A few days ago I had the opportunity of interviewing Antia Boyd who studied psychology from U.C. Berkley. One of the big things that I’ve noticed a lot of in my coaching sessions is a failure to properly understand the difference between an ex who is emotionally unavailable versus one who is just straight up narcissistic through their attachment style.

Luckily, Antia was kind enough to come on to the podcast and answer this exact question for me.

She was even kind enough to give my audience (you guys) a free gift in the form of a quiz.

Check Antia’s Free Gift Out Here

Ok, enough chit chat!

Let’s get down to business.

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How To Tell The Difference Between An Emotionally Unavailable Man And A Narcissistic One

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So today, we have Antia Boyd coming back to be interviewed who I think maybe one of my favorite interviews I’ve ever done. You could always just tell organically when you’re clicking with someone and their message, and that was something I definitely felt with you. And if you don’t know, Antia and her husband, I should say, Brody, are basically the masterminds behind Magnetize Your Man. And if you can’t see, if you’re watching this on YouTube, she’s literally got this Magnetize Your Man book that I was given a hard time about before we started recording. But how are you doing, Antia?

Antia Boyd:
I’m so good. How’s it going over there, Chris?

Chris Seiter:
I’m hanging in there. You know how it is. So Antia, she’s actually the one who suggested what we talk about because I’m always kind of unprepared and being like, “Oh, what should we talk about?” So she actually had a really great suggestion, which is talking about narcissism versus unavailability. And she had something really interesting to say because we were talking last week. I’m just sort of shooting stuff back and forth. And you had something that kind of struck me as really interesting because you said a lot of times, women who you coach will come in thinking that they have a narcissist guy that they’re in love with, but that’s not true. They’re just unavailable. So I’m kind of curious, how do you make that determination?”

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. So let’s actually backtrack because-

Chris Seiter:
Okay, backtrack. Backtrack.

Antia Boyd:
… the reason I got into narcissism is because I grew up in a household of a narcissistic mother. So right away, I experienced the emotional availability, but also the distortion that comes with the narcissism, right? And the reason why I’m so passionate about talking about this is because it leaves women with so much self-doubt and with so much questioning themselves, with decreasing internal as well as external confidence because narcissists are really breaking down your sense of self and your self-worth systematically. But I also studied attachment style theory at UC Berkeley because I was struggling my whole life as you can imagine.

Antia Boyd:
So then after a while, I realized when I started coaching, and of course, I met my men and all that in the process, but when I started coaching, there was always some such quick labeling, right? It would always be like, “God, he’s such a narcissist.” And I’m like, “Well, let’s look at that.” So women are so quick, right? And you say so fed up. They were like texting him and he’s not responding or he ghosted her. And then we go just to the most extreme internal representation that we could possibly find, right? But you’re not necessarily being served with that because for one, now you’re actually projecting onto someone much stronger distortions than they actually have. Right? So you can’t really see the truth. And now, you’re also reacting from a much more reactive, explosive place almost that responds to narcissism because your mom was a narcissist, or your dad was a narcissist, right? Or your ex-husband was a narcissist. So that’s usually what happens.

Antia Boyd:
And I think this is a huge distinction here because… And we would go into all of that, how that all comes together. But here’s the thing. For example, I have a fearful avoidant attachment style or anxious-avoidant or whatever you want to call it, which means I have an anxious part inside of me and also have an avoidant part inside of me. Now, it doesn’t necessarily make me a narcissist. No. Can it be correlation? Yes. Right? But what it actually means is from that point on, you can move someone to secure attachment, right? So in other words, that sense of well-being inside of yourself, that sense that you can rely, that relationships and connections are safe, that intimacy is safe, right? Because that’s actually one of the markers of a secure attachment style, right?

Antia Boyd:
They actually say like, “Oh, I can rely on relationships.” Right? “I can rest in relationships.” They’re secure. Versus the avoidant or the anxious. They’re always looking at, “It’s not secure. It’s not a foundation.” I still need to kind of look out for myself in case it doesn’t work out, right? So there’s always a level of aggravation and anxiety.

Chris Seiter:
So you said a lot of really interesting things, but there’s two things that really first come to mind. The first one is really this concept of you say you’ll be on the phone with your clients and there’s this immediately labeling of a narcissist like, “Oh, he’s not texting me. He’s a narcissist. I can’t believe it.” Do you feel like that sort of immediate labeling is a reflection of how our society is now with regards to… I’ve just noticed with my clients, there’s always this need for instant results. And when they don’t get those instant results, they almost panic or start labeling or start just saying untrue things. Have you noticed any kind of unrealistic expectations with regards to some of the people that you’re coaching and that being one of the reasons that they’re labeling a narcissist or an unavailable person a narcissist?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah, absolutely. So one reason is because they resist their own inner narcissist inside of themselves. I actually wrote a blog about it and I got so-

Chris Seiter:
Oh, that’s interesting. That’s kind of a yang-yin philosophy type or psychology. So you’re saying you wrote that blog post. You got a lot of backlash for it.

Antia Boyd:
Oh, yeah. People are like, “You don’t even know what a narcissist is. You didn’t grow up in a toxic…” I’m like, “Actually, I did.”

Chris Seiter:
Yang would just say like, “Oh, that’s integrating the shadow.”

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Antia Boyd:
Yes, that’s right. That’s right.

Chris Seiter:
You just need to accept that you do have a narcissistic aspect to your… You’re capable of it.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah, exactly.

Chris Seiter:
So you’re saying you got a whole bunch of backlash after this article?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. Because, of course, the women who liked to kind of collapse more into the victim mentality, right? They were abused. This is what is narcissistic abuse. Right? And then they’re like, “Now you’re telling me I’m a narcissist.” That’s too much, right? Because they lived into the identity of this abuse. And then they went to the recovery group. And so there is sort of this way of relating to themselves, right? And out of the sun, they’re saying, “Well, wait a minute, I am in control. I’m actually empowered. I actually have that part inside of myself that could inflict manipulation that’s based on my own agenda on to the other person? No, no. I can’t. No. That’s not. That’s unthinkable, right?”

Antia Boyd:
It brings up so much shame and so much embarrassment that it causes an immediate shame shield. So at the end of the day, all the backlash I got was all the shame shield. It was just collective shame shields, most of the attack, and I loved it. I love when people unsubscribe or when they’re not my friend anymore because I know I hit a nerve. And what you do over here is none of my business. You know what I mean?

Chris Seiter:
What’s really interesting about that concept of hitting the nerve and you kind of loving it, it’s almost like you’ve rewired the way you look at that. I was watching this video which was unrelated to psychology, it was more business related for business. And it was this guy who was talking about the differences between your rabid fans versus your haters, right? And usually, you can’t say anything worth saying unless you offend someone. So a lot of times, I think people come into any avenue of life so worried about offending other people. And there’s different levels to it, but the fact that you’re secure enough, you’re a really big preacher of the secure attachment style. That’s really the key to a lot of what you’re teaching. You’re just sort of preaching or you’re practicing what you’re preaching, especially when they get the backlash. But you also think that one of the reasons that you’re getting that backlash from saying like, “Hey, you do also have this narcissistic side,” or “You’re at least capable of having a narcissistic side,” do you think one of the reasons is because people are afraid to take ownership of that?

Antia Boyd:
I very much think so. I mean, when my mom was… So narcissists, that’s how you know, they gaslight, right? Of course. So my mom projected onto me who she is. So she would say, “You are so selfish.” And so, of course, that was my biggest trigger. Right? So then, of course, if I would have read a blog that like, “No, you are actually selfish and you are actually narcissist,” I’m like, “No, that’s my biggest trigger. That’s how I’m being manipulated. That’s how I’m being constrained. Right? That’s how I lose my sovereignty.”

Antia Boyd:
So then, of course, you go into reaction. But I will tell you, Chris, that actually, what set me free and how I was able to actually break free from my mom sort of owning me just for that word being selfish was actually owning it and actually saying, “Yeah, I can be narcissistic, or I can be selfish, or I have narcissistic distortions inside of myself,” which by the way, you do if you have narcissistic parents, you will have necessity distortions because of the mirror neurons. There’s just no way around it. Right? And it’s really empowering, though, with that awareness to actually say, “Yes, I have that inside of myself.” Right? Because from that moment on, my mom didn’t have that hold, that grip on me anymore. And I was free. I was finally actually being able to be all of who I am. I don’t have to hide myself anymore or be quiet when I actually want to see something because I’m afraid to come off as selfish or as arrogant. That’s another good word, right?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah, it’s really powerful. I always tell my women, the only way through healing, it is really the way through it. Right? You can’t heal it sort of from the outside or if you go around it or over it. You know what I mean? I was like, “No, you can’t go through it.” Right? And you really got to own what you judged your parents the most for or your ex-husband because I know you have a lot of people who want their ex back, right?

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. So for us, it’s like two camps. You have the people who want desperately to get their ex back and people who want desperately just to move on. But both are dealing with breakups. And I think also, when you look at the people who are listening to my podcast or watching the YouTube videos on my channel, a lot of them are going through breakups. And sometimes, I think there’s like how we’re talking about taking ownership. I think sometimes, the women that I talk to take too much ownership. They don’t allow themselves to realize, “My ex should take ownership of what they did.” So for you, where do you feel like that line is between being realistic and not realistic about that?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. I can actually relate to that because I was the kind of child that would stand in the middle of the living room and my parents would just yell at me. And I would just be like, “Yes, it’s all my fault, all my fault, all my fault,” right? So these are the people who would just take on all the responsibility. They’re overly responsible. I also call them the compensated murderers. Right? Or on the other side, are the ones that are blaming. Those are usually the ones that respond with shame shield off attack. Right? Like, “It’s all your fault.” So yeah. So we kind of want to see… What I was telling my women is so when they come in, I can already tell if they’re more blaming or if they’re more taking, or self-blaming, right? So if they’re more self-blaming, will always move towards the balance.

Antia Boyd:
So for the women who would be already like to take the responsibility, I would actually say, “Hey, it takes two to tango. You know what I mean? Yes, you make certain interpretations and you have belief systems and things like that. But you also have to say that he has accountability, right?” So those women don’t hold other people accountable because they’re so afraid of the repercussions of it. Or maybe they were also trained that other people are being put on a pedestal and they are not. Right? So that would be an example of a narcissist child, right? A child from a narcissist. You could either be the black sheep as a child of the narcissist or you could be the golden child, right? That basically is the extension of the parent, right? Like, “Oh, my daughter, she won the competition because she’s my daughter.” Right? But either way-

Chris Seiter:
That sounds a lot like Donald Trump, doesn’t it? He always holds his daughter, Ivanka, up as the golden child but let’s not get political here.

Antia Boyd:
Right, right. But the point is like… So it’s like this golden child or you have the black sheet, right? So you basically didn’t pay attention to me and so you’re being [crosstalk 00:13:23].

Chris Seiter:
So you’re talking about it from the parental perspective right now?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Does that also kind of evolve into maybe a relationship? How does that come into the relationship aspect? Because I feel like the golden child versus the black sheep, I feel like you need two children to have that. Or can it be in one distinct personality? Like one moment, this one person can do nothing wrong. And the next moment, they’re doing everything wrong. And they just flip flop between those two… Can that also happen with one singular personality?

Antia Boyd:
I mean, I’ve seen that, right? So when we actually look at the studies, they actually do distinguish that there’s two different kinds of people because think about it. One is the golden child. So she is getting invested in and she gets all the attention. But she doesn’t have the independence. So she doesn’t have the choice. It’s just because she’s being chosen. Those are the homecoming queens and the child actresses and all of that. Right? Moms are living vicariously through them. But when you’re a black sheep, you’re really being ostracized. It’s like all your fault, right? Whatever goes wrong… It’s basically saying all the shadows are being projected onto you. For the golden child, it’s the opposite. It’s all delight, or whatever the mom had for herself is being projected onto you. Right? Can you experience both? Yes, I guess you could in bipolar situations and borderline personality situations for sure. I mean, that would extend way… Go beyond the scope of this and everything. Right?

Chris Seiter:
Right, right.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. But in general, so my experience has been that you’re either in one of the two camps. So you’re either being praised or it’s like always your fault, you’re always doing something wrong. The parent always has to get the attention, right? So if the parent doesn’t get the attention, they will take many punitive measurements to get the attention. To move the attention away from you, which is basically… And this is how it reflects in a relationship systematically breaking down the self-worth, right? Making those stabby little comments, right? Like, “Oh, you sure you look good in this dress?” Or, “Oh, you could…” It’s sort of like a compliment, but it’s kind of backhanded. That’s usually how it starts. And I see that so often with my women when they sent me screenshots and I’m like, “Oh, look at that. He’s already starting to test you.”

Chris Seiter:
So what’s interesting about the screen… So you’re saying like some of the coaching people that sign up for coaching with you, they’ll send you screenshots of a backhanded compliment that this guy is using.

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Antia Boyd:
Yeah, exactly.

Chris Seiter:
What’s interesting is years ago, I read this book, it’s called The Game, I think, by Neil Strauss. And it’s all about this guy who cannot get a girl. It’s a true story. He’s a writer for Rolling Stone. It’s all about this guy who cannot get a girlfriend. I mean, he’s the most pathetic guy you can imagine. And he does this expose on underground pickup artists, these guys who just go from club to club picking up girl to girl who have systematically designed a way to get a girlfriend that night and sleep with the girl that night, which is a very unhealthy behavior. I’m not condoning it.

Chris Seiter:
What’s interesting is in there, the “pickup artists” talk about using backhanded compliments and somehow at working to attract. Do you feel like the reason that that concept maybe works is because the women they’re using it on have narcissistic parents who have projected that sort of thing onto them? And so that’s almost what works on them. I’m just kind of curious to get your take on that because the backhanded compliments, sometimes is what… You’re on YouTube with me, right? You’ll see these pickup artists like YouTube videos come in and they’re always recommending the backhanded compliments and things like that. What’s going on there?

Antia Boyd:
It’s interesting because I used to watch… I mean, my husband actually started with pickup too [inaudible 00:17:33].

Chris Seiter:
Right, right. I’m not going to lie. When I was early 20s, I was like, “What are they recommending? How can I do it?”

Antia Boyd:
How do you do that? And I love-

Chris Seiter:
Nothing I tried worked, of course. It was just me being me that worked, but yeah.

Antia Boyd:
Exactly, exactly. Right? But I watched this show, it was called the pickup artist and I was sort of the same… It’s the same idea. Maybe it’s the show version of The Game, right? It sounds like it.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. It’s got that guy, wears the peacock hat or whatever.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. What’s his name? Like Marshmallows and I don’t know. That’s a DJ.

Chris Seiter:
Mystery, I think, is-

Antia Boyd:
Mystery.

Chris Seiter:
They all have their little code names as they go… It’s actually amusing to see how it works.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. It’s interesting. It’s almost like being an actor sort off but you [crosstalk 00:18:22]. But what I found who they were seeking out when I was looking at which women, that profile, they had more of an insecure disposition. So they could have had an anxious attachment style, which is approval seeking. So they would seek definitely women who were more at their focus. Now, it doesn’t necessarily have to come from narcissistic parents, not necessarily, because like we said before, if you listen to my other interview that I did with Chris, that when you have an anxious attachment style, that comes from inconsistent response off the primary caregiver. So all that was needed was your mom not responding all the time. So maybe she was busy. Maybe she was working full-time. Or maybe she wasn’t emotionally… She was kind of in and out. Right? But it doesn’t necessarily have to be a narcissist and that’s why I’m so excited to talk about this is because also understanding where the unavailable-

Chris Seiter:
Unavailable. Right, right.

Antia Boyd:
… is coming from. That’s actually coming from no response, right? As a matter of fact, when we watch the Strange situation study by Mary Ainsworth and you can actually all… You can Google all of that. It’s all on YouTube. Right? But when we watch that and we saw toddlers between 12 to 24 months or 18 to 24 months, how they were responding with-

Chris Seiter:
Is that the study where they have the mom with kids, they’ll go in and they won’t say anything to see if the baby cries?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. So the mom leaves. And then they also study the response of the infant at the mom’s return.

Chris Seiter:
And that tells you what kind of attachment style they have.

Antia Boyd:
That’s right. That’s right.

Chris Seiter:
I think it was the fearful attachment was the weirdest one where the child had no response at all when they left.

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Antia Boyd:
The avoidant one, yeah. The avoidant one would be like so mom would return and this child demeanor stayed unchanged. Right?

Chris Seiter:
Right. That’s it. Yeah.

Antia Boyd:
Versus the secure would easily be soothed, right? So they may cry for a second, and then they easily sooth moms back, right? And the anxious is doing something very interesting where they cry and they kind of hold the mom, but they also push away. So it’s kind of love me, stay away. And that’s kind of an inconsistency. Right? You give me the response-

Chris Seiter:
It’s just amazing. You can tell that early. I wonder if they’ve gotten it down to a science to figure out exactly how early these attachments form.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. Now we’re saying minus six months. So after the first trimester, parents, you know what I mean? If you’re watching this, I don’t know. I know you want to get your ex back, but maybe you’re pregnant at the same time [inaudible 00:21:06].

Chris Seiter:
Oh, we have had those situations, by the way, where they’re pregnant and their ex breaks up with them.

Antia Boyd:
Second trimester is literally like, yeah, think about what music you play around them. How’s your own nervous system doing with the baby as they’re screaming outside of the womb? So all of that, right? So the baby decides in the women it isn’t safe to even exist in the world, right? So that’s minus six months. And then we’re usually saying between 18 and 24 months, we’re sealed, we’re done. So it’s irreparable in that sense. Now, you can only help the child to sort of cope with it, heal through it at some point, but it’s not just how you’re so malleable in the first 24 months, right? You’re so vulnerable. We’re just picking everything up from mirror neurons, right? So basically, our parents’ nervous system. Our nervous systems are our parents nervous system.

Antia Boyd:
And so all of that happens. So that’s why we see so much. And I can usually tell when you see the mom, so I’m actually like, “Oh, I can tell. She is showing up this way.” And some moms, they’re also a little bit like, “Why? Why are you doing this?” Right? So when my mom told me, when she left me alone, when I was under a year… I was about a year older because my brother was just born. And she was like, “I’ve come back and he would just smile.” And I’m like, “Mom, that’s not a good thing. I should be crying,” right? She’s like, “I left and you were smiling and you were not crying.” I’m like, “Mom, that’s not a good thing.” I wasn’t emotionally connected anymore. I was already checked out. Right? So that’s unavailable. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re a narcissist. No, you’re not.

Chris Seiter:
Absolutely. Think about it from your mom’s perspective. So you say your mom has narcissistic traits, right? She’s a narcissist.

Antia Boyd:
Oh, yeah. She is definitely a narcissist. Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
She views that experience not as like, “Oh, this is bad.” She views it as, “Oh, look how happy she is to see me.” That’s what she thinks it’s like, “Oh, it’s so cute, she sees me,” but that’s actually not a good thing according to psychology.

Antia Boyd:
Right, right. So I’ll give an example that’s an avoidant… A parent [inaudible 00:23:12] versus a narcissistic and then you can see how this also plays out in dating, right? So for example, so an avoidant parent would simply be just emotionally not available. They would be just kind of dismissive, right? But a narcissistic one, they have an extra twist on it. So when I was in sixth grade and I was in this one play, and I was the mom of the daughter and whatever in that play. And I was like, “Hey, this is my first play. It was so exciting.” Right? And I’m playing kind of my mom, which is kind of ironic, right? I was literally playing my mom, so it’s this woman who was like-

Chris Seiter:
You got to have conflict in a play.

Antia Boyd:
But it was funny because my mom watched it. And in that play, I was a mom who had migraine and was always in a bad mood and so very similar to my real mom, right? But guess what? My mom was like, “Well, that must have been an easy role for you to play because this is who you are.” So she basically told me this is who I am, right? It was so easy for me to play the bitch because this is who I am anyways. Unavailable wouldn’t say something like that. So said something stabby to it. When you play with an avid narcissist, it’s like some gas-lighting aspect to it. And then also, a narcissist will literally tell, “You can prove me black on white that you’re right and you will still not be right.”

Antia Boyd:
So they literally create their own reality that’s an inflated self-esteem. With the unavailable, there’s actually not an inflated self-esteem. They’re actually afraid of rejection. They just checked out, right? But it doesn’t mean they have a huge self-esteem. Actually not at all, the unavailable. But the narcissist, they have an inflated one. So they actually know they’re wrong. Their belief systems are wrong. Their social norms are wrong, and they are still wanting approval even though they’re wrong. So do you see how that’s completely… It’s completely distorted. It makes no sense. They already know that they’re wrong, but they won’t be wrong because in their reality, they’re not wrong. I can already feel that some women are feeling already triggered. That reminds them of something.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah, as you’re talking, I was thinking there’s one very specific person in my life who I’m like, “This is them to a T,” specifically with the reality breaking things where you can literally… So maybe the best example of the narcissistic aspect, that sort of creating your own reality that I’ve personally experienced is when you know clearly that what the person is saying is incorrect. And I had the misfortune once of being like really fed up with it by the… Normally, I’m like, “Okay, I get that this person is narcissistic. This person does not like to be proven wrong.” It ends up becoming an argument where you’re just like, “No, you’re wrong and this is why you’re wrong.”

Chris Seiter:
So I got the idea once. I was like, “Oh, this will shut them up.” I’ll know exactly what to do. So the person made a statement that I knew was blatantly untrue. I literally went to Google. I found the answer. I held up my phone in front of them and it still didn’t work. That’s wrong. That Wikipedia article’s wrong. It’s like you can’t win. That’s an example of a narcissist.

Antia Boyd:
Okay. Awesome. Yeah, totally, totally. You can’t win, right? And it was so interesting. You feel like you’re in a twilight zone. So literally, your realities break, right? You really start to be like, “Wait.” So that’s when you know when you’re with a narcissist. So when you really start to be like, “Oh, wait. What?” All that an unavailable really does, an avoidant attachment style, when we’re talking avoidant-dismissive, right? So fearful avoidant would be like what I was, that’s more the anxious. Mix in there too, that dismissive avoidant, what they’re really saying is everybody is responsible for themselves. So doesn’t necessarily have something to do with narcissism, right? So they also say, “You’re responsible for yourself.” So they don’t want to be accountable to anyone. And they also want you to hold them accountable either, right? So they kind of get this whole…

Chris Seiter:
Can you give me an example of how that plays out specifically in relationships? Just give a concrete example.

Antia Boyd:
Perfect. Well, a really great example that I heard was a woman was asking a guy, he was going on a business trip. And he’s like, “Hey, can you do me a favor? When you’re there, just send me quick testament and say, hey, I landed, all good.” And he agreed to it. And he ended up not doing it. Right? And what he ended up saying is like, “We’re on our own. I mean, I don’t owe you anything.”

Chris Seiter:
Were they dating when he made this statement?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, they were dating. Yeah. So that’s pretty typical for an avoidant because they’re like, “I’m on my own. I’m doing my own thing. I don’t owe anybody anything.” So it’s this whole owing somebody something, being accountable to something, being committed to something.

Chris Seiter:
So how do you get past that specific type of a mentality? This person who’s dating with you who you feel like it’s not like they owe you anything. It’s more like it’s just common courtesy. Like, “I just want to make sure you’re safe.” How do you get through that person to that specific of an unavailable person?

Antia Boyd:
Well, I think the biggest thing is actually that the unavailable has to want it himself. So my husband, he used to work with men and all of that. And he said it was even hard when the unavailable came to him. And the reason why they were coming, they’re like, “Look, I’m in my 40s.” You know what I mean? And I’m just like, “I want a wife. And I know I don’t have one because I was unavailable the whole time. You know what I mean?” And then they have to really face their fear of intimacy because what happens with the avoidant is they’re afraid of intimacy. Intimacy to them means death.

Antia Boyd:
So before they cut off all access to humanity basically or their heart, right? They are actually going through a tremendous amount of despair. Right? We’re talking existential anguish. And so that’s so much anxiety for the baby to handle that the baby literally feels like it’s going to die. It literally fries the whole nervous system, right? So that’s why eventually it shuts off to protect itself and to actually stay alive, right? So what it does is every time when it gets closer, it gets closer to that existential anguish and that despair because it has to go through that to get back to that connection, to get back to that trust, because he cut it all off. So compare it this way. So imagine your piece of metal, and you have to be able to go into the oven, and you have to be willing to melt and to lose-

Chris Seiter:
It’s not going to be a fun process.

Antia Boyd:
What did you say?

Chris Seiter:
It’s not going to be a fun process.

Antia Boyd:
No, it’s scary as heck. Right?

Chris Seiter:
Right.

Antia Boyd:
So the minute the unavailable feels like, men or women, feels like they’re getting too hot, starting to lose form, they’re pulling out. It’s nothing personal. It’s a nervous system, right? It has a certain temperature set. And just for attachment work, them really wanting it, can this actually be healed? It’s going to take a lot, especially when a woman is anxious. I mean, if she’s secure, that’s definitely much more of a potential there that she could just be with that and is like, “Hey, he’s doing his avoidant dance again, whatever.” Right? And she’s very secure, and he learns to be secure. But if a woman is more the anxious side, they really become each other’s worst nightmares on earth because he wants space because he feels like he’s losing his everything, his identity, his form, everything, right? And her worst nightmare is distance. And she wants connection, right? So they become each other’s worst nightmare.

Chris Seiter:
Right, right. I mean, unfortunately, we see a whole bunch of that with ex-boyfriend recovery where we have a lot of anxious women going after really unavailable type of guys who… I think the oven analogy really is a good analogy because it’s almost like, “You’re going to have to melt, but it’s getting hot. I’m just going to pull out.” And from talking with Antia, I almost already know the answer. A lot of people are going to be sitting there and thinking, “Okay, okay, I get it, I get it. How do I deal with that?” Well, the answer is actually a little bit more simple but complicated at the same time. You need to really invest into becoming secure because usually, those secure attachments kind of pull things towards them. They’re almost like magnets. They’ll get their piece of iron and magnetize it. But that’s hard to do if you’re an anxious attachment style. You know?

Antia Boyd:
And that’s why I always say for one, yes, working with what’s secure, and by the way, you don’t have to be finished because by no means was I all finished when I met my husband. As a matter of fact, we were talking about a story yesterday where I had emotional breakdown within a few weeks of dating him and showed him a very vulnerable side of me. And then he was like, “Is this happening all the time? Or is this just happening…?” You know what I mean? Is that the worst, right? So men will measure you and see like, “Is that her worst or is that her every day?” Right? So it’s like very-

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. We don’t want it to be your every day.

Antia Boyd:
He’s like, “Do you break down every day?” I’m like, “Okay, Houston, we have a problem,” right. And then this other thing is also naturally being more drawn to somewhat of a more secure attachment style, right? Because my honest belief is if more women would be naturally more drawn to healthy secure attachment styles, the avoidant attachment styles, or the avoidant women would have to step it up. They would have to heal. They would have to evolve because they would simply not have a partner that wants to link up with them. And we do want to have partnership. We do.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. We all do.

Antia Boyd:
You would literally say, “Oh, you’re unavailable. Okay, I’m going to go.” That would get support right? So there’s a stigma on it versus actually being like, “I think women are really attracted to the unavailable because there’s so much up and down,” as we talked about. Right? It’s such a roller coaster, which sort of is that fake imitation of passion. So they think now, “This is passion. This is life force flowing through me. I feel activated. My heart is beating, right?” Versus if you look at the narcissist, so if you were to come to me like, “I’m dating and unavailable man,” I’d say, “Well, good luck. We can work on yourself and see what happens.” If you were telling me you’re dating a narcissist, I would say, “Get out.” There’s just a zero tolerance. Narcissists are for the most part not going to change because they want to be right even though they don’t… They’re right. So what are the chances that they want to seek out help?

Chris Seiter:
No, not really high because they don’t think they have a problem.

Antia Boyd:
“It’s you. It’s you. You’re wrong.” You know what I mean?

Chris Seiter:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Antia Boyd:
They will never. Remember, they have this grandiose self-esteem.

Chris Seiter:
So you’re hitting on something really profound here and also very scary for a lot of people because a lot of times, especially with breakups, what I’ve noticed is no matter what I can tell someone, especially if I’m like, “This person sounds narcissistic. You probably shouldn’t be dating them or you shouldn’t be trying to get this person back,” they don’t care because in their minds, they’re so dead set on getting that one specific person back. But that’s also some of their anxious aspects coming into play. They’re so drawn to that one person they feel like that is their identity.

Chris Seiter:
But I have seen firsthand people in their 60s who’ve gone through divorce with a narcissist, and each one of them is miserable, and regrets the experience. So even if you are able to make it work, it’s usually not worth it. In the end, you end up being a lot more unhappy as opposed to what Antia is talking about here, which is kind of brilliant and profound, which is if you’re secure and you’re drawn to another secure individual, then not only you’re going to get what you want, but you’re going to force all the other anxious, unavailable, not the narcissistic guys, but to step up their game. And I think that’s just profound but people don’t look at it that way, unfortunately.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. And one thing I want to say for the women who are like, “I really want this particular guy back, and it’s like nobody else on the planet I will ever meet who I will love like that,” really seem like, “What is it about this guy? What is this guy giving you?” Because what you really want is how he makes you feel, right? In other words, the treasures that he brings out inside of you. So then one question that comes up is like, “Okay, so how can you access that inside of yourself?” Those treasures that he activates. Right? We’re proving to herself around her with friends, how can I have other people around me help me to activate that to actually really see, “Oh, it’s really like I feel like a princess when I’m around him.” Or, “I feel like I have this incredible sense of value when I’m around him.”

Antia Boyd:
Okay. All that shows is you have that access inside of yourself. He’s in your presence in this presence that just comes out. Right? It’s like you can’t squeeze the lemon and apple juice comes out. Right? So it’s already in there. So what can you create around you that makes you feel valued or like a princess or the passion or whatever it is, right?

Chris Seiter:
So weirdly enough, what you’re talking about here is a perfect application to one of our core strategies that we teach people after breakups, which is the no contact rule. Go through a breakup, go into no contact, work on getting that secure attachment. But also, a lot of times, we’re finding people fail the no contact 80% of the time their first try, meaning they’ll break it after a week because her ex texted her and like, “Oh, yeah, hey, why haven’t you talked to me yet?” Or they’re worried, “Oh, they’ll forget about me,” which has never ever happened in the history since I’ve done this.

Chris Seiter:
But what’s interesting is what you’re really talking about here is having maybe kind of this out of body experience where you realized, “Wait, what I’m really attracted to is that feeling that he gave me,” but you need to reframe it to where, “Wait, he didn’t give it to me. Just his presence allowed it to come out. It was already in there.” So by surrounding yourself with other things or other people that can make you feel something on that level, it will also kind of take them off the pedestal. You’ll start to look at it in a different way.

Antia Boyd:
Absolutely. I have this example from 10 years ago where this guy was inviting me on a sailboat and whatever and all the women wanted to come.

Chris Seiter:
Oh, that’s nice. Yeah, sailboat’s pretty cool. That’s a nice move.

Antia Boyd:
Sunday afternoon, right? But what I actually understood was like, “Wait a minute, if I do that, then I become codependent.” Because I’m really saying like, “Only he can give me this experience.” And so I ended up actually saying, “No,” and saying, “I need to create this exact same experience by myself.” So then that way, I can choose. Do you know that most women don’t choose? They just literally live by default because they need something.

Chris Seiter:
What do you mean by that? So what specifically are you kind of referring to there?

Antia Boyd:
So when I need attention, well, I need this guy to bring out the sense of whatever freedom or whatever you have on the sailboat, significance. You know what I mean? Whatever, he chose me. Then I can choose him. Right? You can choose somebody when you need them. Does that make sense?

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. I mean, it kind of does. I’m trying to think of the other antithesis of that. You’re saying most women live by default. They don’t ever choose. To me, it seems like it’s a question of being active versus reactive. When you’re suggesting women should be a little bit more active in what they choose instead of being reactive, meaning things are just happening to them, well, I guess it’s more-

Antia Boyd:
So if I need to have attention from someone, then I can choose them because for me, it’s like so when I say I choose somebody, that’s coming from a sense of un-attachment. I’m not attached to anything. I just choose this experience from freedom, from security, from a sense of well-being. But if I need something, then I come from a place of scarcity. I come from a place of limitation. I come from a place of co-dependence. But I can’t exist without the other person. So there’s actually a lack of freedom. There’s actually a limitation there.

Antia Boyd:
And I think most women that are struggling in dating or they’re struggling to get their ex back and whatever, they come from this place of limitation and this lack of resourcefulness. And so therefore, they don’t choose, and guess what? Men can tell. Men can tell if a woman has the resourcefulness inside of herself and she chooses him, meaning he’s almost the price. Or no, then she’s the prize because he’s like, “Oh, I’m chosen by this woman. She doesn’t need anyone. But she chose me.” Right? But if he’s like, “She always needs something. She’s always feeling she’s not worthy.” And then they feel like, “Oh, I’m just like them to fill in the gap because she doesn’t feel worthy. So she just needs a boyfriend.”

Chris Seiter:
So what you’ve essentially done, I don’t know if you realize this, but I was telling you that when I was making fun of your book back there, and it’s on the pedestal, “You should go buy Magnetize Your Man,” I said, “I also have a book,” but I wish I had put it. It’s called Ungettable. Really talks a lot about this concept called the ungettable girl and something that I’ve noticed, which is women who seem to be ungettable to men, men are just naturally drawn to them. What you’ve just described is psychologically, I think, what happens with those ungettable girls. The ability to choose. And I think some of that… Do you think some of that revolves around the fact that most women don’t feel very independent? They don’t have the ability or options to choose? They’re kind of a victim of their circumstances? How would you go about-?

Antia Boyd:
So one of my experience is that so the women that come to me are financially very well, independent and resourced. But the problem is they were so focused on that that their emotional independence actually suffered because they use the financial independence to cope with that co-dependence, that emotional co-dependence, that they had since they were a child because they didn’t get the approval from the parent. They didn’t get the consistent attention that they should have gotten or they didn’t get the right to speak their truth and to separate themselves as an individual and have sovereignty. Right? So it’s two answers. Financially, yes, independent, but emotionally, not at all.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. There’s sort of two aspects to it.

Antia Boyd:
Right. Emotionally, actually very codependent.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. It seems to me like a lot of it really has to do with how you value yourself. And I guess the point you’re making is a lot of women who “don’t choose” don’t have a really high value on themselves or don’t place a high value. They put more of a high value on men and it needs to be the other way around, which sounds like the most cliché advice ever, but it’s also what works.

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. You know what’s sad about that is actually that they don’t have less resources inside of themselves. The women who are anxious, they just project the resources they have inside of themselves onto another person. So they just celebrate you on the pedestal, Chris, right? They’re just like, “Chris, he’s this great person, and he has all those great qualities and all good traits.” You know what I mean?

Chris Seiter:
Why did you stop? Why did you stop?

Antia Boyd:
Keep going. But he’s so humble and so great. But I’m like, “Right, you know you spot it, you got it. Right? So whatever you actually celebrate in another person, and this is why you want to be with that person-”

Chris Seiter:
Then it kind of comes to actually that yang-yin. Yeah, right, right. It’s the projection idea. You have that inside of you. A lot of times, we focus on the bad things. That’s why you had such an outrage over that article you wrote, which is like, “Yeah, you also have that narcissistic aspect inside of you or you’re at least capable of it.” But people forget that you’re also capable of all these good things.

Antia Boyd:
That’s the thing. That’s what I always tell my women. I said, “If you project, you got to project both ways.” You can’t just like say, “You just own the bad things. Then you also got to own all the good things.” So if you want to play that game, you got to do it in both directions, not just one.

Chris Seiter:
So before we end, there’s kind of one thing I wanted to get your thoughts on because what you said kind of made me start thinking of analogies to try to explain it to my audience, which is sort of these limiting beliefs that people have or tell themselves. So the point that I’m kind of ultimately taking from this, which is a lot of women don’t choose because they don’t think that they are capable of choosing. So it’s like almost this limiting belief that they tell themselves. And as odd as it sounds, you see a lot of the same things with sort of the elephant mentality. So you know how elephants are these gigantic creatures, right? And because they’re every single day chained to this little stake in the ground, they can easily escape from the stake, but they don’t realize that they’re able to do that. It’s kind of a matrix type thing. People don’t wake up. Your point is like, “Wake up, you can choose. Realize you have more value than you… Realize you can project all those really good things onto those people. You’re those things too.

Antia Boyd:
Right, right. And it’s really about asking a different question, right? Because women would… So the next logical question that I could see a woman ask is like, “Well, Antia, you have a good thing and you’re married. And so how do you even start with that? How do you even know that I have this resource inside of myself?” That’s a great question. How can you access the resources? So now you no longer doubt that you have resources. Now, it’s much more a question of the access to it, right? How do I get a VIP access to my resources? That’s a very different question than, how do I get to die? Does that make sense?

Chris Seiter:
Right, right. Well, it’s a reframing of it. Instead of focusing on them, you’re putting a little bit more focus on you and kind of building it from inwards to outwards as opposed from outwards to inwards, which I think is maybe the issue a lot of women have, which is they’re looking and they think the men will solve their problems inwards. But usually, it works the opposite way. Wow. Every time we talk, I’m just like, “Oh, I’m going to use that. I’m going to use that. I’m going to use that. I’m going to use that.”

Chris Seiter:
I love it. I love it. Thank you so much for coming on. But before we end, I want to just say that Antia has maybe some of the best stuff of… Any time I’ve interviewed someone, she has some of the best stuff to share. Right? And so I really want to share with my audience the fact that she has coaching available. So why don’t you tell everyone a little bit about your coaching so that they can basically partner up and become your client?

Antia Boyd:
Yeah. So the women that come to me are really mostly fearful-avoidant. So if you find yourself in the camp, I’m kind of both, but still also successful. But I struggle with trust issues, attracting emotionally unavailable men, come also from narcissistic backgrounds. So that can be an overlap like I said before. But are really, really ready to step up and own their power, right? Trusting their own power in their relationships, attracting the right men to them, valuing themselves. So that’s kind of like what we’re working on here. And if you want to learn more, I invite you to actually go to magnetizeyourman.com, fill out a quiz. And at the end, there will be some resources and potentially also an invitation to have a call with me so we can actually see what it is particularly for you, right? Because we have to see where you’re disassociating where you’re associating. That’s literally the game, right? And that’s what men pick up on. That’s how they decide if they trust you. That’s how they decide if they want to ask you on another day. And that’s also how they decide if they’re going to take you back because if you’re still associated, un-associated, disassociated, and you haven’t changed, he’s not going to come back to you. But oftentimes, some women don’t want the guy back anymore after they work with me-

Chris Seiter:
That’s very true.

Antia Boyd:
… because they realize, “Wait a minute. This was toxic.” And they get to go on, right?

Chris Seiter:
Right. Well, the end goal is always to make sure that you’re in a better place than you were when you started. And so Antia has this quiz on her website. And if you’re watching this on YouTube, just simply look in the description link below this YouTube video. Click on the link you see there, I’m going to put a link to it. If you’re listening to this on your run or walk or doing the dishes or whatever, all you’ll have to do is come by our website, find the Antia interview. Just click on the podcast or something. We’ll have a link in there as well. So Antia, this quiz, so what will the quiz measure for them so they know why they should take it?

Antia Boyd:
That’s many different levels. I mean, it’s really actually looking at their own emotional availability and really also seeing like, “Yeah, I mean, where’s the commitment or where’s there no commitment?” So it’s like a lot of different areas, what areas they need to focus on, what archetype they need to focus on. So there’s different energies inside of ourselves. And so some archetypes are really strong inside of us and some are not so strong at all, need to be really… They’re kind of almost in our blind spot. They’re starved. And that’s why they’re attracting distorted men and basically men that are conflicted inside of themselves into their life.

Chris Seiter:
So again, if you want to take the assessment/quiz, schedule a call with Antia, look in the description link in YouTube, click on it. Or if you’re listening on the podcast, make sure you check out this interview on our website. There’ll be a link there and I’m even going to put an email out to kind of let people be aware of this because this is mind-blowing stuff. Thank you so much for coming on, Antia.

Antia Boyd:
Thank you so much. You’re like the best host, Chris.

Chris Seiter:
Oh, thank you. Thank you.

Antia Boyd:
You [inaudible 00:50:49] me. You know what I mean? I’m like, “Wow, that was good.”

Chris Seiter:
Oh, good. I’m glad I’m asking the right questions.