← Mental models for therapists
How a person learned to seek safety shows up most when the emotional stakes are highest, and what looks like a character flaw is often a learned alarm.
Their wordsAttachment patterns tend to show themselves where the risk feels greatest.
Mental modelThe pain beneath the symptom
Their wordsWhen you get angry fast, it usually is not because you are "too much." It is often because your nervous system learned to live on alert.
Mental modelThe pain beneath the symptom
Their wordsUnderneath anger is sadness over all your cumulative experiences in life of not being responded to, past and present. The sadness around powerlessness. Unresolved grief.
Mental modelsSecond-order thinking, The pursue-withdraw cycle
Their wordsBut avoidance does not actually resolve anything, so feelings build underneath the surface.
Mental modelThe pursue-withdraw cycle
Their wordsYou can protect yourself or you can work on being intimate, but you can't do both at the same time.
Mental modelThe pursue-withdraw cycle
Their wordsThey’re not fighting about the dishes. They never are.
Their wordsEFT’s attachment framework consistently provides the most precise clinical map for understanding what breaks and what repairs intimate bonds.
Their wordsromantic love is an attachment bond, much like we have with parents
Where this was said
Said 0:10:45 into the audio
Their wordsemotional isolation is inherently traumatizing in itself
Where this was said
Said 0:14:07 into the audio