Attachment Versus Authenticity
- olivierbranford
- Jun 26, 2024
- 8 min read
Updated: Jan 28
This subject is totally key to your wellbeing and to understanding why you are not quite ok right now. Dr Gabor Maté, one of the world’s leading child development, childhood trauma, and addiction experts, explains the conflict between attachment and authenticity: When we are born, we have these two basic competing human needs. Attachment is contact, connection, and love. Without attachment, we do not survive.
As humans we are the least developed and least mature with the least developed brains when we are born and so we are the most dependent species for the longest period of any creature in the world. So, our attachment needs are enormous, and they remain important throughout lifetime because we must have attachments to form society and social groups, without which we don't survive. So, attachment is a huge need: We must connect, belong, be loved, and love, that's just a basic human need. Do you have unconditional love in your life?
But we have another need as well which is for authenticity. Authenticity is the capacity to know what we feel, to be in touch with our bodies, and to be able to express who we are, and to manifest who we are in our activities and in our relationships. Now, why is that? Well, think of a human being in an evolutionary period who's not in touch with their body and their gut feelings: How long do they survive out there in the wild? Not long. So, authenticity is another huge survival need.
Dr Gabor Maté
Dr Gabor Maté on authenticity versus attachment
What happens to a child where the attachment need is not compatible with the need for authenticity? In other words, we inevitably believe that “If I'm authentic my parents will reject me. If I feel what I feel, express what I feel, and insist on my own truth, my parents can't handle it” and parents convey those messages unconsciously all the time. Not because they mean to; not necessarily because they don't love the child; not because they're not trying to do their best, but because they themselves are suppressed, or traumatised or hurt or stressed. So, we convey that message many times to our children without any conscious desire to do so. In fact, it is the very opposite of what we wish to convey: That they're not acceptable the way they are with their emotions the way they are, but that's the message our children get. Most children get that in our society. What does the child do with that? “If I give up my attachment for the sake of authenticity, I lose my relationships on which my life depends”, therefore there's no question but what becomes suppressed is our authenticity or emotions and then we become adults and we don't know who we are or what we feel. If somebody asks us “What do you feel?” we have no idea. How many times have we all had the experience of having an inkling of a strong gut feeling which we ignore? By ignoring it we're going to get into trouble. Well that tells us what happened: What happened was that at some point we found out that it was too costly for our attachment relationships to be in touch our gut feelings. So, then it becomes not our first but our second nature to suppress our feelings; to lose touch with ourselves, and to suppress our gut feelings. Then we pay the cost later on in the form of addictions, mental illness, or any range of physical illnesses; but it all began with this tragic conflict that children should never be confronted with, but are all the time, between authenticity and on one hand, and attachment on the other. Even as adults, so many people are suffering because they want to be themselves but they are afraid to be because they know, or at least they fear, that they're going to lose important attachment relationships in their lives.
Maté believes that children learn at a young age that they are only lovable when they do things that meet their parents' approval. This leads to cutting off parts of themselves to receive the love he/she needs. “If the choice is between ‘hiding my feelings, even from myself, and getting the basic care I need’ and ‘being myself and going without,’” Maté writes, “I’m going to pick that first option every single time. Thus our real Selves are leveraged bit by bit in a tragic transaction where we secure our physical or emotional survival by relinquishing who we are and how we feel.”
Most people abandon their true selves (authenticity) to please others and keep the relationships (attachments), even if they are ones that are toxic and destructive. Maté believes that children learn at a young age that they are only lovable when they do things that meet their parents' approval. This leads to cutting off parts of themselves to receive the love he/she needs. “If the choice is between ‘hiding my feelings, even from myself, and getting the basic care I need’ and ‘being myself and going without,’” Maté writes, “I’m going to pick that first option every single time. Thus our real Selves are leveraged bit by bit in a tragic transaction where we secure our physical or emotional survival by relinquishing who we are and how we feel.” Some relationships pose the choice to compromise oneself to sustain connection or to remain true to one's Self. This dilemma frequently plagues troubled sibling or family relationships. Often, when siblings interact, they unconsciously regress into childhood roles. We remember our sisters and brothers as they were when they, or we, left the family home. We tend to 'freeze' our siblings as younger versions of themselves, and this makes the choice between attachment and authenticity especially complicated. It also explains the childish arguments at family reunions. When someone chooses attachment over authenticity, they're prioritising someone else’s opinion – and that person’s respect and acceptance - over their own opinion of themselves and their personal self-respect and self-acceptance.
Candace Plattor, a therapist in Vancouver who specialises in addiction problems, has written that Maté was correct in saying that most people choose attachment over authenticity. “I also believe that there comes a time for all of us who truly wish to be holistically healthy to choose authenticity over attachment,” Plattor writes. “Yes, it can be lonely at the beginning – but seriously, what could be lonelier than spending our lives wishing and hoping and scrounging for acceptance from others, only to lose ourselves in the process? For me, life is a lot more fun today – and a whole lot easier.”
This is why we wear masks, and masks can be deadly, instead of being vulnerable and authentic. So, now you know.
Marianna Jaross, a psychologist in Melbourne, Australia, suggests these steps toward becoming more authentic:
Consider your early relational experiences and how they shaped you.
Validate and explore your emotions, with particular awareness of bodily and emotional sensations.
Notice when you feel most 'you,' when you are engaged in activities that evoke curiosity, engagement, presence, and 'flow' states.
Ask yourself questions about yourself, as if you’re talking to someone you care about. For example: What do I like? What interests me? Write down your answers.
Consider whether you have fallen into the trap of over-giving or self-sacrificing in your relationships. Do you ask for support or seek help when you need it? Jaross points out that hyper-independence can be a learned defence mechanism to keep ourselves safe.
“Fun and ease,” Plattor states, "Are two clues that you’ve tuned into the authentic, whole, amazing you, and tuned out of the fearful, clinging little ‘false self’ seeking to attach itself to someone else for survival.”
Speak in such a way that others love to listen to you: Listen in such a way that others love to speak to you.
George Bernard Shaw wrote that “Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” Are you ready to change your mind?
Namaste.
Olly
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