The Validation Equation

When something is valid, it’s worth something, has value, it carries merit, it has force, or weight, or strength… It means something. Sometimes by law it’s valid, sometimes by law of nature it’s valid, and sometimes a thing is only valid because of how the mind sees it.

If a person raises a question on a topic, and the question is a good one, it’s a valid question. If a point gets made that’s a good one; (worth while) it’s a valid point. If someone agrees with you, you feel validated. If someone ignores you or belittles you, you feel invalid.

What is interesting, is our need for validation. On some level, we all need it. Sometimes that means you need to be agreed with. (your Ego) Which is the cheap kind of validation because the important bit in the validation-equation is not a cheap and temporary bigness… the important bit isn’t the need to be agreed with. The kind of validation I would call important is validation that equates to being of value to people, and worth more because they care about you. Like their loving you gives you more worth, more merit, more strength… they validate your existence, you feel worth something to another person, which makes you feel worth more in your own mind. To reiterate and state it another way, they seem to make you like you MORE. (Which I see as a wonderful thing… as you already know.)

Saying that brings a pinch of arrogance to mind I bet. That is not where I’m headed… arrogance is not even in this discussion, because thinking highly of yourself and others is an important thing, not an arrogant thing.

When you are worth more in your own mind, you won’t be pushed around, taken advantage of, and you will matter enough for your happiness to come first. I feel like I am only dancing around the idea of feeling validated without giving a personal example, so here you are:

I had no clue I needed validation, until suddenly I felt it. I decided to buy my mom a plane ticket to visit me. I planned some things we would do during her visit, historical and beautiful places we would see, and I found her a bed and breakfast in my town which would add to her experience (since my apartment was little).

I had arranged to have most of my days off work during her visit, but there were a couple days I wasn’t able to get off, and it was on one of these days some things came together in my mind.

I was a warehouse manager for a furniture factory. I was in charge of getting the warehouse filled, trucks loaded, as well as creating production lists based on what I did and didn’t have in my warehouse. This factory operated backwards, so instead of orders going straight to production, orders came to me, and I had to figure out what was “missing,” then go through the factory backwards to determine what was available, what was being finished, and what still needed to be assembled; leaving lists with each department as I did so. As such, I worked directly with many people.

Needless to say, knowing so many people, (and the majority of the workers being men) I had to put up with much joking and flack on a regular basis, especially since I was in a position of “prioritize this, I need this, work on this.” They all knew the nature of what I had to do, so I wasn’t the bad guy, but I was easily a target for joking around.

One of the days after my mother arrived, and I was at work, I noticed my mind was doing different things as the guys were joking around and teasing. I realized I suddenly felt taller. I felt like I was important. Like I mattered, and I had a level of confidence I didn’t normally have. I was also thoroughly aware it had everything to do with my mother. Her sudden presence in my life validated my existence. I was suddenly important; because I had a Mom. Someone who wholly knows me, someone who wholly loves me, someone who wholly makes me real and significant. It was like I was suddenly on a pedestal, and could say whatever the hell I pleased, and it wouldn’t matter. There would be no consequences, because I was amazing. My Mother made it so.

My mother has always communicated complete and total love to me, she accepts me, she adores me, and I will never have to wish for a second that my mother loved me more. I grew up with this knowledge every day, and suddenly having my mother within reach, meant that I was suddenly valid in life.

I didn’t use the words “she gave me validation” at the time, and I really haven’t labeled it that until I write this, but through personally experiencing that arrival of validation, I know just how powerful it is.

We had a great two weeks, Mom and I. I introduced her to new places, more of my life and surroundings, and at the end of those two weeks, when I took her to the airport, and had so say good bye to her, my heart nearly broke.

I went to a look out deck at the airport, I watched as her plane taxied, I cried my eyes out as it took off, and I couldn’t bring myself to leave until I couldn’t see any trace of it in the sky what-so-ever. I was devastated. It was like I was suddenly a tiny little insignificant thing again. I didn’t realize how insignificant I was before she arrived, but in feeling so validated and ‘worth something’ in her presence, I was very aware how painful it was to go back to being someone without validity.

Feeling valid means you mean something to someone… you matter to them. You are important in their life and they are important in yours. It’s a LOVE thing. A WHOLENESS thing. A HEART thing. We know when we are valid to someone, and they are valid to us.