Joe Davis – Announcer [00:00:00]:
The following content is not suitable for children.

George Faller [00:00:02]:
Let’s talk about attachment theory, baby. The bedrock that makes sense of everything we’re saying here.

Laurie Watson [00:00:09]:
We need to tell everybody about this big secret because it’s exactly what we need to be connected.

George Faller [00:00:16]:
That’s right.

Laurie Watson [00:00:19]:
Welcome to foreplay sex therapy. I’m Dr. Laurie Watson, your sex therapist.

George Faller [00:00:24]:
And I’m George Faller, a couple’s therapist.

Laurie Watson [00:00:26]:
We are here to talk about sex.

George Faller [00:00:28]:
Our mission is to help couples talk about sex in ways that incorporate their body, their mind, and their hearts.

Laurie Watson [00:00:36]:
And we have a little bit of fun doing it.

George Faller [00:00:38]:
Right, g listen, and let’s change some relationships.

Laurie Watson [00:00:42]:
This is the last chance you all to sign up for our class. Unleash the power of sex and EFT for therapists. We are doing this on January 19 and 20th.

George Faller [00:00:51]:
Come on, therapists. This is the front line. This is how we help couples in the area they need it most, and most of us don’t have the training we need. So every one of these trainings, we learn so much more. It feels like we’re pushing this model of sex and emotions and attachment in a direction of more safety and security.

Laurie Watson [00:01:09]:
Yeah. And we want to help you feel proficient, feel at ease talking about it. We’re going to go through anatomy and physiology, kind of talk about the basis for talking about the sexual cycle, how you do it, when you do it, going through EFT stages one and two. It’s going to be exciting and it’s going to be online so you don’t have to travel to do it. This is our winter class.

George Faller [00:01:33]:
Be there, be square, people.

Laurie Watson [00:01:35]:
January 19 and 20th, sign up on fourplacextherapy.com.

George Faller [00:01:39]:
So let’s do it. I mean, attachment theory, it sounds pretty simple. Most people think, yeah, I kind of get this stuff, but I’m not really sure that they do. I like that you use the word secret, Laurie, because it’s a well kept secret that we’re trying to make. Not a secret anymore.

Laurie Watson [00:01:55]:
And when you say it’s just people, I want to turn that off. Maybe theory is going to be boring until we see ourselves in it and then suddenly it becomes alive.

George Faller [00:02:06]:
That’s right. So let’s make it alive. What is this mean? Based on the work of John Balby.

Laurie Watson [00:02:13]:
Right.

George Faller [00:02:14]:
This is decades old. He actually wanted to call it a theory of love.

Laurie Watson [00:02:18]:
I like that.

George Faller [00:02:19]:
I know it would have made it simpler for people.

Laurie Watson [00:02:22]:
Okay, so let’s us call it. This is our title. Theory of love.

George Faller [00:02:26]:
Theory of love.

Laurie Watson [00:02:27]:
Theory of love.

George Faller [00:02:28]:
I love that it starts with the basic premise, like, why are we here? What’s the point of life? And it’s an important question, and lots of models and theorists answer it in different ways. Survival of the fittest, sexual gratification, bartering, compromise, avoiding death. Avoiding death. Id, the superego, all these kind of theories and the simplicity of attachment theory or theory of love is saying, we are here to be in relationship.

Laurie Watson [00:02:56]:
We are here to connect.

George Faller [00:02:57]:
We are here to connect. And we’ll talk in other episodes around the wellspring of research behind this. It seems like from the smallest of molecules to the biggest of galaxies, it’s all about relationship and connection and exchange happening. Why would we think we’re any different?

Laurie Watson [00:03:15]:
Yeah. And I think that’s what makes life so meaningful. Right. Is our connection to each other.

George Faller [00:03:20]:
Yeah. And I think we’re excited for 2024 that we’re going to take some time to really try to unpack this theory of love and this model that’s emotionally focused therapy that helps people put it into practice to connect, to repair. And we’re going to take a couple of months to just go through episode by episode, seeing how it unfolds.

Laurie Watson [00:03:42]:
So we are right now the college of love. We want you to follow us and learn about emotional connection and sexual eroticism so that you know how they interrelate and how to make it work in your relationship. So you’re successful.

George Faller [00:03:59]:
Exactly. So maybe you can call me Dr. Love.

Laurie Watson [00:04:04]:
You have been called Dr. Love in the past. Is that not true, Dr. Love? Was that not your fireman name? When they like, oh, come on.

George Faller [00:04:13]:
That’s right. Conversation at another day.

Laurie Watson [00:04:15]:
Come on.

George Faller [00:04:15]:
We got to leave our listeners hanging sometimes. So we really want to take this theory, help you understand kind of where we’re coming from and how we help couples have new conversations. Then to do that, this theory is trying to answer those questions, why are we here? Right. Basic, foremost instinct is to be in relationship. It’s not aggression. It’s not all these other things. It is to be in connection. So how do you put on these attachment lenses? I guess that’s what we’re wanting listeners to think about.

George Faller [00:04:51]:
Like, can you put on these glasses with us to help make sense of what’s out there in the world. Right. Because there’s so many interpretations. It’s easy to get confused.

Laurie Watson [00:05:00]:
It is easy to get confused. And I think that once you see this, it organizes the way we relate to each other. We understand each other. So the College of Love, George, is how we’re going to help people in 2024, basically find the deepest security with their partner, both emotionally and sexually. Right.

George Faller [00:05:22]:
And to hit that target, we have to embrace, because there’s a lot of pathologizing of this need to connect. Right? It calls it weakness, the dependence and.

Laurie Watson [00:05:32]:
Just to recognize codependence.

George Faller [00:05:33]:
This is our greatest strength. This is what separates us from so many other species like this need to work together, to be in relationship, to look at your relationship without taking that into consideration, it’s like looking at a fish out of water. I mean, this is it. This is what we’re all doing in different forms. So how do we start to. Kind of don’t have to defend that to start recognizing, hey, wait a second. This is our strength.

Laurie Watson [00:06:02]:
We’re stronger together.

George Faller [00:06:04]:
We’re stronger together. And the research in every separate discipline is saying exactly the same thing.

Laurie Watson [00:06:10]:
There’s this saying that says, if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. And this is a long life, a long partnership. People ask me, why should I marry? Why should I commit? Why should I be with somebody when there’s so much pain and there’s so many problems and the divorce rate is so high, why would I take that risk? And it’s because we have a long life, and being partnered is the way we make it, the way life becomes more satisfying.

George Faller [00:06:41]:
And if you have this theory of love, things start to make sense.

Laurie Watson [00:06:45]:
Yes.

George Faller [00:06:46]:
Like you said, we’re looking for these patterns, which we’ll talk a lot about. But I like to start off with, it gives you a really clear model of what health looks like. Okay, what do couples in a securely attached relationship look like?

Laurie Watson [00:07:00]:
Right.

George Faller [00:07:00]:
What do they do?

Laurie Watson [00:07:02]:
Yeah. So two things. They feel really comfortable putting their needs out there. It’s okay to have needs. They know that their partner is going to want to know their needs. And then the other part of it is couples are responsive to each other. I say to my husband, look at the cardinal out there, and he looks up from his computer, and he looks at the cardinal, and for one tiny moment, we share this, like, wow, isn’t nature beautiful? Isn’t it awesome to see these cardinals at our feeder? It’s no big deal. But when he does that, we’re sharing this tiny little moment.

Laurie Watson [00:07:37]:
We’re connecting. And that responsiveness over time, multiplied by the thousands of times that I interrupt him on his, you know, tells me I’m important and tells me that we’re connecting.

George Faller [00:07:53]:
Sue Johnson, who is our mentor, the founder of emotionally focused therapy. She talks, she says, in its simplicity. All of us are looking for are conversations a is my partner accessible? R will my partner respond? E will that response be emotionally engaged? This is the heartbeat of attachment, and most of us never talk about it.

Laurie Watson [00:08:18]:
Yeah. So accessibility, we know, basically, sexually or emotionally, when we reach for our partner, they’re going to be there. Maybe it’s not always in the mood, but when I say to my partner, hey.

George Faller [00:08:33]:
Hey.

Laurie Watson [00:08:33]:
I was thinking about going out tonight. He’s going to say, I’m going to make some space for that. I got to get through all this work, but 07:00 let’s go downstairs and have wine and a fire and connect a little bit and put that on the table or on the couch or the floor or whatever.

George Faller [00:08:53]:
We all have fights and misses, and we’ll talk about what happens when a relationship is threatened. But I was thinking about this this morning, and both my parents are gone. And they had their issues and lots of fighting and craziness, and they came up short in a lot of areas. Irish and italian, I knew, and I still know that from them that I was loved. Right. That’s that sense of security that I still carry with me today.

Laurie Watson [00:09:19]:
That’s awesome.

George Faller [00:09:20]:
To know both of them, if I needed them, were there. So those are e conversation. It’s a true gift, right? It’s not a gift that you just get in that moment. That’s what attachment is. It’s something you carry with you forever. When you have this memory of being seen, of being wanted, of being liked, of being loved. Those are these basic attachment needs that we all have to be seen to be safe, to be heard. I mean, this is what’s driving the ship.

Laurie Watson [00:09:47]:
You told me a story once about your mom that you knew she was always praying for you. And I think that it’s like you knew she was thinking about you, caring about you, loving you, even from afar, even as you were a grown up man, far away. It was like you had this deep sense of, mom is holding me in her heart.

George Faller [00:10:09]:
Yes.

Laurie Watson [00:10:10]:
And that’s what we want from our partners, too. When we’re gone, when we’re at work, when we’re traveling, we want to know that our partner thinks of us, remembers us, holds us in their heart. When we’re worried and troubled, it matters to our partner. When we’re angry, even when we’re angry about our relationship, it matters to our partner.

George Faller [00:10:32]:
Exactly. And that’s why attachment theory says these needs are from your cradle to death. And a lot of us believe beyond that. Right? You’re never too young or too old to be wanted, to feel safe, to be loved.

Laurie Watson [00:10:47]:
I want to say something about that. I think many people feel that about God, right? That there is a greater father presence. Maybe it’s a universal force that is good and loving to them and that stabilizes them.

George Faller [00:11:04]:
It’s good news when science and faith or religion is saying the same message, right? We’re designed to be part of something bigger than just ourselves. And when you start to recognize that’s what’s driving it, it also makes sense what happens when that’s threatened, what happens when the relationship isn’t where it needs to be. Humans have very simple ways of protecting themselves when threatened. We’re going to fall into a fight or flight response. We’re either going to protest and say, hey, I don’t like this. You’re not listening to me. I’m going to shake you to get me to listen or I’m going to just try to turn down the heat, walk away and not let it bug me. We all do, some of both.

George Faller [00:11:46]:
But helping partners understand, like what are you doing when you’re threatened? Really important if we’re going to do it differently, right.

Laurie Watson [00:11:54]:
And I think especially the one who turns it down and walks away sometimes is not quite as aware that they’re doing something. It almost looks like their partner is the angry, critical one coming at them. And if they would just be happy, life would be good. I’m not really doing anything and in some ways they’re not doing anything. And that’s the problem. It’s like they don’t want to look at problems. Right. They don’t want to see those because it disturbs them.

George Faller [00:12:28]:
Exactly.

Laurie Watson [00:12:28]:
And so they have learned survival is don’t look, don’t get involved in all that. Let’s just keep it mellow.

George Faller [00:12:38]:
A basic premise of attachment theory is trying to help couples expand their frame to see circularity. Most people see linearly. Like, the problem is I’m angry because you never listen and you walk away. I don’t see the reason why you walk away is because I’m angry. Right. That’s seeing a relationship.

Laurie Watson [00:12:56]:
Right.

George Faller [00:12:56]:
Attachment theory is always trying to expand to help people see the relationship instead of just the tunnel vision of their own kind of limited experience when they’re threatened.

Laurie Watson [00:13:06]:
Right.

George Faller [00:13:06]:
That’s a big shift.

Laurie Watson [00:13:08]:
That’s a big shift.

George Faller [00:13:09]:
It’s a big shift.

Laurie Watson [00:13:10]:
And I think that as couples, so much of the time we can see the other, we can see what the other is doing and not doing. It’s very hard to see what we are doing and even to wonder why we’re doing that, and that’s where attachment theory comes in, is the why.

George Faller [00:13:28]:
Exactly.

Laurie Watson [00:13:32]:
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George Faller [00:17:32]:
So I like attachment theory is I want to take these lenses and put them on so I can understand all the crazy behavior. You know, couples fight over sex, money, kids, a million different things. That’s the noise of the content that they come in with. But if you put on your attachment lens, you could see the themes in that content. You start seeing the same thing. So I want you all to remember the acronym oil. It’s just a simple way of what are we looking for with our attachment lens? O is the other. We tend to focus on the other person when we’re in defensive states.

George Faller [00:18:07]:
When I’m angry, I want my partner to listen. When I’m walking away, I want to get away from my partner because my partner is too critical. Right. So that’s where we tend to start, in these defensive places of protest, of withdrawal, of anger. And that’s mostly focusing on the other person. Right. The only reason we’re doing that is underneath that other. If you go to the eye, the inside, this is where the vulnerability is.

George Faller [00:18:32]:
This is where the fear is, the hurt. I’m failing. I’m being rejected. Like, this is the heart. This is why we’re threatened. But a lot of times, partners never talk about the inside because they’re focusing on the outside.

Laurie Watson [00:18:45]:
Right. So we see the behavior of our partner, which drives us crazy. But it’s easier to maybe just be angry or just to shut down.

George Faller [00:18:54]:
Exactly.

Laurie Watson [00:18:54]:
Than it is to start to feel all these things that come up inside of us. Like, maybe my partner doesn’t love me. Maybe I’m unworthy myself, maybe I’m unlovable. Maybe nobody’s going to love me. All of these things we kind of defend against this inner turmoil by keeping our focus on the other and not on the I, which is what’s happening in I. In me.

George Faller [00:19:17]:
Yeah. And there’s safety in going away. There’s safety in anger. Right. It gives us a sense of control, but it focuses the problem on the other person, and it doesn’t include the material we need for better conversations, which is really this view of self, these kind of more vulnerable places.

Laurie Watson [00:19:33]:
Yeah. And what’s the l?

George Faller [00:19:35]:
The l is. And this is the good news of attachment. When you understand connection is every fear and hurt or. Ouch. The l is, it has a longing. It has a need to help it. Like when a baby cries, the longing is pick me up. If my partner is criticizing me, the longer is, hey, can you tell me I’m doing it right? What is the longing? That’s the answer to the attachment dilemma.

George Faller [00:19:58]:
If we can just get people to get those longings met, that is attachment work. And that’s how people develop secure attachment. This is why I felt like all these years later, I still hold on to my parents love because I was able to get those longings met. I needed them to believe in me. They did. I needed their love. They gave it to me.

Laurie Watson [00:20:16]:
Right.

George Faller [00:20:17]:
Longings met is the whole damn point.

Laurie Watson [00:20:20]:
Yeah. As I hear that. Right. You came from this, in part, emotionally secure place with your parents, and that’s lasted your whole life. You probably think you’re pretty lovable. You think you’re a nice guy, you think you got riz on. No, but I mean, it does give you self confidence because that’s the mold that they helped kind of shape you into as a child and now in your adulthood. Wow.

Laurie Watson [00:20:49]:
And securely attached people from childhood, George, they have better relationships, they make more money. Yeah. If you were to get sick, you would feel less pain than somebody who came from an insecurely attached background. I mean, what a gift.

George Faller [00:21:05]:
But let’s talk about those insecure attachment styles, because even in my family that has eight kids, not all of us are secure same parents, but we all have our own temperament, our own genetic. There’s a lot of influencing factors here, but basically, if you can’t get your attachment needs directly in a safe way, you’re going to protect yourself. So you want to tell us, Laurie, about those two insecure attachments, anxious and avoidant styles?

Laurie Watson [00:21:31]:
Yeah. So, anxiously attached people basically kind of feel a frenetic part inside that says, I’m not going to get my needs met. Maybe I’m not lovable because my parents, for whatever reasons, kind of gave me attention intermittently. Sometimes they might have been there for me, but they might have been too much, they might have been overprotective, or they might have not been there enough. And I can’t figure out what is supposed to happen between me and my parents. And so what do I do as a child? I develop a strategy. I learn that if I pester them, eventually they will pay attention to me. And so what I do is I pester.

Laurie Watson [00:22:15]:
And it’s like, any way I can get it right. We’ve all heard that about children. Any attention is even bad attention is better than no attention. And so as an anxiously attached child, I’m going to keep going. I’m going to say, look at, pay attention. If you don’t pay attention to this, I’ll act out. I’ll do something naughty to get your attention.

George Faller [00:22:35]:
Trying to influence the outcome. Yes.

Laurie Watson [00:22:37]:
Right.

George Faller [00:22:38]:
Beautiful.

Laurie Watson [00:22:38]:
Because I want my parents to notice me. I want them to love me. I want them to pay attention to me.

George Faller [00:22:44]:
Yeah. And when the responsiveness is inconsistent, it leaves that nervous system in an anxious state over time. Right. This isn’t a choice. This is just what happens in the environment that we’re in.

Laurie Watson [00:22:55]:
Right.

George Faller [00:22:55]:
And the flip side of that is.

Laurie Watson [00:22:57]:
And avoidantly attached people. Right. Oftentimes it’s not coming your way ever. And so the child learns that being good, being quiet, baby sort of not making a demand is the best way to maybe get your parent to sidle up next to you and give you a little attention. Because they know if they make a demand, their parent is going to flee, going to be overwhelmed, forget it, they’re going to go away. So they learn that very early, even in infancy, they learn that, yes. And so they gurgle and coup, but they don’t make the fuss. The anxious, attached baby crying all the time, but the avoidantly attached child learns quickly.

Laurie Watson [00:23:41]:
No, it’s only if I don’t make a fuss that I’ll get my needs met. Sometimes too, in avoidantly attached children. It’s like it’s not safe. Maybe the parent is too angry or is too volatile of a situation and so they really want to keep it closed.

George Faller [00:24:00]:
We’re looking the natural best way of getting responded to is co regulation, getting another nervous system to join you to regulate that anxiety. That’s what securely attached kids can do. If you don’t get it, you either continue to fight for it or you learn to self regulate. You know, you learn to pull away. I love the strange situation experiment. People can look at this at YouTube, but you can see these attachment styles with a kid. A kid is in a room early on playing in the corner and a stranger comes in and you just see how they respond to that stranger and anxiously. A kid runs to the parent and clings and never goes back to play and their nervous system stays in the anxiety.

George Faller [00:24:37]:
An avoidantly attached kid keeps playing, doesn’t even look for help. They’ve gotten so used to dealing with this on their own, they don’t even listen to the anxiety and go for help, which is pretty tragic if you think about it. A securely attached kid goes to the parent because they’re anxious, gets reassured and goes back to playing. Right? They can go into the world. That’s that security that we’re trying to get all couples to be able to create. The good news is, whatever your style is, it can change. It’s not permanent in your relationship. You could learn to do what it takes to get your body in that safer, securely attached style.

Laurie Watson [00:25:11]:
This is the college of love that we really want to help people with this theory of love so that they can have that sense of I can go home, get the comfort I need from my partner, and I can go out again, I can go play, I can do the work that I’m called to do in this world, I can have my purpose and I can have my home, I can have both of them. And feel secure in both places.

George Faller [00:25:37]:
And how grounding is for a couple to be able to recognize. There is a map on how to get to what is the problem in the first place. These defensive strategies where people are sending mixed signals, like, I’m angry at you and you’re walking away. And it happens so fast that people fall into these patterns that they can’t come back together. The distance starts to increase, and that’s the problem. But more importantly, the solution is a couple being able to repair, being able to have these conversations, go to the longings and ask for help. Hey, when you criticize me, I feel like I’m failing. And I deal with that by going away.

George Faller [00:26:16]:
And if you could tell me it’s okay or I’m doing something right that makes me want to stay engaged, that’s the longing inside of it, right? Or what about you? When I walk away?

Laurie Watson [00:26:26]:
Yeah, when you walk away, it’s pretty terrible for me. It says, you don’t care about me, you don’t love me, you don’t want to be engaged with me. And so it’s like I go into a despairing place, which, of course, makes me want to go again. It’s actually a hopeful little piece that says, go again. The problem with the anxiety is that it’s always with me. It still lives in me until we reach that security, which when we reach security, we don’t have to feel as anxious. I don’t know about you, George, but I have relationships and friendships in my life that I’m rock solid with. I don’t second guess myself.

Laurie Watson [00:27:06]:
I don’t overthink it. Like my bestie, I can say anything in the world to her. She knows where all the bodies are buried and loves me anyway and cares about me. And if I have to be short with her or if I have to be demanding. She was at work the other day and I had something to tell her. And I just, like I asked, I need five minutes. And then I basically took eight minutes and she had to say, I got to go back to work. I didn’t get my feelings hurt, and I wasn’t too much for her, even though she had told me I got five and I took eight.

Laurie Watson [00:27:39]:
It was like it was okay. Neither one of us was too pushed or too hurt. And that’s just a micro sort of example. But insecure attachment, when we are secure with somebody, you almost can’t do it wrong.

George Faller [00:27:53]:
So when you’re not, if you would take it personal, that longing inside you would be. For what? And the anxiety?

Laurie Watson [00:28:00]:
Yeah, the longing inside would be for to know, to deeply know that I’m important, that my partner thinks about me, cares about the things that I care about, cares about the problems between us. Yeah.

George Faller [00:28:16]:
And this is where we need love the most. It’s in these insecure places when we feel like we’re failing or letting our partner down, or maybe our partner doesn’t want us because we’re not smart enough or pretty enough. These are the places people need to learn to. Yeah, because this is where we need help the most. And what most partners are not getting it worse. They get their partner’s defenses in this place. So when you don’t get lost in the noise and you go to this college of love, we’re here to help you make sense. This is predictable.

George Faller [00:28:47]:
What works is predictable. What doesn’t work is predictable. And as couples start to learn that, they get empowered, they start to know what they need to do to actually get the safety and security that they and their partner deserve.

Laurie Watson [00:29:00]:
Exactly. And we can solve patterns.

George Faller [00:29:02]:
Yes.

Laurie Watson [00:29:03]:
As human beings, it’s much easier to solve patterns. And that’s what we want to show you. We want to help you with the template of what is happening inside you, what is happening inside your partner, why they have these tendencies. I think it gives us so much mercy for both ourselves and for our partner. It’s like, oh, that’s why you do that. Oh, and that’s why I do that. And that’s why I feel that. And that’s why you feel that.

Laurie Watson [00:29:25]:
And it becomes understandable. It makes sense.

George Faller [00:29:28]:
It’s a beautiful thing, isn’t it?

Laurie Watson [00:29:30]:
Yes. Okay, thanks for listening.

George Faller [00:29:34]:
Let’s love better this year.

Laurie Watson [00:29:36]:
Okay, so tell us about your cutting edge training that you’re doing on success and vulnerability.

George Faller [00:29:42]:
Laurie. We just keep pushing it. Coming up with a new module on the playbook of a pursuer, playbook of a witcher, really practical moment by moment moves of what a therapist can use. We’re so focused on what’s happening in session enough. There’s talk about theories and these global things I think most therapists are looking for. What do I do in this moment? Give me a tool, George. So that’s what we’re trying to do.

Laurie Watson [00:30:08]:
That’s awesome. I am so glad you guys are doing this work. I think it helps us be organized to see you do it. You do demos, you do explanations, teaching. It really is interactive, and I think that so many trainings that we sit through don’t give us an opportunity for that. So what you’re doing is really important.

George Faller [00:30:27]:
No, we try to emphasize the teach it, show it, do it model of learning. You need to have some ideas, so we try to teach those, and then we try to show what it looks like implementing those ideas. But most importantly, you now got to practice it. That’s how they become yours. And that’s what we want our listeners and watchers to do, is become their own moves.

Laurie Watson [00:30:46]:
Find George and his [email protected] call in.

Joe Davis – Announcer [00:30:50]:
Your questions to the foreplay question voicemail. Dial eight three three my foreplay. That’s eight three three my the number four play, and we’ll use the questions for our mailbag episodes. All content is for entertainment purposes only and should not be considered as a substitute for therapy by a licensed clinician or as medical advice from a doctor. This podcast is copyrighted by Foreplay media.