain signals to your stomach that something's up, and your heart starts to race because the blood goes to your heart, and the butterflies start to flutter in your stomach because the chemical structure just changed in your digestive tract, if you have negative thoughts about the plane, a couple of things happen. You start to get scared of the automatic response in your body. And more cortisol starts to flood your brain, which is the stress hormone. And once that happens, what they found at the Harvard Business School study is that the cortisol interferes with your brain's ability to do whatever you had prepared to do. This is why most of us, when we stand on a stage, go blank. It's because we have an automatic response. Our brain goes, Oh, shit. We get scared of our racing heart because we think it means that the plane's about to crash or about to screw something up. The cortisol floods our brain, and we forget what we prepared. When the cortisol floods your brain, you forget about seeing your sister. You forget about all all the exciting things. You forget about all the research that you did that shows that traveling by commercial airplane is the safest way to travel, period.

That's why this matters. It's more than just thinking positive thoughts. It's critical that you come up with the thing you're excited about before you get into the situation. Because once your thoughts start to race and you're like, Oh, my God, I'm going to screw up this test, or, Oh, my God, I'm going to screw up this interview, or, Oh, the plane, you've already lost control. You have to come up with this exciting anchor and this confidence anchor before you start to get nervous. Got it?

Yeah.

Any other questions?

It just makes so much sense. I always have taken the approach of calm down, Kam, making myself to be the bad guy. And not really reframing it in any way, just letting myself soak in all the stress and anxiety and just reprimand myself being like, What the heck? Why are you Why are you not just calming down? There's a six-year-old that's bouncing around, and it's like, Oh, I love when the plane goes up and down. And it's like, Why can't I be like that six-year-old?

Let me tell you why. I think this is Excellent, Cameron. Let me tell you why you can't buy by that six-year-old, because I love this analogy. The six-year-old's brain is not attaching negative thoughts to the plane bouncing up and down. As far as the six-year-old is concerned, this is exciting. That's why they're not panicking. And so the reason why in the history of telling yourself to calm down, you have never been able to calm down is because you are dealing with an automatic response in your body. So let's go back to the science. When you get into a situation that makes you nervous, or that makes you stressed out, or makes you afraid, or that makes you excited, those are states in your body of high agitation. Those are states of alertness. Those are states when your blood starts pumping and your brain starts paying attention and everything aligns because you're about to do something that makes you excited or fun or nervous or afraid. And so you go into a state of being hyper alert. That state of high agitation is one that you can't calm down like that. So what we're doing when we teach you to create a confidence anchor and to use excitement to reframe what you're feeling is we're taking a state of high agitation from the negative to a state of high agitation in the positive.

We're actually using the automatic response in our body to our advantage, and we're just tricking our brain to believe that we're actually excited because our brain doesn't know the difference Your brain is like the six-year-old. Your brain actually doesn't know the difference between excitement and fear. That baby that's bouncing is feeling the heart racing and the bubbles in her stomach. It's just that your brain is framing it in the negative. Because your brain knows that excitement and that fear feels the same, that lumineers, that meeting the lumineers and being on an airplane feels the same, you can use that to your advantage and trick your brain in a moment where you would normally be nervous to actually think you're excited. The reason why this matters, Cameron, is because when you're on that plane, if you can come back over and over and over to your confidence anchor, and if you can close your eyes in a moment of turbulence, and you can imagine your sister, and you can start to say out loud, and this is important, you got to say to yourself, I'm so excited to see, what's your sister What's your sister's name?

Siena. I am so excited to see Siena. I'm so excited to see Siena. I cannot wait for Siena to hug my mom. I cannot wait for this. If you come back to that confidence anchor, you are going to flip your brain into believing that you're excited about that moment, and you will no longer be afraid. And it's a way to gain control. And you want to do something really cool? Because your confidence anchor is related to what you're doing, it's really believable. Because When you are there, hugging your sister, it means the plane made it, and there's nothing to be worried about. That's why this works. When you imagine before a test, yourself walking out of there going, yes, it actually makes you excited to take it. When you imagine yourself nailing the interview, it makes you excited to walk into it because your brain doesn't know the difference between a state of fear or a state of excitement. Now you know a simple trick, backed by research from Harvard, to take control of your mind and take control in situations where nerves normally derail you.

Yeah, that's amazing. I think that was always in the back of my head during our conversation was if I'm still... I feel fear in a lot of different areas of my life, not when I'm just in the air. So when I'm on the ground, how can I use this tool to ground myself, even if I'm not sure the outcome of it?

I love this. Okay, great question. I want you to take out a notebook, and you're going to write down any single thing that makes you nervous. Could be anything. I mean, give me a couple.

There's a long list, probably, but But off the top of my head, something that I don't know, I really wish that I could beat the fear on is I recently moved, not that far, but There's a really nice yoga studio on my street that I pass every day. And I just always think I need to be a part of a community of 20 somethings that are like minded, that I've always loved yoga. I've loved the community it brings, but I cannot bring myself to sign up, and I can't bring myself up. I just constantly think about the day I have to show up for my first class class, and it makes me way too anxious to even go.

This is an excellent example, and by the way, incredibly common and very relatable. So I'm really glad you shared it. So you're going to do the exact same thing. We're going to create a confidence anchor, because what I hear is I hear you want to do it. I hear it pulling you, and the nerves are keeping you back. So Name something you're excited about. Can you pick a coffee shop in your neighborhood that you love to go to, and it's going to be your treat to get a nice latte when you're done?

Yeah. Do you want to name it?

Yeah, I do.

It's called Thinking Cup.

I love Thinking Cup. Now, you're going to close your eyes. What color yoga tights are you wearing?

Oh, God. Maybe I have this really nice light blue ones that I always like to wear.

I love it. And as a treat, because you went to this relaxing yoga class in your light blue tights, sweatshirt tied around your waist, yoga bag over your shoulder, standing at Thinking Cup. What did you order?

Probably aniced oak milk latte.

Love it. How do you feel as you're walking out of the Thinking Cup, having just completed that class and treating yourself to that? How do you feel right now?

Like, proud of myself for doing it.

Awesome. There's your confidence anchor. Anytime you feel nervous, you're going to count backwards, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, to interrupt the nerves and create that starting ritual, and you're going to drop that confidence anchor. And what's going to happen is it's going to slowly retrain your mind that you're not nervous about joining that yoga studio. You're actually excited. And when you start to practice this confidence anchor. At some point, you're going to find yourself walking down the street and there's the studio. And as that wave... Because remember, it's automatic. That automatic response comes up because you're about to do something new. You get to choose whether your brain says no or yes.

Hey, it's Mel. Thank you so much for being here. If you enjoyed that video, by God, please subscribe because I don't want you to miss a thing. Thank you so much for being here. We've got so much amazing stuff coming. Thank you so much for sending this stuff to your friends and your family. I love you. We create these videos for you, so make sure you subscribe.