Lovingkindness versus Loveless Attachment

Blog Post – ABC Bookstore

Understanding Love and Attachment in Relationships

By Jim Byrne, Doctor of Counselling

~~~

Posted on 23^rd November 2025

~~~

Introduction

When we think about love in relationships, most people tend to approach it with a rather naïve, childlike, and sometimes selfish mindset. In my experience as a couples therapist, I’ve often encountered the belief that love is all about “getting it” rather than “creating it”. But in reality, the most reliable way to receive love is by genuinely giving it first. It’s a principle as old as time: what goes around comes around.

The real challenge is that many individuals haven’t yet discovered the wellspring of love within themselves. All too often, what initially draws someone to a partner isn’t love at all, but need. There’s a yearning for connection, a longing for attachment to a “love object” – reminiscent of the bond formed with a mother in early childhood.

Attachment is a fundamental drive. In newborns, it’s an instinct geared towards survival. For new mothers, attachment is both innate and learned, shaped by their own upbringing and cultural influences. When we enter adult relationships, our attachment styles – be they secure or insecure – often mirror those we developed as children, particularly in relation to our mothers, and later, our fathers.

When love and attachment work hand in hand, they create a strong bond that holds couples together. However, if love fades but attachment lingers, that bond can trap partners in cycles of hurt and unhappiness. It’s crucial to learn the difference between loveless attachment – which can be toxic and should ideally be ended amicably – and loving attachment, which is truly life-affirming.

Happy faces of Jim and Renata — **Jim And Renata built a wonderful life by studying self-help and personal development books!**

Loveless attachment often leads individuals to treat their partner as a possession, rather than a companion. It can also give rise to controlling behaviours and, in some cases, domestic violence. Recognising and addressing the difference between healthy, loving attachment and destructive, loveless attachment is essential to fostering happier, healthier relationships.

What do you think of these ideas?

Has this blog post sparked off any insights in you?

Please share your thoughts.

Dr Jim Byrne, Executive Director Best wishes, and take good care of yourself!

Jim

Dr Jim Byrne

Doctor of Counselling

And author and publisher of this book:

How to Build Your Own “Love Island”

An easy to follow blueprint, plus seventeen illuminating case studies from the Couples Therapy Room

Read the full book description online.***

~~~

Read the Preface here.***

~~~

Read the Introduction here.***

~~~

Progressive Muscle Relaxation for Anxiety: A Case Study

Blog post on 2nd July 2024

Renata Taylor-Byrne’s book explores using progressive muscle relaxation to combat anxiety, citing a case study of a college student haunted by fears rooted in a family tragedy. After receiving therapy and implementing relaxation exercises, she overcame her fears and excelled academically abroad. This approach proved more effective than medication or cognitive behavioral therapy. The case highlights the efficacy of addressing mental issues through physical means, demonstrating the power of body-mind connection in alleviating anxiety. For more details, refer to “Relax and Enjoy It!” by Renata Taylor-Byrne.

How progressive muscle relaxation could cure your anxiety problems

In the preface to her book on how to do progressive muscle relaxation, Renata Taylor-Byrne wrote about a couple of case studies where muscle relaxation was used to effectively overcome intense anxiety. This is one of those case studies:

~~~

A college student had been plagued for a long time by fears of the dark; being on her own; and of fires breaking out, and harming her. Part of the cause was this: Her aunt had been killed in a fire three years earlier, and when she (this young student) tried to get to sleep each night, she had very strong images of scorching fires, and people in flames. This was obviously why she found it very hard to sleep at night; and she felt so vulnerable that she had to have someone in the room while she slept; and she had to have the room illuminated all night. (This case is described in a book by Bernstein, Borkovec and Hazlett-Stevens, 2000, Page 18, also in the References list, below).

Eventually she went to see a therapist, and told the therapist that she had to go and study in another country in seven weeks’ time. She didn’t think she could handle the stress of the travel and the new location, and would have to drop out of the study programme.

How could this student handle the necessary changes needed for her to be able to continue with her academic commitments abroad?

A physical solution for a mental problem

The therapist treated her with progressive muscle relaxation training (in a shortened form, similar to that in Chapter 10, because of lack of time), and she practised the exercises twice a day herself; the second session each day being at her bedtime. As well as the daily relaxation sessions, she was instructed to gradually reduce the light level in her room – over a period of many days – and to do her second relaxation session in bed before her roommate came in.

The procedure she was following was designed to enable her to become slowly adapted to more challenging situations, which she had previously feared – (a dark room, with no-one else in it) – and she was experiencing these situations in a very relaxed state.

She carefully followed the therapist’s instructions, and, by the time of the third interview, she was able to announce that her fears had greatly diminished, because of her growing skill at using the prescribed exercises to relax her body and mind, and to bring on sleep. Her training sessions and ‘in vivo’ practice[1] – (the gradually darkening room and her increasing ability to feel comfortable going to sleep in a room on her own) – had paid off!

Anti-anxiety medication and CBT would not have produced such radical results. Working through the body is one of the best ways of calming the mind!

~~~

To read more about this book, please go here: Relax and Enjoy It!

~~~

Jim Byrne, Doctor of Counselling

Executive Director of the ABC Bookstore

~~~

Footnote from above

[1] In behaviour therapy, ‘in vivo exposure’ means directly facing a feared object, situation or activity in real life; which, in the example above, means facing up to the fear of being alone in an increasingly darkened room.

Books about emotional life, including anxiety

Dr Jim’s Blog post

23^rd April 2020

~~~

Books as depositories of valuable knowledge and ideas; and as outlets for speaking to the world…

~~~

Introduction

Jim and the Buddha, 2 I love books; and I’ve enjoyed scouring bookshops for new ideas since I was about 14 years old. It is perhaps one of the greatest deprivations of the Covid-19 lockdown that I cannot get to walk around the philosophy, psychology, health and self-help sections of Waterstones, in Leeds or Manchester; or the Bookcase in Hebden Bridge; or W.H. Smith’s in Halifax; or the Bookcase store in Piece Hall.

I also miss the whole floor of good quality, and interesting secondhand books in Oxfam in Bradford!

~~~

A story of browsing

Yesterday I was browsing my own (and Renata’s) bookshelves in our attic office when my mind alighted upon one of our own books – Holistic Counselling in Practice: An Introduction to Emotive-Cognitive embodied Narrative Therapy.[1]

Book-cover-front But, actually, it was the original version I had in my hands; the one with the bnlue cover, and the coloured illustrations – and my eyes were drawn to three illustrations, on pages vi and vii of the Foreword.

– The first illustration shows the interaction of a mother and baby, giving rise to the socialized mind of the child.

(See below).

– The second is a blue boxed callout, which says: “We are bodies as well as minds; primarily social animals; with the potential to develop virtues and vices”.

(Not shown on this page).

~~~

– And the third was also a callout, like this:

“The thoughts and beliefs of the (counselling) client cannot exist independently of their diet, exercise, self-talk, relaxation, stress level, social and economic circumstances, etc.”

Basic-CENT-model

With the benefit of the passage of time, I can see that sleep and relaxation should have featured prominently in that second callout.

Anyway, the surprising thing was that I had to skim all the way through to page 123 before I could find our Holistic SOR model, which is what distinguishes us from the CBT, psychodynamic and humanistic traditions. This is it:

Holistic-SOR-model2

This model shows that diet and food supplements; meditation; exercise regime; plus sleep and relaxation histories; are among the many factors which determine how the body-brain-mind will respond to an incoming stimulus, or, if you like: how we will respond to our ongoing experiences.

The importance of high quality, original research

I recall that, as I was beginning to draft that book, I realized that we needed to be quite specific about the kinds of foods, and exercise systems, that would most benefit a person who is suffering from anger management issues, or anxiety/panic, or depression. And I knew I could not afford the time to study nutrition and exercise at that time; so I spoke to Renata (my wonderful wife and life and business partner) and she agreed to do what turned out to be months of research of the scientific studies which have looked at the links between diet and exercise, on the one hand, and the experience of anger, anxiety and/or depression, on the other.

Renata’s research of those subjects appeared as Appendices E and F of the Holistic Counselling book; and later we created a more expanded book – Lifestyle Counselling and Coaching for the Whole Person – in which Renata did weeks of research on the science of sleep, and how it relates to emotional states; and that went into the Lifestyle Counselling book.

Recently, we’ve gone back to all of that research, and subsequent refinements, to produce a new book.

This time we’ve tackled a topic which is very relevant to the Covid-19 pandemic: how to control your anxiety. Here are the details of the book:

Cutting through the Worry Knot!

How to Reduce and Control Your Anxiety Level: Using a whole body-brain-mind approach

And without using drugs, alcohol or escapism!

By Dr Jim Byrne and Renata Taylor-Byrne

Anxiety is not a disease; not a mental illness. Anxiety is part of our normal, innate, mental signalling system which tells us what is happening to us, and what to do about it. That is to say, it is part of our emotional wiring. Our emotional intelligence.

Trying to get rid of anxiety with drugs is like hanging two overcoats and a duvet over your burglar alarm when it goes off. The burglar alarm is designed to give you helpful information, which you can then use to guide your action. Should you check to see if a burglar has got into your house? Or call the police? Or realize that you’d mismanaged your alarm system, and that you should therefore switch it off?

Once you understand anxiety correctly, it becomes as useful as a burglar alarm; and you can learn how to manage it correctly.

When you buy a burglar alarm, it comes with a little Instruction Book about how to set it; calibrate it; monitor it; reset it; and switch it on and off.

You should have got just such an Instruction Book about your anxiety alarm, from your parents, when you were very young – and some people did. But if your alarm goes off at all times of day and night, in unhelpful ways, then I guess you were one of the unlucky ones who did not get your Instruction Book. This book contains your Instruction Book, plus lots of other backup information, which will help to make you the master of your anxiety, instead of its quaking slave.

Don’t let your anxiety “burglar alarm” reduce your life to misery. Learn how to use it properly!

For more information about this book on anxiety:

~~~

Paperback copy:

~~~

Kindle eBook copy:

~~~

We love books: Reading them; writing them; and talking about them. We hope you enjoy what we have to say about what we have learned, and how we have applied our learning.

~~~
Best wishes for a happy reading aspect to your growing life!

Jim and the Buddha, 2 Jim

Dr Jim Byrne

Doctor of Counselling

Joint Director of the ABC Bookstore Online UK

Joint Director of the Institute for E-CENT Counselling

Dr Jim’s Counselling and Psychotherapy Division

~~~

[1] Byrne, J.W. (2019) Holistic Counselling in Practice: An introduction to the theory and practice of Emotive-Cognitive Embodied-Narrative Therapy. Updated edition (2). Hebden Bridge: The Institute for E-CENT Publications.

~~~

Byrne, J.W. (2018) Lifestyle Counselling and Coaching of the Whole Person: Or how to integrate nutritional insights, physical exercise and sleep coaching into talk therapy. Hebden Bridge: The Institute for E-CENT Publications.

~~~

Taylor-Byrne, R.E. and Byrne, J.W. (2017) How to control your anger, anxiety and depression, using nutrition and physical activity. Hebden Bridge: The Institute for E-CENT Publications.

~~~

Byrne, J.W. and Taylor-Byrne, R.E. (2020) Cutting through the Worry Knot! How to Reduce and Control Your Anxiety Level: Using a whole body-brain-mind approach. Hebden Bridge: The Institute for E-CENT Publications.

Diet and exercise affect mental health

Blog post: 4^th July 2019

~~~

Diet and exercise are at least as important as philosophy of life in determining how we feel!

~~~

Copyright (c) Jim Byrne, Doctor of Counselling, July 2019

~~~

Front cover design 3 Over the years that I’ve been providing counselling and therapy services to individuals and couples, I have had to keep broadening my understanding of the nature of human beings.

I was originally trained as a Rational Therapist (REBT), and tended to focus exclusively on the self-talk of the client. I had bought into the idea that people are upset by what they “tell themselves” about their negative experiences.

Then I came across clients who did not seem to have any obvious psychological reason to feel depressed or anxious, but they were. This led me to realize that many people suffer from ‘gut dysbiosis’, including Candida Albicans overgrowth, which (we now know) also causes ‘leaky brain’, which allows toxins from the large intestine to get into the bloodstream, and from there, into the brain; disrupting brain chemistry, and causing symptoms of anxiety, depression, in the main; but theoretically also, anger.

Dr-Jim-Byrne8 (2) I also found that some people were anxious because they were over-consuming caffeine or sugary foods; and not consuming enough calming foods and drinks (like Brazil nuts, and Camomile tea).

Out of these realizations, and others, I began to build, and to constantly amend, my own stress and anxiety diet, which I shared with my clients, when appropriate.

And some clients had such sedentary lifestyles that they became anxious or depressed, because of the lack of exercise-induced production of endorphins (or ‘happiness chemicals’); and exercise-assisted washing of stress hormones out of their systems.

Jim.Nata.Couples.pg.jpg.w300h245 (1) Eventually, Renata, my wife and professional partner, did some research on the role of diet and exercise in the experience of anger, anxiety and depression; and we collaborated on a book in which we put her research, and my stress and anxiety diet, together; plus some work we’d jointly done on exercise.

The book is titled, How to Control Your Anger, Anxiety and Depression: Using nutrition and physical activity.***

~~~

There are six parts to this book:

Front cover design 3 The first part deals with diet and nutrition and how they influence anxiety, anger and depression.

The second part of the book deals with physical exercise and how it can affect these common emotional problems.

The third part is a description of my ‘stress and anxiety reduction diet’ and offers guidelines for understanding different types of diets and their effects.

The fourth part shows some of the key findings from the science of nutritional deficiency, and the role of inflammation in the creation of depression.

The fifth part is a summing up of the key findings of the book, so that you can spot the most useful material that you can use for yourself – or for your clients, if you are a health-care or psychotherapeutic practitioner, counsellor or psychologist.

And the sixth part is our attempt to coach you through the process of habit change (including controlling alcohol consumption; changing your diet; or increasing your physical activity); and to give you a map to guide you through the process of accessing, learning and applying the transformative information in this book.

You can read a page of information about this book here:

https://abc-bookstore.com/diet-exercise-mental-health/

~~~