#285: How to Respond to Inconsistency and Mixed Messages

0:00For decades, a shadowy organization called the Lemonati has kept lemon on top and lime in the shadows. Look around. Lemon forward sodas, even lemon forward songs. We ran the tracks, slowed them down, reversed them, and squeezed out the truth. That's lemon propaganda right there. But now, 7up is fighting back with their new lime lemon soda. Join the 7up rising. Flip the sip. Fall has never looked or tasted this good. Sweetgreen's fall harvest menu is back. with seasonal favorites dressed to impress and made to be devoured. Warm roasted sweet potatoes, crisp apples, maple glazed Brussels, and crave-worthy flavors in the autumn harvest bowl, maple glazed salmon plate, and roasted bacon Brussels side.

0:51The season's most desirable menu has returned to Sweetgreen, featuring fall's best dressed. Make your move. Order on the Sweetgreen app. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of On Attachment. In today's episode, we are tackling a big and important topic, which is how to best respond to someone's mixed messages and confusing behavior. So this is one that so many people struggle with. It is so at the heart of the anxious attachment experience, feeling like we keep coming up against behavior in romantic relationships that doesn't quite make sense, that feels conflicting and confusing. and so much of the time as we'll talk about our instinct when met with this kind of behavior is to try and decipher it, to pick it apart, to piece it together, to try and locate the truth in amongst all of the back and forth and the confusion and all that's left unsaid.

1:51And while that really makes so much sense as an instinct, it can actually be an expression of our own pattern that entrenches us in relationships that are really insecure and that leave us feeling anxious. And it can be a bit of a blind spot that we have in that we don't really see our role in the perpetuation of those dynamics that feel fundamentally unstable and unreliable. So we're going to talk about why it is that that's our default response. We're going to talk about how that sort of tracks with the broader picture of anxious attachment and the origin of anxious attachment. If you've been a listener for a while, you might have heard me say in the past that anxiously attached people will often have experienced some lack of consistency or reliability in the relational environment in early life.

2:43And so even at the same time as that uncertainty and inconsistency causes us so much grief and pain and distress and confusion, it can be strangely familiar and so we can maybe not respond to it as a problem to walk away from so much as a problem to solve. We'll also distinguish between different stages of a relationship so if someone's being very flaky and giving you mixed messages very early on in dating compared to when you're in a more established relationship if there's some confusion or uncertainty or inconsistency because I don't think it's a one-size-fits-all problem with a one-size-fits-all solution.

3:20And we will also talk about what it means to have self-respect and dignity in these situations. Because again, I think so often we can lose ourselves in trying to hold on to someone else and reel them back in and stop everything from unraveling when we feel like the relationship is slipping through our fingers. All of that anxiety can lead us to really lose ourselves in the process. And I think that can certainly take things from bad to worse. So that is what we're going to be talking about today. Before we get into that, a reminder that my book, The Secure Self, is now available for pre-order.

3:57A huge thank you to all of you who've already pre-ordered the book. For anyone who hasn't yet or who has missed the recent announcements, I've written a book all about anxious attachment and how to free yourself from the grip of those patterns by rebuilding your relationship with yourself and using that as the basis to really transform how you do relationships with other people and frankly how you approach life more broadly. Because as you would know if you struggle with anxious attachment, the excessive focus on everyone else and what they think and what they want and what they're feeling and all of that energy and attention out there does tend to leave us with a deficit within and we can feel very disconnected from ourselves, we can really lack healthy self-esteem, self-confidence, self-trust, all of the things that would make it much easier to experience a healthy relationship.

4:52But because of the way that we have adapted and what's normal for us in relationships, we can find ourselves again and again in these very imbalanced, insecure dynamics where no matter how hard we try, and even the more we try, the harder we try, the worse it seems to get. and that can feel very defeating and exasperating and overwhelming and can leave us feeling very hopeless. So if any of that resonates with you, and if my work more broadly resonates with you, please do consider pre-ordering the book. It's as simple as just going onto Amazon and hitting order as you would with any other book.

5:27And as a thank you for ordering in this pre-order period, you can then go to my website, stephanierig.com book, and just upload your proof of purchase, and you'll get access to a bonus package, which includes a three-part workshop series all about the core wounds of anxious attachment. So the first workshop is on the abandonment wound. The second workshop, which will be released next month, is on the fear of rejection. And then the third and final workshop, which comes out in December, is on the unworthiness wound. And in addition to those three workshops that you'll get for free, you'll also be invited to three live Q &As with me.

6:02So you can come along, ask a question, get some coaching on, you know, whatever it is you might be struggling with in your own relationships, or you can just come along and listen to other people's shares. So you get all of that for free when you pre-order the book as a way to say thank you for getting behind it and supporting me and my work. It really is a huge, huge help. The pre-orders make a world of difference. So I'd be immensely grateful if you could take a minute to pre-order the book. And again, a huge, huge heartfelt thank you to those who've already done so. Okay, so let's talk about what to do when someone is behaving in a way that is confusing and erratic and inconsistent, where you don't really know where you stand with them.

6:42Now, as I foreshadowed, I want to paint the picture a bit of what this can look like and what we usually do in response. So I hear this literally all the time, most days from students in my programs. I am always fielding questions on some version of this situation, being I don't know where I stand with them. Things were one way and now they're feeling a bit different, but I don't want to ask the question because I don't want to push them away when it feels like they're already pulling away. So I don't want to put any more pressure on them because I'm sensing that something's going on with them or they're having second thoughts or they're a bit unsure.

7:16And so when we're faced with that, the last thing we want to do is tip someone over the edge. And so I think what a lot of people will do then is cower and tiptoe and try and gather information in the background and reread all the messages and check to see if they're online, to see if they've posted any photo, like all of the things, right? We really have our detective hat on and we're trying to figure out the puzzle. We're trying to solve it so that we can know what the right thing to do next is. But I think the right thing is always the thing that's going to get us the outcome that we want, which is for them to come close again, which I would argue misconstrues what the right thing is.

7:57And we'll talk a little more about that towards the end when we talk about what acting with self-respect looks and feels like. But that's a really, really common picture that someone starts to behave in a way that's confusing, that we're getting these mixed messages and that our instinct is to try and figure out what the truth is rather than maybe stepping back and focusing on the bigger picture of the fact of the uncertainty, right? And I've said before, Sometimes the fact that someone is giving us mixed messages tells us a lot more than the content of the various messages rather than trying to figure out on Thursday they said this, but then on Monday they said that.

8:33It's like, well, the fact that they said something completely different on Thursday and Monday might tell me that this is a person who doesn't really know what they want or who's experiencing a lot of inner turmoil and chaos or who is maybe not all in on a relationship with me. And maybe that's the piece that I kind of need to take away from all of this. But of course, because our orientation is always towards keeping a relationship together and wanting someone to choose us and not wanting to push them away. And a lot of anxiously attached people have this story that I'm too much. I'm too sensitive.

9:07I do always push people away. I'm too needy. I don't want to overwhelm them with my anxiety. We do get into this rhythm whereby when someone starts to behave in a way that is sounding the alarm in our system, we try and turn the alarm off or keep it private, keep it at bay, because we're worried about making things worse. And our instinct is always like, just don't make it worse, right? Don't make it worse. And you know, when we look at the early environment of many folks with anxious attachment patterns, that makes a lot of sense. And that's a theme that we will have come up against many, many times, not only in our previous relationships, but often in our early life.

9:46So for many folks with anxious attachment patterns, the early environment is one that is characterized by love and connection sometimes. Things might be really good, but then they're bad and there's no rhyme or reason to it. There's no real way of predicting it. There's no way of controlling it, but we become so invested in trying to hold onto the good times and trying to maneuver around everyone and everything and try and keep things at bay so that we can get the love and connection that we so deeply long for and that we've experienced and we know feels so good. But for whatever reason, it's unreliable or it's only there sometimes when we reach for it, but other times it's not.

10:30And we feel really dropped and alone and abandoned. And so we do just become overly indexed on needing that from other people, but also not knowing when it's going to be there and when it's going to be taken away. And so our whole job without even realizing it becomes tracking that and also shape-shifting and trying to solve the puzzle, reverse engineer it and just do whatever we need to do in order to get what we want from someone else. And as I sort of flagged in the introduction, that's a really reliable way to lose yourself in the process, to not stand up for yourself, to not be clear in what you want and need.

11:06And of course, that makes so much sense in the context of being young, being a child and trying to get by in a family system where you were just doing what you had to do. But of course, when we just carry those patterns through our lives, the key difference is that as adults, we do have a lot more choice and agency. we aren't stuck we can decide what we want and we can choose to participate in certain relationships and not others but of course many of us by default just keep doing the thing we've always done playing the role we've always played because that's what we know and that's what is familiar to us and so as much as it causes us a lot of pain it's also comfortable in its familiarity and of course all of this is exacerbated by the fact that much of the time we will be drawn to and in relationship with folks with more avoidant patterns who by their nature tend to pull back when they're feeling overwhelmed, when they're feeling unsure, when they're feeling stressed, even when they're just feeling a bit tired or depleted.

12:07And so it really pushes our buttons in all of the ways because that sounds the alarm when we are someone who has a really hypersensitive alarm to anything that could be going wrong in our relationship and we're in a relationship with someone who does pull back or who does experience doubt, it does kind of create a perfect storm. And the fact that we then don't raise it or that we go quiet and we sort of enable it in a way, I think that can entrench us in the pattern. And part of our work is being able to really see what would it take for me to step out of this pattern in this moment, whether that's by not being in the relationship or by doing something differently in the relationship because if we just keep doing what we've always done and what's familiar to us we will just keep getting more of what we've always gotten and then often we have the blind spot of kind of pointing the finger at them and going it's just because of their behavior that I'm like this and while that can feel so true it always misses the full picture which is that I think everyone in relationship feels like they're responding to the other person so even at the same time as you feel like you're only doing your thing because they're doing their thing they might feel like they're doing their thing because you're doing your thing and we can just play that game forever and it doesn't get us anywhere.

13:22So with that, I want to talk about how best to respond when you are met with someone's inconsistency, mixed messages, confusing behavior, them expressing doubts, them just going AWOL, disappearing. All of these are things, again, that I hear about all the time to varying degrees. And I think at the more extreme end of the spectrum, if someone disappears for a month, I just wouldn't be entertaining that at all. But when we're talking about someone who is a bit hot and cold, is a bit inconsistent, is sending mixed messages, maybe they're saying, I really like you, but then they're expressing some doubts and saying, I'm not sure if I'm ready for a relationship.

14:01Or, you know, they're really, really warm and you have a great time when you're together, but then you don't hear from them at all between dates, or they're a bit short and abrupt and standoffish in their communication. This can take a lot of forms, but it tends to have the same effect on us which is leaving us in this pool of anxiety not knowing where we stand. So the first piece I think is kind of an inside job and it's getting really really clear for yourself on what do I actually want for my relationships? What do I want for my life? How do I want to feel? And can I set that as the standard?

14:33Can I set that as the floor rather than a nice to have? So if your relationships are always characterized by feeling uncertain and insecure and not knowing where you stand and all of those things. I think you have to really just put that down for a minute and go, what am I really doing here? And that can be hard to do if, again, that's your whole experience of relationships. So you don't really know anything different and you don't really know that anything else is possible. But the catch 22 there is that if you just keep going off your past experience in terms of setting the bounds of what's possible, then you're absolutely going to experience that as the ceiling.

15:09And that's going to demarcate what is possible for you because that's what you'll keep putting up with. So I think you do have to start going, okay, what am I available for? Like, what do I actually want? And what will I not tolerate? What am I not going to subject myself to anymore? And really getting clear on that and really meaning what you say, because so many of us will say these things in the abstract and then we become attached to someone who's in front of us. and all of that goes out the window because we just want to make it work and we want to find a way to justify continuing to invest in a relationship that is well below the standard of what we've said we're going to hold for ourselves.

15:47So I think having that and really doing that, not from a place of guardedness or defensiveness or red flag spotting, but actually just from protecting our own peace and caring about our wellbeing and going like, yeah, I'm not going to do that to myself. Like I'm not going to be in a relationship where that's par for the course. That's how I customarily feel is like an afterthought or like I'm auditioning for a role, like I'm on probation and I have to prove myself. All of that is going to do an absolute number on your anxiety and your self-worth. And it's really just not worth what it will cost you.

16:25So I think that's really step one is doing that work for yourself and getting so clear and really standing firm in it such that you're not trying to prove it or persuade or justify to someone else why those things are important. It's just like, it's a declaration almost of like, here's what I'm available for and here's what I'm not available for. I don't need you to agree with me, but that's where I'm at. And when you reach that place of sturdiness and clarity for yourself and really coming from true self-respect, that makes the next step, which is having a conversation about it, so much easier and more straightforward because it's basically akin to just like turning on the lights in the room and going, okay, what's here?

17:09What do we need to acknowledge? What do we need to name? What do we need to talk about? And can we figure out if there's a path forward for this relationship, if we want the same things? And if we don't, then that's a good outcome too. I'm glad we turned the lights on and figured that out because otherwise we'd just be fumbling around in the dark, wasting our time and prolonging the pain and experiencing a lot of anxiety in the interim. So, you know, that very cliched statement of like the truth will set you free. I think there's, there is some truth to that, particularly by contrast with just turning a blind eye and sweeping things under the rug and hoping that things are going to magically resolve, even as we don't acknowledge them and kind of live in denial and avoidance, which I think is something that we do to buffer against our fear of rejection.

17:57That's something I write about in my book as well. Now, with that being said, I think if it's very early dating, you're talking like a few weeks or something, you probably don't want to have like a full sit down serious conversation with someone who you've gone for a drink with once. And I think this can be an overcorrection that some anxious folks can engage in is like, oh, I've got to make sure that I set my boundaries. And it can come across as a bit overly serious or kind of weird and controlling. So I don't think you need to do that. But if someone is being really unclear, I think you can just say like, hey, I've noticed you've been a bit quiet.

18:32Is everything okay? And seeing how they respond, I think it doesn't have to be that complicated. You don't have to spend four hours crafting the perfect text message with the help of ChatGPT. You can actually just say the thing without all of the padding and without all of the footnotes and the over-explaining and the sorry to bother you and no worries if you're too busy and like all of that stuff that's just our anxiety trying to fill space. I think you're much better to just be direct and polite but straightforward and name the thing and trust that you can handle the answer. Because so much of the time I think we're trying to buffer against an answer that we're afraid of when again even the thing we don't want to hear if that's the truth, it's better that we hear it now rather than just pretending that that's not the truth and continuing to spin around in all of the anxiety and insecurity until that eventually comes out.

19:25So all of that to say, as far as mixed messages and uncertainty and inconsistency in early dating, I think you need to really raise the bar for yourself on what am I actually going to be available for and make myself available for. And a big part of, I think, becoming more secure and more self-confident is actually just drawing a clear line and going, I am not going to make myself available for anything that isn't what I really want for myself. And no one's going to do that for you. So pointing the finger at the unavailable person or the avoidant or the person who's leading me on, you can't be led on unless you are following.

20:04So like that really takes two to tango. And that can be a bit of a blind spot because of course it feels like these kinds of dynamics are being inflicted upon us against our will, but we actually have to take a stand there and go, yeah, no, that's not for me. Thanks. I wish you all the best if that's all that someone can give us. And of course, sometimes we might name the thing and we might have a really great conversation and that might establish a healthier dynamic going forward and make clear what the expectation is such that someone comes to the table. But again, either way, good outcome and And the counterfactual where we just keep trying to solve the puzzle and figure it out behind the scenes almost always leads us deeper into our pattern, which is not what we want.

20:46Okay, and I did also say that I'd speak to what this looks like if you're in a more committed relationship and someone is sort of experiencing doubt or behaving in a way that feels uncertain or inconsistent, that is infusing the relationship with some insecurity because it maybe feels like they've got one foot out the door or they're being distant. I think there are a lot of variables here that would impact this situation. So it's kind of a tricky one to give a soundbite, concise piece of advice around. But I think it is kind of an extension of what I just spoke to around dating, except that just walking away is probably not going to be the thing that you do as readily if it's someone that you're in a long-term relationship with.

21:27So I think defaulting more to seeking to understand while also making clear how that impacts you and being able to hold both of those things. So I can see that you're a bit distant. I'd love to understand what's going on for you. And just so you know, it's really hard for me to feel that you're not really here or that you've got stuff going on. And I feel a bit shut out from that. That's really hard for me and leaves me feeling pretty anxious if I'm being honest. So I'd love if we can talk about what's going on. I think those sorts of conversations, while they take a lot of courage again, because we can have a lot of fear around what they might reveal.

22:05That's ultimately how we build healthy relationships is by being honest with each other, by prioritizing the truth above comfort and just keeping the peace and maintaining the status quo. If the status quo isn't working, then we need to do something about that. And again, I think having a loving, respectful, but honest conversation is always a good idea. I should also say I have a few past episodes on what to do when your partner's pulling away that I think are a bit more focused on long-term relationships from memory. So I might try and dig that out and link it below in case you wanted a more fulsome discussion of that, if that's the situation you find yourself in.

22:43But I would say as sort of a parting comment, and this is very much the core message of my book, all of this stuff becomes so much easier and simpler and more natural when we prioritize our inner relationship as the first port of call. when we build self-worth, when we build healthy self-esteem, which in my book, I walk through four pillars of self-worth being self-compassion, self-regulation, self-advocacy, and self-trust. And I really believe that with that foundation in place, your inner relationship is just so radically transformed that naturally the way you hold yourself and carry yourself in relationship to others is going to be very different.

23:27And so it's not even something that you have to like really focus on. It's just like something that you embody. And I think that natural confidence and self-respect that comes from knowing who you are and knowing what you want and really being comfortable with that and being proud of who you are and being at peace with what you know is right for you without all of the noise and the self-doubt and the questioning and the unworthiness. That makes all of these things feel much more straightforward. And I would also argue, particularly in the context of dating, means you're probably less likely to end up in these situations in the first place, because over time, the types of people and dynamics that you're drawn to will shift towards something a bit more steady and healthy rather than the roller coasters and the intensity and the drama.

24:11So all of that to say, starting with you and your inner relationship is always, always a good idea. And that is really the crux of kind of everything that I teach, but certainly what I've written about in my book. So thank you all for joining me. I really hope that you've found that helpful. And again, please do consider pre-ordering my book, The Secure Self. And if you do, make sure that you head to stephanierigg.com book to submit the short form and redeem your bonus package. Okay. Thank you so much for joining me, everyone. Sending you lots of love and I'll see you. Coca-Cola for the big, for the small, the short and the tall.

24:49peacemakers risk takers for the optimists pessimists for long distance love for introverts and extroverts the thinkers and the doers for old friends and new Coca-Cola for everyone pick up some Coca-Cola at a store near you fall has never looked or tasted this good Sweet Green's fall harvest menu is back with seasonal favorites dressed to impress and made to be devoured. Warm roasted sweet potatoes, crisp apples, maple glazed Brussels, and crave worthy flavors in the autumn harvest bowl, maple glazed salmon plate, and roasted bacon Brussels side. The season's most desirable menu has returned to Sweetgreen featuring fall's best dressed.

25:40Make your move. Order on the Sweetgreen app. Again next week.