Someone told me recently that you shouldn't look for external validation, but validation from within yourself. I don't know how though. It doesn't make sense to me. Surely a person's own opinions of themselves are biased? And in efforts to get somewhere in life, isn't it more important what other people think of you?
internal validation
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Not necessarily. If you base your validation on the opinions of others and try to please everyone then you may find yourself being pulled uncomfortably in different directions like the man who's legs were tied to separate angry horses. You could make yourself a slave to the approval of others, because there'll never be time for you to grow.
I would ask why it is that you feel this validation is necessary. Those who attempt to judge the worth of others they've never met before are making a mistake and should be spending more time looking to their own affairs. They can try to make themselves the judge of that as much as they like, but they may as well be trying to make themselves god of all life in the universe, because that's not going to be a reality outside of their mind either. All opinions are a little biased. The best we can do is expose them to new information whenever we get the opportunity. If you tell a human that they must grow and develop and be validated, you'll likely only befuddle them and stifle that growth. It'd be like shouting at a plant, "GROW UP, YOU LITTLE BASTARD!"
Think of all the people and all the voices out there. There are a lot, more than the mind can probably comprehend. You'll drive yourself mad trying to do listen to them all, so as you live and you meet new people, satisfy yourself with listening to their stories and remember that they're you, just from a different place and time. They feel your wants and your fears and you can share experience with one-another to help you both grow naturally. Ask yourself what it is that really makes you you, what it is that makes you separate, and you'll have your base. You simply build on that, but don't tell yourself that you must. It'll happen naturally, like breathing, and your mind will quiet itself.
I would ask why it is that you feel this validation is necessary. Those who attempt to judge the worth of others they've never met before are making a mistake and should be spending more time looking to their own affairs. They can try to make themselves the judge of that as much as they like, but they may as well be trying to make themselves god of all life in the universe, because that's not going to be a reality outside of their mind either. All opinions are a little biased. The best we can do is expose them to new information whenever we get the opportunity. If you tell a human that they must grow and develop and be validated, you'll likely only befuddle them and stifle that growth. It'd be like shouting at a plant, "GROW UP, YOU LITTLE BASTARD!"
Think of all the people and all the voices out there. There are a lot, more than the mind can probably comprehend. You'll drive yourself mad trying to do listen to them all, so as you live and you meet new people, satisfy yourself with listening to their stories and remember that they're you, just from a different place and time. They feel your wants and your fears and you can share experience with one-another to help you both grow naturally. Ask yourself what it is that really makes you you, what it is that makes you separate, and you'll have your base. You simply build on that, but don't tell yourself that you must. It'll happen naturally, like breathing, and your mind will quiet itself.
Don't trust others. Ever. Don't trust yourself either. No one has a perfect track record when it comes to judgment. Accept that everyone is horribly irreparably flawed, including yourself. What good is validation if it comes from such flawed warped perspectives? It's an attempt by unworthy creatures to elevate themselves beyond their station or to put trash on a pedestal. Take comfort in the knowledge that you are as damned as everyone else. That we were all born to die and that in the end nothing you or anyone else will have done will matter and that you will ultimately be forgotten. When you accept all of that, what good is validation?
I need that validation, because I'm also told I need self esteem. I could see that. I generally consider myself to be the floor beneath the bottom of the barrel. My problem is that without proof that I'm worthwhile, how can I believe that I'm worthwhile? I've achieved things, sure. I just graduated from uni with a 2:1, but on the other side of things, I just had to quit a job because of anxiety, and as for relationships, I just can't seem to go out as easily as I could only two years earlier, and I'm a virgin, which at 23 years old, as a man, makes me feel like shit even if people aren't judging me for it. I feel like everyone else, be it in employment, in friendships, or more, will judge me in comparison to someone else. Who is more worth spending and risking time or money with? I feel like I'll never come out on top in that contest. I guess that's why I feel so desperate about it. The longer it goes on, the further behind in life I fall, and the bigger the gap in between me and the better person I'll be compared to.Barbas said:Not necessarily. If you base your validation on the opinions of others and try to please everyone then you may find yourself being pulled uncomfortably in different directions like the man who's legs were tied to separate angry horses. You could make yourself a slave to the approval of others, because there'll never be time for you to grow.
I would ask why it is that you feel this validation is necessary. Those who attempt to judge the worth of others they've never met before are making a mistake and should be spending more time looking to their own affairs. They can try to make themselves the judge of that as much as they like, but they may as well be trying to make themselves god of all life in the universe, because that's not going to be a reality outside of their mind either. All opinions are a little biased. The best we can do is expose them to new information whenever we get the opportunity. If you tell a human that they must grow and develop and be validated, you'll likely only befuddle them and stifle that growth. It'd be like shouting at a plant, "GROW UP, YOU LITTLE BASTARD!"
Think of all the people and all the voices out there. There are a lot, more than the mind can probably comprehend. You'll drive yourself mad trying to do listen to them all, so as you live and you meet new people, satisfy yourself with listening to their stories and remember that they're you, just from a different place and time. They feel your wants and your fears and you can share experience with one-another to help you both grow naturally. Ask yourself what it is that really makes you you, what it is that makes you separate, and you'll have your base. You simply build on that, but don't tell yourself that you must. It'll happen naturally, like breathing, and your mind will quiet itself.
I hear you on not listening to all the voices, though. I'm told being a nerd is good, I'm told being a nerd is bad. I'm told that I need to be an alpha male, I'm told that alpha males are douchebags, and the third party doubts they even exist. I'm told I should back off, I'm told I should come out of my shell. Some days it really does feel like they're all in my head, shouting at me and telling me I'm doing everything wrong. I want to stand on my own, I want to live without feeling I have to listen to those voices, but at the same time, I hate the doubt of whether I'm doing things right, which is why I listen to such things in the first place. It's all a big circle, and I've no clue how to break it.
No offence, but if I bought into nihilism, I would've probably just ended it long ago. I don't plan on being forgotten. It's not the be all and end all, but it isn't the plan either.Aramis Night said:
I think it's just a matter of finding your own satisfication.Doclector said:
It's like a exam in university. There's a few ways to look at it. Let's say that you have an extremely difficult course that you just don't understand. Now, a lot of big self-achievers intrinsically tie their need for validation to the grade they get on exams. "I need an A on this exam." I believe this is unhealthy. It puts the axis of control too far out of your hands.
Instead, a healthier way might be to say, "I'm going to learn this material to the best of my knowledge." Now you control the validation. Maybe you'll receive outside validation in the form of a good grade. But even if you don't, you can still say, "Hey. I think I challenged my limits. So that's awesome."
In other words. Set your own goals. If you receive external validation for them: Great! If not, know that they are your own goals and thus, your validation should be all that matters.
Honestly, OP, if somebody tells you they don't need external validation, they lie.
Everybody needs it and everybody builds his or her self-confidence on it, not necessarily in a tangible "I build X" or "I archieved X" kind of way but every time somebody ascertains their existence in some way, maybe by a smile, maybe through meeting new people, maybe by being pleasantly drunk with friends, maybe by playing with their pet or having one or more kids - everybody has and needs a project that ascertains themselves, even if they don't realize it. As such the talk about "internal validation" is a misnomer to me and essentially just means to not let a temporary lack of validation get you down.
And, frankly, from this perspective they are right: OP, I commented a few times on your other topics in advice already and, as such, know that your self-esteem, well, isn't very good. And the thing is, what this means is to keep your past successes in mind and let a temporary stumbling block not let you get dragged down - keep your head above the clouds, remember your successes and keep a firm look on the things you want. That's what they mean with it, and when I read your posts here, again, I think that advice is spot on.
However, people will use different concepts to tell you that, will describe it in different ways, will contradict each other in what may be the problem or may even talk more about themselves than about you. And, honestly, that's to be expected given that everyone is different, so the difficulty lies in boiling this down to a common denominator. So, just try to see the common thread that connects most of those things in the same way that when you measure something in science and then apply some statistics to make the most likely statement about what you were investigating. That's essentially the difficulty and the balancing you have to perform: listen to people but keep in mind that what they say could be bogus. Listen to them but always check whether or not what they say makes sense and how it relates to what you heard already. Listen to them but try to follow the most common advice distilled from all of them.
And, once more, in your case I think that's your main problem: you are overthinking stuff and get too anxious about little things that don't matter instead of seeing the whole thing. Keep your head above the clouds, keep trying and never lose track of what you want. Now, take a deep breath and get to work.
Everybody needs it and everybody builds his or her self-confidence on it, not necessarily in a tangible "I build X" or "I archieved X" kind of way but every time somebody ascertains their existence in some way, maybe by a smile, maybe through meeting new people, maybe by being pleasantly drunk with friends, maybe by playing with their pet or having one or more kids - everybody has and needs a project that ascertains themselves, even if they don't realize it. As such the talk about "internal validation" is a misnomer to me and essentially just means to not let a temporary lack of validation get you down.
And, frankly, from this perspective they are right: OP, I commented a few times on your other topics in advice already and, as such, know that your self-esteem, well, isn't very good. And the thing is, what this means is to keep your past successes in mind and let a temporary stumbling block not let you get dragged down - keep your head above the clouds, remember your successes and keep a firm look on the things you want. That's what they mean with it, and when I read your posts here, again, I think that advice is spot on.
Also a very important point and something that the guy with the unmemorizable name is talking about in his post above mine: be realistic in what you aim for and don't overdo it. If you obsess over something unrealistic, it will likely kill your self-esteem when you can't get it, too. So stay realistic. Especially given such things as you described above: many people will tell and recommend you many different things to help you and you rightfully say it confuses the hell out of you because a part of you really wants to always listen to them. And that part is absolutely right! You should listen to them! Listening to other people is the only way for you to find out where what makes you miserable may lie and you can do get rid of it. And that this works is evidenced by the existence of psychiatrists.Doclector said:
However, people will use different concepts to tell you that, will describe it in different ways, will contradict each other in what may be the problem or may even talk more about themselves than about you. And, honestly, that's to be expected given that everyone is different, so the difficulty lies in boiling this down to a common denominator. So, just try to see the common thread that connects most of those things in the same way that when you measure something in science and then apply some statistics to make the most likely statement about what you were investigating. That's essentially the difficulty and the balancing you have to perform: listen to people but keep in mind that what they say could be bogus. Listen to them but always check whether or not what they say makes sense and how it relates to what you heard already. Listen to them but try to follow the most common advice distilled from all of them.
And, once more, in your case I think that's your main problem: you are overthinking stuff and get too anxious about little things that don't matter instead of seeing the whole thing. Keep your head above the clouds, keep trying and never lose track of what you want. Now, take a deep breath and get to work.
You have approached this from the wrong direction from what i had intended. The point wasn't to get depressed or down about any of the things i mentioned. The point is to set aside ones ego. The idea was to be free of such concerns and to live your life as you see fit. It isn't a call for the death of empathy. It has the potential to allow one to live by their own sense of compassion without ones sense of selfishness or concern for the petty opinions of mobs getting in the way of that. Admittedly i am a bit of a nihilist, but i am just as much a stoic which serves to inform my direction when it comes to the angle i view nihilism thought from which leads me to different conclusions from your average angsty teenager. True compassion isn't born from a fear of the abyss, but an acceptance of it. Otherwise it still stems from the transactional expectation of good behavior=reward.Doclector said: