Validation from within can never be taken away

Photo by Carlos Machado on Unsplash

When you choose to believe in yourself, you’re ignoring the status quo that says you require approval from others in order to proceed with your belief in you.

Many of us, myself included, have been the cheerleaders and validators for others in our lifetime - whether friends, family, students, clients, co-workers, strangers we meet and encourage. Others have done this for us too - hopefully you’ve been able to be on both the giving and receiving end of this. I am grateful for the kind people in my life, who have encouraged me, even those times when I couldn’t quite hear their positive words.

A kind word and non-judgmental attitude can go a long way to helping another person take a step, let go, or feel better about themselves.

Mind you, and this is something I had to learn the hard way over many years, we cannot do it for them. The work of healing and letting go is theirs, they get to choose how or when or if - they will grow and heal. Someone may look like they cannot hear a word you said or have any of the validation you sent their way right now, but they might also come back hours, weeks, or years later, and let you know that your kindness made a difference for them and was a helpful energy on their path. Or not.

Meanwhile, you were not the one who got to decide whether they would choose to heal themselves. Neither am I.

This week’s focus, and probably for a few weeks to come - is self validation. It’s the energy I’m looking at for myself, and it’s what I’ll be writing about and sharing here. The energy of self validation is just that - it’s energy. You can feel it, know it, and see it. It can be read as an energy, and the energies that block it can be released. Being able to validate yourself is not about having a gigantic ego - in fact, if you play it small and self effacing to the point of hiding and hurting yourself, that’s ego too. All this spiritual talk about getting rid of the ego makes me giggle, isn’t that, too - the ego talking?

One needs a good healthy ego in this world!

What if instead of trying to hide and get rid of our egos, we practice self love in a new context? Here’s one idea: if we do not know and appreciate ourselves and our abilities, we will leave ourselves open for others to use them, and us. You know this already - if you’ve ever felt betrayed, or like you weren’t being seen for what you have and know. If you were self effacing to the point of hiding your light so nobody could see it, there might have been someone who saw no problem with taking the credit that was yours. Of course, there are always going to be folks like that, no matter what. A capitalist culture breeds them like flies. However, I’m talking about you, and me too.

When I was a young 20 something, just starting my career in clothing and costume design, I landed a plum job from a soon to be opening restaurant in my hometown. I liked the restaurant owner, as well as the designer who was creating the look and feel of this restaurant. She was a petite energetic seemingly fearless woman, older and wiser than me. I was just out of art school, and doing my best to make a living with my art and creations. She hired me to create some amazing uniforms for the restaurant staff, all of which would be hand painted to match the colors of the place. I was thrilled.

I remember one conversation we had, when she asked me why my prices were so low.

I had no idea how to price or value my work, or what to charge, and had some kind of idiot’s noble attitude that somehow I needed to pay my dues. “I’m paying my dues”, I said to her, expecting her to fully understand. Instead she got this funny smile on her face, she was truly amused by my ignorance, I believe. “Paying your dues, huh?”, is all she said. And we spoke of it no more.

But. It lit me up like nobody’s business. She didn’t try to heal me, mother me, or school me. She did the wisest thing she could, and let me figure it out for myself. Even so, it still took me years before I learned to charge what I was worth for my work. After making many mistakes, and being invalidated about the worth of my work, I started to wake up to where I’d been unconscious about how I was valuing myself. This is an ongoing project, and the more I work at it, the more I learn about value, and how we see ourselves in the context of having it.

How about you? What does it look like and feel like when you have your own validation, from within yourself?