Where it starts

I find Attachment Theory a helpful lens through which to look.  This is, after all, where we begin and the point from which our stories are developed.  

Attachment comes first.  As human beings, it is our primary instinct:  we prioritise it over everything else.  And this is where Bowlby disagreed with Freud...

I am, today, less concerned with the intellectual rift between these two mighty influential thinkers and far more interested in thinking with my clients about their attachment styles and how these play out in each and every one of their relationships.

  

Evolution has not reduced the power of the attachment instinct.  It is hard wired.  

An infant has an innate capacity to engage his or her caregivers through a range of behaviours designed to attract and elicit their vital attention.  This is how we boost our chances of survival.  

Attachment Theory provides a very comprehensive framework through which to explore and come to understand a wide variety of relational issues.  A history characterised by secure attachment provides an emotional backbone which some of us must work to stabilise and strengthen in later life.  Attachment informed therapy provides an opportunity for healing to take place and I seek to provide the secure stable base that may promote the likelihood of this reparative piece.  

Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, 

but anyone can start today and make a new ending.

Maria Robinson