We've all become avoidantly attached.

And it's making us feel like our basic needs are too much

If you’ve ever had the experience of being in a relationship with someone highly avoidantly attached, you will know that it can leave you feeling like you are the neediest person in the world. Wanting commitment - too needy. Wanting to talk regularly - too needy. Wanting to hang out all the time - clingy. Trying to have conversations about how you feel - far too needy.

Because the avoidant partner has cut themselves off from their own need for closeness - usually because they’ve learnt that people can’t be depended upon - they project all their neediness into the other. And so what seem like quite reasonable desires in a relationship are experienced and labelled as overwhelmingly demanding. The avoidant gets to push away and feel that it’s the other person who carries all the neediness. Meanwhile, the pushed-away person is left doubting themselves and wondering if they are indeed too much.

Photo by Andrew Gook on Unsplash

I’ve come to realise recently that this dynamic isn’t just happening in one-on-one relationships; it’s also happening societally, at scale - in our relationship to our culture.

We live in an increasingly avoidant culture. Historically, many of our needs were met through systems that were relational in nature: family networks, local communities, stable institutions, even more predictable state structures. Whatever their limitations, there was a clearer sense that needs were met between people.

But individualisation has completely changed this.

We are now, in many ways, in relationship with systems that feel unreliable, overstretched, or entirely untrustworthy. Governments, healthcare systems, housing markets, Big Tech have shown us that we can’t safely rely on the people who are supposed to be in charge. Just like the wounded avoidantly attached infant who's learnt they can’t fully rely on their caregivers, we’ve been wounded by systems that have are supposed to look after us. These systems increasingly neglect our well-being. And so we’ve got the message - no one is coming to save us; we can only rely on ourselves.

Enter hustle culture, overworking, the aspirations of young people to have financial independence (a goal which is at the heart of many toxic cultures online, such as the Manosphere or wellness grifters flogging £5000 courses). The attention economy as a whole is an example of people trying desperately to build online platforms because it’s so hard nowadays to build security through normal jobs. With fewer and fewer resources or support available, we’re essentially in avoidant relationships with the systems around us. They give us a little, but remain unable to fully meet our needs.

And what happens when we’re in a relationship with someone (or something) avoidant? We become convinced that our basic needs are too much.

This is the stance so many of us have come to believe. That we shouldn’t ask for help - not just because we’re unlikely to get it, but also because we shouldn’t need help in the first place. We’re supposed to be strong, independent people who can do it all, and if we can’t do it all alone, then there must be something wrong with us.

I’m always struck by the idea of oversharing, for example. The notion is that we’re opening up too much, that we should only let out a small amount of vulnerability, not burden others with our mess. But isn’t that what people are for? To be burdened. Instead, the culture has become so boundaried that we’re only supposed to share fully with our therapists, so the other people in our lives can remain free to focus on themselves. On the one hand, I get it - we shouldn’t make other people responsible for our feelings or take up so much space that we fail to see how much we’re taking. Reciprocity is important. But still, I don’t agree that we shouldn’t fully break down in front of each other or keep up a pretence that we’re fine.

Individualisation hasn’t just made us overly self-reliant; it’s also produced a cultural shame around needing at all. We’ve become so accustomed to relating to ourselves as individual projects that neediness itself has begun to feel embarrassing. We apologise before asking for help, we hesitate before reaching out, we convince ourselves that everyone else is busy and that our problems are ours to manage alone.

And yet the opposite is true. Dependency is essential. We are, all of us, desperately needy. Humanity has only survived this long because we have depended on each other. For food, warmth, group thinking, childcare, knowledge, safety, belonging, for nurture, for care, for joy. We aren’t supposed to be individual, nuclear creatures.

That’s why loneliness can hurt so much. It’s an existential threat not to have anyone. On the flip side, community is one of the most potent mitigating factors against both mental and physical health. We need people; there is no getting away from that.

And the funny thing is that, in my experience, people love to be needed. Not everyone, of course, but most people feel a sense of value and worth from people. I’m always struck at weddings by how many people want to help out, want to be a part of things, want to be the village.

And yet, day to day, we rarely ask for anything from the people around us. It’s like we’ve forgotten that our friends and family aren’t just for entertainment purposes but for survival, to really show up for us.

We speak constantly about needing community, but community isn’t something you have. It’s something you do. It requires really letting yourself depend on people and showing up in return.

Perhaps that’s what our avoidant culture struggles with most. Not just receiving care, but needing it. Admitting that there are things we can’t solve on our own. Accepting that a meaningful life will always involve both leaning and being leaned on.

So I want us to break free from this avoidant dynamic. I want us to let ourselves need, to embrace the part of us that simply cannot do it on our own.

Ask for help. Invite yourself around. Give big hugs. Overshare. Stop saying ‘I’m fine’ while you suffer in private. Tell people what’s really going on. Create community. Organise meetups. Host admin nights. Bring over lasagne. Ask for lasagne. Help your friend move house instead of just meeting them at the pub afterwards. Call someone when you’re upset rather than crying into a pillow alone. Take the shoulder. Be the shoulder. Need.

Because the cure for an avoidant culture (and avoidant-anxious dynamic) isn’t pretending you don’t have needs. It’s having them, unapologetically, and not letting anyone convince you otherwise.