Approaching & Avoiding: Relationship Tips

Building and maintaining long-term loving relationships is one of the most challenging activities in which people engage. Relationships are exceedingly complex affairs. The bonds that sustain relationships – for better or worse – are built from what we say using our spoken words, what we communicate with the non-verbal parts of language (i.e., our voice tone and speech pace, body posture, facial expressions, and even how dilated our pupils are or how flared our nostrils appear), deep seated emotional memories from our own upbringings, and the accumulation of relationship experiences collected throughout life up to the present day. Much of what influences feelings or closeness or distance is processed outside of our awareness, which means that our relationships are often at the mercy of reactions over we may have little direct control. Is there a way to cut through all that complexity to capture or at least catch a glimpse of what influences relationship health? Surprisingly, there is.

The enormous advances in computer capabilities makes us forget that the very basic elements of computer language is the binary system of 1’s and 0’s. Those two options (1 and 0) when combined in an infinite number of sequences, enables every software program used by every computer and computer network around the world to operate accurately.Achieving that level of complexity from only two elements can also be seen in our own DNA. Instead of two, our DNA uses only four amino acids (A, C, T &G) that are combined in different combinations to produce every life form on earth. Garden slugs and human beings share the same four building blocks in their genetic codes! These two examples show just how much diversity, variety and complexity can arise from simple building blocks.

When it comes to the laws of attraction that govern our relationships, the basic building blocks are found in two responses: To Approach or Avoid.  Deep within our brains are structures that process information we take in about our outer world (including our relationship partners) through our senses as well as the information we process from our inner world, which is where the idea of having a “gut sense” comes from, for example. Stripped to its bare essence, the result of the information that we process is to stimulate us to approach someone or to pull back or avoid them. Looking back across an evolutionary time scale that “decision” meant we either ate or were eaten. Approaching and avoiding is hard-wired into our brains.

Obviously, our options for relationship behavior goes well beyond just approaching or avoiding. At the same time, every single day I work with individuals and couples who either enter into relationships with people that they should ultimately avoid or avoid entering into relationships that would probably be worth approaching! One of the key skills for using our approach/avoid system in our relationships more effectively is to first become better tuned in to the various thoughts, feelings and impulses that are aroused through our interpersonal connections to others. The second step is to be better able to regulate our reactions through greater focusing skills and improved inhibitory control. When becoming more interpersonally attuned is coupled with better self-regulation skills, the result is a vastly increased ability to turn the basic approach/avoid system into a brain-based resource for fulfilling long-term intimacy. 

One resource that offers practical suggestions for building those self-regulation skills can be found in Dr. Susan Johnson’s book, Hold Me Tight.