Attachment (psychology)

“ At last the inner, hidden beneath the outer, shows itself. Then, when the first impressions are fairly overcome, the attachment felt is all the stronger, because the soul clings to it as its own creation. ”

“ But if, after the preliminary process of adjustment of the mental eye the object opens up no inter [Pg 133] esting phase, all the willing in the world will not produce a calm, settled state of concentration. The will introduces mind and object; it cannot force an attachment between them. No compulsion of attention ever succeeded in making a young child cordially embrace and appropriate, by an act of concentration, an unsuitable and therefore uninteresting object. We thus see that even voluntary interest is not removed from the sway of interest. ”

“ O Mother, Karma with attachment I fear, for it proceeds from selfish motives, and as a man soweth so shall he reap. I see again that work without attachment is exceedingly difficult. If I work through attachment I shall forget Thee ”

“ Only we know that all which is already ours, by living experience, by intimate attachment, will be gone. The warmth of the present companionship, the comfort of familiar habits, the loving intimacy of deep and dear associations, the tender presence of this fond earth, the joy, the love, the hands that touch, the voices that charm, the hearts that beat. ”

“ Is your heart constituted differently from every other human heart?—I have lately observed an inequality in your behaviour, that has whispered something flattering to my heart. Examine yourself—Have you felt no peculiar interest in what concerns me—would the idea of our separation affect you with no more than a slight and common emotion?—One more question propose to yourself, as a test—Could you see me form a new, and more fortunate, attachment, with indifference? ”

“ Was it not natural enough that I should love with no ordinary attachment—that my love should be an impetuous torrent—all-devoted—struggling, striving—rushing only in the one direction—believing, in truth, that there was none other in the world in which to run? ”

“ Think what it must be to live out one’s allotted time of physical existence without ever experiencing the faintest romance—without even a gleam of what love means! I presume that the sense of attachment is unknown to them ”

“ Have you ever felt that as long as you are near an object of attachment, the mind is restless in the direct ratio of proximity, and, as you recede from it, you become more satisfied, as it would seem, from a feeling that every mile increases the difficulty of contact, till impossibility at length stares you in the face, and produces resignation per force. ”

“ Attachment is a very different function of life from affection. Affections will continue as long as the heart beats. But attachment requires something more than organic causes. The very things which stimulate and intensify affections may141 undermine attachments. For these are bred in tranquil stability; they are nourished in constant relationships. Acceleration of mobility disturbs them at their root. And without abiding attachments associations are too shifting and shaken to permit a public readily to locate and identify itself. ”

“ We establish with such objects a relationship, I had almost said a friendship; they become, as it were, a part of ourselves, things essential to our own existence; and that deep attachment we feel to the place of our birth, or our home, finds its apology not alone in natural instinct, or in acquired habits, but also in the highest philosophical considerations. ”

“ The fact is, the imagination is suffered to wander where it ought not; and the affections are not guarded and restrained, and confined to their proper object. And if there be a diminution of attachment, it is not owing to any change in others, but in ourselves. If our affection has become less ardent, let us look within, for the cause. Shall others suffer for our own fault?
But, secondly, we may do much to control the affections, even after they have begun to wander. We still seek the happiness of the object of our choice, more, perhaps, than that of any other individual. ”

“ How indeed could this transition be more easily and surely achieved than through this relationship—at once the earliest, the most necessary and, in many ways, the most intimate which the individual ever knows? Through the affection which the child feels towards those who supply its elementary needs, it learns the meaning of attachment to an object outside itself—an attachment which, in its further development, leads to the tendency to seek the goal of effort and desire in the outer world rather than in intimate connection with the self, the tendency upon which all altruism is ultimately based. ”

“ That which distinguishes this attachment from others is the transferable nature of our feelings with respect to physical objects; the associations connected with any one object extending to the whole class. Our having been attached to any particular person does not make us feel the same attachment to the next person we may chance to meet; but, if we have once associated strong feelings of delight with the objects of natural scenery, the tie becomes indissoluble, and we shall ever after feel the same attachment to other objects of the same sort. ”

“ As I had learned rather to fear my parents than to love them, and he was, so to speak, the first human being who had displayed affection and sympathy toward me, I clung to him, in return, with enthusiastic attachment, seeking to fulfill his every wish, and never so happy as when he appeared satisfied with my endeavors. ”

“ Each person is connected with every other person by some bond of attachment. It may be by the steel bond of brotherhood, by the silvern chain of religious fellowship, by the golden band of conjugal affection, by the flaxen cord of parental or filial love, or by the silken tie of friendship. One or more of these bonds of attachment may encircle each person, and each bond has its varying strength, and is capable of endless lengthening and contracting. ”

“ I felt that human affections and passions are not made of this transferable stuff, and that we can love nothing truly, unless, we devote ourselves to it heart and soul, and our life is, as it, were, bound up in the object of our attachment.
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It was worse when I recollected my wife and my children. When I considered for the first time that they were now in a manner nothing to me, I felt a sensation that might be said to mount to anguish. How can a man attach himself to any thing, when he comes to consider it as the mere plaything and amusement of the moment! ”

“ Is, then, apathy the perfection of our nature—and is not that nature refined and harmonized by the gentle and social affections? The Being who gave to the mind its reason, gave also to the heart its sensibility.
'I make no apologies for, because I feel no consciousness of, weakness. An attachment sanctioned by nature, reason, and virtue, ennoble the mind capable of conceiving and cherishing it: of such an attachment a corrupt heart is utterly incapable. ”

“ And even in the animal creation we find the same analogy existing between these feelings of sympathy and their opposites which occur in the case of human beings. Every feeling of attachment or sympathy existing between two individuals has a counterpart in an opposite feeling of discontent when the object of [59] the love or attachment in question dies, falls sick, or runs away. ”

“ I remember once in particular your saying, as you went out at the door in anger—“I had an attachment before, but that person never attempted anything of the kind.” Good God! How did I dwell on that word BEFORE, thinking it implied an attachment to me also; but you have since disclaimed any such meaning. You say you have never professed more than esteem. Yet once, when you were sitting in your old place, on my knee, embracing and fondly embraced, and I asked you if you could not love, you made answer, “I could easily say so, whether I did or not—YOU SHOULD JUDGE BY MY ACTIONS!” ”

“ When, by the grace of the unique Spirit, I become disembodied,—when the world of unbodied spirits, unity, and singleness, shall appear, my attachment to the flesh will become attachment to you, and I shall then have but one sole attachment. ”

“ I remember once to have read in some French author that the attachment we feel to home, the sacred names of son and brother, are not more than the instincts of habit; that natural affection, as it is called, has no real existence; and that it is the mere force of repetition that forms the tie by which we love those whom we call father or mother. ”

“ What is wanted is an attachment, a real love that will prompt us always to regard His will, and to make our life a part of His. It is our likings that have led us astray, and it is by new likings implanted within us that we can be restored. ”

“ If you have paid any attention to these love affairs, you will have observed the great difference there is between those where the attachment commences early in life, and the parties grow up together, forming and moulding their feelings, their wishes, their amusements, their tastes, their whole heart and soul, by the same model; and those "whom accident or blind chance" bring together, and from some peculiarity of form or mind, for a while deem themselves in love with each other. ”

“ Let those who deny the existence of a sympathy of souls, explain, if they know how, why the first glance, the first word of Madam de Warrens inspired me, not only with a lively attachment, but with the most unbounded confidence, which has since known no abatement. Say this was love (which will at least appear doubtful to those who read the sequel of our attachment) how could this passion be attended with sentiments which scarce ever accompany its commencement, such as peace, serenity, security, and confidence. ”

“ I am speaking the language of unexaggerated truth when I say, that their affection for each other increased, instead of suffering diminution, as they advanced in years. A purer or stronger attachment than theirs has never, perhaps, existed in a world in which there is so much of mutability as in ours. ”

“ Wherefore joy, like a cloud, darkens the judgment, since there can be no voluntary joy in creatures without voluntary attachment, even as there can be no joy which is passion when there is no habitual attachment in the heart ”

“ Many a long cherished attachment, even for those who were nearly related by the ties of kindred and friendship, must be broken off, when it is discovered that the bond of sympathy was only external and natural, not internal and spiritual. ”

“ Close to the shores of earth I must remain.
Nor yet would I relinquish my sweet dream
To gain possession of the Fact supreme.
I am attached, and well content to stay,
Learning such truths as love may send my way. ”

“ I have no other wish to accompany you than what arises immediately from my personal attachment, and a deep sense in my own heart, that let us be as dejected as we will, a week together cannot pass in which a mind like yours would not feel the want of affection, or be wholly torpid to its pleasurable influences. ”

“ What I feel to want is the constant presence of a friend—one who, from personal attachment, may have my welfare and interest at heart, and form as it were a second self at all times—let me be present or absent—and absent I must be very often—you perceive? ”

“ These attachment filters, acting below our conscious awareness, giving shape to how we feel about ourselves, helping us make sense of our lives, God and others are, in fact, what we call worldviews. When, as a young infant, I feel seen and heard as lovable and worthy, I develop a secure attachment and I am primed to be open to the world. However, when things go seriously wrong developmentally, I do not feel seen and heard and negative attachment filters develop which make me ‘naturally’, reflexively, even if unawares, pre-occupied, dismissive, or fearful. ”

“ I have said that she thus felt and suffered for that one day; for, as will be seen hereafter, a strange and sudden change came over her, and with no apparent reason, she soon gave herself up unboundedly to the full influence of, her attachment. The human heart is a strange thing; but very often, for visible effects which seem unaccountable, there are secret causes sufficient for all. ”

“ The first love experiences a tenderness, a purity and unreservedness, an exquisiteness, a devotedness, and a poetry belonging to no subsequent attachment. "Love, like life, has no second spring." Though a second attachment may be accompanied by high moral feeling, and to a devotedness to the object loved; yet, let love be checked or blighted in its first pure emotion, and the beauty of its spring is irrecoverably withered and lost. This does not mean the simple love of children in the first attachment they call love, but rather the mature intelligent love of those of suitable age. ”

“ The attachment is not pure when personal beauty or gracefulness is a source of pleasure; when either desires to be esteemed by the other, or when either is unwilling that his friend should receive attention from others; when one does not wish that others should observe, hear, or speak of what is passing. ”

“ But those who devote themselves to the analysis of their own consciousness will discover, in many cases, a more or less close resemblance to a person who inspires, or has inspired, us with love, tenderness, antipathy, or respect. A mother may feel a sudden sympathy for a young man who is like her dead son, or even merely of the same age. ”