April 2, 2026 Field Note #83 The Beginning of Life on Earth-Part 1
Avraham Cohen, PhD, RCC-ACS, CCC
The Beginning
of Life
on
Earth
Part 1
Audio Version
Something different this time as I noticed this Field Note was growing of its own volition, I have broken it into Part 1 and Part 2. Part 2 will appear next month in the May edition.
In this Field Note (Part 1) I will provide some educational material about early attachment bonding and its implications for Parent-child relationships and the implications for future relationships for the new born as they grow up. As well you will see possibilities as to what may have influenced your own experience in relationship.
In next month’s Field Note (Part 2), May 1, 2026, I will provide some personal history as a schema for work with attachment and relational experience. I will include some experiential practice for you in the service of your increased connection to your deepest sense of Self and to facilitate increased connection in your most important relationships.
See two interviews with me here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qG2vuIyGWU&t=165s
https:www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu-A-AOeNz1&t=1121s
AI generated image at https://www.freepik.com/pikaso/ai-image-generator
Quotes of Note:
Why do you stay in prison? When the door is so wide open?
—Rumi, from Stay in this Circle
And the day came when the risk to remain a tight bud was more painful than the risk to blossom
—Anais Nin
Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life, and you will call it fate.
—C.G. Jung
No father, no mother, no you!
—Shi Heng Yi,
HISTORY AND FRAMEWORK OF ATTACHMENT BONDING
In many of my previous Field Notes, I have mentioned the effect of early bonding rupture and bonding insult experiences, especially the effect of bonding absences and omissions, and their long-lasting impact on the way the afflicted experience relationships as life goes on. In this Field Note, I want to go into the details of what these long-lasting impacts would be in primary relationships: particularly, marriage and marriage-like relationships as well as parent-child relationships. To go into the details, I will need to start at the beginning: with the infant-primary caregiver (traditionally viewed as, infant-mother) bonding experiences.
Melanie Klein (1882 – 1960) was an Austrian British psychoanalyst who was one of the main founders of Object Relations Theory: a theory about the importance of the relationships between children and their primary caregivers (traditionally, the mothers) from the earliest moments. A note to add here: as we know, contemporary views and culture in the West have shifted to include fathers, grandparents and other close by influencers as significant in the lives of infants and children.
These early relationships create internal mental representations of people, which were named as “objects” In Object Relations theory. These first bonding possibilities contribute strongly to the formation of mental images, both conscious and unconscious, that will be influential in the selection of, and experience in, relationships, as life goes on.
Another important figure in Object Relations Theory: Donald Winnicott (1896 – 1971) was initially trained in psychoanalysis under Melanie Klein. They eventually became collaborating and debating colleagues. Winnicott’s paradigm of the “good enough mother’’ is a key part of Object Relations Theory. According to Winnicott, a ‘good enough mother’ starts out with very strong mother-child attunement with her infant, but over time, contingent life events inevitably impose themselves and disrupt this attunement, and the child is ‘disappointed’ and suffers as the mother cannot meet all the needs and demands that her growing child has.
The hypothesis was that her failure to be a ‘perfectly’ good mother, if conducted in a gradual and attuned way, can then become an important opportunity for the child to realize that their mother is a separate person and that she is fallible and not perfect. This is the process of the child becoming a person of their own, having their own agency that can be cultivated and grown. Without this process, the child remains “fused” with the mother. Through this process, a child also learns to accept and tolerate imperfection and attendant frustration, which is a hallmark of human resilience and maturity.
However, the abovementioned process may be seen as unrealistic and not go well as it requires the child to come to conclusions that are not easily arrived at by very young humans about Mother’s circumstances and intentions. Much depends on whether a given child in a given context can tolerate the degree of failed attunment and their resulting fear and frustration. As a corollary, much also depends on whether the mother is able to sense and gauge the child’s capability and tolerance and compensation ability for failure. Young children may indeed survive occasional short falls, but at the earliest stages, their ability to tolerate and withstand what is interpreted as survival threats to their underdeveloped limbic systems is not likely sufficient.
As a result, children will make, again at the limbic systems’ level—what are reactive adaptations, which are unconscious. Such adaptations will be reproduced as patterns in adults that are usually far from optimal in their relationships with others, especially in their intimate partner relationships. Since these patterns are mostly unconscious and beyond the control of the adult persons exhibiting them, the involved persons suffer a lack of both connection and a felt-sense of intimacy.
I have given above a thumbnail sketch of complex processes and offered a rather sweeping generalization at the level of theory. How the process in question works out in the actual circumstances of each of us is diverse and complex, with the uncertain and unknown, requiring further observation and discovery of the liberating potential and possibilities unique to each individual.
Let us now look more closely at the above introduced ideas. As previously elaborated “good enough” is an ambiguously qualifying term in that “good enough” is not precisely defined or qualified, let alone quantified. For, every human being, every relationship, every context, is unique and particular. What this means is that, when parenting, we always need to inquire: Is what we, as the central and truly most important person in a young one’s life doing optimal for this child in this moment at this place, in this circumstance, and in this way?
A unique and important part of the inquiry process is that we inquire and reflect, that is, be engaged in our own inner work process towards our own increasingly liberated authentic way of being. This is for our own benefit, for the benefit of our relationships, and as a model for the growing child. Without such pause and reflection, chances are that we will simply repeat our own pattern of conditioned behaviour, which is most likely a pattern of unconscious reactivity. An exceptionally good enough parent would be one who is in an ongoing process of developing their ability to attune to the child, understands what’s going on in their world, is profoundly empathic, and supports the child to be aligned with their own unique nature.
The concept of “good enough mother” also reminds us, more than ever, that we live in a complex, harassed, harried, and increasingly precarious world. From my observation of and interaction with parents and their children in the contemporary world, most frequently I see that it becomes near-to-impossible to be a “good enough parent.” The survival stress level is so high that many parents are constantly reduced to reactivity. There really is not time, energy, or space of mind to pause, reflect, and direct the inquiry both to the self and to the reality of the child. Socrates famously enjoined us, “Know thyself!” That was 2,500 years ago. It does not seem we in the 21st century are doing too well with our engagement and use of this Socratic wisdom.
THE IMPORTANCE OF ATTACHMENT BONDING FROM THE EARLIEST DAYS
Most all parents that I know personally or with whom I work professionally are living in the circumstances of contemporary life that stretch and exhaust them frequently beyond all reason. Proverbially, it takes a ‘village to raise a child,’ but the contemporary scene is typically that of two parents with full-time jobs. This is not even a nuclear family: what we now have is more like a subatomic particle family; tiny bits! What happens to the little and profoundly helpless and vulnerable children when they cannot be cared for in an attentive and attuned way?
In the beginning, the infant’s dependency is total. Literally, the parents’ presence and attention are life-and-death for the infant. At the earliest stages, the child cannot do anything for themselves other than cry out their distress and helplessness and, of course, give smiles, make sounds, and manifest body movements that indicate their pleasure about what is happening. This prompts parents to respond—promptly and attentively. Most parents do, but their energy to supply warmth and security in the body and on a feeling-level is too often running on or near empty. If parental ability to respond is seriously compromised for whatever reason, the little one eventually realizes—non-cognitively but viscerally—that they must do something for their own survival.
Very early the young one begins to ‘think’ at the limbic system level—to ‘strategize’ for survival. The little one will experience too much, too fast, and too soon: that is, be overwhelmed and experience some level of trauma. An adaptive pattern emerges at the neuronal level. This is a survival reaction that engages limbic brain activity and that is seamlessly connected with all kinds of shocking, frightening body sensations that arise very quickly in an infant who does not have any higher-level cognitive ability to mitigate, understand, or interpret what is happening. Desperation arises in a flash! Imagine the effects that do not dissipate but now exist, all unconsciously, in an adult who was that child. Of course, this is us!
The little one is helpless and alone in their panic. These are certainly the precursors to what eventually will be termed Trauma Reactions in adults! This reactivity is all in the Shadows of our consciousness. The little one’s cognitive functions are not yet formed. The infant and even a small child’s ability to tend to their fear, shock, panic, and anxiety is basically limited to crying and, when help does not show up, to panicking and eventually to shutting down. As such, the comfort, warmth, and skill of a mature caregiving adult is essential to children growing up and developing into mature adults. Yet, such adults are all too often missing in children’s lives for many reasons in this stress-ridden world of VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity).
Young humans are limited in their ability to feel in a nuanced way, to be consciously present, and to be affectively attentive and attuned, not only to the world around them but also to themselves. For instance, when they experience pain or suffering, they are, understandably unable to be fully present and attentive to their pain. If pain is severe enough, they dissociate, or even just pass out. Before reaching this level of emergency, they compromise with behaviour and patterns that anaesthetize the pain and discomfort, at least a little, and they exhibit cries and physical behavior that signals their discomfort. This type of reaction is at the limbic system level. These reactions will continue unmediated throughout the lifespan unless inner work processes are introduced in the service of recovering their authentic and true Self, with which they were born.
Tiny humans cannot mitigate their reactions to discomfort. They need mature adults who can perform the function of mitigation, in the forms of protection, safety, rescue, and comfort. When such is not available, little ones are trapped at the afore mentioned limbic level of reactivity. In other words, they are shocked and traumatized. This early inability readily becomes entrenched to the point where we see it being reproduced in persons as they grow and mature physically and yet are still subject to the unconscious reactive behaviors that were formed in the early days of their lives. When this happens, those in close contact with the traumatized person are affected by this reactivity. And since most of us are not freed from our own reactivity patterns, we meet others’ reactivity with our own reactivity. Trauma meet trauma. Is it any wonder that the world is such a chaos?
AFFECTS OF EARLY BONDING EXPERIENCE ON THE CORE AND MOST AUTHENTIC SELF
The effect of repeated omissions of attention and attunement from mature adult caregivers who themselves have been subject to such omissions is repeated generations of humans who have deficits in their connection to their core self, their core of being.
You may ask, what is the core self or the core of being? I would suggest to you that this is our true authentic nature, our birthright with which we are born. In some sense the Buddhist non-self is referenced. In Judeo-Christian terms it might be named as the soul. A basic truth about this, which I think is quite apparent in small children as they go about is that this self is core energy and manifests through the structures of various personality moments and that they shift through moment by moment quite seamlessly. Another lost and key characteristic is congruence between what is in their inner Self and the Self that shows up in the world moment by moment.
Now, I will offer you some ideas as to how this authentic Self is buried and lost. Here is an analogy to explain the phenomenon. If you are being chased by a tiger all the time, and you are constantly running for life, you will find that there is not time or energy for, and awareness of, anything other than the tiger at your heels. At some point, you may see that tigers are always chasing you. That is, in life you know nothing other than tigers chasing you. Given that, awareness of your inner core would be completely covered and obliterated from your awareness by the survival distress you feel in reaction to the perceived constant incoming threats. This noticeable experience shows up for you as chronic anxiety, fatigue, and/or a sense of emptiness and despair.
Here is another analogy related to the effects of caregiver’s non-attunement. The changes that occur to you as a result of absence of caregiver’s attunment and support for the care of your inner and authentic nature are like starting on a journey of 1000 kms. Imagine that at the beginning, you are diverted from your true course by one centimeter; and then one more centimeter is added, and then one more, and so on. Then you continue to follow that consistent diversion. By the 1000-kilometer point, you are very far off course. You don’t arrive at your intended destination. You don’t know where you are. You don’t know how to find your way back. There may be no conception of ‘back’ in your consciousness. You might describe yourself as lost, along with feelings of not knowing and helplessness and feelings that may be articulated as, “Something isn’t working. Something doesn’t feel right.” You do not know how, when, and where your journey on the deviated path began or how the continued deviation ensued. If the disturbance wakes you up, you may notice the opportunity to seek your original core self that was beginning to be obscured in your very early days.
I recommend that you to ‘look in and ‘back’ from your current experience in life and see the roots of the patterns that you are now living out in your current life. I know that many of you have already embarked on this path. My own experience tells me that the process of fine-tuning and growth is life-long. I suggest you refrain from the heavily enculturated habit of looking outward at persons and circumstances in your life and seeing them as the cause of your suffering. This is not to suggest that people in your life haven’t done something wrong in their interactions with you. They almost certainly have, and their actions might have been even morally egregious and most harmful, but the key point is the perceptions and reactions are in you and are almost invariably formed from your own reified experiences that are along the lines of what is described above. The inner experience is what you can do something about…
These others are most certainly in the same boat of having lost their core being or core self and do not feel well and right about themselves. Given this, in terms of addressing your own suffering, the recommended way is to look at your own loss of contact with your core self and work on recovering this connection and nurturing its being in the world. As well, forced behavior changes, while useful and even necessary in some circumstances, are hard to live with, without the deeper change towards who you most truly are. What I am talking about is the difference between suppression of behavior and true transformation. Suppression is akin to violence against your Self. The eventual outcome may look better. It is very hard on the body and the soul. The point is to work towards a deepening understanding of who you are and how your way of life led to becoming who you are not. The roots of your suffering were planted long ago. The same is true for others—those with whom you are struggling.
Being and feeling lost is often a first clue to finding the way back to your core self, that is your most original self). In Daoism this is the search for the Dao: that energy force that is the core of you and the core of all things and their inter-connection. Please take this word Dao as a pointer word to the essence of you that I am pointing to.
In the next Field Note I will make all this as real as possible for you by sharing some key points from the process of my own life and my journey back towards the Dao, towards my original nature with which I was born, as we all are. This process goes on in me to this day as there is no end to this wayfinding toward authentic being. My experience has been and continues to be that wayfinding towards the Dao is an engaging and most fascinating life process, and perhaps the most meaningful process to be had in this life.
This Field Note seems to have kokoro (こゝろ) (a Japanese term, meaning mind-heart-spirit). It has continued to grow and grow, leading to having a Part 2 in May.
If this material resonates for you, let me know by way of a comment below that others might benefit from or by contacting me directly. As you know my work is process-oriented and blends inner work with psychological material and mindfulness type practices. If you would like to further pursue your own inner work with me in these realms, I can be reached by email: dr.avrahamcohen@gmail.com
Stay tuned for Part 2 next month.
Many thanks to Heesoon for her, as always, most stalwart support with this Field Note.
Shalom to you all,
Avraham
PS Do watch my interviews on these Podcasts: