CIIS Public Programs Podcast

TRANSCRIPT

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This is the CIIS Public Programs Podcast, featuring talks and conversations recorded live by California Institute of Integral Studies, a non-profit university located in San Francisco on unceded Ramaytush Ohlone Land. 

Did you know that attachment styles impact more than romantic relationships? As it turns out, most of us are thinking about Attachment Theory all wrong, and in her recent book, The New Rules of Attachment, triple board-certified clinical and forensic neuropsychologist Dr. Judy Ho provides clarity. Grounded in the science of attachment, Dr. Ho’s game-changing approach shows that our attachment style impacts every aspect of our lives. Moreover, we can all learn to become securely attached, no matter what attachment style we developed in childhood.

In this episode, Dr. Ho is joined by Kini Chang, Chair and Core Faculty at CIIS’ Counseling Psychology Program, Community Mental Health Concentration, for a conversation with Dr. Ho about her latest book and how to begin to develop unconditional self-love and a meaningful, joyful life. 

This episode was recorded during a live online event on April 17th, 2024. You can also watch it on the CIIS Public Programs YouTube channel. A transcript is available at ciispod.com. To find out more about CIIS and public programs like this one, visit our website ciis.edu and connect with us on social media @ciispubprograms.

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Dr. Kini Chang: Hi, Dr. Judy Ho. I've been dying to ask a couple of questions. I started reading this text and it's been so exciting. I feel like Stop Self-Sabotage and this book go so well together. And I'm sure that's sort of the way that you were thinking, maybe even a part two or an additional piece to what you've already started working on. And I think one of the first questions that comes to mind has to do with pop psychology, all the stuff on Instagram, all the things that people are attempting to learn about when it comes to attachment. And I think there's this feeling of, well, what's accurate? What's actually supportive to me understanding my attachment? And what's just out there that may not be beneficial or supportive to me? So I'm really curious for you, how do folks discern that?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah. I think that what we find in pop psychology, in online articles, is a huge focus of attachment on romantic relationships, which of course is a huge and important impact of attachment bonds and attachment theory. But it's a limiting way to look at it as well because attachment bonds affect not only your romantic relationships, they affect your friendships, they affect your collegial relationships, they affect your family relationships, both with your family of origin and with the new family that you adopt as you become older. It also affects how you go about your career, your drive, your motivation. It affects how you take care of yourself mentally and physically. And most of all, it affects the formation of your self concept.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. And talking about self concept, can you say a little bit more about the formation of self concept? Because I think there's kind of the previous school of thinking around attachment and they used to be like these four quadrants and your book specifically is titled, you know, the new way of thinking about this, right? And the approach to it. And I really wanted to get some sense from you about what are we talking about here? What is your book bringing to the surface for us that's maybe in addition to the four quadrants of attachment styles we're talking about and what's happening in this space?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, definitely. Well, I think that a lot of times when we're thinking about attachment, we think about these categories and obviously categories are helpful. They're valid to some degree and also as human beings, we're drawn to categorizing. It's kind of an easy way for us to try to understand what's going on. So we don't want to completely discount that that's obviously important. But at the same time, it can also be so limiting in terms of how we think about attachment because most people are a combination of styles as opposed to just one category. In my research and in my clinical work with patients, it's actually more common for people to show different spectrums of different attachment styles as opposed to just being in one category. Sometimes people will show insecure attachment at work, but they'll show secure attachment in their friendships and their family relationships. Or somebody might have a disorganized attachment style with romantic relationships and then at work, they might have an avoidant attachment style. So I see a lot of different combinations of different things. You could also be secure in a lot of domains of your life, but maybe in one or two domains, you have an insecure type. So that's one, I think, misunderstanding that people have about just these four attachment styles and how categorical one really should be. I also talk to people about this idea of insecure attachment, essentially showing yourself usually at the most inconvenient time. So if it's something that you're really used to doing, you feel really confident about probably operating pretty securely in those moments, but it's when a situation is novel. It's when a situation is challenging. That's when some of the shadows of your insecure attachment style might come back and produce negative thoughts and feelings and actions that don't move you toward the different goals that you have in your life. 

Dr. Kini Chang: That's super helpful. I think for folks tuning in, just really helping normalize that because there's this feeling of sometimes categorizing ourselves and we can also end up stigmatizing or self-blaming or other ways that we feel like there's something wrong with us, but actually it's really normal to even move between these areas and to have some space for that. I was thinking about how does somebody, then navigate what you just talked about? I feel really confident and I feel really good at work and I feel like I have it figured out and I can show up and then I feel like home life is a mess and it's not. You're fine. There's these juxtapositions about these areas of our lives and sometimes it can feel really difficult to navigate that. What is your thought or advice about how do you move through that and how do you navigate that?

Dr. Judy Ho: I think that there's also some messages out there that make it hard for people to feel like they can move through these patterns. I've seen a lot of literature essentially stating, well, this is how this attachment style shows up. Then it feels like it's stable, that it's permanent and that you're just going to try to find some way to struggle through it if you have this attachment style. I think it also sends that message too for people who are in relationship with you as a reading something if they think that they've identified your attachment style, like, okay, this person is anxiously attached. It's like a label and then they think that that's how you're always going to be in the relationship and here's the things that you have to sidestep, et cetera. I'm not saying that those things aren't helpful. I do think that the articles are trying to be helpful. It's like, let's understand ourselves, understand our partners, but I think that it does a disservice and that it makes it seem like, well, this is a label that you apply to this person and they're going to be like this all the time. I believe and I have seen attachment wounds be healed at all ages and stages of life. I've seen people deal with traumas from childhood, decades after the trauma happens into their sixties and seventies and be able to shift their attachment style even at that age. And so I think that that's the way you move through it is just to have hope that this is something that you can learn. You can learn to be securely attached. It's like a skill that you can adopt. So the first step of course is self-awareness, but the second step is really understanding that there is a path forward, that this isn't just an attachment style that you're quote unquote stuck with. If it's an insecure attachment style that's causing you pain and that, you know, just like everything else, you learn the coping strategies every once in a while, you might find yourself in a similarly challenging situation, but now you know the way forward. You've done it before. You can bring yourself back to that point of secure attachment again.

Dr. Kini Chang: It really makes me think about the beauty of neuroplasticity, right? And as someone who studies neurology and all of those other areas that are the neuroplasticity is happening literally until the moment we die. And so the possibility of being able to shift that with every synapse and every memory and every corrective emotional experience gives us the opportunity for moving towards secure attachment. I love that. You know, I think that gives me hope. And I think about my clients or people who struggle with that.

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah.

Dr. Kini Chang: There's something you talk about around being fiercely independent. And this stood out to me because I think about fierce independence as potentially sometimes a trauma response or a protective response or like a defended place that if I can't count on other people to take care of me, I have to make sure that I can do it for myself and I'm going to do everything in my power to do that. And I think in our society, some of that is even, you know, acknowledged, celebrated even like, oh, you can do it all. That's amazing. But there's a cost to that. And I just wanted to hear a little bit more about your thoughts about this.

Dr. Judy Ho: Well, I think that the fiercely independent style is one of the styles that I think people almost want to emulate. It's almost like a very egosynchronic style because some of the outward behaviors are so admirable. Like, wow, this person gets so much done. They're so self-sufficient. They never burden anybody with their problems. They've always got it figured out. And we're talking about the quintessential traits of the avoidantly attached person. And like you said, it is a coping strategy. It's actually a way of escape. And when it's overused, obviously it can create all kinds of things like loneliness and toxic workaholism and also this huge need to keep going achievement to achievement to validate yourself. And that can lead to an increased risk of burnout too, which then leads to increased risk of mental and physical symptoms. So I think that when we talk about this idea of the fiercely independent, how do we help that person be balanced? How do we help them be more interdependent so that we can actually work together and have room and space for that connection, but also still retain the part of you that is ambitious, that is motivated and does have independence? Because there are these upsides too, for each of the insecure attachment styles. It's just about this idea of leaning too much into one specific coping strategy to the point where it's not really serving you anymore.

Dr. Kini Chang: Right. Thank you so much for saying that, right? Because I think there is absolutely strengths in all of the areas. It's how do we be able to move through the nuances? And when I heard you share just this last bit around the fiercely independent, it made me think about that we don't actually have to deal with what's really going on inside and how that matches with avoidant piece. Because if we're on the next project, we're really busy, we're taking care of things, then we never really slow down or pay attention and notice what's really happening. And sometimes that's really scary when we have to look at ourselves in a real way and the silence can feel really loud sometimes.

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah. And I think that it's true for both, well, it's true for all of the insecure attachment styles, I think especially, but I can also see that being true for the anxiously attached person who basically will sometimes do the most unpleasant things for the people that are in their life just to avoid being alone. Like I've known anxiously attached people who are my friends and my colleagues and my patients who say, well, I don't want to be alone for any long period of time because I don't want to know what my mind is going to say to me. And so then they completely just fill their social calendar to the brim. And even when they're exhausted, it's like, well, I better go out with this person because one, I want them to like me and two, if I stay home all night, then that's going to be a huge problem because my mind might run away. And then I don't know what it's going to say about me or anything else that's going on in my life. So they use other people as a crutch for their coping, whereas people who have avoidant attachment, they use their work or achievements or individual goals as they're coping. And then for people who have disorganized attachment, it's really just this bouncing back and forth between feeling like they're in fight, flight or freeze. There's a lot of emotional dysregulation that can happen with that type. And it just doesn't feel like anything is stable. And at the same time, it's also how they cope because they've survived that before. And so they're almost looking in some ways, even if it's subconscious for chaos, so they can manage and they can say, Oh my gosh, my life is so crazy because it's the narrative that they know. And at least they've coped with it and they're still surviving. So then they've kind of fall to the familiar.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. I feel like this pattern is so common, especially growing up there being in dysfunctional relationships or family systems or traumatic relationships in the past that there's this comfort in the dysfunction, dysfunction. And so when things are going well, it can feel like boring or this piece around like peace and boredom and having difficulty discerning that. And so I wonder tying this with self-sabotaging, I wanted to actually loop that piece. And I know that was your previous book, but it's so related, right? But I think about when does the mechanism or the piece of self-sabotaging arise and how do you see it kind of get interwoven in these different kinds of attachment styles?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah. I think so much of it is about our negative self-talk, our inherent self-talk. Our self-talk is a quintessential part of being a human. We all talk to ourselves. It's kind of what's led us to the top of the food chain, but it also leads to the most stressful situations and the most painful emotions because just with self-talk, you can take yourself back to a previous time in the past that was really painful, or you can fast forward to a future that is catastrophic, even if it's never going to happen. And so I think self-sabotage occurs mostly because of our thought patterns. If we have certain belief systems about how the world works, how people are likely to respond to us, our capabilities to cope during stress, it's going to lead to essentially self-fulfilling prophecies through our feelings and our actions. And then those then feed back on your thought process. And then you're thinking, oh, okay, well this pretty much just confirms what I already know about the world. And then our minds are very selective in terms of how it takes an experience. And so it's going to remember these things that confirm these preexisting ideas about you that are negative, rather than seeing the information that might be disproving it and then saying, oh, maybe that means I have to change my worldview. I have to change my self-talk. We're less likely to do that unless we really take our thoughts out of that auto-focus and then really put it in manual for a while and learn a new strategy to have more balanced and more realistic thinking.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. It totally makes me think of confirmation bias, right? Like we can even find journal articles that might not even have the best data to confirm our belief about ourselves, because we hope that that will continue, even if it's not in our best interest sometimes. And that it's super normal, as human beings we do that. I was thinking about just the way that maybe if there was advice or thoughts about how to shift that, right? How to shift that pattern or how to shift that way of being. And of course we think about therapy as one, but how else would you say are ways that folks could shift that pattern?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah. So there's a lot of different ways to shift thought patterns. And the ones that I find that are the most helpful fall into three categories. The first category is questioning your thoughts. So many times we just take a thought as true and essentially we just kind of run with it. Like, okay, I thought it, so it's going to happen or it's already happened or it is happening right now. But thoughts are mental events. And I recently came across some really interesting research about how many thoughts we have in a day. So obviously this has been a question that's been asked so many times. And depending on the research methodology, there's people who say it's 5,000. There's people who say it's 60,000. I mean, it's pretty hard to measure, but more recently researchers at Queens University, Canada found this other way to measure thoughts. They actually measure them in terms of the number of consecutive thoughts that we have about a specific topic or a theme. They call these thought worms. So they could be like, you know, it could be hundreds of them, but they're all about kind of the same idea. And apparently the average person has 6,200 of these in a day. Wow. Yeah. So how, what are the chances? And remember these are thought worms, so they are consecutive thoughts. So it could be, a thought worm could be three thoughts, but it could be like a hundred thoughts. So we have 6,200 of these thought worms. And then if you really kind of break that down, how likely is it that all 6,200 thought worms are important? Just can't be, no way. But also how likely is it that these 6,200 thought worms are all true? Also unlikely. And then I think of another study that I read that was so fascinating, which is there was a study at Penn State University. They asked chronic worriers. So people who had a generalized anxiety diagnosis, they asked them, write down your worries every single day for 10 days. All of the worries, just write them for 10 days. And then they made these poor chronic worriers review these lists of worries every single day for 30 days to ask them how many of these actually came true. And what was so crazy is 91.4% of them were false alarms completely. Like no version of it, not even a shade of it became true in that time. So this tells us that we need to start to question our thoughts more, take an attitude of curiosity toward our thoughts. That's really my first tip is modifying thoughts first by just acknowledging that a lot of them might not be true. So question their validity. And an easy concrete way to do this is evidence for and evidence against. So Dr. Kini, you know this one, it's like for a lot of people, it's easy just to kind of like divide up a paper into two halves at the top, write down the negative thought you're having. And then one side would be evidence for, one side would be evidence against. It's almost like if you're in a trial in a courtroom and then just challenge yourself to actually write down observations. These are things that people could actually also observe, not just more thoughts that you have, but like if somebody else was in the room, they could be like, okay, yeah, that's true or that's false. And essentially write down everything that supports the thought being true and everything that supports the thought being false. Most people will find that there's usually something in each column. It's never absolutely always true or no exceptions. Right. And then so from this point, from that type of work, you can then move into modifying thoughts, which is my second category of techniques. And modifying thoughts is not just about this toxic positivity either, which is like, I'm going to say awesome affirmation, like everything's going to work out perfectly. Like, okay, well, that's also not very likely to be true, but it's about recognizing both sides. And so I like to use a yes, but formula. So yes, fill in with something that is true about what's going on that does suck, that isn't great. And then, but fill in with something that's going better, something that's in progress, something where you're taking agency through the problem, right? So yes, I didn't get that promotion this time, but I'm starting a certification class next month. And I think that's going to give me more opportunities, right? That's a way that you can modify your thoughts. So they're a little bit more balanced and accurate and complete. And then the third category is really just de-emphasizing the impact of negative thoughts. There's going to be some days where you're like, I've done all this stuff and the thought is still just with me. I just can't get rid of it. And it's affecting the way I feel and affecting how I act and how I work. So labeling is a page out of acceptance and commitment therapy. Essentially, you're just going to add a phrase in front of that negative thought to lessen its impact and its hold on you. So maybe if your thought is I'm never going to have a good relationship, adding the clause in front of it, I'm having the thought that I'm never going to have a good relationship. So now it's about the thought that you had. You are the one having the thought, you are not your thought too, right? It's not, you're not like identifying yourself with your thought. But secondly, it just creates that distance. Like I'm having the thought that I'm not going to have a good relationship. Doesn't mean that that's like a prophecy and it doesn't mean that it has to be true. There's a lot of different versions that you can do of this too, where you like write down the negative thought on a card and then put it in your pocket. And then like anytime you're tempted to think about the thoughts like, oh, don't worry, it's already in my pocket. Like it's there and I'm just going to move about my day. Or sometimes I just have people write the thought on a piece of paper and then just kind of hold the piece of paper. And you can see that there's an actual physical distance created in the sentence that you added so that the scary thought is now farther away from you and that you're really seeing the whole thing in context. And so there's a lot of different ways to kind of play around with that.

Dr. Kini Chang: When you're talking about this, one of the themes that comes up for me is that really around externalizing what it feels like, what's internalized as your voice or your reality. And even though it's true for you, the thought doesn't have to guide or make decisions for you. And that putting space between it gives you perspective so that you can actually choose probably more wisely or what's best for you or what feels more grounded.

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, exactly.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. 

Dr. Judy Ho: Exactly. And what you're talking about, I think is related to the concept of cognitive flexibility. Like just being able to apply what's needed in the moment as opposed to being in a fixed mindset, feeling like you're never going to find your way out of it. I think that a lot of times we're often likely to get stuck in those kinds of ideas. And then it does become a self-fulfilling prophecy. You do end up self-sabotaging because your feelings and your behaviors are going to try to stay consistent. It's that whole concept of cognitive dissonance. Like our minds do not like to be in dissonance. And so oddly, to actually make it in consonance, sometimes it actually veers towards making something negative. But as long as they match up, it actually calms your brain. It's like the weirdest thing that we do this to ourselves. But we also have to remember that it's kind of a survival strategy that works well that gets turned on its head. Because when things are dissonant, it makes you feel like you're supposed to be on alert. Like there's a fight or flight that gets ignited. And we're not really supposed to be in fight or flight so much. It's really only supposed to be very periodic and brief. Unfortunately with chronic stress now, it's like all the time. And it's not good for us. And so your mind is trying to find some way to get back to a norm. It's trying to get back to a baseline so that you don't feel like you're constantly running away from a bear when you're not. And so it's basically an evolutionary advantage that gets turned on its head and ends up not serving us, even though its design was to help us.

Dr. Kini Chang: Right. Right. And, you know, I think for folks to know and understand that that's also part of our reptilian brain, you know, it's, it's evolutionary there, it doesn't necessarily serve us the way it once did. And being again, with that being able to put some distance between that, just because my brain is telling me something doesn't necessarily mean it's true, which is a weird concept, I think, for some folks, right, where you're like, how can that not be true? I'm thinking it, I'm feeling it, I'm experiencing it, it must be true. And maybe it's not. Maybe it's not all the time.

Dr. Judy Ho: That's all we're asking you to do is like take an attitude of curiosity and just say, is it possible that it's not true? Is that a possibility? Like, let's just consider that possibility, you know? Yeah, you're just trying to use your critical thinking on your own thinking.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah.

Dr. Judy Ho: Just taking everything as truth, right? I mean, think about how you are in life, like, probably everybody here who's tuning in is a critical thinker. That's why you're interested in this discussion. That's why you're part of this process in this community. So if you would question that in your real life, why wouldn't you question it in your own mind? You know, it's kind of interesting how we just like take everything as is. But meanwhile, every time we read a news piece, we're like, are you sure like you want to open that news piece? You want to do like some doom scrolling or like, just go find articles into it and be like, is this actually true? How come we're not doing that with our own thoughts, right? We should at least ask the question.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah, that's a really good point. And I'm sure maybe hopefully from this conversation, some folks will begin to be able to do that for themselves. I was thinking a little bit more about codependency, actually, and just around how codependency shows up. And there's this idea that's come up around like codependency, meaning both parties are dependent on each other. And I just think that's a little bit of a false, not totally correct term that I think the word codependency can be confusing. And so I'm curious for just to kind of hear your perspective about like, well, what is codependency? And are there certain attachment types, insecure attachment types that have a tendency more so than the other to fall into this role?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, people who are anxiously attached tend to be more codependent. And it's because a lot of their self worth and their self esteem is derived from making other people happy. Because as a result of making other people happy, they themselves and feel validated and supported. And it's one of the ways in which they can actually garner safety from other people like, okay, this is the purpose that I'm serving. And if I keep serving this purpose, then you'll stay around me. And some of these lessons were learned in childhood. And they kind of carry through as an adult that you feel like you might not have worth if you don't take care of other people's needs before you. And over time, because you're you don't really let up that type of coping, you never also allow yourself the opportunity to assess whether or not that worldview is still holding true or not. I mean, it probably did hold true to some degree in your childhood when one of the primary caregivers are important adults in your life. But now you're an adult, now you're grown up. And now you're finding a different situation, a different environment with different people. So why do we keep applying the same worldview? Well, it's because again, our brain favoring shortcuts is like creating these rules at an early time when we're rapidly learning and discovering about the world. So these things do tend to stick with us longer than lessons that we might learn later on in life. But because of these patterns, and because also people who have anxious attachment probably do really like helping people, it does make them feel good. It's kind of those behaviors, one of those behaviors that's kind of hard to kick, kind of like we were talking about with avoidant attachment, like being this quintessential lone wolf and being this high achiever, those are admirable qualities. So it's kind of hard to let go of the whole thing, because they really do care about achievement, they really care about their careers, too. It's not just the coping strategy, it serves multiple purposes. And so I think codependency just tends to be the most common for anxious attachment, because they kind of have this need to rescue everybody in their life.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah, I could see that. And I could see how sometimes breaking that pattern can be really difficult because it's so connected to their identity. And it's what's given them a sense of purpose for some people as well. Like I've been the person since I was young, take care of my younger siblings. I was in emotional support with my mom and I was dealing with abuse. And so it's like a formulation of their identity and they can show up in adulthood as well. And so I just wonder about how to shift that without losing a part of who you are, or feeling like you're losing a part of who you are.

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, I think that that's a really good question. And it's all about still staying authentic, but finding a balance. And so recognizing, for example, that you do care about other people, you care about their well-being, but also just understanding that you're just as important as everyone else, number one. And number two, if you truly do like to give and help people, you also need to fill your tank every once in a while or else you're not going to have that capacity. And so really starting to see self-care as a necessity rather than just a luxury. And then secondly, how do we find a way to validate your worth without having it be dependent on what others are reacting to, what situation you find yourself in, how much validation you're getting from everyone, where's that internal place where you can validate yourself? And that all goes back to nurturing your inner child through your adult self and through reparenting strategies, which sounds like it could be something that feels like, oh, whoa, it's a little woo-woo. What do you mean by that? But it is so common for people to have that reaction. I totally understand it. But at the same time, nurturing your inner child is just like another conversation you have with yourself, which we have all the time as we've established, like we're always having self-talk. So you're just nurturing the part of yourself that has some unhealed wounds, but it's causing some problems today in your life.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. How do folks know whether it's their inner child talking to them or some other thought or like, how can you identify like, oh, my inner child is needing nurturing. That's what's showing up right now. How do they know?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah. I think part of understanding what your inner child is going through is noticing the things that are triggering you. I think once you notice that, and usually what does triggers do to people? Usually it means that you're going to overreact to something like, of course, you have the right to be annoyed at the situation, but why did you fly off the handle the way you did? Or somebody does something that feels like a total, very, very hurtful thing. And then you kind of generalize it to a lot of other things like, you're the same as so and so. It's like, okay, well, where did that come from? They're a different person. So you either have these overreactions or overgeneralizations, and that's when you know that there is something that was triggered. And usually the trigger relates back to a unmet need from when you were a child or like some wound or some pain or some trauma or a major stress that you haven't allowed yourself to process. And the inner child is a little bit more, I'll say, volatile, but I don't mean that in a negative way. I mean that they're just a little bit more impulsive like all children are. Their frontal lobes aren't formed when we're children. So you kind of just act on your feelings. And so that's why the overreaction, that's why the overgeneralization, because essentially that was a reaction from your child self. It's like, oh, I feel upset and I can't even control, I can't even manage that with my frontal lobe because it's such a deep wound that goes back to a time when my frontal lobe wasn't formed. And that's how you identify what your inner child still needs today. And then it's really just about once you find that way of identifying with them. And sometimes there's other things that you can do to identify with your inner child. Like sometimes people like to do visualization exercises where they try to imagine their inner child at a time where they had a particularly stressful experience and what that was like to try to bring out what was going on. Sometimes people write letters to their inner child or a letter from their inner child. Sometimes people look at photos of them as children to like try to recall stories. There's a lot of different ways to get in touch with that. But all of us have that metaphorical little us. And if you still don't believe me, then think about the last time that you regressed to a childhood activity when you got super stressed. Like we all do it sometimes. Maybe some people do it more than others, but you know, like the part of you that wants to play video games and not work on your project and the part of you that just wants to binge watch some TV show instead of getting to sleep early because you're kind of stressed out about a big day tomorrow at work. I mean, we all do that from time to time and that is your inner child crying out. Like, I need attention. I need you to look at what's going on.

Dr. Kini Chang: That's super helpful. And I think that gives people really specific examples about being able to identify because I think sometimes it feels confusing or like, how do I know what that is? And there actually are ways that you can begin to notice and you're sharing and maybe think of like when adults throw tantrums or like, or what looks like a tantrum, but it's like, well, that's actually your inner child screaming, like having an internal meltdown. Like, you know, it's like being a toddler again, right? Or it's like being a kid that didn't get something that they needed and it can actually show up as an adult. And we've seen that happen. And also the self inquiry is part of what I'm hearing, right? Like we're responsible for our own healing, but of course we're not responsible for what happened to us. And so sometimes there's that struggle I noticed for folks that are healing through attachment or attachment wounding, which is the displacement or the placement of the anger or the, and sometimes that's gone inward. Sometimes that's gone outward into their now partner, but it's really directed at their parents. And so this displacement, like how do we, how do people deal with this, the displacement and how do we affect that? Because we can see how that directly affects our intimate relationships, our friendships, our work relationships, like all of our relationships, right? But how do we address that displacement? Cause I think it happens to everyone at some point.

Dr. Judy Ho: Absolutely. And I think that as long as you kind of understand that, acknowledge where it's coming from, then you're also not going to be hiding certain parts of yourself because sometimes we have those overreactions like, Oh my gosh, that was so shameful. I can't believe I just screamed at my friend. Like it felt like it came out of nowhere. And then because you feel like you can't control it or you're embarrassed over the behavior, not only do you not get to the bottom of why that even happened, it also takes the power away of you being able to work on it and to actually do something positive about it. And then, so there's just like that until it happens again, you know, and we want to try to help people move through that so that they can say, okay, I know why that happened. There was a reason why that happened. Like, let's, again, let's get curious about this. Let's try to figure out like why that happened and what was driving that as opposed to, Oh my gosh, so shameful. I want to just pretend it didn't happen and just move on.

Dr. Kini Chang: I think about how important repair is, like how much more important it is than even the conflict itself. Cause I think about when we're, when we're kids, a lot of kids and there's an unmet need or the inner child and unmet need, it was also that they didn't receive the care or the comfort or the holding, whatever that repair is or was that even as adults that gets nearer, nearer to that, our experience gets re-triggered when that repair doesn't happen. And I've been doing a lot of the couples work and client work. I think about that a lot, like looking at the conflict, reflecting upon ourselves, but also how important that repair aspect is and how healing that part of it is.

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah. Yeah. And how, again, that you can repair like at any stage in your life. Like it's important to know that too. Like, well, I've been sitting with this idea for so long. Like, is it too late for me? And no, no, it's not too late. There's always a time to be able to make improvements and repair.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah, absolutely. I wanted to ask about this combination of a secure, securely attached individual or person in partnership, whether that's friendship or work relationship or romantic relationship with someone that has an insecure attachment, regardless of whichever one of those that may show up. And this experience that I often see like the secure attachment person trying to hold it down, like hold the relationship, regulate the person. And there's this emotional labor that ends up, I think, the person that's securely attached ends up carrying and they get really tired. Right? They get like relationship fatigue. Say a little bit about how to navigate those kinds of relationships when that shows up. Because I see like anxious and avoidant, you kind of have an idea about how that shows up. And let's just say because this is the in between, this is like nuanced. There's healthy aspects, there's aspects that aren't as healthy. Can you say a little bit about that combination of those combinations?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, definitely. You know, I think that so many of the times when somebody does maybe have a more secure attachment, they may feel like they have to shoulder the responsibility for their partner. Like, okay, well, they're, you know, at first, maybe they're even making excuses for them like, okay, it's okay. You know, they've gone through a lot in their life. There's a lot of trauma. And yeah, maybe it's my responsibility to show them that they are loved and they are cared for. But obviously, over time, it can cause a lot of exhaustion. And it's also not your job as a more securely attached person relationship to do the self-development work for your partner. That's why it's called self-development. It's about them wanting to do that too. But I think that the most important thing is to use active listening as a tool and just, you know, express your concerns in a straightforward way. Let the person, allow the person to react to it by summarizing or paraphrasing what they think they heard. So there's no miscommunications before moving on. And then just getting on the same page. Like don't insinuate that there's intention behind certain behaviors that they do, but just say this behavior that you do hurts me, or this behavior that you do frustrates me. And I'm trying to find a way forward. Can we kind of get on a team, get on the same page and like, let's brainstorm together, you know, invite them into the dialogue and act as a team. Because that's one of the things that I hear the most in couples work with my patients is like, I don't feel like we're on the same team anymore. And that's just big frustration that causes more and more separation. So if you can just kind of bring them back to that viewpoint of, you know, I'm not blaming you, you're not the problem, but like, this is hurting me or this is bothering me. Like, can we get on the same page as a team and solve this problem together? 

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah, yeah,

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. I see that a lot too, actually. Because when you're frustrated, and there's this part of you that wants to be right, that shows up, and you forget sometimes that like, Oh, this is my partner, like, we are on the same team. And I think that's why sometimes seeking space away to not be in each other's space, even for a moment, like, let's just take time and come back, right? So we can like reground and reorient ourselves in those moments. Because ultimately, I think it's the bid for connection, right? Like, we want to be, we feel disconnected, and we're trying to figure out how to connect and it can get turned into something challenging. And it makes me think about this segment and talk, I really love actually, your book has all these exercises. I love active books, because they really help us integrate and learn things in real time as concepts are coming in. And there's a segment you talk about types of intimacy, or like nourishing intimacy, they think about how to support clients or people in general on bringing them back to that sense of connection. And you talk about a couple forms of intimacy, which are physical intimacy, emotional intimacy, spiritual intimacy, intellectual intimacy, and experiential intimacy. And I don't know if most people think about intimacy as in like, wow, there's actually a lot of different forms of that. What do you find? Maybe it's like one of the more challenging areas and maybe people don't really think about  when they think about intimacy, and how to maybe bring that to the forefront of their mind. 

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, some little known facts about intimacy. I mean, you went through just those categories, which I think a lot of people are not acquainted with. They don't, you know, they mostly think about maybe emotional or sexual intimacy,

Dr. Kini Chang: Physical.

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, but they're not really thinking about these other forms. And like, physical intimacy doesn't just have to be sexual. There's like other forms of physical intimacy as well. So I think that that is definitely something that I think can help people just expand their minds about how much the different intimacies the different categories intimacy can do to help you with connection, not just with a romantic partner, but just with other people in your life. You may find that there's certain friends where you have an excellent experiential intimacy with you know, where you do lots of activities, that where you guys share that and you guys can kind of enjoy those memories. And maybe that isn't necessarily something that you do as much with your partner. And that doesn't necessarily mean that that your partner is wrong for you. I think that there's these ideas and maybe it's from Hollywood movies where it's like, Oh, you complete me. It's like, one person can't shoulder all of that. And that's not healthy. So I think it's okay to like, absolve your partner of that responsibility and also check your own expectations about what a great relationship means on the romantic side and just saying, well, sometimes one person just can't serve all my needs. So who else? Who else might I bond with? And we can talk about, for example, more creative pursuits, more intellectual pursuits. Maybe if we don't see totally idolized with my partner, they're like, there's a different way to nourish that. I also think that intimacy doesn't just come from happenstance. You have to nourish it consciously. And it is important in your relationships to identify, well, where are we lacking? And if it is an important dimension for our relationship to thrive, like what are some little small things I can do every day to nourish this specific form of intimacy?

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. Makes me also think about the intimacy and relationship in those categories to ourselves, right? And how do we nourish our own intellectual or emotional intimacy and the ways that we cultivate that so that we can show up for others and we can show up for ourselves in a way that's healthier, that's more self-expressed and that they're both the relationship. We often don't talk about the relationship to ourselves, which is bigger than self-care.

Dr. Judy Ho: Right.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah.

Dr. Judy Ho: Exactly. And I think that self-care, others care. I mean, it's also about like feeling integrated into a community, which is why nurturing all these different aspects of intimacy is so important. 

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah. Yeah. We definitely hear that. I know we talked about attachment styles, particularly secure, avoidant, and a little bit on disorganized and mostly anxious. A lot of times people talk about disorganized attachment being one of the most challenging areas. And I feel like there's some labeling of folks that are quote unquote, disorganized, disorganizedly attached and a lot of shame. And I'm wondering how can we help folks that maybe lean in these areas of a disorganized attachment have a little bit more grace and compassion for themselves and maybe for other people to elicit some compassion for who they are and maybe where they come from?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, definitely. I think the disorganized attach is the most misunderstood and secure attachment style of all. They first came to the fore from the original attachment studies research in the sixties and seventies because on the first research protocols, they couldn't really categorize them very well. It's like, well, this is the one that's like the catch all. We know that this is not secure attachment. We know it's a form of insecure attachment, but it doesn't fit as well into the anxious or the avoidant box. So we're just going to call these guys disorganized. Also, the term is pretty stigmatizing in itself, but you're disorganized. Yeah. And confusing. Yeah. But I think that over time it's become known for a couple of things that it's not like, oh, if you're disorganized, that just means that you're a combination of anxious and avoidant. I mean, if you're a combination of anxious avoidant, then that's what you are. Kind of like what we talked about earlier. That's your shame. That's the mix. That's not disorganized. So that's not quite right. And then the other piece is, okay, disorganized attachment is the one that has the most personality disorders. That's also not proven and also creates more stigma. And then another one that I hear oftentimes about disorganized attachment is that you just can't heal from it. It's too hard to heal from it. You're just going to be the worst kind of attachment style for life. And while it might take a little bit more extra work and you might even benefit from maybe having a professional help you through some of these issues, people with disorganized attachment can heal also. So I think that that's what's so difficult. But I do think that the more quintessential identifying characteristic of disorganized that people have missed out on before, it's just that they have the most difficulty emotionally regulating because they spend most of their lives in fight or flight response. And so it's really about calming their nervous system, helping them to achieve safety and to understand that chaos isn't how their life always has to look and that they have to learn to regulate their nervous system and to calm down during times of actual calm that this is not like a signal for something that might be horrible that might be happening next. That's what I hear a lot from my disorganized attachment patients. It's like, well, when things are too calm, I feel like something terrible is going to happen. And that's just because they haven't gotten a lot of that when they were younger. And so they don't really know how to deal with that stillness.

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah, it's really difficult to tolerate peace. And earlier I was talking about, I mentioned this bit around like the silence can feel so loud and I can see that internally and externally chaos has been the norm. So when it's not that, then what is it? What do I do with that? And it's scary. It's actually more scary to be in that peace than to be in the chaos. And I totally hear and see that. And I think it's wonderful to know it doesn't have to be like that. You can heal from that. It's totally possible. And you don't have to live like this forever. Sometimes we leave the late, the self labeling or the others creating the labels of them and to pigeonholing them. And it doesn't have to be like that, which is great. In your conclusion, we talk about the resilience self. And do you want to say a little bit more about what you mean by that or how that's bringing us home and thinking about the resilience of yourself?

Dr. Judy Ho: Yeah, definitely. I think that the most important thing to recognize about what secure attachment really means, and I say this actually in the essentially like the preamble of my book. It's like having secure attachment isn't going to just all of a sudden bring you a million friends, solve all of your problems and you're going to live a perfect life. Nobody can do that. You know, it's really about understanding that when you have secure attachment, you have more resilience. You believe in yourself, you believe in and you like yourself. You believe you can affect positive change. You believe you can handle what comes your way. And you believe that you can be independent and rely on others at the same time. Those are the four most common themes of self talk that I see with securely attached people. So does that mean that you'll never have problems? Of course not. Does that mean that you, you know, you're all of your problems all of a sudden go away? No. You know, does that mean all your wounds, your own wounds? Because secure attachment people also have wounds. Does it mean that those are all healed overnight? No. But does it mean that you believe that you have the capability to weather the storm when you have challenges? Yes, that's really the key. And I think that's why working towards resilience is so important. It's so interesting because I think so many people feel that resilience means that when there's a majorly stressful moment that they're just not stressed or something. It's like, no, no, they're stressed. But they just feel more confident that they have some kind of tool to manage the problem. Doesn't mean that they can solve it and get rid of it, but that they believe in their ability to manage it. And people with secure attachment just have more coping strategies at their disposal. They're more willing to try different coping. And they're also willing to essentially see the challenges in some ways, at least as a learning experience. Doesn't mean that you're always happy about them, but at least there's a part of you that says, okay, well, what can I learn from this situation? Like, how can I use this to be better?

Dr. Kini Chang: Yeah, like it's possible. Like the possibilities are there or a sense of hope. Earlier, you talked about cognitive flexibility and that secure attached folks have more cognitive flexibility. They're able to kind of move in those spaces a little bit better and emotionally regulate when things are rising. So to hear about a kind of building resilience, it sounds like there are some components such as increasing your ability to address emotional dysregulation. Is there other things that you think that would be helpful for those who are building resilience around things that they can address?

Dr. Judy Ho: Well, I think values-based work is always so important, which is like really asking yourself, what are the most important things in your life? What really matters to you? How do you want to be remembered when you're not on this earth anymore? How do you want people to talk about you when you're not in the room? What are those things that you can't check off, but should be the guiding compass of your life? And when you're able to get in touch with your values, I think that that also helps you to have psychological flexibility because it's like, okay, well, I'm suffering right now. I'm stressed right now. I'm anxious right now, but I know that community is important to me. So even though it's hard, I'm still going to show up at this event to see my friends because I made a commitment and I want to be there. It's essentially not making excuses to not do things that are important to you or to act in ways that would feel in concert to your values, even when you're going through moments of pain. It's like, no, but my life, it's important enough for me to keep moving forward in these value directions. I think that that's a huge part of cognitive flexibility and psychological flexibility.

Dr. Kini Chang: Awesome. Thank you. Thank you so much. It was so good to hang out with you and chat and really talk about these topics of attachment that are so essential, I think, to the human experience. So thanks for coming here and being our guest today.

Dr. Judy Ho: Thank you so much. I really enjoyed our conversation too. Appreciate you.

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Thank you for listening to the CIIS Public Programs Podcast. Our talks and conversations are presented live in San Francisco, California. We recognize that our university’s building in San Francisco occupies traditional, unceded Ramaytush Ohlone lands. If you are interested in learning more about native lands, languages, and territories, the website native-land.ca is a helpful resource for you to learn about and acknowledge the Indigenous land where you live.

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