Psychology defines ambivalence (or detached personality) as a state of having simultaneous contradictory reactions, beliefs, or feelings towards some a person, object, or state of facts. It may or may not be experienced as psychologically unpleasant when the positive and negative aspects of a subject are both present in a person’s mind at the same time. While people who have a detached/ambivalent personality are very often aware of their traits, they don’t specifically feel something is wrong with their way of perceiving the world. Eventually, their ultimate pursuit for professional help in therapy is triggered by the complaints of the people in their lives, mostly spouses, who either misuse the term “bipolar disorder” to label them or find their failed attempts to connect to each other impossible to live with.  

1. You change your plans all the time

Ambivalent personalities can turn tables easily, and while for them this feels completely natural, people in their lives might take this spontaneity as incapacity to keep to a decision. You might have carefully planned a journey with your friends to Bali, but you sink in three days before your flight and decide you need to go alone to India and soul search without any rational explanation. Ambivalent types don’t feel like they have to justify their mixed feelings and revolutionary decisions and will do what they have to do to put things in order for themselves, be it at the cost of bailing out from an important event in their family’s or close peers’ life.

2. You’re constantly indecisive about things

This is not so much about not being able to decide what to wear today, but rather about a constant rumination of all facets of a situation in the hope of landing the right conclusion. One day passionately in love with your job, the next you want to bootstrap and never look back because going to an office each day suffocates you.

3. You’re hot, then you’re suddenly cold

Ambivalent personalities often leave their romantic partners bedazzled with confusion and emotional pain. That’s not because they love to play games, but simply because their feelings towards someone or somebody can vary greatly from one day to the other. One day you might feel completely in love with your SO, while the next one you’re questioning if you made the right choice entering the relationship. It’s a neverending, consuming back and forth process, and usually the only thing that helps is patience and trust.

4. You question absolutely everything

You simply won’t settle for plain answers, the same way you can’t take most things for granted. You’re always asking questions, especially the dreaded Why, and you demand people to justify their opinions and philosophies around a topic, because in your world everything is relative and subject to change.

5. You contradict yourself quite often

Ambivalents might surprise those around them with opposing points of view around the same topic over the course of one hour. They analyse things in depth but are never completely satisfied with the outcome. They reflect at things while they talk about them and disagree to what they’ve stated earlier simply because what they feel right now seems more accurate.

6. You have attachment issues

Not because you’re intentionally avoidant, or because you like to profit from other people’s kindness, but rather because your conflicting insides often fail to come to a mutual agreement. You’re a realist, and an indecisive, and yet a romantic. You often have the best intentions, but people may feel you’re not 100% honest.

7. You’re either a sweetheart, or a total jerk

You usually go with your intuition when you first meet a person, however, even if when they trigger red flags, you decide to give them a chance and see where that goes. While you might be openly kind and cute to someone you’re getting to know, you have the opposite reaction once they do something that confirms your initial point of view. You either lash out at someone who puts you off, or simply turn your back elegantly and close your door to them for good.

8. You have sinuous energy levels

You’re either really alert and engaged, or very apathetic and silent. People have a difficult time with your constantly changing energy levels and often come to think you have a neurological disorder. In reality, you put a lot of time and energy into things you’re passionate about and that leads to exhaustion and very much needed conservation of your inner resources before you can be the joyous, creative, compassionate friend once again.

9. You always think life is someplace else

You dream a lot about the things you’d love to do and you openly express your musings out loud, because that’s your legitimate way to pave your progress towards them. While some people may grow bothered about how you’re obsessing about the life you aren’t living, you know deep down that one day everything you dream about now will come true, one way or the other.

10. You talk a lot about how you feel

Ambivalent personalities often turn a situation on all sides before settling for a final outcome. While people might end up believing you can’t think for yourself, this is simply your way to achieve the best solution for any given situation in your life. You like talking about things on your mind with everyone you trust, mostly because hearing yourself talking over and over again helps you put events into perspective.