Reinventing Your Life: Safety & The Abandonment Life Trap

Hello unique individual, In this informative talk, I am talking about the lack of basic safety and the "Mistrust and abuse life trap" also named schema's from schema therapy, and explaining lifelong patterns we repeat from having such lifetraps. Based upon my own experience and the book "Reinventing your life: the breakthrough program to end negative behaviour, and feel great again" by Jeffrey E. Young and Janet S. Klosko Ph.D.

Transcript

Hello,

Welcome back!

Today I would like to talk a little bit more about what you needed as a child,

So the basic safety and the belonging lifetraps Which are abandonment,

Mistrust and abuse And if you haven't done so already,

You might want to listen first to the introduction of the lifetraps,

Quote on quote schemas Where I explain what I'm going to talk about If not,

Welcome back and I will dive into it more So I'm going to paraphrase the book Reinventing Your Life,

Made by Jeffrey Young and Janet Klosko And I'm going to talk more into depth about the need basic safety,

What it is and why those certain lifetraps belong to it As a child you needed basic safety and this is a real core thing you needed and it really begins early And as an infant you might have not felt safe,

It might have actually been a matter of life and death And this might involve the child's treatment by his or her own family or caregivers And the threat of abandonment or abuse comes from those who are most intimate,

From those who are supposed to love us,

Take care of us and protect us And yes I am talking about those who were abused,

Abandoned as children and even mostly damaged You know,

You didn't feel safe or perhaps you were so scared that each moment something terrible might have happened Here a child feels vulnerable and fragile,

The moods are intense and later on these people,

These little children can become very impulsive and self-destructive So we all need a secure stable family environment and even if our caregivers have tried so hard they might have failed at this point The point is,

In a safe home parents are predictably available,

Again physically and emotionally and no one is being mistreated Fighting is within normal bounds but no one dies or leaves the child alone for long periods And I always thought well I haven't been abandoned because both of my parents were there but again I stress the importance of emotionally present And the book gives a lovely example of a man who keeps having female relationships where they are abusive and they abandon him And that's because his parent was a severe alcoholic so he is again repeating that child to trauma and their need for safety is again not met in the relationship he is having now So is there something in your life you are repeating so that your needs with safety are not being met?

And always feel free to pause the recording if you need to The problem is if you didn't have a safe childhood like the example given in the book,

This Petra guy who feels really drawn to these women who will abandon him This might also be the case for you,

You really have this chemistry towards people who will not meet your needs for basic safety,

Like me I really felt drawn to very toxic people who would abandon me if I weren't abandoning them first And yes,

Unsafe childhood situations are the most dangerous to repeat,

You end up rushing headlong from one self-destructive relationship to another or you avoid relationships altogether So now I would like to talk a little bit about the life traps belonging to this basic need First off,

The abandonment life trap and the book really has the title,

Please don't leave me Okay so sometimes I'm a little bit inappropriate but I do have to make it light sometimes even for myself And the book really gives wonderful examples with people who have different forms of abandonment issues Personally I didn't know I had them but that was a whole different story because I was always of course pushing this feeling away of abandonment And I didn't even realize,

Become aware that I had this life trap So if you have,

Please listen carefully because you might not even be aware of all the actions and thoughts you might have because of this life trap So the book gives this example of Abby where her husband goes on a work trip but she feels like her own child again when her dad was,

Yeah well when she was young and her dad had a heart attack and died And this very sad story is also how I imagined abandonment would be,

You know either a parent would leave when you were very young or they would die But again there are more forms of abandonment like the book writes about,

For example we go back to Patrick whose parent was an alcoholic remember He falls for females who always cheat on him,

Who have affairs with other men and in the same way abandon him like his parents did to him when he was younger And Patrick would forgive his cheating wife over and over again but felt abandoned at the same time And then the other example of Lindsay who never ever seems to be able to get a relationship because well there were always problems you know They wouldn't want to marry her,

It would never seem to happen and she would just go from man to man Sounds relatable?

And with abandonment you have this fundamental belief that you will lose the people you love and be left emotionally isolated forever Whether people die or send you away or leave you,

Somehow you will be left alone And you expect to be abandoned and sometimes might even act on this and push the people you love away And there are even two types of abandonment based upon dependence,

So you are really dependent on someone,

You always want to be with them,

You cannot function Or based upon instability or loss And I want to share some examples,

Some origins of the abandonment lifetrap to make sure that you know whether or not you have it You might just have a biological predisposition to separation anxiety,

So difficulty being alone A parent might have died or left the home when you were younger Your mother was hospitalised or separated from you for a longer period of time when you were a child or you were in the hospital for a longer time and your parents weren't there Maybe you were raised by nannies or sent to boarding school Your mother might have been unstable,

Being depressed,

Angry,

Drunk or in some way withdrawn on a regular basis Maybe your parents were divorced at a very young age or fighting or not What I found interesting is you lost the attention of a parent in a significant way For example a brother or sister was born or your parents were remarried Or your family was excessively close and you were overprotected,

You never learned to deal with life difficulties as a child These are many examples and maybe you can relate to one of them And what I would like to highlight is that abandonment and intimate relationships,

Well especially romantic relationships are really difficult They are seldom calm and steady and I have so much difficulties with these,

Not only romantically but even being intimate with close friends And the thing with abandonment is you might not always show vulnerability because you are afraid they will leave Or you might do other things which will actually draw you further away from the one you want to be closer to And for those who are dating or in a relationship and who suffer from this life trap,

The book also gives some dangerous signals which I found very helpful Your partner is unlikely to make long term commitment because he or she is married or involved in another relationship Or your partner is not consistently available for you to spend time,

Like they travel a lot,

They are workaholics Your partner is emotionally unstable,

Again could have been another alcoholic or they cannot hold down a regular job,

They cannot be there emotionally for you on a consistent basis And this one I really like Your partner is Peter Pan who insists on his or her freedom to come and go,

Does not want to settle down or wants freedom to have many lovers Well for those who are on dating apps I think we have all seen Peter Pan,

Right?

And the final one,

Your partner is unsure about you,

They might be holding back emotionally or some moments they are really deeply in love with you and the next moment they think you do not exist And oh boy,

Don't I know this one And for some of you who are listening that you might think,

Well duh this is obvious right?

I'm going to be fair with you,

I suffer from abandonment and this wasn't clear to me so I really had to learn this And maybe this helps you again if you think like oh I'm not a Peter Pan,

I'm not going for this And again,

When you have this life trap you keep attracting and feeling attracted to these sort of people which are unhealthy for you So it's really important that you choose a life partner who is well not one of these signs and is a very stable person Okay let's get to the good stuff How can you change abandonment?

First up and hopefully I have helped you a little bit on the way,

Understand your childhood abandonment I love doing inner child meditations,

I have placed multiple ones on insight timer so have a listen,

It has really helped me Otherwise I would suggest go on youtube,

Find Jen Peters,

Wait she's also on insight timer,

She has amazing meditations The next tip the book gives is monitor your feelings of abandonment Identify your hypersensitivities to lose enclosed people and your desperate fears of being alone I track my emotions every morning and I write them down,

That has been really helpful for me But also review past relationships and clarify the patterns that recur,

So list your pitfalls of abandonment So I've made a list that I'm not going to look for Peter Pan's,

I'm not going to allow it,

I'm not going for the partners who are hot and cold to one minute I'm really looking for a stable partner who makes me feel safe,

You know again back to that safety And also I know it's actually a bad sign if I'm really attracted to a person because well,

Because of my mommy and daddy issues and maybe because of the abandonment life trap inherent And this one I find difficult,

When you find a partner who is stable and committed,

Trust him or her,

Believe that he or she will be there for you And they will not leave and of course there is always a possibility that they will leave,

But hope for the best and live that life So do not cling,

Become jealous or overreact to the normal separations of healthy relationships I'm going to be honest with you,

When I read that I'm like ehh I'm not there yet,

But hey we're working on it right?

Reviews

Thank you for sharing this and for being open about your journey.. another good book on attachment styles and why we keep choosing similar partners is “The Eden Project” by Jungian psychologist James Hollis. I found it enlightening.

Thank you for sharing your journey. This has been so helpful. Many blessings ✨🙏🏻✨🩷🥰🤗

Wow, do I need this! Thank you so much. I will look for more of your inner child talks as well as looking into your recommendations. You have a great way of speaking so that I connect with what you're saying.