- This session will focus on how children become attached if conditions are conducive
- Attachment is a potential that needs to be realized and requires development and time
- The speaker was surprised by the stages of attachment that emerged in their research
- The material presented is the speaker's contribution to attachment theory
- The next sessions will focus on the context of attachment and the polarization of attachment energy
- The capacity for relationship is gradually developed in six sequential phases
- Each phase adds a new and more complex way of attaching and pursuing proximity
- The first six years of life are important for attachment, but it can unfold at any point in life
- The potential for attachment deepens if conditions are ideal
- The speaker has developed this theme in an intensive course focused on the six stages of attachment
- The plant analogy is used to explain attachment.

- The plant analogy is important because it represents living and attachment
- Humans have not developed a language around attachment because it is natural and culture preserves attachments
- Digital devices have been put into the hands of children, causing them to become disconnected from their parents and teachers
- Seeking connection through digital means makes children feel lonelier
- Understanding attachment is key to understanding the digital revolution
- Senses are key to seeking contact and closeness
- Using smell can help with separation anxiety, as it is a sense that can provide comfort
- Language acquisition is achieved through imitation and being like those we are attached to

- Language acquisition begins when children start imitating the sounds and noises of those they are attached to
- Children learn language from those to whom they are attached, just like animals imitate their owners
- Children also take on the form, gestures, values, and behaviors of those they are attached to
- Attachment theory explains that children model after and imitate those they are attached to, rather than just learning from them
- Sameness and conformity are a result of children becoming peer-oriented when they can't physically stay close to each other
- Albert Bandura, a learning theorist, realized that attachment theory better explains social conformity and imitation than his own learning theory
- Attachment rituals, such as eating the same food, are important for children's development
- Belonging becomes essential for children, and they seek to be called "my boy/girl" or "my mummy/daddy" to feel part of a group
- Loyalty and taking the same side as someone are also part of attachment instincts in the third year of life
- Traditional times allowed for the natural unfolding of attachment instincts, but modern society often tries to teach children to be good before they are developmentally ready

- Emotional intimacy is crucial for healthy attachment in children
- Children develop attachment through feeling a sense of belonging and significance
- By the fourth year of life, attachment becomes more significant and children want to be special and important to their caregivers
- In the fifth year of life, children give their hearts to those they are attached to and seek emotional intimacy
- Emotional intimacy is necessary for effective teaching and learning
- Love and emotional intimacy are often overlooked in academic textbooks but are essential for healthy relationships and development
- Attachment rituals and symbols, such as giving heart rings, can foster emotional intimacy in children
- Freud's theories on attachment were incorrect, as attachment is not about sexual desire but rather about wanting to be with someone forever and having their heart in safekeeping
- Attachment at the heart level allows for deeper friendships and connections
- Emotional intimacy can be risky if it is not safe, and the brain will retreat from attachment if it feels threatened.

- Attachment is crucial for healthy development and involves feeling safe and secure
- By the age of six, children want to share their inner thoughts and secrets with their attachments
- Psychological intimacy is the ultimate form of attachment, where the child feels understood and known by their attachment figure
- Attachment allows parents and teachers to better understand and parent/teach the child
- Attachment becomes sexualized during puberty, but if attachments are superficial, sexual relationships will also be superficial
- Children will naturally fall into attachment if conditions are warm, safe, and inviting
- The conditions for attachment include a good enough invitation to exist and make room for one's own person
- Continuity of attachment means allowing the attachment to develop, even during periods of separation
- Defenses can skew attachment instincts towards non-human attachments, like rituals or structures

- The piece discusses the idea of attachment and how it can lead to sameness and conformity.
- It mentions the Stockholm Syndrome and how it relates to attachment.
- The depersonalization of attachment is discussed, including obsessions with looks, possessions, and rewards.
- The importance of personal relationships for fulfillment is emphasized.
- The piece mentions the pursuit of proximity with others and how it can lead to neurotic pursuits.
- The importance of rest and the problem of restlessness in society is mentioned.
- A checklist is provided to help analyze attachment in children.

- The speaker emphasizes the importance of understanding a person from the inside out
- The person being discussed is not inclined to share anything about themselves due to fear of being hurt
- The speaker suggests using the lens of attachment to analyze the development of relationships and understand behavior in children
- The attachment profile can help explain why a child may be stuck or not reaching their full potential
- Session 11 concludes and session 12 is upcoming.

- The session focuses on how children become attached under conducive conditions and the stages of attachment that emerge
- The speaker's contribution is to attachment theory and they have developed an intensive course on the six stages of attachment
- The importance of the first six years of life for attachment and the potential for attachment to deepen under ideal conditions
- The impact of digital devices on children's attachment and the importance of understanding attachment in the digital revolution
- The role of senses, language acquisition, and imitation in attachment
- The development of sameness, conformity, and emotional intimacy in attachment
- The significance of attachment for healthy development and relationships
- The importance of understanding a person from the inside out and using attachment to analyze behavior and relationships in children.

In this session, we're going to take a look at how children would become attached if conditions were conducive.

If everything was unfolding as it should, how attachment would happen, what it looks like, what are the stages of attachment.

It turns out that attachment too is a potential that needs to be realized, a very basic potential.

And so this is very much of a surprise, even in classic attachment theory, there wasn't the idea that it required a development and some years to be able to really realize the full capacity for relationship.

And so we're going to take a look at that.

It took me by surprise when I put it together.

I spent some time looking at various attachment theories in the literature with the idea that we attach in different ways.

And I was not at all expecting the model of attachment to emerge that did in which there's actual stages to the unfolding of the capacity for relationship.

Fortunately, in my consulting with overseas adoptions, I could see it happening right before my very eyes at later stages in life to see it unfold.

So I had some opportunity to observe where attachments began very late.

This material is the material that I actually present when I'm invited to present at international conferences on attachment as my particular contribution to attachment theory is the six-stage model of development, developing the capacity for relationship.

We, in last session, we introduced attachment, the essence of attachment, what it was about, how big it is, how big the phenomena is, and then we took a very quick open the window to the impact of facing separation and what it looks like.

And that Now we're going to look to something quite different, again, of the unfolding of the capacity for human relationship.

The next several sessions we're going to continue to spend on relationship, we're going to look at 3 keys, 3 keys to unlocking the mystery of human attachment.

The first is what we're going to look at right now.

The capacity for relationship requires time and conducive conditions to develop.

The next session, we'll take a look at that it's a tiles attachment that provides a context for raising them that empowers the adults responsible for them.

In fact, the material is so important here I've decided to devote 2 sessions for it, session 12 and 13.

And then finally, a very important aspect of attachment that is rarely talked about and is very important for making sense of children, especially children that are in trouble and stuck, is that attachment energy polarizes just like magnetism and gravity and this accounts for some of the phenomena like shyness and defensive detachment, important to understand these things, especially now as shyness is becoming pathologized more and more as social anxiety disorder because they simply do not have the understanding to make sense of this very important phenomena.

And so we'll take a look at that as well.

We'll begin with the conclusions after I had time to put all the pieces together.

Part of the time was on sabbatical, but I did this and I continued on to try and get this coherent model of how attachment develops.

First and foremost is the capacity for relationship is gradually, gradually developed in 6 sequential phases, each phase adding a new and more complex way of attaching and adding to the previous forms of pursuing, and preserving rather, and pursuing proximity.

And so as we go along, we'll find that each way of attaching becomes the answer to experiencing more separation in the previous way of attaching.

I had tingles going down my spine as I put this material together and was discovering it.

It was just to see this design crystallize before my very eyes was so exciting.

And then to see it affirmed in the research and in the observations, equally exciting.

And so, Again, the idea here is, is a capacity for relationship is not something that we have at birth.

Our ability to relate to others is so important.

As we look at it, it's the children's relationship to the adults responsible that are context for the whole realization of human potential.

But to know what it looks like, how it unfolds, and again, it is a basic potential that needs to be realized.

Only humans have the capacity, this kind of capacity for relationship.

You'll see they go up to about stage 3, our favorite pets do, our dogs, our cats, our horses, but then we leave them behind to a much deeper capacity for relationship.

And secondly, if conditions are ideal, if conditions are ideal, and we'll take a look at what those conditions are.

If conditions are ideal, a different mode of attaching should emerge in each of the first 6 years of life.

The first 6 years are incredibly important.

Fortunately it's not a critical period as was originally understood.

Fortunately, it can unfold at any point in life.

I have seen children move to the first level of attachment at 8, 9 years of age.

I have seen adults move to the more psychological intimacy, the more emotional intimacy levels of attachment at 50 and 60 years of age.

It seems to be a potential that's always there that can unfold if the conditions are conducive.

And so if they are there, if there's not too much defendedness, it's just a blossoming that takes place.

And it deepens to the place where it can be a fruitful garden for growth, a fruitful context for maturation.

So I actually developed this theme in the third of the intensives.

And so now there's a level 3 of intensives and I thought I would only teach it once and then it became so popular it now becomes something I have taught every year, and I'm not sure how it's going to go, but I finally decided to call it Level 3.

And it's basically completely devoted to the unfolding of these 6 stages of attachment, and it's the intensive that I put more of a focus to on adult relationships as well.

Generally I restrict myself to talking only about children for reasons I've already talked about, but every now and then I just shift the focus a little bit to the adult relationships.

And so we get a chance to unpack it all in that level 3.

But We'll introduce it here and we'll walk around it.

And so the analogy that I use, and if you've been exposed to any other of my courses, the teachability course, the power to parent material, the attachment puzzle, which is basically unpacks the attachment theory for helping professionals or transplanting children, which unpacks attachment theory for those in the foster and adoptive community.

If you've taken any of those courses, you will have been introduced to this material.

And so this will be a bit of a repeat to you but hopefully you'll can you can see it as a fresh when you see it in the context of the larger picture.

In those courses I don't get to teach attachment theory in the context as I would like to of maturation and vulnerability on the unfolding of human potential.

And so when you look at it from this, hopefully there should be some fresh insights for you as we unpack this.

I use a plant analogy Because a plant analogy is extremely important for a number of reasons.

And so many of the analogies in learning theory, the analogy always is of sculpting, which is dead.

And so it's very important to have a living metaphor, and so a plant.

Secondly, that plants attach through their roots and many times multiple roots.

It's the roots and multiple roots that are important here.

And thirdly, the most important plant, part of the plant, is something we don't see.

What meets our eye is the results of it, the outcome of the rootedness of the plant.

And that so much is so in terms of humans.

Again, because we have not developed a language around it, because if it works, it works naturally.

Culture's never had to create a language around us because the whole purpose of culture is to preserve the attachments that are required.

So if a culture is successful, there's no need to talk about it.

And if a culture is not successful, it never occurs to them.

When we come undone, we look at the behavior, the resulting behavior, and not the underlying rituals and customs that we lost, in which were the rituals of attachment, the customs of relationship.

And so, just like a plant, it's what's underneath the soil that counts most.

At least half the energy in a plant is devoted to the root system.

And this is basically the general guideline.

And I would say that in terms of humans it's much more than half the energy that's devoted to the root system but at least it gives us our idea of the relative importance of things.

The first root, the attachment through the senses, here the primary theorists were the normal theorists you think of.

Harlow, Lorenz, if you know this material you'll know it, Bowlby, It's a normal kind of attachment theorist that you think of.

And through the senses, these senses we share with all other mammals, and through these senses our longing is to be with those to whom we are attached.

To be in sight, to be in smell, to be in sound, to be in touch.

That is our longing and we would ultimately create a technology of attachment to be able to better keep in touch, in sight, in sound and so it was in our destiny when we figured out how to turn information into ones and zeros so we could encode it, we could retrieve it, we could store it with the digitalization of information.

As soon as those digital devices were created.

Instead of going for just any information, we use it for the most important information to us.

We wanted to know who likes us and how much and whether and to stay in touch and to connect.

And so we repurpose those digital devices for the purposes of attachment.

And so when you look at these, yes, the digital devices brought in the information age or the digitalization of information did.

The digital devices were our means to be able to deal with that information.

But if you look at all of this to explain the shape of a digital universe, just like to explain the shape of the physical universe, you have to understand attachment.

That the information we're looking for is not basically the information simply about our world, but our information, the information about attachment.

And so we use it to connect with each other, to make contact and so on.

The problem is, of course, is we put these digital devices into the hands of our children.

And to our hands of our children, they've ended up courting each other and ending up in taking them away from their parents, from their grandparents, from their teachers, from the adults in their life that are meant to raise them.

And so we were ultimately going to get to this place, but now we have some trouble.

Some trouble that we don't have much time to figure out because we can lose our children very, very quickly.

And we still put digital devices into their hands in the school system to learn about their world without ever thinking of what they do with these devices as soon as they're out of the classroom.

And so we still have the problem of this and that again how the digital universe is a universe of connection, of attachment.

The irony of course is, as I speak to in the added chapters in my book, Hold On To Your Kids, is that the more children seek connection through digital means, the lonelier they feel.

And so we have 1 of the leading books on the digital revolution by Sherry Turkle, so eloquently called her book, Alone Together.

It is about our search for togetherness, but we have taken a wrong turn.

My book was written in 2004, and it's in 2005 that Facebook came on the scene.

That's why I needed to write another couple of chapters to this.

But I wanted to talk about how important it is.

Because to understand the digital revolution, we have to understand the basics of attachment.

When you understand this, We seek contact and closeness through being in sight, in touch, in smell, missed 1, in sound, yes, thank you, that we seek to this kind of contact.

So our senses are absolutely key to this.

Now this application can be used for all kinds of things, in intuitive times, intuitive cultures.

They knew what the basic issue of night time was, is a child could not keep in sight, could not keep in sound, could not keep in touch.

So the most natural thing in the world to get a child to sleep was not to push their face into separation, which unfortunately is what many parents do today.

It was to use the sense that, to use another sense.

And the other sense was very, very obvious to them.

If you can't do in sight, in touch, in sound, what can you do?

And so they would wrap the baby, wrap the toddler, you know, in their own clothes with the smells of their own clothes.

You know, to this day, this is a very simple thing to do.

I remember giving an address and the lights of appearance went on in terms of this.

She says, oh my goodness, my nine-year-old is still attached primarily through the senses.

She can't sleep alone and what it is, I've always wanted to get her to sleep on her own.

I'm going to give her my nightie to sleep with.

And I kind of laughed because I cheat that way too.

I travel a lot and I have a hard time going to sleep at night sometimes, and so sometimes I take my wife's pillowcase with me.

I, you know, if I can't be in sight and sound and touch, at least I can be in smell.

And so you can see as soon as you understand we are just creatures of attachment.

We love connection and this is what it's about.

It is by the second year of life and this this makes perfect sense because as the child begins to toddle in traditional times when it was the first time that they would actually experience separation.

As a child begins to toddle, in Bali, the child is basically held for the first 7 months.

Their feet aren't allowed to touch the ground.

And then when the child begins to toddle, Now we have more separation and the brain goes, we got to solve this problem.

And so part of the design has happened is that when we can't be with, then a whole another avenue of attaching opens up and that's to be like.

And this is the key to the acquisition of language.

In all mammals, We talk like those to whom we are attached.

It's so Simple after all the millions and billions of dollars We're spending worldwide on literacy and we're losing the war research shows we are forgetting the most important thing of all.

The answer to language acquisition is so simple.

When the child starts imitating the sounds and the noises of those they're attached to.

That is the beginning of language acquisition.

When I was attached to my teacher, I started to talk like my teacher.

Akerberg in grade 1, she was British, and my middle name is Arthur, and she called me Arthur, and I called myself Arthur for 5 years.

I used her idioms, I laughed at her jokes, I loved her literature, I printed like her, I did all of these things.

So much of school is language acquisition and we're forgetting the very first thing of all of this is children talk like, write like, they learn language from those to whom they are attached.

It's no different, and this is the key to this.

But much more, the child takes on the form of, begins to walk like, not only talk like, but walk like, act like, takes on the gestures, the values, the form.

Sometimes when you see it in your child taking on your form, walking like you and talking like you and you see a little mirror of yourself, you're not so pleased or else, sometimes we have to clean up our language a little bit and so on.

It's nature's answer to not keeping close physically is to be able to be like.

This is why you see such phenomenal sameness, conformity when children become peer-oriented, because they can't keep close to each other through being with each other all the time.

They become preoccupied with talking like each other, acting like each other, dressing like each other.

And so there's huge quest for conformity.

1 of the blind sages to do with this, I forgot to introduce him in the last session in that some of the source literature on attachment was Albert Bandura.

And Albert Bandura was a brilliant theorist, a learning theorist, and He is the author of social learning theory, the theory of social conformity, of imitation, of emulation, of modeling, of all of those things that have to do with taking on the same form.

And it's said that in his retirement, it's reported that in his retirement, he, when asked if he had any regrets, he said, 1 regret, if I'd only got the big picture, the very simple thing, we model after, we imitate after, we emulate those to whom we are attached.

I would have brought my whole theory under attachment theory instead of learning theory.

So 1 of the most brilliant learning theorists we ever had, you know, simply was, he simply didn't get the big picture in here that this is 1 of the blind sages of this.

He operated out of Albert Bandur, out of Stanford University.

And so this is sameness, a story about about sameness.

Julian lived with us, my grandson, for the first couple of years.

Mom was a single mom and a father was in Europe and he lived with us and he got very attached to his uncles, Shay and Braden.

And so when he acquired language and he'd be asked, of course, he'd all things that we ask children, what do you want to be when he grew up?

And it was very clear to him, he wanted to be an uncle.

Now that's exactly it and Tasha could get him to eat anything as long as she said to Julian, this is Brayden's favorite, you know, and then he would eat anything and so this was the sameness, right?

And exactly that kind of emulation, part of the key of toilet training, is to use this construct to be the same as.

A little story about, I once did an experiment, I've always done experiments on cats, but I got carried away on this time, and I knew that cats attach through smell, and so I actually used a shield to shield the little blind kitten to the mother, and foolishly, it became the primary attachment of that cat.

It was very foolish and but nevertheless I had to live with the consequences.

I messed with some of the basic instincts but when it came to potty training her and we tried basically to litter train her and we couldn't do it.

Finally we put the litter box in the bathroom that I use and she was delighted, this little cat, but she tried to flush the toilet after she did her business and the litter and she would only eat the food I ate and again it was the clue this is in many cultures the many cultures are if you're in the alpha lead children will eat the same food you do we're having so many problems with eating because we don't follow some of the very basic attachment rituals around this of eating that kind of food.

Another story around sameness is I was visiting Shay here in Montreal.

He was going to McGill and it was his first year and it was his first year away from home.

There's a wonderful restaurant there called Chez Q and his second name is Quentin, so we pretend that it was his restaurant.

And so we made it a tradition whenever I came to Montreal to work, we went to Chez Q.

And this is our first time, and I noticed that whatever I ordered, I think we had Chateaubriand for 2, and then I wanted Caesar salad, he said, well, get it for 2, and of course I love the cherry flambe, as you can imagine, and had all of these wonderful, delicious things, and he was always saying, me too.

I haven't heard a me too from him for a few years.

And then at the end of the meal, he actually made a sign that he was ready for the bill, or dad was ready for the bill, but he made the sign, that, you know, the way I do because I could never remember what country I'm in and what languages and so I just use a Shorthand to be able to do this and he did it.

I said, you know, that's that's that You know, that's something that that I usually do that say grinned He had a grin on his face and he said yeah, I know Says I since I'm gone since I've I've left home I notice how much I'm like you and how much I relish being like you.

And then it dawned on me, Oh, my dad had passed away and I was, now I couldn't be with him.

Whenever I caught a certain kind of gesture that I had or a look in the mirror that reminded me of my father, I relished my being like him because I couldn't be with him.

So even as adults this still becomes important is this quest for likeness when we cannot be with.

So you can see all kinds of manifestations this way, but it doesn't end here it goes on.

By the third year of life, if the attachment is fruitful at all, if it's fruitful, the child begins to be aware of differences.

That they're not absolutely the same, not identical.

And what in the world is the brain to do?

Aha, it's got a few tricks up its sleeve in terms of this, other kinds of things in terms of development.

Now, now it occurs to the child that to be close to is to be part of.

And so belonging becomes absolutely essential.

A part of a group and belonging becomes essential.

It's not an issue of possession, not in a material way, it's an issue of belonging.

It is about my wife, it's an issue of belonging.

My spouse, my friend, and so, and with it can come very strong feelings of possessiveness and loyalty and so on.

But this is a way of being part of, in the wake of it, there's yet another way of being close.

And to be close there is to be on the same side as, which is the essence of loyalty.

To take the same side, to stand up for, to all of those things that have to do with all the loyalty instincts that are there are all part of the attachment to, to protect and the very old instincts that we hardly ever talk about, to serve and obey.

These are all part of the attachment instincts of loyalty.

Now notice that this comes naturally to the child in the third year of life.

Now we understand why it is the terrible twos.

Children just want to sit on your knee and to be the same as you.

But there's not a bone in their body that it would occur to do your bidding.

And so we get all preoccupied with trying to teach children to be good.

You see, in traditional times, this took time to unfold.

Wait a minute, you need to control their situations and circumstances until a child belongs to you, wants to take the same side, be on the same side, agrees with you, has the instincts to serve and obey, because this is the birth of the child's desire to be good for you.

You'll have all you need to work with a child.

And for those of you that are teachers that are listening, when a child develops an attachment at this level, you can just feel it, you can just sense it.

Some of the master-teacher movies are movies of this kind of loyalty that comes of how strong this is, of belonging and all of the learning that unfolds in that context.

By the fourth year of life, if everything goes well, and I put this in gray because it is more tentative, it requires conditions that are conducive, attachment is always vulnerable business.

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Intensive I - session 11