Chemistry and connection aren't always good things. Real connection means feeling seen, heard, and safe without effort. If you're constantly trying to win someone over or changing yourself for approval, that's a fawn response, not connection.
Chemistry and connection are really dangerous words to me. They can be trauma bonded words. When somebody says to me, I feel the sense of connection, my question is, shrink's gonna be, what does that mean to you? What you call connection, what I call connection, what a random person on the street calls connection, may be very different things, right? There's healthy feelings of connection, feeling attuned to, feeling seen, feeling heard, a conversation that seems to just flow effortlessly. You don't feel judged. You feel safe. But connection, when it's sort of like, you kind of feel like you're on your back foot, that now you're sort of game on, and how do I win this person over? It's almost like a match, like how do I sort of, it's a little bit gamey that concerns me. Because that to me could actually be a throwback to somebody feeling as though I have to win this person over. And you'll see this in people who have sort of a sympathetic nervous fawn response, like how do I have to modify myself to win them? That familiarity, especially if that's how somebody had to go through childhood, can actually feel like connection.
Secret Service Agent: Your Neutral Face Is Making People Distrust You (Here's How to Fix It)
