Secure attachment is maintaining one's inner person while in a relationship, while insecure attachment is letting go of oneself while in a relationship. 

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            Those who suffer from insecure attachment in relationships tend to give all their attention to their partner, and they also tend to block out the signs that show their partner is not the right person for them (Saribay and Anderson). When you are someone who demonstrates insecure attachment you often support the things your partner does without having any real knowledge that these might be things you do not actually like in other people.

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           A study was conducted to show how past relationships influence one’s security in present and future relationships, although these are not necessarily romantic relationships. All of our personal relationships can have an “influence on how interactions with new people unfold” (Saribay and Anderson). We do not always see how our relationships can change us, and each one can change us in a different way. What happens to our brain is that a new person might have a specific characteristic or behavior that resembles a characteristic from someone in a past relationship or current familial relationship, and this resemblance is what influences our interaction with that person (Saribay and Anderson). When someone reminds us of another person, we tend to react to the new person as how we would have reacted to the person in that past relationship. While not all of these resemblances are negative, generally negative things stick with people, so those negative tendencies and attributes stick out the most, and these negative qualities are what lead to the potential insecure attachment.

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         So what can we do to avoid this potential insecure attachment to someone who based on the fact that they remind us of someone we once had an insecure attachment to in the past?

 

1. It is important to be able to recognize characteristics of other people that were questionable in the past. Those characteristics often bring out insecure attachment because we try to hide the fact that they are not good qualities. We cover it up by rationalizing and justifying in our head.

2. Question how someone is acting, and make sure that they are being genuine. It is important that we can see when someone is not showing us their true self. Once we recognize that someone is being fake, it is easier for us to make the decision to not attach ourselves to them.

3. Look within, and be able to see that you may also be part of the problem. Holding onto the past will be the main issue in creating insecure attachment to another new person. If you hold on to past relationships, you are not seeing these warning signs in new relationships, and instead you are still romanticizing what created the issue initially.

   

     While this list is not extensive, these points are important ones to recognize because without being able to do these small and easy things, it is likely that you will be victim to insecure attachment in future relationships.

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Reference

 

Saribay, S. Adil and Susan M. Andersen. "Are past Relationships at the Heart of Attachment Dynamics? What Love Has to Do with It."            Psychological Inquiry, vol. 18, no. 3, July 2007, pp. 183-191. EBSCOhost