Does Art Therapy Promote Healing for Cancer Patients?

Posted on June 23, 2017 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

by Kayla Blanche Tse, LMFT

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” — Rumi

What are the benefits of art therapy for healing cancer and chronic illnesses?

Cancer and chronic illnesses bring physical and emotional challenges that begin at diagnosis and continue throughout treatment and beyond. These life-challenging experiences bring forth a wide-range of fluctuating emotions. Common feelings are fear, anxiety, anger, hopelessness, grief, depression, loss-of-control, guilt, low self-esteem, and body-image issues. Such feelings are not easily expressed verbally. Art therapy is a non-verbal form of communication that accesses part of the brain not easily reached through talk therapy alone. It provides welcome expression and relief, while creating opportunities to process heavy emotions. Art Therapy is a a holistic approach to cancer care, treating the whole mind-body-spirit versus focusing on the emotional or physical symptoms. It is a welcome layer of emotional support, increasing hope and building self-esteem from the creative process itself.

What is art therapy?

During an art therapy session, art is created as a way to increase self-awareness and including a sense of control that is so quickly lost when facing a chronic illness. It allows the expression of complicated emotions. With the gentle support and guidance of an art therapist, one can develop effective ways to cope with symptoms, high-levels of stress, and opening the often feared discussion of life and our mortality.

How do I know if art therapy is right for me?

Art therapy is a safe and enjoyable way to relax and create hope. No art experience is needed since the creative process is ultimately the focus, not the finished art product. Art therapy is about the process of creative expression, processing emerging emotions with the art therapist, and the release of long-held feelings. These experiences with an art therapist influence the mind-body-spirit connection that is considered essential to healing and well-being during treatment.

What can I expect?

The art therapist works with you, suggesting an art therapy “directive” or instruction, that is suited to your situation, physical capabilities, and healing goals. The art therapist has intimate knowledge of how certain art materials are more appropriate for different situations and individuals. There is a wide array of artistic media, such as drawing, painting, magazine images collage, clay, or mixed-media.

What is Art Therapy and How Will It Help Me?

Posted on June 23, 2017 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

Contact me, if you are interested in working with a therapist who works with Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB) and Positive Psychology. I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to learn out how art therapy may benefit you and your loved ones. Call me at 323-920-9278 or 323-920-9ART.

Pushing Buttons — Untended Pain

Posted on April 5, 2015 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

Daily Om by Madisyn Taylor

When someone continues to open our old wounds on purpose, they must be told that their behavior is no longer welcome.

We all had our buttons pushed to the point where we feel we can’t take it any more, and chances are, we’ve all pushed somebody else’s buttons, with or without knowing it. The button pusher may not be conscious of what they’re doing, but in the end the buttons belong to us, and we are the ones who must deal with what comes up. The more we take responsibility for our own feelings and reactions, the less tender these buttons will be.

The importance of self-care.

We all had the experience of having someone snap at us, seemingly out of nowhere. This happens when we unconsciously push a button in someone else we didn’t even know was there. This can happen with a complete stranger and sometimes with a person we’ve known and been close to for years. We ourselves may have a relationship with someone whose buttons we secretly like to push. Buttons are just soft spots that have been touched one too many times, and they symbolize some pain that needs to be acknowledged and healed. This may be a wound from childhood, or some recent trauma, that we haven’t adequately tended. Whatever the case, when our buttons get pushed, the person who most needs our attention and caring is us, and blaming the button pusher only distracts us from finding a true resolution to our suffering.

Image from cyh.com

At the same time, if someone continually opens our wounds so that they never have time to heal, we are well within our rights to set a boundary with that person. Compulsive button pushers, who seem to find pleasure or satisfaction in hurting us, are not welcome in our personal space. In the end, knowing where our buttons are enables us to do the work necessary to heal. Freedom comes when we deal with the pain behind the button, thus disconnecting our automatic reaction to being pushed.

For more information visit dailyom.com

Contact me, if you are struggling with a relationship you feel “keeps pushing your buttons.” I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to discuss any questions you may have and to find out how I may benefit you as your therapist.

Bloom Where You Are Planted

Posted on February 12, 2015 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

February 11, 2015

Now Is the Time

by Madisyn Taylor

The time to blossom is now, not sometime in the future when you believe the stars will be aligned for you.

Having a vision for our future that differs from our current circumstances can be inspiring and exciting, but it can also keep us from fully committing to our present placement. We may become aware that this is happening when we notice our thoughts about the future distracting us from our participation in the moment. We may find upon searching our hearts that we are waiting for some future time or situation in order to self-actualize. This would be like a flower planted in North Dakota putting off blooming because it would prefer to do so in Illinois.

We have a habit of presenting life with a set of conditions—ifs and whens that must be fulfilled before we will say yes to the gift of our lives. Now is the time for each of us to bloom where we are planted, overriding our tendency to hold back. Now is the time to say yes, to be brave and commit fully to ourselves, because until we do no one else will. Now is the time to be vulnerable, unfolding delicately yet fully into the space in which we find ourselves.

There are no guarantees in this life, so when we hold back we do so at the risk of never fully blossoming. This present moment always offers us the ground in which we can take root and open our hearts now. What this means is that we live fully, wherever we are, not hesitating because conditions are not perfect, or we might end up moving, or we haven’t found our life partner.

This can be scary, because we might feel that we are giving up our cherished dreams if we do not agree to wait for them. But this notion that we have to hold back our life force now in order to find happiness later doesn’t really make sense. What might really be happening is that we are afraid to embrace this moment, and ourselves, just exactly as we are right now. This constitutes a tendency to hold back from fully loving ourselves, as we are, where we are.

For more information visit dailyom.com

This article is printed from DailyOM – Inspirational thoughts for a happy, healthy and fulfilling day.
Register for free at www.dailyom.com

Contact me, if you are interested in working with a therapist who works with Expressive Arts Therapy and Positive Psychology. I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to discuss any questions you may have and to find out how I may benefit you as your personal therapist. Call 323-920-9278.

Going Back By Going Within

Posted on November 8, 2014 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

From Daily Om- April 15, 2008

Healing Childhood Wounds

Events from childhood, our first experiences, have the power to shape our lives. Some do so immediately, offering us challenges to overcome and encouragement to make use of our talents and interests. In the process character is built, and we make the first steps upon our personal paths. Other events seem to lay dormant until adulthood, when our closest relationships help to bring out the deepest aspects of ourselves. This is when unexamined lessons can be put to use and untended childhood wounds make themselves known in a call for healing.

“…We have the power within us to heal ourselves at the deepest level. With the wisdom of an adult, we can be the loving parent or guardian we needed as a child.”

We may discover issues of trust coming up, or perhaps we find ourselves mirroring actions from our past instinctively. No matter the case, we have the power within us to heal ourselves at the deepest level. With the wisdom of an adult, we can be the loving parent or guardian we needed as a child. Knowing that we are each whole spiritual beings having a human experience, we can nurture ourselves from that wholeness, and then reach out to others as well. We can recreate scenarios in our mind’s eye, trying different outcomes and following them to their logical conclusions. In doing so, we may be able to imagine possible reasons a situation occurred as it did, and even accept that it could not have happened any other way. With the wisdom born from age and experience, we might be able to see events from a different perspective, bringing new understanding and freeing ourselves from any hold the past may have on us.

Life offers opportunities to clear these weeds in the gardens of our souls. However, when we want to focus on easier and more pleasant tasks, we are likely to pass up the chances, leaving the wounds to continue to drain our energy and resources for living life fully today. We might find we need support to face the events of the past, so turning to a trained professional who can offer tools for healing can be a valid choice. As long as we remember that the child we were lives on within us, we are always free to go back and right old wrongs, correct mistaken perceptions, heal wounds, forgive, and begin anew.

Source: http://www.dailyom.com/articles/2008/13454.html

I help people remember who they are on a Soul Level.

Contact me, if you are interested in working with a therapist trained in Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB) and Positive Psychology. I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to discuss any questions you may have and to find out how I may benefit you as your personal therapist.

Follow my blog and feel free to “Like It” and “Share it,” if you are interested in learning more about healing, psychology, mindfulness, and all things related to helping you feel good about yourself.

Are You Excited or Scared?

Posted on November 5, 2014 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

Translating Our Feelings

by Madisyn Taylor

Sometimes the feelings of being scared and excited can elicit the same physical response in our bodies.

When new challenges and opportunities show up in our lives, we may diagnose ourselves as feeling scared when what we really feel is excited. Often we have not been taught how to welcome the thrill of a new opportunity, and so we opt to back off, indulging our anxiety instead of awakening our courage. One way to inspire ourselves to embrace the opportunities that come our way is to look more deeply into our feelings and see that butterflies in our stomach or a rapidly beating heart are not necessarily a sign that we are afraid. Those very same feelings can be translated as excitement, curiosity, passion, and even love.

There is nothing wrong with being afraid as long as we do not let it stop us from doing the things that excite us. Most of us assume that brave people are fearless, but the truth is that they are simply more comfortable with fear because they face it on a regular basis. The more we do this, the more we feel excitement in the face of challenges rather than anxiety. The more we cultivate our ability to move forward instead of backing off, the more we trust ourselves to be able to handle the new opportunity, whether it’s a new job, an exciting move, or a relationship. When we feel our fear, we can remind ourselves that maybe we are actually just excited. We can assure ourselves that this opportunity has come our way because we are meant to take it.

Framing things just a little differently can dramatically shift our mental state from one of resistance to one of openness. We can practice this new way of seeing things by saying aloud: I am really excited about this job interview. I am really looking forward to going on a date with this amazing person. I am excited to have the opportunity to do something I have never done before. As we do this, we will feel our energy shift from fear, which paralyzes, to excitement, which empowers us to direct all that energy in the service of moving forward, growing, and learning.

Source: http://www.dailyom.com/articles/2014/45518.html

This article is printed from DailyOM – Inspirational thoughts for a happy, healthy and fulfilling day. Register for free at http://www.dailyom.com

Contact me, if you are interested in working with a therapist trained in Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB). I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to discuss any questions you may have and to find out how I may benefit you as your personal therapist.

Stop Comparing the Present with the Past

Posted on October 30, 2014 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

Written by Sara, from Institute of HeartMath. October 26, 2014

Stop Comparing the Present with the Past

I drove past a church the other day en route to Santa Cruz and the sign they had out front displayed this message: “Don’t dwell on the past because you’re not going back there.” That says it all to me. One of the hardest things for any of us not to do after a crisis or major change is to compare the way life was before with how it is now.

It’s perfectly okay and possibly necessary to do this comparing as we move through grief or deep loss. The time it takes to vent our anger and recover from despair can be different for all of us—and time can’t be forced because healing heartache doesn’t respond to schedules or agendas. Yet, in our own time, we will start to regain some stability and decide to move forward with our life. This was certainly true for me in a past crisis.

It’s a good idea to learn from history – we can get good perspectives about how to do better – and hindsight is 20/20, as they say. But if we dwell, we go around in circles and get caught in the snare of the past, we don’t focus on where we’re going and we can’t create the future we want. In fact, we may recreate what we don’t want. We stay in thought forms that are like carrying a heavy backpack of guilt, blame and other negative emotions. The past weighs a lot when there are unresolved issues and you’re the one paying that price.

When the present is more rewarding than the past, we don’t tend to hang out in the past, so creating more fulfillment in the present can help the healing. HeartMath founder Doc Childre told me how he did this. In a past personal crisis, eventually he realized that to move forward, he had to redirect his thoughts and feelings from the past situation that he couldn’t change in order to be at peace now and build the future. After an understandable period of grief, he started to realize that he was perpetuating deep pain and depression by constantly comparing now with the past. Often, his heart’s intuition would whisper: “Constantly comparing with the past is not helpful for you now. It’s time now to use that energy to move forward with your life.” It was hard at first, but being honest with himself, he knew it was time to take a responsible step towards reducing the emotional toll and inertia from dwelling in the past.

Below is a HeartMath practice that helped him. It is for after the first phase of our initial anger, grief or despair. No one would expect us to be able to stop comparing the past with the present during the first phase of sadness and despair. Be comfortable with your own timing, however long it takes you. Some people do not experience as much loss, pain or despair as others because their situation is different. For them, the first phase could be much shorter, so they may choose to use this practice earlier in their emotional recovery process.

With self-compassion and patience, make a genuine heart commitment to practice recognizing some of your thoughts and feelings of comparison with the past. As you become aware of these thought loops and feel your energy down-spiraling, then from your heart accept that it’s normal to have these thoughts and feelings. Yet, know that constant preoccupation with them can drain and depress your spirit, which you need at this time to re-stabilize and move forward.
Then, in an easygoing way without force, choose something to focus on that doesn’t cause as much pain and energy drain. It often helps to switch thoughts by changing what you are doing in the moment or changing the subject if you are rehashing the past with someone. You can also replace the thoughts with appreciation for someone you care about.

With practice, you will be able to recognize the thoughts and feelings and then just shift—to something that doesn’t bring you down and leave you with depressed feelings. When this is done from the heart, then you are not repressing feelings, you are transforming them.

HeartMath practices, such as the above, are used by mental health professionals to help people get their system into heart coherence, an optimal state in which the heart, mind and emotions are operating in-sync and balanced. As people activate their hearts to get in sync, they have more capacity to hear their intuition which helps guide them to shift perspectives, so forgiving and releasing the past become possible. Using HeartMath’s emWave® technology before talking about a problem can also help.

Some years ago, I went through a relationship breakup that I didn’t want. It was hard for me not to dwell on comparing every person I met thereafter with that man. It took me a long time to let go of that hurt and accept that maybe life had something else in store for me that would open those same heart feelings so I could feel fulfilled again. I felt like I would never have that great of a relationship experience again. I think a lot of people end up feeling this way. They assume the person they were in the relationship with is the only source of those good feelings they had. It’s helpful to realize that it’s not so much the person you’re enjoying but the feelings you experience that are fulfilling – and you can have those feelings by re-opening your heart with or without another person. This was a big life lesson for me: It’s the feelings in our heart that are opened by love. We can experience those feelings again, even when the one we loved who helped us open our heart is not present – our heart feelings are not dependent on one person. As long as we think so, we’re trapped.

With self-compassion and patience, you can emerge from the depths of challenging times, especially if you connect with the strength that comes from truly putting your heart into the intention to move forward. The first step to activating your heart is having compassion for yourself, which quickens recovery and re-stabilization. It’s important to come from the heart not just the mind to get the full physiological and emotional benefit. You may also need help to re-open your heart if the past you’re trying to release was traumatic. Be proactive: When you start creating the future, your mind starts to free up. And then you can move on.

Source: http://www.care2.com/greenliving/surefire-stress-relief-part-6-reduce-comparing-the-present-with-the-past.html

Note: For traumatic past events it is best to work with a professional therapist that can guide you through the process.

Understand more about Interpersonal Neurobiology with Dan Siegel

Posted on October 29, 2014 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

The Limbic System- where “Flight, Fight, Response” occurs

“Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB) is just a fancy way of saying that the brain is a social organ of the body… Relationships are our life’s blood, and this is what gives us resilience, not only as individuals, but as a collective community.” — by Dan Siegel

TEDxBlue – Daniel J. Siegel, M.D. – 10/18/09 (24:20)

Incredibly uplifting video on the possibilities of creating an integrated brain and how teaching mindsight and mindfulness as early as in preschool, has the potential for a kinder and more compassionate world.

Uploaded on Nov 12, 2009

Dr. Daniel Siegel explores the neural mechanisms beneath social and emotional intelligence and how these can be cultivated through reflective practices that focus on the inner nature of the mind.

Daniel is a child psychiatrist, educator, and author of Mindsight, The Mindful Brain, Parenting from the Inside Out, and The Developing Mind. He is the Founding Editor of the Norton Professional Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology, co-director of the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center, and executive director of the Mindsight Institute.

About TEDx, x=independently organize event
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-
organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience.
At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep
discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized
events are branded TEDx, where x=independently organized TED event.
The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but
individual TEDx events are self-organized.*
(*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

Dan Siegel, M.D. – Discussing the science of mindfulness (21:02)

Fantastic video and introduction into benefits of mindfulness to brain development, including children and adults.

Published on Apr 14, 2013

Room to Breathe is a surprising story of transformation as struggling kids in a San Francisco public middle school are introduced to the practice of mindfulness meditation.

Visit roomtobreathefilm.com for more information.

Dan Siegel – Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain (Family Action Network) (1:22:44)

http://youtu.be/kH-BO1rJXbQ

Published on Nov 16, 2013 (note video file size was too large to be uploaded here, please click on link above)

Siegel illuminates how brain development impacts teenagers’ behavior and relationships. Drawing on important new research in the field of interpersonal neurobiology, he explores exciting ways in which understanding how the teenage brain functions can help parents make what is in fact an incredibly positive period of growth, change, and experimentation in their children’s lives less lonely and distressing on both sides of the generational divide.

Find links to recent Dan Siegel’s books on my Resources page.

Follow my blog and feel free to share it, if you are interested in learning more about healing, psychology, mindfulness, and all things related to helping you feel good about yourself.

Happiness is… A Free 8-week Online Course on The Science of Happiness!

Posted on October 26, 2014 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

Join me as I embark on this free 8-week online course through The Greater Good Science Center in Berkeley! Sign-up here.

The Science of Happiness

Course Is Now Live! Take It at Your Own Pace Through May 2015

An unprecedented free online course exploring the roots of a happy, meaningful life. Co-taught by the GGSC’s Dacher Keltner and Emiliana Simon-Thomas. Up to 16 CE credit hours available.

We all want to be happy, and there are countless ideas about what happiness is and how we can get some. But not many of those ideas are based on science. That’s where this course comes in.

“The Science of Happiness” is a free, eight-week online course that explores the roots of a happy and meaningful life. Students will engage with some of the most provocative and practical lessons from this science, discovering how cutting-edge research can be applied to their own lives.

Created by UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, the course zeroes in on a fundamental finding from positive psychology: that happiness is inextricably linked to having strong social ties and contributing to something bigger than yourself—the greater good. Students will learn about the cross-disciplinary research supporting this view, spanning the fields of psychology, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and beyond.

What’s more, “The Science of Happiness” will offer students practical strategies for nurturing their own happiness. Research suggests that up to 40 percent of happiness depends on our habits and activities. So each week, students will learn a new research-tested practice that fosters social and emotional well-being—and the course will help them track their progress along the way.

The course will include:

Short videos featuring the co-instructors and guest lectures from top experts on the science of happiness;
Articles and other readings that make the science accessible and understandable to non-academics;
Weekly “happiness practices”—real-world exercises that students can try on their own, all based on research linking these practices to greater happiness;
Tests, quizzes, polls, and a weekly “emotion check-in” that help students gauge their happiness and track their progress over time;
Discussion boards where students can share ideas with one another and submit questions to their instructors.

Instructors Emiliana Simon-Thomas and Dacher Keltner

The course will be led by two celebrated teachers from the Greater Good Science Center: Emiliana Simon-Thomas, Ph.D., the GGSC’s science director, and GGSC founder Dacher Keltner, Ph.D., who is a psychology professor at UC Berkeley and author of the best-selling book Born to Be Good. It will also feature guest presentations by some of the world’s leading authorities on positive psychology, including Rick Hanson,Sonja Lyubomirsky, and Jon Kabat-Zinn.

Students will be able to proceed through this course at their own pace. However, students who participate between September 9 (the course’s launch date) and November 4 will have more opportunities to interact with instructors and fellow students. “The Science of Happiness” is a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), hosted on the edX platform, meaning that it will enroll students from all over the world. Though there are many opportunities for students to interact within the course, the opportunities for live interaction with the instructors are limited.

Interested in receiving continuing education units? Click here for more details about how you can receive 6 or 16 credit hours for taking “The Science of Happiness.”

Source: http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/news_events/event/the_science_of_happiness

Enjoy and May We All Be Happy and Free from Suffering!

Follow my blog and feel free to share it, if you are interested in learning more about healing, psychology, mindfulness, and all things related to helping you feel good about yourself.

Contact me, I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to discuss any questions you may have and to see if we may be a good therapeutic fit.

How to Stop Attachment Insecurity from Ruining Your Love Life

Posted on October 26, 2014 by Kayla Tse, LMFT

Take this 5-Minute Test and Find Out What’s Your Attachment Style

By Meghan Laslocky | February 13, 2014 |

Do you have commitment, trust, and attachment issues? Science helped Meghan Laslocky—and it just might help you, too.

Readers of my book on heartbreak often ask me what aspect of it had the most profound effect on me personally. My answer is always that becoming familiar with the ins and outs of attachment theory has, quite simply, changed my life.

Attachment theory was spawned by the work of John Bowlby, who was the first psychologist to put forth the idea that underpins much of today’s psychotherapy: that a child’s intimacy and sense of security with his or her primary caregiver plays a crucial role in how secure that child will be as an adult. Over time, psychologists have further refined this idea to argue that early childhood attachment patterns predict adult attachment styles in romantic relationships later in life.

While the exact terminology can vary depending upon which expert one consults, adult attachment styles generally come in four flavors:

Secure: “Being close is easy!”
Anxious-preoccupied: “I want to be emotionally intimate with people, but they don’t want to be with me!”
Dismissive-avoidant: “I’d rather not depend on others or have others depend on me!”
Fearful-avoidant: “I want to be close, but what if I get hurt?”

The last three of these fall into a mega-category known as “attachment insecurity.” The avoidance and anxiety that go along with most attachment insecurity are undoubtedly key themes that many of us in therapy wrestle with, week after week, and sometimes year after year.

I know I did.

Getting over it

I am, or at least was, a textbook, or perhaps even extreme, case of anxious and avoidant. For years, I was so crippled by fear of intimate relationships that I didn’t have anything even close to a boyfriend until I was 28. Even then, it took another eight years for me to pull off having a long-term, serious relationship, much as I wanted one.

There are a lot of things that explained this rather debilitating immaturity (depression, trauma, and a bevy of neuroses, not to mention misguided stubbornness and pride), but the only thing that explains how I got over it and ultimately became a wife and mother (and the author of an entire book on heartbreak) was the patience and care of a truly gifted therapist—that and medication that treated my depression and social anxiety.

And while I know I still have a long way to go—intimacy still be a battle for me, as those who are close to me will attest—just having acquainted myself with my attachment style and made the progress I’ve made thus far fortifies me for all the work I have yet to do.

But I also find it incredibly comforting that just as I was a textbook case for anxious and avoidant when it came to my intimate relationships, I’m now a textbook case for someone who has, more or less, gotten over it.

You see, research in attachment theory is pointing in a thrilling direction: that just because an individual is, as an adult, suffering from attachment issues that negatively affect their romantic relationships, that doesn’t mean they will forever.

Five ways to overcome attachment insecurity

If you think you’re insecurely attached, and it’s having a negative impact on your love life, here are a few common sense steps you can take to make the transition to secure attachment:

Get to know your attachment pattern by reading up on attachment theory. I don’t care if it’s through Wikipedia, an academic article like “Attachment Bonds in Romantic Relationships,” or immersion in a book like Attached, by Amir Levin and Rachel S.F. Heller, a psychiatrist and a neuroscientist respectively. Trust me: Knowledge is power.
If you don’t already have a great therapist with expertise in attachment theory, find one. It might even be worth asking if they’ve ever had a patient or client who they’ve seen make the leap from insecure to secure attachment in their adult romantic relationships.
Seek out partners with secure attachment styles. The last thing you need if you’re trying to overhaul your attachment style is to be undermined by someone who can’t support you. Research indicates that about 50 percent of adults are secure in their attachment style—pretty good odds for finding someone out there who rocks your world AND is secure. Studies suggest that a positive experience with a securely attached person can, in time, override your insecure impulses.
If you didn’t find such a partner, go to couples therapy. If you’re, say, anxious-preoccupied and you’re already in a loving relationship with, say, someone who is fearful-avoidant, I’d advise finding a couples therapist who can help both of you become more secure, together. Even if you feel like your relationship is going great, consider taking this step as a pre-emptive strike against trouble.
Practice. Pillow talk just isn’t your thing? Make yourself do it, even if you have to start by talking to a stuffed animal. Hate talking about the future of your relationship? Try talking about the next few months of your relationship if you can’t handle talking about the next few years.

It’s important to keep in mind as well that secure attachment in intimate relationships doesn’t just make those relationships more fulfilling; there’s evidence that it can make interactions with even those you’re not close with richer.

Research indicates that “boosting” one’s security in any fashion (“security priming” in psychology circles) makes people more generous and compassionate overall. This study by leading attachment researchers indicates that “the sense of attachment security, whether established in a person’s long-term relationship history or nudged upwards by subliminal or supraliminal priming, makes altruistic caregiving more likely.”

My sense is that for those attempting to upgrade their attachment style from insecure to secure, it is, as the saying goes, just like riding a bike: Once you’ve got it, you’ve got it. Over time you can still challenge yourself to become a “better biker”—a stronger one, a faster one, a more agile one—but once you’ve mastered looking ahead and pedaling at the same time, you are forever good to go.

About The Author

Meghan Laslocky is the author of the new book The Little Book of Heartbreak: Love Gone Wrong Through the Ages (Plume, 2012). She lives in Oakland and is a graduate of Middlebury College and the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.

Source: http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_stop_attachment_insecurity_from_ruining_your_love_life

Follow my blog and feel free to share it, if you are interested in learning more about healing, psychology, mindfulness, and all things related to helping you feel good about yourself.

Contact me, I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to discuss any questions you may have and to see if we may be a good fit.

Kayla Blanche Tse, LMFT

Trauma-Informed Art therapy & Psychotherapy, Certified Havening Techniques® Practitioner

Category Archives: My Approach

Does Art Therapy Promote Healing for Cancer Patients?

What is Art Therapy and How Will It Help Me?

Pushing Buttons — Untended Pain

Bloom Where You Are Planted

Now Is the Time

The time to blossom is now, not sometime in the future when you believe the stars will be aligned for you.

Going Back By Going Within

Are You Excited or Scared?

Stop Comparing the Present with the Past

Written by Sara, from Institute of HeartMath. October 26, 2014

Understand more about Interpersonal Neurobiology with Dan Siegel

TEDxBlue – Daniel J. Siegel, M.D. – 10/18/09 (24:20)

Dan Siegel, M.D. – Discussing the science of mindfulness (21:02)

Fantastic video and introduction into benefits of mindfulness to brain development, including children and adults.

Published on Apr 14, 2013

Room to Breathe is a surprising story of transformation as struggling kids in a San Francisco public middle school are introduced to the practice of mindfulness meditation.

Dan Siegel – Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain (Family Action Network) (1:22:44)