Emotional Availability: In Conversation With Fabienne

Join Fabienne in this conversation about emotional availability. Fabienne explains what it means to be emotionally available, how we can show up with our availability, how this produces safety and security in relationships and creates healthy functional relationships.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to In Conversation with me,

Fabienne Sandoval,

Life coach,

Author and speaker.

I talk way too much so I thought I'd put that skill to use by sharing with you this series of conversations designed to expound your awareness and knowledge of becoming secure and empowered in your self-worth.

Meet Sam,

My OBM,

Wingwoman and literal can't live without.

We tried to break up once and it didn't work.

I'll be here to ask the juicy questions and help extract some of these powerful insights from Fabienne.

So let's begin.

And today we're going to be talking about building your emotional availability.

Okay,

So what does it mean to be emotionally available in a relationship and why is that so important?

Yeah,

So this topic is really,

Really important.

So,

I mean,

A lot of the things that we talk about,

For me,

Are themed back to the idea that we're wanting to build our self-worth,

We're wanting to raise our self-worth,

We're wanting to have healthy and functional relationships,

We're wanting to move beyond and heal our attachment styles,

Etc.

So all of these things that we're looking at,

All these things that we're doing,

Emotional availability is something that comes in,

Which is,

I feel like,

Only a more recent kind of topic that we're getting insights into in terms of what it is and how it kind of affects our relationships and things like that.

But typically what I see is,

I'm going to come at this from like a slightly different angle in the sense of actually a lot of what I see is people being emotionally unavailable and then dating people that are emotionally unavailable.

And what does that mean?

That means that that sense of security isn't maybe really there in the romantic relationship,

Like it might be kind of a little bit like,

It's there and it's not,

It's there and it's not,

It's there and it's not,

It's there and it's not,

Right?

But that sense of safety and security that's so necessary that we really,

Really need in good,

Functional,

Healthy relationships.

When we're struggling with emotional unavailability,

It's usually pretty much like this in and out kind of effect.

And so a lot of the time when we've had experiences where our self-worth is not so high,

Or we are suffering from maybe like an anxious or avoidant attachment style,

We can find ourselves in relationships where the person is emotionally unavailable.

And a lot of the time we want to pin that on the other person.

But if we look at ourselves,

We'll actually find that we are also emotionally unavailable.

We are meeting them somehow,

Somewhere.

We're not ready to receive that safety,

That security,

That availability,

Because it's actually quite threatening to the system.

If you've never had it before,

Can you imagine just being given safety?

Like you've never had safety before in relationships.

You've always felt like nervous and anxious and worried about them.

And then you give them safety.

That is like the most uncomfortable thing to receive ever.

You're like,

What's going to happen next?

You know,

Where's the catch?

100%.

100%.

So I mean,

The basics of when we're talking about emotional availability and what it is,

It's essentially,

So I always think about it from this perspective of how am I being emotionally honest?

So it's like,

Well,

How does that tie into emotional availability?

Well,

Emotional availability,

If we're being available emotionally,

It means we're declaring what is going on internally for us.

So then you start dating someone and you're five dates and you're like,

I'm not really sure this person's me.

I don't really know if this is working out.

I just saw that thing.

Maybe that's a red flag,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

But then to the person,

You're like,

Yeah,

I really like you.

You're amazing.

That's not being emotionally honest.

So we're not really emotionally available.

We're just giving like a false pretense that we are and then potentially going to close out the relationship.

And the other person would be like scratching their head like,

But I thought they really liked me because they were saying all these things and doing all these things and I don't understand.

And the reality of it is we were not showing up clearly in that relationship.

We weren't showing up with the full availability that a good,

Healthy relationship,

Whether it's romantic or not,

Requires,

Right?

Because relationships require a lot.

And it isn't just,

You know,

We've talked about this in previous recordings that it isn't just like flowers and hearts.

There are harder things that we need to do.

And so actually emotional availability really comes down to is like,

How am I sharing what's going on with me internally?

And that can look like,

You know,

I'm really excited to see you today.

That might be really vulnerable to share that when you've only been out on two or three dates with someone,

For example.

Or when you're in a romantic relationship and you guys have been together for a while and you've got things coming up,

It's about talking about your fears and worries and concerns and allowing those to have a space to live.

But it's actually giving that emotional,

Like I say,

That availability of your emotions,

Right,

To the other person,

To the other people that are involved.

So how can you kind of improve your emotional availability?

What are,

I don't know,

I suppose that's quite a broad subject,

But are there any kind of like little tips,

I guess,

Or little tricks that you can do to improve your emotional availability?

Yeah,

Absolutely.

So I think that this is a really huge,

A really,

Really huge piece.

Yeah.

Emotional availability.

I remember way back when someone introduced me to this and I remember even watching a class on it and I was like,

But I do all of those things,

But I'm available.

Like,

You know,

I'm,

I listen,

I'm present.

I want to spend quality time together.

Like whatever it was that they was sharing,

All the things of like how we're emotionally,

Like,

You know,

Available,

Right?

Like it's usually through presence and time spent.

And like,

For example,

Like how do you respond to someone?

Do you respond to them within,

You know,

Sort of 24 hours or like two hours or seven days or what does that look like?

Right.

So this also talks to us about like the availability.

So there's a whole lot that goes into emotional availability,

But I remember for me,

Like I saw it and I was like,

Yeah,

I do all of that good.

And then I also realized,

And some things I don't do so good.

And actually there are some elements here that,

You know what,

Even though there's some parts I am doing well,

There's some parts I'm not,

And I'm actually just really afraid to do them well.

So it's a really huge topic.

I think if you're struggling with emotional availability,

I would highly recommend coaching.

Why?

Because of course,

When we are experiencing,

You know,

A lack of emotional availability,

That's going to have been,

That's going to have likely come from somewhere,

You know,

So we're used to that experience.

We're trying to recreate it all of the time and to move out of it can be quite challenging to do it alone.

So I would say,

You know,

Definitely working with someone helps because that is just going to get you there in the fastest possible way.

If it's something that you're like,

Okay,

I really just want to get started right away,

It's about practicing being comfortable with really sharing what it is that's going on inside of you.

That's kind of like the best way that I can think about it.

So it's like,

It is saying the things,

It is being vulnerable,

And it is saying what might be hard to say.

So when we're talking about emotional availability,

I think you've got to think about it,

It's your availability of your emotions to another person.

So how am I being clear?

Whether that is in like my job at work or whether that is in a romantic relationship,

Whether that's a person I just started dating,

Whether that's in my 10-year marriage,

How am I being clear and honest with my like emotional state?

That's what I always think it comes down to.

And so that would be the first place to start coming to this kind of ability to ask yourself that question,

Like,

Am I being clear and honest here?

And I guess it works the other way around.

It's also how you are kind of receiving their emotional availability as well.

Absolutely.

So like when someone's emotionally available to us and they tell us about like their struggles or their hard things or they're scared or there's worries or their fears,

Do we back away from them and go like,

Oh,

No,

I don't want to deal with that?

Or do we stay present and listen and seek to understand what they're going through?

So you're totally right,

It is both ends of the spectrum.

Yeah.

It's another one of these ones where I think we can talk a lot about it because it's just so layered.

It's not just I am emotionally available and that's it,

Tick.

Like you say,

It's got so many different connotations to it.

It's coming maybe from past traumas or experiences.

Do you in kind of your journey as a coach,

I mean,

Obviously everybody's different,

But do you find that there is a common thread to people who feel they aren't emotionally available?

Usually,

Yeah,

Usually like an unavailable parent.

And so that might be like physically unavailable,

That might be emotionally unavailable,

But there's been some kind of unavailability or the parental figures,

Whether that's,

You know,

Depending on how you grew up,

It's usually typically from that.

And then we usually,

Like I've said before,

It's like we replicate those experiences that we had early on in our childhood.

And then we kind of seek them out in our romantic relationships.

And of course,

It feels safe and comfortable to have that repeat experience.

But really,

The reason why we're seeking it out is so that we can heal it and so that we can change it so that it can be something different.

And so a lot of the time when people do come into this and say,

Yeah,

I'm just attracting like unavailable people.

Yeah,

We also want to be challenging ourselves.

If you do find yourself in that place,

I would always say,

Well,

Why is that attractive to you though?

Yeah,

Really great practice if we're coming at it from like the romantic side of it,

Just keep meeting people and keep getting partners that are emotionally unavailable.

You want to really seek to understand yourself,

Like why do I find that attractive?

Why is that attractive?

Why am I actually going after and like actually entertaining people that can't give me the availability that I'm looking for?

And so learning and teaching yourself that that's not attractive to me.

One of the things I do with my coaching clients is we will practice that like it's like if there are things that they're attracted to that they know that it's not good for them,

We practice when we see it like,

Oh,

That's not attractive to me.

Yeah,

Like retraining yourself.

That's literally not attractive to me.

Like,

Yo,

Why would I be attracted to that?

That's not cute.

That's not nice.

Like,

No.

So obviously,

People can have coaching with you to help you become a bit more emotionally available.

But is there any other resources that you have at the moment or is this something that you're planning to have?

Yeah,

So at the moment,

I would just recommend attending one of my live sessions on Insight Timer.

So we regularly cover this subject and it's always really,

Really great because you can ask questions,

You can we can delve into the subject together.

And I really love the experience of teaching the lives because just so much comes out of it when we teach in live.

I always get directed in a slightly different way.

It is a topic that we cover like frequently and often.

So I would definitely recommend if you're like,

Oh,

I want to know more,

Just pop over to my profile,

Check on my live events and you're going to find that coming up in the next few weeks for sure.

And you'll be able to join that.

That would definitely be my first place to point you.

And then,

Yeah,

As per usual,

There is more coming.

Nothing to share at this moment in time,

But I'm certain that we will be releasing other content around this as and throughout the year.

That's brilliant.

Thank you once again,

Fabienne.

Thanks.