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| Why do I push people away? You asked Google – here’s the answer | Why do I push people away? You asked Google – here’s the answer |
| (4 days later) | |
| There are few things as difficult to navigate as the space between ourselves and others. Get too close, and we feel suffocated; move too far apart, and we feel abandoned. | There are few things as difficult to navigate as the space between ourselves and others. Get too close, and we feel suffocated; move too far apart, and we feel abandoned. |
| Pushing people away takes many forms. It might involve being verbally or physically aggressive, or, just as destructively, shutting them out emotionally. Pushing people away shows someone still matters to us. Indifference, after all, is a greater form of insult. | Pushing people away takes many forms. It might involve being verbally or physically aggressive, or, just as destructively, shutting them out emotionally. Pushing people away shows someone still matters to us. Indifference, after all, is a greater form of insult. |
| Pushing people away is intimately related to desire. For the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, desire is always incomplete because it comes from outside. Lacan situates psychic development in relation to the question “Che vuoi?” (“What do you want?”). | Pushing people away is intimately related to desire. For the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, desire is always incomplete because it comes from outside. Lacan situates psychic development in relation to the question “Che vuoi?” (“What do you want?”). |
| Desire is partly formed through trying to suss out what people with very conflicting wants transmit to us in early life. Toddlers and teenagers are especially likely to push people away in order to try to separate their desire from that of “others”. This task is essential to develop a sense of an “I” that can endure the vicissitudes of life. | Desire is partly formed through trying to suss out what people with very conflicting wants transmit to us in early life. Toddlers and teenagers are especially likely to push people away in order to try to separate their desire from that of “others”. This task is essential to develop a sense of an “I” that can endure the vicissitudes of life. |
| Given that other people’s wants and desires are fundamentally unknowable – we can never know precisely what they are thinking – the “other” always fails you because they can never know you. | Given that other people’s wants and desires are fundamentally unknowable – we can never know precisely what they are thinking – the “other” always fails you because they can never know you. |
| Our capacity to deal with these mini-failures, or see them as catastrophic, is a function of the security that we have experienced predominantly from early relationships with caregivers. Psychotherapy often works as much through moments of rupture in the therapy relationship as moments of connection. Experiencing that discord can be repaired, that everything is not lost – can help instil good-enough forms of relating. | Our capacity to deal with these mini-failures, or see them as catastrophic, is a function of the security that we have experienced predominantly from early relationships with caregivers. Psychotherapy often works as much through moments of rupture in the therapy relationship as moments of connection. Experiencing that discord can be repaired, that everything is not lost – can help instil good-enough forms of relating. |
| The aspect of a missing piece is vital in our relationships with other people; sometimes partners push one another away in order to produce a sense of loss so as to feel some desire again. This push-me-pull-me cycle can prove addictive, a pattern sustained by our cultural idealisation of famously stormy romances such as that of Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez, or indeed Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton – who pushed each other away and then refound each other more times than many of us have had hot dinners. | The aspect of a missing piece is vital in our relationships with other people; sometimes partners push one another away in order to produce a sense of loss so as to feel some desire again. This push-me-pull-me cycle can prove addictive, a pattern sustained by our cultural idealisation of famously stormy romances such as that of Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez, or indeed Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton – who pushed each other away and then refound each other more times than many of us have had hot dinners. |
| To have stable relationships one generally has to accept losing something of the intensity of early stages in a relationship when the “other” holds the tantalising promise of satisfying us. This is an unfortunate state of affairs. | To have stable relationships one generally has to accept losing something of the intensity of early stages in a relationship when the “other” holds the tantalising promise of satisfying us. This is an unfortunate state of affairs. |
| Pushing people away again and again is a frequent sign of mental health problems such as depression and trauma | Pushing people away again and again is a frequent sign of mental health problems such as depression and trauma |
| The more contradictory, inconsistent or inappropriate messages people receive from the world in early life, the more the confusion about who one is supposed to be, the more likely one is to push people away. If a parent has been too present, for example, only reinforcing certain ideals of how a child should be (“a good student”, “a girly girl”), a person may unconsciously sacrifice themselves for the parent, trying to fulfil their desire at any cost. Pushing people away here may feel like the only recourse. | The more contradictory, inconsistent or inappropriate messages people receive from the world in early life, the more the confusion about who one is supposed to be, the more likely one is to push people away. If a parent has been too present, for example, only reinforcing certain ideals of how a child should be (“a good student”, “a girly girl”), a person may unconsciously sacrifice themselves for the parent, trying to fulfil their desire at any cost. Pushing people away here may feel like the only recourse. |
| If the desire from outside has been abusive (physically, sexually, emotionally) or neglectful early on, proximity in adult life may be so threatening that a kind of psychological moat is established as protection. If someone threatens to come too close, especially if it feels like they might witness aspects of the self one is ashamed of, they are pushed away. | If the desire from outside has been abusive (physically, sexually, emotionally) or neglectful early on, proximity in adult life may be so threatening that a kind of psychological moat is established as protection. If someone threatens to come too close, especially if it feels like they might witness aspects of the self one is ashamed of, they are pushed away. |
| Many people switch between a desire to cling to other people who may finally offer a restorative experience and a need to retain this psychological moat that once provided much-needed safety. Pushing people away in all these scenarios is an existential survival strategy that has become a default, though one that we are not doomed to repeat if we can find support to experiment with relating in different ways. | Many people switch between a desire to cling to other people who may finally offer a restorative experience and a need to retain this psychological moat that once provided much-needed safety. Pushing people away in all these scenarios is an existential survival strategy that has become a default, though one that we are not doomed to repeat if we can find support to experiment with relating in different ways. |
| It is important to try to think what one might be pushing away in pushing away a loved one or indeed a stranger. It may be that the person is irritating or bad for you. Hell, after all, can be other people. But the person may also be a cipher of someone from one’s past, or an aspect of oneself that one has split off and projected into the other. Pushing people away in these cases may cause a temporary relief from anxiety or agitation, but the tension that has bubbled up is likely to recur unless the root causes are addressed. | It is important to try to think what one might be pushing away in pushing away a loved one or indeed a stranger. It may be that the person is irritating or bad for you. Hell, after all, can be other people. But the person may also be a cipher of someone from one’s past, or an aspect of oneself that one has split off and projected into the other. Pushing people away in these cases may cause a temporary relief from anxiety or agitation, but the tension that has bubbled up is likely to recur unless the root causes are addressed. |
| Pushing people away again and again is a frequent sign of mental health problems such as depression and trauma. If an imposed distance becomes one’s only response to the world, the inner world can become equally deprived. In such cases, it is important to try to regain some social bonds in a way that does not feel too intrusive, or defences will kick in. | Pushing people away again and again is a frequent sign of mental health problems such as depression and trauma. If an imposed distance becomes one’s only response to the world, the inner world can become equally deprived. In such cases, it is important to try to regain some social bonds in a way that does not feel too intrusive, or defences will kick in. |
| This is why though the current cultural imperative to talk is important, it can be better to coax someone back slowly to wishing to relate again first, for example through a shared activity that holds less relational pressure, such as watching a film together. | This is why though the current cultural imperative to talk is important, it can be better to coax someone back slowly to wishing to relate again first, for example through a shared activity that holds less relational pressure, such as watching a film together. |
| This brings us to the importance of having the means to disconnect from others when we feel over- or underwhelmed by them. Therapy culture has fuelled a fantasy that we can always feel connected to others, that we should always feel satisfied. These internalised imperatives can make us push away people when they fail to make us feel this way. The idea that there is always a better option, or the guilt and shame that we feel when we have pushed away someone we love, stops us learning to tolerate frustration and disappointment in relationships. | This brings us to the importance of having the means to disconnect from others when we feel over- or underwhelmed by them. Therapy culture has fuelled a fantasy that we can always feel connected to others, that we should always feel satisfied. These internalised imperatives can make us push away people when they fail to make us feel this way. The idea that there is always a better option, or the guilt and shame that we feel when we have pushed away someone we love, stops us learning to tolerate frustration and disappointment in relationships. |
| These cultural imperatives can also serve to attempt to squeeze people into modes of being in the world that do not fit their proclivities, turning difference into disability (for example by imposing normative relational goals on someone with Asperger’s, which often provokes a desperate pushing away). | These cultural imperatives can also serve to attempt to squeeze people into modes of being in the world that do not fit their proclivities, turning difference into disability (for example by imposing normative relational goals on someone with Asperger’s, which often provokes a desperate pushing away). |
| Couples that function well have often achieved this by finding socially sanctioned ways of pushing people away as opposed to making incendiary comments that provoke annihilation anxieties, such as “I need some space”. Gardening, dog-walking, art and other activities can be a way of excusing oneself from the imperative to relate when the world is that bit too much. One can then return to the relationship renewed. | Couples that function well have often achieved this by finding socially sanctioned ways of pushing people away as opposed to making incendiary comments that provoke annihilation anxieties, such as “I need some space”. Gardening, dog-walking, art and other activities can be a way of excusing oneself from the imperative to relate when the world is that bit too much. One can then return to the relationship renewed. |
| Navigating the space between ourselves and others is one of the great tasks in life, one that we perhaps never completely master. Some humour in, and some communication about, our inevitable failures to manage this border effectively can help drain the charge that makes us push people violently away. | Navigating the space between ourselves and others is one of the great tasks in life, one that we perhaps never completely master. Some humour in, and some communication about, our inevitable failures to manage this border effectively can help drain the charge that makes us push people violently away. |
| • Jay Watts is a clinical psychologist, psychotherapist and senior lecturer | • Jay Watts is a clinical psychologist, psychotherapist and senior lecturer |
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