Validation - the importance of this being an inside job.

Welcome. If you would prefer to listen to the podcast, click here.

Hi everybody.

If you don't already know me, I'm Pam, welcome to the Living Your Dream podcast. I own Pam Poole Self Discovery Coaching and if you would like to know more about me or what I offer my website is www.pampoole.co.nz But today, today I'd love to talk to you about validation and the importance of this being an inside job.

We have likely felt at some point what validation feels like. It feels pretty good. It's the process of recognizing and affirming our feelings, thoughts, and actions. So of course, self-validation is recognizing and acknowledging our own feelings, thoughts and experiences as legitimate and valuable and without needing an external source to agree with us and regardless of what another person's response to that is.

Now most of us, most of us look outside ourselves for validation, when we're born, we have a basic need to feel safe and this requires a sense of belonging, and approval, to feel seen, to feel heard.

We are literally driven by instinctive DNA to seek that from others, even if it means not being or showing up as our true selves. On a primitive and instinctive level, we know it is safer to be with others, that we are more likely to survive than if we're on our own.

Now, of course in today's world, you know, it's not usually about physical survival, but of course we're still subject to those primitive survival needs. When that need is not met, we begin to look outside ourselves to meet that basic need, and over time, we receive compliments or complaints, recognition for an exam result or getting a job, something like that. We learn to get our sense of worth or validation, sometimes even our sense of identity from external results, events, circumstances, people.

Certainly, in Australia and New Zealand we are brought up in a society and schooling systems that promote and encourage us to look outside ourselves for validation. But then, then we add another layer to this problem by learning as we grow up to criticize and judge ourselves, to not allow our feelings, you know, probably because we've been told we're not allowed to feel a certain way, or that other people's thoughts or opinions, perhaps feelings, are more important.

So, we're not just looking outside of ourselves for validation, internally, we're invalidating ourselves. So is it any wonder that so many of us have struggling mental health or experience depression or overwhelm or confusion or people-pleasing or any other types of you know unhelpful learned behaviours more than we want to.

Then we carry these learned patterns of behaviours into adulthood, of course, it won't be the first time you've heard that. And then we criticise ourselves, yes on top of all that, we criticise ourselves for being a person who needs or wants other people's approval.

So, it's not just the natural part of our DNA, that need for longing or belonging, it’s been further adapted and overdeveloped through learning, none of which we have any control over, right, but when we get to adulthood, where we actually start to learn and understand that we do have some control, we actually criticize ourselves for the very things that we've learned that we had no control over learning.

Honestly, even saying it leaves me feeling like, what the? Anyway, look, honestly, nearly every person I meet, every client I work with, criticises themselves, judges themselves, speaks to themselves in a way they would never ever speak to another person. Some people have no awareness that they're even doing it, or the damage that it's doing to the relationships that they have with themselves.

That they are literally invalidating or dismissing, rejecting themselves, their own thoughts, their feelings, their behaviours. It has a huge impact on our mental health and general sense of wellbeing.

 So, you know, we can't control what other people think or feel or behave like, right? So, looking outside ourselves for validation is at its very best a roller coaster ride and a really unreliable one.

The solution is to look inside and begin to acknowledge that our thoughts, our feelings, our behaviours are true and real for us in this moment. Even the ones that we would rather be different. Accepting them as legitimate and without judgement. Just like we often do for the people we care about in our lives.

Learning the skill of self-validation improves resilience during times of stress and everyday challenges. It improves self-esteem, self-confidence, reduces considerably just general emotional distress and it increases our sense of well-being, supports quality mental health and most importantly being able to be self-validating allows us to be and live more authentically.

So, I want to share with you today the steps or the place to begin the self-validation journey. First, we need to observe or notice what we're doing or saying to ourselves, how we're treating ourselves. We want to acknowledge that, and then we want to allow for that and understand that it's just learned behaviour. Of course, we are going to do it, this is where we are currently at, and change takes time, and this is part of the process. It will certainly require some kind of effort.

So, the ways that we can begin to practice self-validation includes prioritizing our own needs, treating ourselves with kindness, notice and accept our feelings as fleeting and not as who we are, by this I mean, if we feel bad, that doesn't mean we are bad, if we feel guilty, it doesn't mean we are guilty. Encourage ourselves - be our own cheerleader, tell yourself you're doing a great job given the skills that you have in this moment, we're still learning.

Acknowledging our own progress and how far we've come, how much effort we've made. I often look back on, you know, say, between two and five years ago, and I'm amazed at how far I've come. You know, how differently I feel about myself, how different my relationships are, how much I love everything about my life, even when it's not going great, I just view it very differently these days. I know the effort and the energy that I put in to achieving that for myself, and I thank myself every day, I really am grateful to myself for doing that, I really appreciate that I've done that for myself. Celebrating who we are, how far we come, and who we're looking to become, because we can. It really is.

I like to celebrate by going for a walk with my dog, having some space, you know, resting in the sunshine. Nothing quite like having a beautiful sleep in the sun on a warm sunny day.

Here are some of the options of self-talk that I thought I might offer you today, and you can take them or leave them, whatever works for you. These are some of the statements I use for me - It's okay to feel this way. Of course, I feel this way. This will pass. My feelings are not who I am. I get to choose my actions no matter what or how I feel. I am so much more than this one moment feeling or thought. It’s normal to feel this way.

Now they are just a few and I'm sure that you guys can come up with numerous more, if you fancy, I would love for you to share those because I think, you know, we all can do with a lot of thoughts that support us in moving forward in a way that helps us feel better, generally day to day, about ourselves and about life because that can only help every other area of our life and that's the truth of it.

If you would like to learn more about this or anything else that I offer, my website is www.pampoole.co.nz you can sign up for my friends list, that's my emailing list and in that you get a private link that allows you access to resources and some really helpful material that is not available any other way. It also allows you to know first what's coming up and any special offers.

Or you might like to book a 30-minute no obligation enquiry call and ask a few questions directly. Whatever way you would like to get in touch, I would love, Love, love, love, to hear from you.

Until the next time we chat have a great week and thanks for listening. Bye for now. 😊