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Are you constantly ruminating over an ex who happens to be an avoidant attachment style, and you're wondering, how do I move on and how do I stop feeling like this? Well, if this is something you're going through right now, literally in today's video, I'm gonna give you steps that will take that sting out of your breakup immediately. And whether this is a long term relationship, a situationship, somebody you are married to, these steps work for everybody. And they help you move through a breakup so much more quickly and effectively. So stay with me. I promise you we can start moving you through in a much faster way so that you don't have to stay locked into your suffering and pain and you can finally move on and into the next season of life that you deserve to have. Here's the introduction to grief first. Okay, Our subconscious mind, which, if you're not already familiar, is actually responsible for a 95 to 97% of all of our beliefs, our thoughts, our emotions and actions. That's according to Harvard Business Review. What happens is, is your subconscious mind is responsible for so much. The part of you that's your conscious mind, the think that you think of as like your logical, rational, thinking self, kind of the part of you you identify as your personality. In a sense, this part of you is Only responsible for 3 to 5% of your beliefs and thoughts and emotions and actions. And so what happens is your subconscious is kind of your habituated self, the natural patterns that you'll fall into without thinking about it. So when we attach to somebody, okay, when we build, like a deep bond with somebody, our subconscious mind does two things that you really want to understand. Number one, it actually starts to identify ourselves with that person. You see this in a lot of facets across society, right? Somebody may buy a new car and they start to kind of identify like, this is my car. Their ego mind, like, identifies with the car or their house. But we do this a lot. Even more so arguably in relationships or you see it with people in their job. I do this for a living, right? So we tend to take something as ours. And when we do that, we start to essentially see that this is part of ourselves. And the reason this has a huge impact with breakups is that we do this with traits, okay? Biologically, there's something known as trait variety, where if you years and years and years ago were out in the wild trying to survive and somebody was really smart and they paired up with somebody really strong, when you pair up with them, you have a better chance at surviving together. So what Essentially happens is when we attach to somebody, we start to take their traits as a part of ourselves. So if somebody was very protective of you, for example, and protectiveness was one of their traits, then you'll start to feel like, oh, that that base is covered, right? That that makes me feel safer in the world. If somebody made you, maybe they were very present, you start to feel like, okay, this person, you know, they end up making me feel very seen because they're so present. And I see this all the time with people. If somebody's really attractive, then people will attach to that and think, okay, I must be kind of attractive cuz this person's really attractive that I'm dating. And so it actually kind of causes us to have this like positive improvement to our self esteem esteem or the second point is to our needs being met. So we also, once we attach to somebody, we get used to somebody meeting our needs over and over again. And so what, the subconscious mind relies on that person meeting your needs. So when grief happens, okay, why grief hurts so badly? Because we're not just missing somebody's like physical body when we grieve them, right? If their physical body just appeared, but they weren't alive, but you know, we wouldn't be like, oh my gosh, all my grief is gone. No, you're actually grieving all the invisible things. You're grieving the traits and the needs that they brought into your life. So the subconscious mind attaches to these things, comes to take these things as a part of oneself. And then when that person suddenly goes missing from your life and they pull away or they're not there or they leave, we actually have this huge void left behind where our subconscious started to identify itself with this person, with their traits and qualities. And it also got all of its needs met, or at least a lot of its needs met through this person. So maybe the person made you feel validated or encouraged, or maybe they just made you feel special or important because you had them on a pedestal and you thought that oh, if they're letting me into their life then I must be special or important. Now of course we know you know this is talking about avoid avoidance. So I know you listening are probably like wait. But avoidance aren't present and they don't necessarily make you me feel special and important. But if you put somebody on a pedestal and you think of them as being like hard to get or kind of like aloof or mysterious, as soon as you put somebody on a pedestal, their attention makes you feel special and important, right? So you can see these different dynamics and then we attach to getting these needs met through this person or having these traits they pull away out of our lives. It feels like there's this void left behind. And exactly that void is what you experience as grief. Okay, now remember I said there was four things that we experience as grief. And I'm going to give you one or two things you can actually start working on today. There's two other things that cause us to grieve. We help Painful stories after a breakup. If you're listening to this, chances are you've probably done the thing where you go, oh, if only I did this one thing differently, maybe they would've stayed. Or if only I was more attractive or more interesting or more funny or more fill in the blanks, then they would have stayed. And so there's a lot of like storytelling, right? Because you don't know that that's just an idea. That's just the concept you're projecting onto a situation. You actually don't know that if you did one thing. And honestly, sometimes when you take a just honest look at it and go, wait, if I did do this one thing differently, does that actually guarantee that this person would have stuck around? And you know, a lot of what happens is we, we overtake responsibility after a breakup. Especially if you're more anxious and, or you end up in a situation where you're like, oh, if I just did this one thing, or I'm not good enough, or I'm alone now, I'm going to be alone forever. Everybody will always abandon me. As soon as you start storytelling, you are just creating your own grief right now. It's not conscious, it's not your fault. It's not like you're sitting down and choosing this. These subconscious autopilot thoughts do this right, because we have pre existing programs where we're like, I'm going to be abandoned. We have these fears and we hold on to these fears and then when we get triggered, these programs get projected out onto our outside world. It's part of how the subconscious mind works. So now you can start to see, oh my goodness, this is why I'm grieving things. And the fourth thing that we grieve is we grieve the fantasy of a person. You know, we grieve the what was going to happen, what could have been the projections into the future about what was going to happen next. And often, a lot of times when people are grieving, especially avoidance, they're grieving me. The story of a person and the fantasy of the person more than the person themselves, quite honestly. So that begs the question if these are four of the major parts of grief, right? We look at the traits that are taken away, the needs that are no longer a part of our lives. We tell all these stories about how we're going to be alone forever or we're unlovable, and that's really painful. And then we look at all of the costs to the future that, you know, all the things that were taken away instead of like, hey, how is there actually a silver lining here? You know, why is that relationship maybe not serving me? Well, then you end up in a situation where you are in this prolonged grief period, and it makes it really hard, honestly, to be available for future relationships to be able to move on. So what do you actually do? We're going to talk about what you can actually do about this, and I'm going to give you two tangible things. You can start right here, right now, today. I do wanna let you know before I tell you these two things that if you wanna do a deep dive into all four of these pillars, you can check out our how to Heal from a Breakup course fully, for free. You can go through two, three courses at pds. They're only like two hours long each, but they give you really tangible tools for engaging your subconscious mind in actual healing. Because we need to engage the subconscious mind for true healing to take place. I'll put the link down below if you wanna check it out. So these two major things, number one is I want you right now to make a list of all of the needs that you think this person met. And I'll give you some examples of ones that often come up for people. And it doesn't just have to be the ones they actually met. It can include the ones you fantasize about them meeting. Because a lot of times you're like, in the fantasy, and that's actually what's meeting your needs more than necessarily the reality of how the person showed up. Maybe the person made you feel protected. Maybe they made you feel like there was a sense of novelty or excitement. Maybe they made you feel like there was a sense of challenge which actually could meet a need for growth. Maybe this person made you feel validated, even if it was intermittently. Maybe this person made you feel encouraged or special. You were loved or lovable. You were wanted, right? Like, oh, they were attracted to you. They made you feel wanted. So these are some common things. Again, oftentimes we're more in the the fantasy of somebody than the reality. And if you're actually honestly looking. And we're going to come to this in point number two. So first thing is, you look at all these needs and then I want you to ask yourself, when you've written out a bunch of these needs, I want you to ask yourself from 1 to 10, without this person in my life, how much do I feel like I have these needs met on a daily or regular basis? Chances are you're going to find that, like, wow, I really don't have these needs met on a regular basis much at all. And that is why I'm willing to put up with breadcrumbs from somebody else, because I'm starving for this connection and moving in that direction. Now, I want to be mindful here that this is not me saying, like, all avoidance are negative or bad. I was a fearful avoidant. We have tons of people when I was working in client practice that were dismissive, avoidant, fearful avoidant that would do the work and show up incredibly well. And I really believe in that. For all attachment style, they really. Because I've been in this field for a long time and I've been in the trenches with people firsthand for so long, I honestly don't actually find that there's an attachment style implication to healing so much. There's different nuances of, like, how different attachment styles will heal, but it's more about is somebody doing the work or not? That's really the main question. Like, it doesn't matter what somebody's attachment style is. Everybody can heal their attachment style. Everybody can show up as a loving, supportive partner. Is the person that you are dating or is the person that maybe you are listening to this? Are you willing to show up and do the work, to ask the questions, to get some answers, to dig deep, to work through your core wounds, to shift your patterns of communication and boundaries? Like, that's the only factor that really plays a role. But part of why I'm making this video is like, a lot of people really get stuck on avoidance and they haven't asked the question, is this person doing the work? Is there growth? Or is this person showing up with me? Which is arguably one of the most important questions you can ask when you're dating any Instagram insecure attachment style. But I will go back to staying on track here. So this point is for you to look at how much do you have those needs met from 1 to 10 that you were attaching to in that other person? And if you're finding that you're showing up really low, that's why you're putting up with grad promise. Right? That's it makes perfect sense. So then I want you to ask yourself what is one thing I can do a day for the two needs I'm hungering for the most right now from this person? What is one thing I can commit to doing each day to start getting these needs met in my life, whether it's through myself or through somebody else. So for example, if the need is this person made me feel valid and encouraged, okay, well I can actually, at the end of every day, I'll make a daily habit that for three minutes I will acknowledge three wins that I had today. It may take you 30 friggin seconds, but you're gonna do that small thing, tangible. But as you do that through repetition, it actually starts to fire and wire new neural pathways. You start to get in the habit because it becomes subconscious once it's ingrained. And all of a sudden you're actually meeting that need more naturally. One thing you can do per day to meet that need, if it's the person, was they made you feel special. Sometimes we can make ourselves feel more special by actually attuning to our own feelings and needs and actually allowing ourselves to take up space. A lot of people who chase feeling special in relationships with others, they do that because they make themselves feel the opposite of special all day long because they constantly put themselves and their needs on the back burner. So again, again, like a tangible thing that you can do in here, I want you to make a list. I talk about this quite often, but this is a really important tool for getting over and avoidant. Make a list of all the things you want in a partner, your standards. Maybe you want somebody who's consistent, caring, shows up, who's loving, who makes you a priority. Like make a list of 10 things, arguably five to 10 things. But the more the better of things that you feel like you really want. If you could wave a magic wand and have it, your partner would have these things. And then I want you in the next column next to those things to Write down from 1 to 10 how much this avoidant person was actually showing up, meet these things and to be there in this way on a regular basis. And what this does, it gives us a reality check because sometimes we really are chasing and mourning the fantasy of somebody more than the reality of how they showed up or who they were. And that can really help anchor you back into that reality mindset. And that's a really powerful shift or very quickly for being able to start moving on. So those are two things you can start with right here, right now, today, and I hope that makes a lot of sense. Thank you for stopping by. I hope you subscribe to this channel if you enjoy the content for today, and I really appreciate you being here.
Host: Thais Gibson
Date: August 10, 2026
In this episode, Thais Gibson guides listeners through an actionable, psychology-backed framework for quickly moving on from an avoidant ex. The focus is understanding why attachment-related breakups hurt so much, debunking myths around blame and fantasy, and breaking the healing process into practical, tangible steps that engage the subconscious mind. Thais assures listeners that growth and freedom from heartbreak are accessible, regardless of attachment style, and shares tools to help listeners reclaim their emotional well-being and stop ruminating over avoidant partners.
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Thais stresses that attachment healing isn’t about fixing your ex or waiting for avoidant partners to change; it’s about addressing your own needs, challenging your stories, and reprogramming your subconscious. The episode is both compassionate and practical, empowering listeners to take immediate steps toward inner wholeness and future relationship health.
For anyone struggling to get over an avoidant ex, these steps offer both insight and concrete tools, delivered with Thais Gibson’s trademark empathy, clarity, and directness.