March 2022 - Kate Gegg, AM, LCSW

There is “what is happening” and then there is how we perceive “what is happening”. Knowing how to tell the difference between the two has a huge impact on our functioning, relationships, and wellbeing.
When we are approaching a moment from an embedded stance we are not aware of how our perception is effecting our understanding of the moment. Instead, we equate what we feel, intuit, and believe to be an objective reflection of and reaction to reality. We don’t see ourselves as having a “perspective” we see ourselves as having the facts.
An embedded stance has its benefits; we can get lost in a moment of love, creativity, or act intuitively on danger. The challenge with an embedded stance is that we are not connected to how our own personal filters impact how objectively we can perceive what is happening around us.
When we are embedded, we are at risk of our internal world being more persuasive to us about “what is happening” than what the external world presents. This leaves us vulnerable to misunderstandings in relationships, making assumptions, and incorrectly “reading” interpersonal situations.
When we are embedded what we believe to be happening “is” happening. “Everyone hates me”, “It won’t get any better”, “I can never come back from this”, “there is no point” are thoughts that are much more dangerous when experienced by a person in an embedded stance, because they are believed to be truths.
For most of us our biggest challenge with an embedded stance is coming to recognize the signs of when we fall into it. Some of us are there much of the time, for others of us we can fall into it only at certain times, or only around certain topics.
The most important cue to look out for that will help you identify when you or others are embedded: We are convinced we are “right” AND we are unable to take a collaborative stance (meaning feedback, ideas, or the perspectives on what is happening from others does not inform / change / influence how you see a situation).
The more we can work to observe our inner worlds, the better we can get at catching when we’re in this embedded stance and shifting to a reflective or collaborative stance where we can recognize we have a (valid) perspective, but not the only perspective and often not all the facts.
We want to try and hold, at all times, that any perspective is informed by our thoughts, feelings, prior experiences, AND what we think of as reality (aka what is happening in the environment around us). None of us are ever completely without our filters, but we can work to see them and understand how they influence our perception of “what happens”
The path out of embededness is flexibility, openness, curiosity, self-inquiry, and an acceptance that we hold a perspective that is informed by both current and prior experience. The more we can accept the impact of perspective, the more we can sort out and eventually cope with “what is happening”.

Our thoughts and feelings are incredibly powerful influencers over our actions. While we want to live a life where we can honor, listen to, and respect our inner world, we also need to become monitors of when our inner world may be overly informing how we understand a situation.

When we are embedded we are no longer treating our feelings like traffic signals, but instead they have become truth detectors about what “is” happening inside and outside of us. As David Wallin says, “When embedded in experience…whatever we sense, feel, and believe at any given moment we simply take at face value” (P. 135).

This might mean if I notice I’m angry “because you didn’t do the dishes” I take that anger at face value and am more limited in my ability to step back, reflect, and recognize that what I’m actually angry about is a feeling of inequity in our household responsibilities; or, perhaps I’m angry and associating it with the dishes, but really it’s about the fact that I am hungry, or had a bad day at work. Perhaps my anger is also about my own relationship with responsibility; I would never give myself permission to rest before the responsibilities are done, and I am angry that you allow yourself to do so. My anger is important for me to listen to, reflect on, and perhaps act on and make changes around, but my ability to use my anger constructively is highly limited when I’m in an embedded stance, “I’m angry about the dishes because you didn’t and don’t do the dishes” is as far as I’ll ever get.

To really address and solve problems in our lives, we need to be able to see and understand “what is happening”. To do this effectively we have to look at what is happening both inside and outside of us. When we can access a reflective stance we can sit with, interpret, and make sense of our feelings and cues from our inner world. When embedded, we cannot access this reflective place.

Openness, flexibility, curiosity, self-inquiry, and a desire to slow down and look at all internal and external aspects of a situation will help us shift out of an embedded stance and into a reflective stance. Examples, further explanation, and further resources in today’s comments.

Comments:

The quote from page 135 is in reference to David Wallin’s Attachment in Psychotherapy. Full citation: Wallin, D. J. (2007). Attachment in psychotherapy. New York: Guilford Press.
If you are in an embedded stance a lot of the time, please take this as a cue that you need professional help. An embedded stance can be hurtful to relationships, jobs, and ones ability to make progress in treatment. It can even lead to harming ones self or others when we are “certain” things are a particular way that concerns or upsets us. If you are having those kinds of thoughts right now, reach out for help.
Embededness can exist on a spectrum; some of us experience it most of the time around many topics, others of us can fall in or out of it based on the topic and hand or current stressors in our lives. While many of us are not operating from an embedded stance most of the time, we want to hold awareness that we can all get there and we are more prone to doing so the less safe we feel, and the more stress our bodies have to endure (whether from sleep deprivation, illness, hunger, or ongoing environmental stressors – like conflict, lack of safety in relationships and in your community, etc). We also want to remember that embededness is not all or nothing, we may experience it only around certain topics and we may be able to access openness, flexibility, and curiosity around other topics or at other times.
One key thing to remember, sometimes are are “right”, i.e. seeing the facts of a situation in an objective, collaborative way with awareness of our subjectivity. Being aware and building insight into when we are operating from an embedded stance means that there are times when we are aware we are less open to and prone to reflection, but it doesn’t mean that there aren’t other times we can’t have an understanding of what’s happening in a productive and useful way. The key is to work towards knowing when you’re embedded and missing out on your subjectivity.
Other potential indicators that you are in an embedded stance:
1. We may find our focus narrowing on a singular “cause” and “effect” narrative about what’s happening to create the current dynamic and situation. When this happens we may start internalizing or externalizing (i.e. assigning responsibility entirely to someone else or ourselves for the outcome of a situation).
2. Often we are feeling one or more feelings intensely. I.E. we are flooded. If you are flooded you want to work to ground.
1. We may be out of our window of tolerance.
2. As David Wallin points out, we may not see any need or purpose for reflecting or considering a topic further (because we already think we “know all the facts”).
So what’s the difference between being “embedded” or “stubborn” or “a know-it-all”? When we are embedded we not only think we are right, we cannot take in another perspective as being valid or possible. The embedded stance applies to both our external relationships (like how we talk to or treat others), and most critically our internal world (how we think through things ourselves). When we are embedded we can’t entertain the idea that we hold a perspective, rather than the “facts”. If this is how you think of stubborn or a know it all – then ok! There is no difference, but if this feels slightly more nuanced, than I hope this explanation helps.
Embedness is a path to inadvertently creating self-fulfilling prophecies for ourselves and our relationships. As David Wallin says in Attachment and Psychotherapy when we are embedded we are “Unable to reflect on the difference between feelings and facts, we remain blind to the ways in which we habitually construct as well as construe the ‘reality’ of our own experience” (Wallin 158). For more on how this happens see my post on cyclical psychodynamics.
A lot of what I am writing about in terms of the way out of an embedded stance translates into Marsha Linehan of DBTs concept of “Dialectical”. As she says, “There is always more than one side to anything that exists. Look for both sides…what am I missing? Where is the kernel of truth in the other side”? Quote is from Page 151 of the 2nd edition of her DBT workbook manual, full citation: Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT® skills training handouts and worksheets (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
A further example of how an embedded stance can impact our perspective and hurt us in relationships: “When feeling frightened, for example, the circumstances that seem to have evoked our fear are regarded – unquestioningly – as realistically dangerous…our internal world trumps external reality, regardless of the facts of the case” (Wallin, 135). In some situations (like a fire) there isn’t too much interpretation needed; in relationships, however an embedded stance can very quickly create problems. I may feel it’s a huge warning sign if someone doesn’t arrive on time because of all the associations I have about feeling unimportant or blown off by prior relationships. In an embedded state I will take this to be true, because I feel blown off, I must be unimportant to this person. When embedded I fail to recognize the impact of my personal sensitivities, or perhaps the context of their situation. When embedded “there is only a single perspective on experience, a single view, as if there were no interpretations but only perceptions, no beliefs that are not also facts” (Wallin, p. 135). More here on how and why our brains can create associations and pathways to beliefs.
I talk about constructive uses of anger in the post. If this is a foreign idea to you, read more in my post about how to make use of anger, and why we need it.
How to handle a conversation when someone else seems to be coming at the dialogue from an embedded stance? You can feel shut out, unimportant, angry, and unheard. Try saying something like: “Hm. I’m feeling like I can’t really get through to you right now. Like everything I’m saying doesn’t seem to shift your perspective. I’d like to ask that you think about your willingness to be open to new ideas or a new perspective on this topic, I’m hopeful we can have a productive conversation if we can both come at this with an open mind”.

We may not like it, but we need anger, and we have the capacity to experience it for a reason.
For so many of us our anger has created problems for us; we can’t connect to it because we don’t trust it, or when we feel it we do so in ways that we (or others) experience as out of control.
Anger is a signal that something (internally, externally, or both) isn’t working for us and needs to change. It can motivate us and help us protect ourselves from being harmed by situations, experiences, or people.
When we are not accepting of our anger we are at risk of repeatedly falling into situations that are hurtful to us; we need our anger as a cue to us that something isn’t working.
The key to having a productive relationship with our anger is noticing and responding to it in a way that doesn’t create problems for us or our relationships.
Part of having a harmonious relationship with your anger is learning to sit with it, be curious about it, and identify what it is signaling to you about your needs, limits, expectations, environment, and relationships.
When you feel anger, it becomes your job to identify what isn’t working about a situation, and address that situation in a manner that holds respect for you; your values, limits, and well being; and the emotional (and physical) well being of those around you.
We can be quick to confuse our “trigger” (what set off the anger) with the cause (which might actually be about an expectation, our limits, our needs, etc). The fact that we feel anger means something isn’t working, BUT that something isn’t always the “thing” we get angry at.
Because anger narrows our focus and intensifies our drive to act it can be counterintuitive to zoom out and sit with the big picture, but often that’s exactly what we need to do.
The more we can embrace the need for anger, and accept that it serves a functional purpose, the less we fight it when it arises, and the the more able we are to tame it, and express it in ways that protect us and our relationships.

Many of us have an uncomfortable relationship with our anger. It feels threatening, overwhelming, and potentially damaging to relationships. If you’ve followed this account for sometime you know that I am an advocate of building a harmonious relationship with your inner world, which includes all of your feelings – even anger.

In moments of an immediate threat our anger can help us protect what is ours; we can get physically aggressive or we can yell and intimidate. When we want to maintain positive relationships with others, however, our relationship with our anger needs to shift; we still want to feel it to receive cues about our needs and limits, but we need to be careful about how we express it. This does not mean that we “don’t want to feel angry”, what it means is we need to have our anger AND be thoughtful about what we do from there.

Anger, like all emotions, serves a functional purpose about the intersection of our needs and our environment. When we feel anger we are receiving a cue about feeling exploited, threatened, unsafe, or wronged. It can help to think of your anger as a signal that a limit has been passed, that a boundary is needed, that something needs to change, or that we feel unsafe.

To have a productive relationship with our anger we need to learn to sit with it, be curious about what’s causing it, and then address that cause in a manner that’s consistent with our long term goals and values. Anger has a heat and an energy about it that can make us want to act quickly. It can be intense, but we need to work towards learning to slow down, unpack it, and act on it with care.

This is where the thoughtful reflection and awareness about the function of anger is essential. Your anger has arisen to try and keep you safe. Trust that, then ask yourself what feels threatening and why; what expectation has been violated and how universal is that expectation; what is your anger telling you about the gap between what you need what you are getting; what is making you feel unsafe, exploited, or unseen and how can you address it? Try and be open to both internal and external causes of your anger

Comments:

Like all emotions, our ability to feel and manage our anger is informed by prior experiences. Emotions that were welcomed when we developed will be easier for us to access, tolerate, and regulate (i.e. turn the volume down on). Emotions that were not welcome may get twisted and we may have to work to learn how to feel them, or they may only come out in big ways, or jumbled up with other feelings. If anger wasn’t tolerated in your development, or if it only erupted in ways that were hurtful to relationships, chances are you too have internalized that “anger is bad” or “problematic” or “to be avoided” etc. It’s not uncommon for someone to tell me they don’t feel anger, or they perceive it as bad. In my experience, this generally means anger exists within this person’s inner world, and they need help learning how to feel and tolerate it. Without that tolerance, the anger can shift into guilt, shame, anxiety, or depression. For more on how our development shapes our ability to access and tolerate certain thoughts and feelings see my post on how our brains work as an association machine.
I mention that anger has a heat about it in the post, it most certainly does, and if we don’t have adequate emotion regulation skills or distress tolerance skills one of the only ways we know how to cope with it is to push it down (i.e. pretend it’s not there) or let it build up and erupt. For more on how emotions effect us even when “we don’t feel them” see my post on emotional blocking and its impact. For more on distress tolerance skills see this post on in the moment coping mechanisms, and this one too , and this post on why we need distress tolerance skills. There will be more emotion regulation and distress tolerance skills to come, but one huge way to improve your tolerance of your emotions (and decrease your impulsivity to release them in a burst) is to take up a meditation practice. And of course, any very intense emotion can be quickly tamed with grounding skills (though they work best when you practice them in low intensity situations first).
For those of us that have a history of not feeling heard in relationships, we are more prone to express our anger in a way that is “larger”, as an attempt to control situations through intimidation, or as an attempt to be taken seriously and heard. Part of grappling with changing how you express anger, may be grappling with the secondary gains you experience about the ways your expression of anger helps you feel heard, empowered, and in control. Read more more here on secondary gains and how to work through them.
Anger and conflict is inevitable in relationships. For tips on how to manage moments of anger in relationships in a constructive manner see posts on problematic dynamics to avoid, the importance of taking time in conflict, and this post on fair fighting.
I mention in the post that all of our feelings are signals about the intersection of our needs and our environment. It’s true. For more on how we can learn from our emotions see this post on emotions as traffic signals.
Moments of anger can push us out of our window of tolerance (and leave us vulnerable to overly internalizing or externalizing. Read here for more on how to recognize when we (or others) are internalizing or externalizing .
Do you have a hard time with your anger? Perhaps it feels unjustified or not ok. See my post on acceptance for help working to trust it.
I talk in the post about how our “short term” selves often want to release our anger, at the expense of our “long term selves”. For more on this concept and how to grapple with these different priorities see my post on our long and short term selves.

Month: March 2022

The Dangers of an Embedded Stance

Anger