Are You Avoidant? Or Just Scared of Abandonment?

I never want to be the one they got over. I'd rather be the one that got away.

Now the problem with that statement is that you're always the loser.

Well, exactly.

What does Tara have to say, Steven?

So Tara says after a few relationships I'm now starting to realize the common factor in all the relationships and is me. How do you become more self aware of your own patterns and break them? I have discovered I have this fear of abandonment. So when things get difficult sometimes my first instinct is to run and have one foot out the door. I think it's self protection help.

Can you, Jameson, do you relate to that at all or have you never had that? Because I certainly do relate to that.

No, I totally relate to that. I mean what part are you, are you questioning like having patterns or just.

The idea of when you get scared, when you think that someone might be doing something that threatens you or the relationship or when you, when you're kind of, when you get triggered and immediately think, oh, I might get hurt here. There's that, that flight reflex. Yeah.

100%, I think two, I guess there's two sides of it. There's probably the, the person that is terrified of rejection so they want to, they want to just leave before they get rejected. And then there's the other type. I could just think of archetypes of friends of mine that just, they're really good at being alone and so they'll just leave out of a certain kind of like laziness or not wanting to try.

Yeah. That's interesting. I. Elaine de Botton talks about the idea that when someone does something you don't like in a dating or relationship context. Well, I suppose especially in a relationship context, when someone does something you don't like, there's an immediate projecting into the future of what, you know, what makes us so angry or what makes us so upset. What makes us react so strongly is not just this thing in the moment is the thought of every time this is going to come up in your relationship and projecting that into the future in a catastrophic way. Which leads you not to thinking, huh, that person did a thing I don't like today. But instead to the conclusion you've ruined my life. Yeah.

That's whatever they do. I think more you're more on that side. Yeah. Where it's like.

Yeah.

Because we've talked about how important storytelling is in a. Early in a relationship because the. You can't help but just kind of project. Your brain is like this computer algorithm that's just like, oh, I'm gonna project into the future. What will this be like? What will this reality be like years from now? And I feel like I'm very good at doing that. But then there's a negative side to that where it's like one little fight. You project that into the future and it's like, well, it's not that, it's not that you got mad at me for leaving. Addition to sink is that now I feel like you're going to be mad at me for everything all the time, forever, to infinity.

Yes. Well, so that's one type the idea that, you know, I'm immediately looking at all of the ways this could affect me negatively in the future. And then there's Tara who is saying that this is based in a fear of abandonment. So when she feels threatened in any way, like she could get hurt, she's the one who, she's like, well, I'm gonna jump first. You're not gonna get there before me. I'm gonna leave you before you have the chance to hurt me.

Yeah, I think there's a spark of fear and a feeling of oh God, they're suddenly starting to feel some cracks or they're, they're suddenly not happy. And there can be a, a mix of ego in with that as well. Where that self protection thing does come and says like well I, I, I'm not going to stand around wait for you to like get sick of me or for this to happen. Like I'm, I'm getting out. Like you don't like it. I'm out of here. And, and there is that is self protection and fear coming from ego as well.

Exactly. And it, and it produces that fear produces extreme reactions. Right. And it can happen both in a romantic context, it can happen in a work context. Hey everyone. Welcome to me interrupting my own video. If you want to know why someone may have faded out, why they may have disappeared, why all of a sudden it felt like the momentum was lost with this person. Go, go to whyhe's gone.com where I talk about the main reasons someone disappears. Go check it out whyhe's gone dot com. And now let's go back to the video. We had dinner last night with a friend of ours who is a movie director and he said actors, when they tend it tends to be when they're mad on set and they yell at people when they get angry. Because we've all seen the kind of tirades that actors can go on or the footage of someone going crazy or you know, the, the audio of an Actor losing his mind on set at somebody. What he said is, whenever an actor does that, what's. What's actually happening is he's scared or she's scared. It comes from fear. Fear of, I'm in a bad movie or you know the movie's going to be bad, or this script is bad and I'm going to end up looking bad. I don't look good, I look old, this other actor is doing better than me that I'm working with, and I shouldn't have signed up to this project because it's not going well, or I can't trust this director or. And it comes out as anger. But what it really is is fear in that moment. And what he said is what he learned when he learned it was coming from fear. Instead of just, I'm dealing with an asshole. He decided the number one thing he can do is make them feel safe. If he can make them feel safe, he'll solve that problem. But to know that, he has to understand that it's coming from a place of fear. And I think that that's a very interesting thing to apply to relationships in general. How often is someone angry because they're afraid? And therefore how often is the solution to make them feel safe in that moment? But to rewind for a moment, we've got Tara here. She says, when I get scared that I'm going to be abandoned, I leave first. So what is the solution to that, Audrey? What do you think that. That instinct you get, that overwhelming fear that comes up and that fear makes you want to jump the gun and be like, well, I'm not gonna allow this to play out and be the fool here and get trampled. I'm gonna get out before that can happen to me. What do you think people should be doing in that moment? Because of course, some people might say, well, I'm. I. You know, that saved me a lot. You know, that saved me a lot of pain. And in a lot of cases, my instincts proved to be right. I was right that that person was going to abandon me. I was right that that person was on their way out in some way or criticized me too much and wasn't accepting me. So there's that battle, isn't there, between the instinct that is protecting us, that sometimes has served us well, and the knowledge, the self awareness that Tara has that that instinct can go too far and it can make her take the escape parachute too soon.

I suspect we can all talk ourselves into believing our relationship's gonna fail because we only see what we see. In terms of our partners, we only know what they tell us. We only see how they behave towards us. We don't know about 90 of what goes on in their brain when they're not speaking it out loud. So to a certain extent, I think we're always. We can always talk ourselves into thinking that we're not safe. We can always talk ourselves into thinking somebody could leave us. But for me, fear of abandonment feels very, very intimately linked to sort of, you know, a non secure attachment to other people. And I suspect, I don't know much about it, but I suspect there's probably different types of fears of abandonment because for instance, the idea of kind of running away, I, I personally don't exactly relate to, but I definitely know that I worry about people disappearing from my life, leaving me, people I love or who have come to rely on leaving me. That's something that I do think about. And you can drive yourself crazy thinking about it because people can leave and things happen.

The really tough thing is that when we are in an anxious mindset or our nature trends towards that kind of anxiety and fear of being left of, it's going to fail and I'm not going to be here when it does. I'm going to leave now. We tend to have extreme reactions to things, right? If you are speaking in terms of attachment styles, it can produce an extreme anxious reaction and it can produce an extreme avoidant reaction. In a sense, the, the running away or the ending it prematurely is an extreme avoidant response to the situation. I'm gonna leave you before you can leave me.

I had a friend who once said to me, and it kind of reminds me of this in a way, it's. She said to me, I never want to be the one they got over. I'd rather be the one that got away.

Now the problem with that statement is that you're always the loser.

Well, exactly.

It's like either way you don't end up with somebody. But at least I have my pride, you know, like that's, that's the, that's what's kind of messed up about that idea is that it values pride over everything else.

Well, I think it's interesting because when she was telling me about it, it was coming from a place of, you know, that's always been my mentality. And as a result I've come out relatively unscathed in terms of relationships. And I've been able to say that I was the one who always called it and whatnot, but I'm no closer to actually being in A long and happy and successful relationship. And she was actually working sort of to. To be more vulnerable and to make herself more vulnerable in a relationship in order to get over this idea that she somehow needed to control what the outcome is. Now, I think what's really difficult for a lot of people is we really feel like if we are left or abandoned or like, not abandoned, but are left, and it triggers that kind of fear of abandonment or are rejected, we really, really worry about how much that's going to affect us. And we really think, you know, will I ever be able to get over this?

But that's the thing, right? It's all about your relationship with rejection and what that means and the meaning you ascribe to that. There's a quote by Viktor Frankl, who wrote man's Search for Meaning, and he said, between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is the power to choose our response, and in our response lies our growth and freedom. And, like, when you don't allow. If you just go. Stimulus, response, trigger. Protect myself. Get the power. Okay, you're not gonna leave me. Screw this. I'm out. You've. You. It's fear. It's. I'm not even gonna sit in this space and figure out what's actually going on here in case it means the worst.

Mm.

But sometimes it's okay. If it does mean the worst, maybe that's okay. And it might be. It might just mean that, okay, maybe we don't figure this out and it means that we're wrong for each other and that's all right, or this person decides something, that's okay, but. But you are not allowing the space because that person might be like, what the hell? Why did you go crazy over that one tiny argument? Why did you suddenly, like, bolt? Just because I brought up a problem or I brought up something that was bothering me, and you bolt. Whereas they might have been like, I just wanted to solve a problem that was. Something was bugging me or something was an issue. And I know I've had that response in the past where I've been like, self protection mode. And I've been like, well, you're gonna crit. Like, I. You know, and it. I know. I know now that that can be triggered in myself and the space. It's incumbent on me to hold that space and say, okay, let's just sit and actually talk about what's going on here, and maybe we can actually just figure this out calmly. But you. If you're just terrified of the rejection, you won't allow that space.

I'm curious, how would you, how would you make someone not scared of that rejection? Because I think it's a very, it's almost, you could argue it's a kind of trauma response probably a lot of the time. And so, you know, that space is all well and good that you mentioned, Stephen, but it's a really hard thing to hold when you're feeling really activated in something. And it's kind of. Yeah, it's just triggering all of your, all of your trauma, all of the things that you're most scared of. And you know, you do sort of step into that fight or flight mode, I think. How would you advise someone to actually hold space for that emotion in order to process it and move forward?

Well, the reason that we do things consciously that are scary or difficult, the reason that I decided to go to Poland and do these freezing challenges in the snow with Wim Hof, the reason that someone chooses to run a marathon, the reason someone gets up on stage to do their first stand up set even though their heart is beating out of their chest. People choose these things because they're difficult. Well, we can actually and all of those things, by the way, grow us. All of those things make us bigger as people. So we could look into, look at our relationships and those moments in dating as wonderful moments to choose discomfort. This can be actually in the same way that going to the gym and working out is chosen pain. This can be chosen pain. I can. And I'm not talking about, you know, no one hopefully needs me to say, I'm not talking about this as a reason to stay in an abusive relationship or anything like that. But when it comes to someone just said something that made me feel, it triggered me because it made me worried they're gonna leave me or that I'm not enough or, you know, it freaked me out. And not because they did anything terribly wrong, but just because made me scared. That's a moment where we can say to ourselves, okay, I can choose now to use this as a chance to get bigger. That doesn't mean I know how this is going to go. It might be that this person ends up not wanting to be with me, but I don't have enough information for that yet. I just don't know. And if I don't have enough information about that yet, I'm going to choose a path that is uncommon for me. My well trod path is fight or flight. And the unfortunate thing about both of those paths, those extreme reactions is that they actually start to manipulate the Result, that's what's really sad and damaging about them is that they, it's no longer a fair experiment because they actually tamper with the result. Like you said, Stephen, if. If I, if I, out of fear, give you the silent treatment for the next three days, that might affect how much you want to be with me because not because of the original thing that you said or criticized or, or gave some feedback on and said, hey, you know, I'm feeling this, or I'm not sure about whatever. That's not the thing that made you truly question the situation. But me going silent for three days does. That's the, actually the thing that makes you go, whoa. I. This is unpredictable. This is not a healthy pattern that I want to engage in in a relationship. This is making me feel like I have to tread on eggshells in even saying anything. And that's not the kind of relationship I want to be in is where I have to tread on eggshells. And the same is true. If you say something to someone and all of a sudden they come at you in either a desperate way or a really angry way, then it has the same effect. So that's where we actually begin to self sabotage. And the very thing we're afraid of becomes self fulfilling. And someone finds us hard to be with not for the original reason that we were afraid of, but for the patterns that we demonstrate when we're afraid. So we have to say, those common paths that I take actually are hurting me more than the thing that I'm afraid of. The alternative is for me to take the uncommon path, the path that is not well trodden for me, which is, let me, let me learn more. Let me actually have the kinds of conversations that help me discover more, discover more about who this person is, about how they feel about me, about where this is going. And, and those conversations, by the way, can include vulnerability. They can even include admitting that you're scared. But admitting that you're scared is very different from acting out. One is vulnerability, the other is a destructive pattern. And the brave thing to do is to be vulnerable instead of be destructive. Through vulnerability, you'll start to reveal if someone could actually be right for you by being destructive. You just tear down something in a way that means you'll never really know.

I love what you said about taming your fear, because I think when you can really connect to the fact that that's where that's coming from, which is a place of fear, the next step is to feel brave enough to, as you say, communicate that fear and say, I want to run away right now because I feel scared that you're going to leave me. Now, that's really brave. That's a really hard thing to do. But as you rightly say, the right person will make you feel safe, and that will begin to heal.

And I. And I would say that to Tara and to anyone out there who relates to what Tara said, just going from running away because you're scared to telling someone that you feel like running away because you're scared is a massive sign of growth and evolution.

That was a huge change for me. And I don't know when this happened, but when I got comfortable in relationships voicing things that I had done before when I was like, hey, I. I. Sometimes when this happens, I respond like this. And it may. It's making me feel worried, anxious, trapped, you know, defensive, even just vocalizing that, speaking it out, it's like, oh, like it's out there. Like, clarity. That. That's something in my early 20s I would have never done because I would have just felt it. Felt the animalistic fear and been like, right, this is what I'm gonna do in response. But not actually just calmly spoken out. Here's what I'm feeling right now.

And what I like about that construct that you made is it works for all kinds of patterns. Because your pattern might be that you stay too long. That might be someone's pattern from. From anxious attachment style. Right? They're just gonna. Very straightforwardly, I'm gonna put up with whatever because I'm afraid to be alone. But with Tara, she's asking, you know, what do you do when you recognize this pattern? And. And you're absolutely right. You just recognize it and you speak it. And that is truly a zero to one level of progress right there. Because once you could do that, and it doesn't actually, it's just so much easier said than done, like, because you can still. I'll still in my relationship have so much difficulty. Just.

I just.

It's just so easy to skip that part where you just. You just say, like, this is making me feel like this, instead of like, you're doing that, you know? And it's just like, if you can just find your pattern and just try. Just try to break it and keep. You can keep iterating that process of keeping, breaking your pattern, then I think you'll get. You'll get some growth.

That kind of openness also gives someone a chance to truly know you and understand you and not misinterpret you. Because when we. I don't think any of us truly realize the extent to which we are confusing. When we have extreme responses to things when either we get extremely angry or when we get extremely afraid and run away or extremely defensive or we go on the attack. I. I think we kind of intuitively think people understand more about where it's coming from with us than they do. So we forget that all they're seeing is a. It's. It's like the actors. All you're seeing is an angry. That's. That's all you're seeing in that moment. But you're not. You're not actually. And that person may go, you know. No, they must understand that it's coming from insecurity. But of course, people. People actually don't. They don't. There's a. You know, I've said before, there's that moment in Catch Me if youf can where DiCaprio Frank Abagnale Jr. Is speaking to the agent. I forget his name, but Tom Hanks is Hamrati Hanratty. Agent Hamratty. And he. He. He says to him, people only know what you tell them. And that line is so unbelievably true for relationships, is that when you tell someone, I'm afraid, it's like a pressure valve on the whole situation because someone goes, wait, what? And you go, I'm afraid. Afraid. And that's why I'm acting like this right now. It's like it lets all the air out of the balloon. And someone then goes, you're afraid. What are you afraid of? I'm afraid that you're gonna leave. And then someone's like, what? Wait, whoa. What? I'm gonna leave. And then. And it's like, now you have this. You have the real conversation that no one was having, but no one even knew. The other person didn't even know that there was this other conversation happening. They just know that you're angry, and then they're pissed at you for being angry or that you just left.

Yeah.

And then they're pissed at you for being stubborn. But they don't know. People don't know what you don't tell them. And so that kind of honesty is also a way of giving someone else a blueprint for your mind and who you are, which, granted, is a very vulnerable thing to do and can be dangerous, by the way, in the wrong hands, especially if we don't know how to have boundaries if things start really going south. But giving someone that access to our mind is also the only real it's the only way to have a real relationship. You don't have intimacy ultimately if you don't do that. And the price of admission for an amazing relationship is that kind of intimacy that comes from that kind of vulnerability. Wait before YouTube sends you down the rabbit hole of watching raccoon videos or videos of large crocodiles on Florida golf courses. I have something that will help your love life more than these things. And it's@whyhe's gone.com if you want to know why someone faded out, why they were giving you attention and all of a sudden they stopped. This guide shows you. Go to whyhe's gone.com and then enjoy your baby bear videos.