If the relationships are positive, attuned, empathic, caring, supportive, and challenging, then they cause positive development in the brain and increase performance capacities. If they are not quality connections, they either cause nothing to happen when something should be happening, or bad things to be built into us when they shouldn’t be—“bugs,” such as an overreactive brain, distrust, squirrelly thinking, an inability to focus and attend, impulsivity, controlling behavior, sensitivity to failure, and other liabilities that interfere with our performance.
