The Constant Need For Validation
Validation: it’s a wonderful thing to receive. But how much validation is too much? Achieving goals and being recognized for those goals feels great, sure, but most of us aren’t satisfied with that feeling for very long. As soon as we receive praise for our efforts, we start needing validation all over again — only this time, we’ve raised the bar for ourselves once more. The attention-seeking cycle repeats, and we’re left with nothing.
How do you stop needing validation? How do you separate hard work from attention-seeking behaviors? How do you decide “enough is enough” and let your progress speak for itself? Today, we’re going to tackle the tough topic of validation, how to navigate it, and how to ultimately overcome the constant desire to “climb to the top” and be seen for it.
Good validation and bad validation
To start, it’s important to recognize that some validation is a good thing. Needing validation is a byproduct of wanting to be sure we’re performing well, contributing to a cause, doing right by our coworkers and creating high-quality work. For these reasons, it’s important that employers take special steps to make sure they’re providing praise and validation to employees who deserve it.
With that said, there’s a perceived trend that young professionals need more consistent validation and attention than older employees. Part of this has to do with the always-online culture of millennials and Gen Z workers, and part of it has to do with the cultural environment we’re now living in. Note that these aren’t bad things — it’s not worse that young professionals want more validation; it’s simply different.
However, needing validation turns sour when it starts to impact your ability as a professional to get the job done, or when you no longer enjoy the work you do unless validation is given. Constantly stressing or worrying about whether or not you’ve done a good job because your boss hasn’t specifically commended you can lead to a lot of internal stress and, ultimately, burnout.
How to stop needing validation
Fortunately, needing validation can be remedied by increasing our emotional resilience as both professionals and people. Emotional resilience is our ability to not be swayed as much by external stimuli, our emotions and other challenges that come our way.
This starts by coming to an understanding that our overall wellbeing and emotional states are separate from what we do, what we’re praised for doing, and who’s praising us. Our wellbeing and emotions are important and valuable because they’re valuable — not because someone else says so.
To start untangling your need for validation, it helps to first come to an awareness within yourself that a problem exists. If you’re here, then congratulations: you’ve already accomplished that first step. You’ve realized that when you don’t engage in attention-seeking behaviors, you unjustly feel bad, low, distressed, depressed or anxious.
Now that you’ve uncovered the pattern that makes you unhappy, it’s important to really dive into your feelings about validation. What is it about praise or receiving an award makes you feel better? Once you know that, you can start to separate feeling valid with receiving recognition.
In other words, you can start to recontextualize the situation by understanding that feeling good happens because you decide it happens, not because of external stimuli. Good feelings come from the stories we tell ourselves about our lives, not the accolades we accrue along the way.
Needing validation is a myth
If you think about it, none of us really “need” validation. We can survive just fine without it — it’s not a crucial resource like food, sleep or shelter. Once you start to realize that validation is just a concept that acts as a stand-in for happiness, it becomes easier to start dismantling that worldview and thinking differently.
The next time you’re feeling down because you didn’t receive the validation you thought you would, ask yourself, “Is there a way I can think differently about this situation? Can I be proud of the work I’ve done without being told I did well by someone else? Can I let myself be happy without external stimuli?”
Choosing to say yes to those questions might just make all the difference.
If you’re still curious about how to stop needing validation, we’ve got an entire podcast episode on the subject. Why don’t you check it out and see what you think?