I’ve come to understand that our emotional need for connection is a core aspect of being human. It’s not just a preference but an essential part of our survival. In many ways, the emotional bond we share with another person resembles the bond between a child and its caregiver, shaped by our attachment to one another.
In my work as a marital therapist, I’ve often witnessed how adult relationships suffer not just from personal quirks or differences, but from a breakdown in the emotional accessibility and responsiveness that make attachment bonds thrive. This concept of attachment, as explained by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, has become my guiding framework. I believe, as they did, that our deepest motivations in relationships stem from our need for secure attachment.
Many of the perspectives on love that I’ve come across—whether psychoanalytic, where love is seen as an extension of early childhood relationships, or behaviorist, which reduces it to a simple transaction—have felt incomplete. Instead, I have come to view love not as something irrational or purely transactional but as an emotional experience rooted in our early interactions and the deep-seated need to feel understood, safe, and valued.
When I see couples struggling, it’s often because they’ve lost that emotional responsiveness. In these moments, it’s not just personality issues causing the problems—it’s the failure to connect emotionally, which brings about fear. This fear doesn’t just sit quietly; it often manifests as anger or withdrawal, which only further distances the couple from one another.
In my approach to therapy, especially through Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy, I aim to help partners reconnect on a deeper emotional level. The goal is to create a space where both partners can be vulnerable without fear of rejection, where emotional needs can be expressed freely. In my experience, when partners make themselves emotionally available to one another, love becomes not only transformative but also healing, not just for the relationship, but for the individual’s sense of self.
Ultimately, I believe that the ability to engage in an emotionally accessible relationship is a powerful tool—not just for fixing troubled marriages but for fostering emotional well-being and personal growth. When we open ourselves to each other’s vulnerabilities, we create a foundation that allows love to truly flourish.
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