How to Break Emotional Attachment in Romantic Relationships – 7 Proven Ways

How many soulmates have you had, while for each one of them you thought you were to spend a lifetime together?

Did it leave any tiny bit of resentment when the relationship was done?

You have probably fallen in love with someone, so mad in love that you gave them a chance, perhaps your whole heart. You spent some time together, ranging from a few months to years. Then one day it all came to an end, leaving you in hurt and regret.

Dealing with the past

Past heartbreaks and traumas tend to make us fall into unhealthy levels of attachment and codependency in our romantic relationships.

However, we don’t have to live with this burden in our lives. Regardless of our past, we can still choose to enjoy romantic relationships without being overly attached to our partner.

Attachment issues may arise in our romantic relationship with our partner due to jealousy, past romantic experiences, insecurities, and childhood traumas.

In this read, we will discuss how to avoid poisoning our relationships with attachment and replacing those feelings with love and positivity.

1. Embrace the beauty of relationships

When we accept nothing is permanent, and everything comes to an end, we will appreciate our relationship much more. We will love our partners without the fear of waking up to them falling in love with someone else.

What if they fall out of love? This won’t bother you as much when you accept that nothing lasts forever. You have both allowed yourselves to share this moment together, enjoy it! They don’t own you, and you don’t have to own them.

It is true relationships come with a lot of uncertainty. You don’t know if your partner is going to change.

Whether one day you will look at the person you fell in love with and feel no single drop of affection for them. This doesn’t have to turn into anxiety and over attachment to prevent falling out of a relationship.

Appreciate all the drama; all the shouting at each other on one day and making love the next one. It is revealing to you what you had not known about yourself. By bringing your fears and imperfections to light, you will be better equipped to deal with them.

2. Give yourself a second chance

We may tend to look at our current relationship through the lens of our past romantic adventures. We just can’t allow ourselves to go through what happened with our last partner.

Allow your heart to wander again. Don’t close it in a box. Of course, you will use past experiences to avoid making mistakes you are already familiar with.

You are not exposing yourself to hurt, nor are you avoiding the world. But don’t be attached to your past hurt and relationship failures.

Living this way will allow you to get exactly what you deserve. And you deserve the best!
You won’t make relationship decisions out of desires to revenge your past lover.

You have heard of situations where people fake “falling in love” with their lover’s friend to let them know that they have moved on. This creates a strong desire for possession and refusing to let go.

3. Acknowledge your shortcomings

It’s true nobody is perfect. By acknowledging your weaknesses, you are the first beneficiary of your own love. You drop down resistance by dropping down your guard, and facing what caused hurt in the first place.

It may be your relationship with your parents. We tend to project whatever we lacked from our relationship with our parents onto our romantic relationship.

If your parents spent time away from you for long durations due to work constraints, you may think that your partner is no longer interested with you when he is late from work as he might have been with another person.

We have to turn inside and ask, “What do I fear most that may happen in my relationship with my partner?” “I fear my boyfriend may choose my best friend over me if he spends time with her, what may have caused this feeling of inadequacy to arise inside?”

4. Involve your partner

The reason you are in a romantic relationship with someone is to walk through life together, right? You don’t have to face your inner turmoil alone, involve your partner. Tell them what you are going through. Let them know what triggers your past pains and insecurities in your relationship.

Does criticizing your mistakes make you feel inadequate? Is there a better way they may use to communicate their feelings to you?

When you learn to involve your partner in what you are going through, you nurture the ability to be open to them. You will be less likely to hide emotions from them, which tends to increase feelings of inadequacy and self-worth.

Inadequacy makes us feel like we have something to prove and consequently make us appear over-possessive to our partner.

5. Put yourself first

Regardless of how backwards it sounds, you come first before any other person. We are so used to being taught that we are here to serve others.

However, you are here to walk through life joyfully. It is that joy that arises in your day-to-day activities that other people are influenced with positively.

Putting yourself first involves finding wholeness within. You don’t need anything outside of yourself to feel complete. Allow yourself to do what you love most.

This may be finding a hobby, writing that book, quitting the job you hate and doing what you love most.

Being in union with your heart creates a sense of harmony around you. You will literally enjoy your own company, and other people will find you interesting.

6. Become financially independent

Taking care of your financial life, at least to the point you don’t need to depend on anyone, will give you a huge advantage when it comes to your dating life.

You won’t need to fall in love to make ends meet. You won’t be afraid of breaking up when the relationship no longer serves you because you don’t have a roof over your head.

By becoming financially independent, you allow yourself to view a potential partner from a neutral standpoint and come into a relationship as an equal other.

7. Work towards inner balance

You don’t require someone else to feel loved. You already know love is an expression that we allow ourselves to feel when we experience elation, sweetness.

You can nurture your own sense of love by reconnecting with our emotions, the part of us that needs to be nurtured.

To feel a sense of worth, we can focus our capabilities on advancing in our careers. To feel a sense of being nurtured and attended to, we can take care of bodies, get that massage, get a nice hairstyle and work on gaining a flat tummy.

Working on being in a state of inner balance makes us feel complete emotionally and gives us a feeling of self-worth.

We will then be able to live with our partners without necessarily expecting anything in return for our love.