A lot of the help found here advises to “be confident” and “don’t be needy”, but fails to take into account the Attachment Styles first formulated by John Bowlby.

The truth is that if your Attachment Style is Anxious, you will most likely be a needy person and it’s not your fault. It stems from very early interactions with your parents and it is extremely difficult (but not impossible) to go from Anxious Attachment to Secure Attachment. So when someone tells you “just be confident and not needy”, it’s the same as telling a man to “just fly”. A man simply does not fly.

However, a man can be taught how to build an airplane. A man can use acquired tools and skills to build an airplane and cheat his hardwired inability to fly and, well, fly.

If your Attachment Style is Anxious, like mine is by the way, you need to put in the work. You need to read. You need to train. And you can become confident.

Your neediness will not just disappear. I want to make that very clear. But just because there’s a “limitation” in us, doesn’t mean we have to act according to it.

Being needy and acting needy are two completely different things. Being needy feels intrinsic. You feel like she needs to check up on you and she needs to reply to your texts soon or you might feel like you’ll lose her forever.

Acting needy is texting her multiple times without replies, asking where she’s been, agreeing with her on everything, etc.

The key to flying is to first: pinpoint your limitations to flying; and second: erasing or modifying those limitations. It’s the same with anxious attachment. First, pinpoint and write down the ways in which you are needy; and second: erase or modify the actions associated with neediness.

For example:

You may feel that a girl hasn’t texted back in a timeframe that your anxious attachment tells you she should’ve. Write that timeframe down and remember it. Also write down what you normally would do in this situation. Most likely you’ll want to text 3 times to get a reaction, because you want the anxiety to end. You want to either have her reply something nice to momentarily ease your anxiety, or have her reply something that ends your chances with her so you can erase your anxiety completely.

But in order to slowly go from anxious to secure; in order to fly, you have to stop flapping your arms cause it doesn’t work!

So don’t do either of those things. You have to face the anxiety, realize that you can’t control when someone texts you or whether they like you or not, and keep building an airplane. Go on jogs, keep swiping on dating apps, eat better, love yourself. If there’s things about yourself you’d rather change you gotta put in the work!

She might text back; she might not. You’ll still wake up the next day with another scar on your chest and be stronger for it. Your neediness might not go away instantly but you just built the engine for that airplane. It’s only a matter of time before you can fly.

Being confident and not being needy aren’t always feasible at first. But acting confident and not acting needy are a matter of tool gathering and plane building that are most definitely feasible today, even for anxious attachment styles.

So don’t hate yourself for being needy. Don’t blame yourself for being needy. Use your tools to learn how to not act needy regardless of how you feel. You’ll be a better man in the end, and might even get to fly.