Dating Tips for Avoidant Attachment

Last month, I focused on what anxiously attached daters can do to make the process more smooth. This week, I address things for those who lean more avoidantly attached to keep in mind.

Folks with avoidant attachment style tend to not attach quickly, and often hang back while the people they date pursue them. Many feel quite content on their own, to the degree they may put minimal effort into dating while focusing more on imperfections in potential partners they go on dates with than on what they enjoy about them.

Here’s what to keep in mind if you’re interested in breaking out of this dating pattern.

1. Know why you’re ending or cutting off a potential relationship.
WRONG versus NOT FULLY RIGHT are two different things. Listen to WRONG. Unpack NOT FULLY RIGHT.
Statistically, according to attachment expert Amir Levine—co-author of Attached, avoidants are more likely to end relationships or opt for not getting into one to begin with. The reasoning isn’t always wise and logical, but rather rooted in defense mechanisms.

Levine recommends: “Don’t act on your impulse. When you’re excited about someone but then suddenly have a gut feeling that s/he is not right for you, stop and think. Is this actually a deactivating strategy? Are all those small imperfections you’re starting to notice really your attachment system’s way of making you step back? If you thought she was great to begin with, you have a lot to lose by pushing her away.”

2. Pay attention to the way immediate judgments affect attraction.
Judging or assessor mind keeps you safe. It keeps you from getting hurt because you’re not being vulnerable. You might even be rejecting others for qualities you haven’t come to accept in your own self, but doing this closes us off to potentially rich connections.

I initially thought that a girl who was interested in me one summer (many years ago) was intelligent and attractive—but I didn’t feel a “spark.” Even after two or three dates, I felt myself maintaining some distance.

Looking back, I can see it was partly because I’d placed us into separate boxes when it came to the type of people we were. I wasn’t aware of the behind-the-scenes paths my mind had taken to that initial conclusion of, we will never understand each other. All I knew was that I’d reached it and that it had birthed the instinct to keep her at arm’s length.

Something shifted though, during a low-key moment. The two of us were lounging on her couch one morning. I realized talking to her was easy, and that we laughed a lot. For the next two months, we built a genuine connection.

At the beginning of dating someone, you might reduce yourself and the other person to roles that aren’t the full truth of either of you. You may both turn out to be so much more than them. I think the majority of us are too multi-faceted for any box we could hope to contain ourselves in. We forget that people can surprise us when we let them.

Ask yourself what assumptions you may have instantly made that might not be accurate. Then squint to see the bigger picture.

Squinting doesn’t mean disregarding red flags. It means fixating less on the inconsequential things. Sometimes the mind takes a single thing a person did or said and runs with it—in turn closing us off to potential connection. Or it will immediately file away as a “dealbreaker” what might’ve been an innocuous slip that wasn’t truly indicative of genuine character differences.

3. Resolve your ex baggage.
More than other attachment styles, the avoidant mind is prone to idolizing what the authors of Attached refer to as “the phantom ex.”

They write: “Once the avoidant person has put time and distance between herself and the partner whom she’s lost interest in, something strange happens: the feelings of love and admiration return! This fixation with a past partner affects budding new relationships because it acts as a deactivating strategy, blocking you from getting close to someone else. Even though you’ll probably never get back together with your phantom ex, just the knowledge that they’re out there is enough to make any new partner seem insignificant by comparison.”

Sometimes the previous relationship wasn’t even that positive. The mind simply revisits it when it fears change. Try reminding yourself that you shared many experiences with your ex, that familiarity breeds attachment, and that this person you’re on a date with is still a stranger. So was your ex at one point.