Labels vs. Attachment Styles — And Increasing Our Capacity for Empathy

“My boyfriend is a narcissist.”

“My mom’s borderline.”

 “She keeps gaslighting me!”

“Don’t you think everyone who voted for _____________ is a sociopath?”

“I’m convinced my dad is emotionally abusive.”

Labels. Session after session, conversation after conversation, I’m hearing people revert to labels.

On one hand, I’m glad we’re becoming more psychologically literate and more aware of the mental health challenges so many of us are dealing with.

On the other hand, I’m observing how common it’s become to use psychological labels to villainize people. I’m seeing how often we feel compelled to categorize people in terms of good and evil or right and wrong.

Believe me, I understand the temptation to use labels. They offer easy explanations. They give us comfort. They take away our blame. Sometimes, they free us from putting up with behavior that causes us pain. I get it.

However, as a therapist, and as someone who’s dedicated to helping build empathy, I think it’s more useful, and more emotionally restorative, to look at people through the lens of attachment styles.

What are attachment styles?

What do I mean when I refer to attachment styles? I could dedicate an entire post to attachment styles, attachment theory, and how to assess your own attachment style. There’s lots of information out there if you’d like to explore the topic more deeply.

But for the time being I just want to give you a basic idea of what attachment styles are and how they work.

Attachment styles represent what we learned to do in response to our unmet emotional needs as kids. There are 3 main categories:

·      Anxious types tend to fear uncertainty and have difficulty letting go when separating; no amount of affection/attention feels like enough.

Typical descriptors: ‘over-sensitive,’ clingy, needy, borderline, and/or dramatic

·      Avoidant types are often charismatic and fun but detached; when they show their love it feels like you’ve won the lottery, but it’s challenging for them to give when directly asked for anything.

Typical descriptors: narcissistic, arrogant, distant, ego-driven, unavailable, and/or flaky

·      Secure types can give and receive love; they believe both partners can get their needs met in relationships and are confident that relationships can survive disagreements.

Typical descriptors: warm, affectionate, generous, wholehearted, understanding, open-minded

What’s important to keep in mind here is that attachment styles are not a diagnosis. Though we usually have a dominant one, our attachment styles constantly fluctuate in response to different people and situations. They can also change over time.

In other words, we aren’t in any one attachment style 100% of the time. We all have moments when we’re anxious, or avoidant, or secure—or a combination of these.

We also have moments when we act out based on an attachment injury we experienced in the past. So does every person we interact with.

If we keep attachment injuries in mind, it can change the way we relate to the people in our lives. Instead of labeling them as narcissistic or needy or flaky, we can think about their behavior—and our responses to their behavior—in terms of attachment styles.

Let’s see how this works in practice.

Relating through attachment styles vs. labels: The example of Isaac and Jade

I have a client, let’s call him Isaac, who started dating Jade about six months ago. From the beginning, he’s been super excited about their relationship—and super conflicted.

“Sometimes I feel like she’s the perfect person for me,” he said. “Other times I’m not so sure. I feel like things are moving too slowly. I want to see her more, be in touch more. But the more I reach out, the more she seems to pull away. Is she just not that into me? Is she taking things slow because she has issues of her own?”

It might be tempting to jump to conclusions here. To label Isaac as needy or Jade as distant, maybe cold.

But when we revert to these types of labels, there’s little chance of redemption. There’s little space for empathy. There’s basically no room to strengthen and/or repair the relationship because we’re seeing things in black and white, without nuance, without compassion.

On the other hand, if we look at the people in this relationship through the lens of attachment styles, we have a place to go.

Even if we don’t know that Isaac was abandoned by his mom when he was a kid, and that his dad was emotionally unavailable, it’s safe to assume that Isaac’s behavior in the relationship is driven at least in part by an attachment injury.

When we look at things through that lens, it’s easier to understand why he might feel anxious and need reassurance in his relationship with Jade.

And what about Jade? Like Isaac, she was dealing with her own attachment injury—her distant relationship with her parents—which led to her developing an avoidant attachment style.

When Isaac considered her attachment injury, he could see how creating distance might make her feel safer in their relationship.

He could also see how he and Jade had opposite coping styles when they were scared, how he became more anxious and she more distant—and how their opposite coping styles led to misunderstandings and hurt.

Having this awareness didn’t just help Isaac see his relationship more clearly. It enabled him to develop compassion for himself and for Jade, and for how they both learned to cope as kids. It also gave him an opportunity to change his behavior.

Over time, as Isaac started to give Jade more space, it had a ripple effect on their relationship. As she sensed his compassion for her and his willingness to accept her for who she was, Jade began to seek him out more. Their connection grew, and their relationship continues to deepen.

Attachment styles as a tool for empathy

What’s our takeaway from Isaac and Jade’s experience? When we view ourselves and others through the lens of attachment styles, we have the power to change our state—and the state of others we care about.

Again, it can be comforting—and easy!—to use labels to categorize the people we interact with. But if we want to improve the quality of our relationships and build our empathy muscle, labels aren’t very helpful.

One of my goals, for myself, for my clients, for the wider world, is to be able to relate to ourselves and others with understanding and empathy. The more we can use attachment styles as a frame of reference in our relationships, the closer we’ll get to that goal.

Do you want to learn more about how to create great relationships in your life? In my book, Life Launch, I write about how to realign and release negative emotional patterns from childhood—and how to sustain healthy relationships in adulthood. Download a sample chapter here.