Another episode of Waking Up to Narcissism and or The Virtual Couch.
If you end up watching this on YouTube, you will see
basically a patchwork quilt of video because I came back on after editing this
entire episode and re-recorded so that I can put in the introduction that we're
running this on The Virtual Couch as well as Waking Up to Narcissism because
I cannot tell you how much I think that you're going to enjoy today's episode.
Now, with that said, watch as we now smoothly transition over into the regular
opening that I had recorded specifically for the Waking Up to Narcissism podcast.
But if you are listening to this on the virtual couch, you are in the right place.
Sit back and enjoy the show. I am your host, Tony Overbay. I'm a licensed marriage
and family therapist, host of the virtual couch podcast as well.
And thank you as always to Riley Hope for her intro, the theme song, Not My Job.
Please go find Riley and her music wherever you stream your music.
I'm really excited today. That is a line. That's a line that I say often.
I can't actually think of a time where I said, hey, you know what,
folks? Today, this one's kind of a dud.
To buckle up. Not all the balls are strikes, but I really am. I'm excited.
I'm excited to share this episode with you because recently I had the chance
to sit down with my friend and fellow therapist, Angela DeHoyos on her podcast
called Finding Balance with Mental Health and Spirituality.
We talked about validation and we ended up having one of those conversations that felt very dense.
I don't like going back and listening to my own podcasts.
And I was on a walk a couple of nights ago.
And I thought, okay, I want to hear how she does the intro. And then I listened
to the whole episode. We cover so much ground.
There's an episode on Frank Kate Anthony's Divorce Survival Guide podcast,
where we go into so much detail about the concepts around differentiation,
especially in an unhealthy relationship, that I often refer to that one when
I am talking about really deep diving into differentiation.
And I had the same feeling talking about validation and finding who you are,
your sense of self, as I listen to this episode, I want to encourage you to
go find the podcast and follow it and listen to all of Angela's work because
she's a really good therapist.
I think she's found exactly what she loves doing.
And Angela also sent me the audio file because back in the day,
I used to post some of the interviews where I went out on somebody else's podcast
to hopefully help my listeners connect with other podcasts that I think that they may enjoy.
I've got the link in the show notes. So we talked about validation and we talked
about what it is and what it isn't and why so many of us are still walking around
just starving for it without even realizing how many things fit in this validation bucket.
And before we get to today's episode, let me own up to the fact that I am about
to throw you a pitch, a sales pitch.
So while my business manager would not like how I'm about to do this pitch,
I am going to let you know that you are welcome to hit that forward 30 seconds
button. I don't know, four or five, six times if you want to skip this or hear me out.
So I want to talk really briefly about a reboot of my Magnetic Marriage course.
It is coming soon to an internet near you.
And if you happen to listen to both the virtual couch and waking up to narcissism,
they attract different audiences. And so then that leads to different emails,
different conversations, and different tones in the episodes.
The emails from the virtual couch are often from listeners who are saying things
like, we've grown apart, we don't communicate anymore, but we both are willing to work on it.
And those are very real struggles. But if you're a long time waking up to narcissism
listener, you know that these emails that I get are a little bit different because
they come from people who aren't just disconnected.
Often there's an individual in the relationship that is destabilized and they
are really not understanding what is happening at all.
And they're definitely convinced that they're the problem.
And these are the people that feel very alone in their relationships.
People have been told so often that they're too sensitive, that they've remembered everything wrong.
And so they've started doubting their own perception. These are people whose
nervous systems won't settle down around their partner, even when nothing obvious is happening.
So that's a very different starting place than, hey, we're both just kind of not sure what to do.
I want to honor the difference because now as I talk about a marriage course,
I want to be really clear about what my magnetic marriage course is and what
it isn't. It's not a cure for narcissism.
I'm not promising a secret formula that will finally give your partner the aha
moment. And I do see that messaging out there from some people that are creating a lot of content.
And I think that often leads to more confusion and damage and self-blame because
it's not going to work that way. There is no cure.
I'm not saying that there's no hope. That's probably something for a different
episode. But what I do believe is in the power of a solid framework.
Sometimes I think we understand ourselves better when we have something grounded
to interact with a lens, a mirror, a structure that helps us see what's actually happening.
And then who we are inside of it.
That's more of what my Magnetic Marriage course is designed to be.
In it, I share what I've learned from more than 20 years working with couples.
And in it, we explore how and why we choose our partners, this anxious avoidance
cycle that keeps so many couples stuck.
We talk about my four pillars of a connected conversation, which will give you
a stable place to return when everything in your reality feels pretty slippery.
I cover losing strategies and circular arguments, and I go really deep into
Schnarch's four points of balance of differentiation or learning how to hold
on to yourself in a relationship without attacking or collapsing or withdrawing.
Will it fix everything? No. Can it help an individual in a challenging relationship? Yes.
Am I going to continue to interview myself? No. No, I'm not.
But the course may help you see more clearly. It may give language to what you've
been feeling, and it may help you determine what you need, whether that is a
healthier path forward together or the clarity to make a different decision.
So the next round isn't open yet, but the wait list is. So go to TonyOverBay.com
slash magnetic and sign up today, and I will buzz through this quickly.
I would greatly appreciate it if you follow me on Instagram at virtual.couch
or TikTok at virtualcouch.
And let me do something very ironic because we're going to talk today about
validation. And I'm sure at some point I'm going to talk about not needing validation
any longer once you know who you are.
And while I also am claiming to know who I am, don't get me wrong.
Validation still feels really good, especially when you do feel seen and understood,
especially if it's from somebody that you care about.
And because I'm trying not to say but in the new year, and I'm going to ask for a favor.
If you haven't ever left a review for Waking Up the Narcissism and or the Virtual
Couch podcast and you genuinely enjoy the content.
It would do this old man good if you would take the time to rate and review the podcast.
There's a pretty funny thing that happens. It's almost like the opposite of
if you've ever heard of Gottman's concepts of the ratio of positive to negative comments.
It needs to be something like five positives to every one negative.
In the world of ratings and reviews, all it takes is one negative review to
undo very many positive reviews.
And the negative reviews for waking up to narcissism in particular,
it's usually all or nothing, which is kind of ironic because that is immature.
And it is somewhat narcissistic in that it's either people really connect with
it or people absolutely say this is ridiculous and dumb.
Because I do think, and I may sound immature here, but a lot of those reviews
show the emotional immaturity of the reviewer.
Yet the review process itself does not care.
So I could have hundreds of five-star reviews and then one person who is probably
told they're the narcissist or they caught their spouse listening to Waking
Up to Narcissism. Those are the people who are typically motivated to go leave
a review, and then they often sound like this. These are some real ones.
He's dumb. One star. All he cares about is money.
One star. I listened for five minutes. I couldn't understand a word he was saying,
which in my book is actually a positive review, yet they only gave me one star.
So I really would appreciate it if you took a second rated and reviewed the
podcast. So back to today's episode.
So there's a moment in this interview with Angela where we talk about something
that I see, I would say most every day in my office, people come into therapy
and very understandably so they want me to tell them what to do.
They want clarity. They want direction.
They want certainty. They want somebody to say, here's what you need to do.
You're paying me the big bucks. Here's the right answer.
And here's who's right. And here's who's wrong. And here's how you fix this.
And here's what you say. and by the way, yes, you are absolutely okay.
And I genuinely understand that desire and by the way, you are okay because
it would be so much easier if somebody could just come in and hand you a blueprint for your life.
Here's who you are, here's what you like, here's what you should tolerate,
here's what you shouldn't and here's
how to make your partner finally act differently. But that is not therapy.
It's actually more like parenting. And even then, it's not really healthy parenting
because a grounded, differentiated, securely attached parent understands something
that emotionally immature parents often don't.
That my child's emotions are not a referendum of my worth as a parent.
So when a child comes home and says, hey, hey, dad, I didn't make the team,
a grounded parent may feel sad for their child, but they don't collapse into
shame or defensiveness.
They may say things like, you seem really sad, or tell me what that was like, or that must hurt.
They make space. They don't rush to fix it or minimize it or turn it into a
commentary about their own competence as a parent.
The old Uncle Rico moment. Oh man, I never got cut from a team.
And as a matter of fact, toss me that football champ. I can throw it over that mountain.
An emotionally immature parent, on the other hand, might respond with something
like, man, I thought you tried your best. Or, well, that coach clearly doesn't know talent.
Or even, I can't believe this. After all the time and effort that we put into
this, do you know how much I sacrificed to play catch with you, champ?
So what just happened there is a subtle thing, but it's really powerful that
the child's disappointment gets swallowed up by the parent's insecurity.
That also happens to be projection. Projection is when I can't tolerate my own
uncomfortable feelings like inadequacy or embarrassment or rejection.
So then I unconsciously assign them over onto you.
So instead of sitting with a thought of, man, I'm noticing that this makes me
feel like I failed for some reason, the parent pushes that discomfort outward
and it becomes, you didn't try hard enough.
Or it's sometimes I hear the versions where somebody says that the parent has
told them, man, you really made me look bad. You embarrassed me.
So that same thing will show up when the teenager says, hey,
I don't necessarily still believe the same things that you believe anymore to a parent.
Now, a differentiated parent will still feel sad.
They might even feel fear and even grief, but they regulate themselves first.
They say, okay, hey, help me understand what you're thinking.
I'm so proud of you for coming to me
with this. That must have been really difficult. Tell me more about that.
An emotionally immature parent might say, after everything that we've taught
you, and now this is what you're doing?
Or, you know, you're breaking your mom's heart if you break away from our faith
tradition or if you really do believe these things.
Because the child's independence feels like a threat to that parent or that
family, that family system's identity. Again, projection.
The parent's anxiety gets placed onto the child. And now the child isn't just
navigating their own development as a human, but they're managing the parent's emotional stability.
So if you grow up in a home like that, you probably learned something really specific.
You learned that your job was
to regulate other people and you became hyper-tuned. You became very kind.
You became very careful. You became good at reading a room.
The highly sensitive person concept, HSP.
And that skill set helped you survive. It was an adaptive way to live that is
maladaptive now as an adult. But you survived.
It got you here. Thank you, inner child.
But it's probably also made you really vulnerable to partnering later in life
with somebody who also needs you to regulate them. It's the familiar.
This is where the concept of being pathologically kind, I think, becomes so important.
And kindness is beautiful. Don't get me wrong. It's one of the best human traits.
But when it becomes pathological, when it becomes to your detriment,
then that's where it's a challenge, a problem.
When your empathy, when your willingness to self-reflect, when your sensitivity
then become the very tools that somebody else uses to convince you that everything's your fault.
Many of the people who find themselves in long-term relationships with emotionally
immature partners are the ones that did grow up in homes and they were wired
for hypervigilance. where love felt conditional and then connection would disappear without warning.
So when their adult partner says, you're too much or you're too sensitive or
you're not supportive enough, they don't immediately reject that message.
They internalize it because if it's their fault, then maybe they can fix it.
It's really fascinating because admittedly, I start to recognize that truly
is a lot of the stories that I'm hearing more behind why a therapist becomes a therapist.
Now, not me. I was the special flower. I did it just because I like people.
No, it's because of exactly what I just shared.
That if you go through life assuming, well, everything must be my fault,
but if I work hard enough, I can fix it.
If I can learn enough concepts and then share those with the people around me,
then they'll finally understand that I am of worth and value,
and that will make our relationships better.
And that is a pretty adorable thought for so many people.
Because if you're doing it so that, then people will like you.
While that might be the push you need, ultimately, you need to do it so that you like yourself.
But if I can make everything my fault, then again, I can fix it.
And that feels probably safer than accepting the far more destabilizing possibility
that But the person that you chose, the person that you really want to grow
old with may not reciprocate what you are hoping for in the relationship.
And sometimes I'm working with couples where we start talking about a concept
of capacity, where you may then recognize because of their own childhood wounding,
trauma, abandonment issues, that they may not be capable of the kind of emotional maturity,
that you now recognize you really want in the relationship.
The more that I sit with this dynamic, the more I'm beginning to see it as its own form of betrayal.
And I've thought about this for, it's been a couple of years,
and I don't think I've recorded anything about it because I know betrayal trauma is a thing.
I've been trained in betrayal trauma by a psychologist who is very well known in the field.
And betrayal trauma is often associated with infidelity. But I think that the
concepts can be so much more.
I think it can often be about the slow erosion that happens when you repeatedly
go to the person who is supposed to be your safe place, your co-regulator, your partner in growth.
And they continually tell you that the The way that you think,
the way that you feel, the way that you exist is wrong.
And then often they don't do anything about it.
You do. And when you come back to the relationship and say, okay,
I've worked on the thing that you have told me that I am, and then they have
another thing, and then they have another thing.
That's not their role. Their role isn't to define you. It isn't to parent you.
It isn't to determine whether your inner world is valid. When you finally walk
into therapy after years of trying harder, being kinder, being more understanding.
Reading more books, listening to more podcasts, trying to figure out and understand
what is wrong with me that's making the relationship, not connected,
you often don't come in and say, hey, help me discover myself.
You come in saying, please tell me what I'm doing wrong.
And that's where therapy can feel almost infuriating at first because I don't
want to tell you who you are and I won't tell you what you should do because
nobody likes to be shut on. Here's the big part of this.
My job is not to replace your partner who replaced your parent as the new authority over your identity.
My job is to help you build a solid sense of self. So you don't need to outsource
your worth to someone else who is not looking at it with your best interest in mind.
So in this conversation with Angela, we go all the way back to the origin of
validation, literally to the moment of exiting the womb and learning that we
exist through interactions with other people.
We talk about co-regulation and a lot about emotional immaturity.
And we unpack the difference between validation and agreement and how you can
acknowledge and consider someone else's experience without unfolding your own sense of self.
We even explore a spiritual lens. And that's not something I get to do very often.
And we look at the idea of a differentiated, grounded, loving parental figure in God, in your creator,
in your higher power, who doesn't fluctuate in approval based on your performance,
which is so meaningful for those of you who have discovered that often a bonus
or free faith crisis or faith deconstruction comes with.
The awareness that your relationship isn't what you've always hoped it would
be. So if you have spent years asking, am I okay?
If you've been trying to decode somebody else's moods in order for you to feel
safe, or if you are chasing validation from somebody who just can't seem to
hold it steadily, then I really think you're going to get a lot from this episode.
And as you listen, what is what that brings up for you?
Notice whether it feels like, and just seems like Angela and Tony just validating me.
But I want you to notice whether you can begin to practice that quiet,
grounded internal voice that says, you know what? Maybe I am okay.
I'm not as crazy as I think I am or that I've been told that I am.
I do exist. I matter. My experience is real. And maybe I don't need somebody
else's approval in order for that to be true.
I think you're really going to enjoy this interview where I went on Angela's podcast.
Again, it's called Finding Balance with Mental Health and Spirituality.
I'll include a link to her podcast in the show notes.
Please go subscribe to Angela's podcast as well, wherever you listen to podcasts.
Okay, let's get to this episode.
Well, I am more than excited. The fact that Tony Overbay has said yes to being
interviewed on my little teeny podcast.
I want to introduce you to Tony. Tony is a marriage and family therapist,
and he was in California, and he's also in Arizona.
I found Tony several years because you've gone on Jodi Moore's podcast.
And she interviewed you. You talked to her about some things that are pretty
important. And Tony specializes in a few things that I've really admired.
A couple's therapy modality from Sue Johnson called Emotionally Focused Therapy.
He also has really great parenting modality.
And one of the things that he's most known for is how he views narcissism in the world.
Not as this scary, you must walk away from anybody who has this,
to introducing the idea that this is more about emotional immaturity.
People that just didn't get good models growing up.
And today, as we go on our ABCs, he's going to talk to us about validation,
which is something that encompasses all of these types of relationships.
I am grateful. I feel very seen right now because, yeah, narcissism, it's a big word.
And I've got the two podcasts, Virtual Couch and Waking Up to Narcissism.
And then the whole point of the waking up to narcissism is I knew fairly early
going in that I wanted to change the conversation because only a small percentage
of people would be diagnosed narcissists.
But then we throw it around like it's half or more of the population.
But then if you reframe it of we're all emotionally immature till we're not
and we don't know what we don't know and all those wonderful things,
people are a little more willing to listen.
If you tell somebody, hey, you're a narcissist, then that is that never goes
well. And I don't use all or nothing statements very often, but that one doesn't.
But if you if we talk about our immaturity, you might get a well,
you are, too, which is a pretty immature response. But then we can at least
start talking about it, hopefully.
Yes, for sure. Based on what I have shared, is there anything on your mind that
you're like, I've got to talk about today?
There's a lot. And it's funny. I love that you're asking me that because I do
find that I get on something shiny and new and it becomes what I'm viewing everything through.
And that has been all of these things from emotional maturity and the ways that
the things we do now were adaptive in childhood and they become maladaptive
as an adult or, you know, emotional maturity as what you were saying in the
introduction of how we saw things modeled.
If our parents didn't model taking ownership or accountability of something
and that nothing was their fault,
then it's hard to blame the kid coming out of a relationship or a situation
like that where he also says, well, I mean, you didn't say that or I didn't do that.
But I'm currently obsessed with this concept of co-regulation.
And it's the way that we react, how our emotions are talking to each other.
And the most basic example of this is when a newborn is crying and a mom holds it close to her.
And what she's saying is, hey, you don't know how to regulate your own emotions.
So let me let you borrow my central nervous system.
And then when you calm down, we are co-regulating.
And that is a beautiful version of it. And in theory, we would then be able
to healthily co-regulate with our partners.
So if one person's really feeling amped up and the other one's nice and grounded
and calm, then it would then calm that person down as well.
And Brene Brown has some really cool concepts around this. She talked about numbers.
Maybe I come in and I tell my wife, hey, I'm firing at an 80 today.
So if she says I'm firing at a 10, well, I've got you. But if I come in and
say I'm at a 30 and she says I'm at a 20, maybe we shouldn't have these emotionally
charged conversations or potentially emotionally charged conversations.
I'm obsessed with the concept of co-regulating and I think it fits in a little
bit with the validation concept.
I think it does really well. Some of the things that I discovered early on with
my emotional immaturity was boundaries.
When you read the boundaries book, it talks about how we're responsible to others, but not for them.
And one of the things it talks about is that we're not responsible for other people's emotions.
Now, on my podcast, it's all about finding balance.
So we could go into a situation and say, well, I can do whatever I want and
you're responsible for your emotion.
But what you're talking about is that we do have a lot of effect on each other.
Absolutely. And I love that you brought it up that way because co-regulation
speaks to, it's this work by a guy named Dan Siegel and it talks about the familiar.
So if I grew up in a home where there was a lot of chaos and where I never knew
which version of my mom or my dad I was going to get, and I'm going to be a
little more wired for hypervigilance, I'm going to understand that love or validation
can disappear at any moment. And if it did, it's probably my fault.
I mean, this is the message I'm getting as a kid because the parent isn't taking
ownership of things, then I become wired for this hypervigilance.
And I'm going to think that is what a relationship looks like.
So if I am going out into the world as an adolescent or dating,
and there's somebody that is incredibly grounded, it might seem foreign to me
because they don't have enough.
Excitement is what we call it. Reactivity and drama.
Not of drama and chaos. To us, it feels familiar.
And so that's what a relationship feels like. And our emotions travel,
I believe, two to two and a half times faster than our logic.
So we're actually reacting to things.
And a lot of times then the logical brain kicks in and tries to make sense of
it. We don't even recognize that we're reacting to that person's reactions.
And then they're reacting to my reaction. And we're going to fill in some words
at some point because that's what we do. and try to make big meaning of these
words when really it's our central nervous systems that are arguing with each other.
Okay, so it's like bypassing stuff that we don't really know how to articulate
anyways, getting to something deeper and how do we do that?
And I just love going deeper and deeper and deeper because I'll give you an
example from the emotionally immature world.
There's one of my favorites and it's already come up today in a couple of sessions.
I call it emotional reasoning. If I think it or if I feel it, it must be true.
The classic example that came up today was a wife and it can be either wife
or husband whoever starts this wonderful concept.
But if she just said, yeah, I just kind of feel like you're mad at me.
So then if I think it, it's true. So therefore you are mad at me to her husband.
And the husband happens to be a people pleaser.
So then he's like, oh man, oh, I'm so sorry.
Even though he's kind of trying to feel, and you can see his awkwardness now,
but whereas, I mean, I don't think I'm mad at you, but I don't want to tell you that you're wrong.
So then he's, I'm so sorry. Let me, let me try to do better,
but he doesn't even know what he's doing.
And so when you slow that one down, she doesn't like the way something feels.
And so what she's seen model is if I think it or I feel it, it's true.
And now I need you to make me feel better, even though I don't even exactly
know what I need. And you certainly don't know what I'm talking about. But now it's on you.
And you can see that there's so many layers there, but it is the dance.
And so to this couple, it's familiar.
And so then they start talking. I'm trying to get them to use my beloved four
pillars of a connected conversation.
And eventually, they're not even really hearing the words I say,
but then he says some things and it sounds like the right things to say.
So she tells him she appreciates that. He feels great. And so they feel better.
If I ask them 10 minutes later what they just talked about, nothing.
They won't know. So it's just like this emotional co-regulation.
So really what we're just trying to circle around today is validation.
I've had some therapists that I've listened to that almost talk about validation,
like it's an unnecessary or the fact that we want it as a dependence and the
validation feels great, but it's not what we really should be looking for.
And I've really come to not enjoy that idea because I think validation is very
important the way I understand it.
So I'd love to hear your opinions about what is validation.
Well, I'm going to go all the way back to the exit of the womb.
I think that's a good place to start.
So a child exits and then we don't even know that we exist until we interact
with another human. We don't even know we're a thing.
It's in our interactions as a baby that the way I interact with the world is
going to help me survive.
And so for a baby, all they have to do is cry and then they'll get fed and they'll
get held. They'll get their diaper changed.
And thank goodness, babies are pretty cute. And so they are validated for the
things that they're expressing, the things that they need.
That's why you're saying that they're getting responded to in a way that lets them know they exist.
Yeah, exactly. Yes. Oh, I need to carry you along with me. People noticing and responding.
You can be the person that makes sense. I'll say a bunch of words and then I'll
say, Angela, tell them what I said, because I know I can get pretty excited about this.
So then at that point, the kid gets a little older. And they've learned.
And the reason I like starting all the way back exiting the womb is because
it's built in to need people to know I exist.
And how do I get them to know I exist? By doing or saying things,
by the way that I show up in the world.
And so I think we can start introducing the concepts of I need to be validated that I exist.
Is this why when you get like the cold shoulder or the silent treatment,
it is so painful? I think so.
I really do. Because all of a sudden, wait, do I not exist?
If I don't get anybody interacting with me, then do I disappear?
And I know that sounds like some magical thinking. But again,
if you're a kid, you're just existing in the world.
And so now you get a little older and you say, I would like some dessert before
dinner. And then the parent says no.
And all of a sudden, wait a minute, I asked for something and I didn't get it.
So then how do I get this to happen? So now I'm going to need to either go really
be really sad, get really angry,
push buttons, whatever, because I need to get the thing that I want.
Because if I don't, then I may not exist.
I may not live. Sad anger is what used to work as a baby.
Yeah. So you're trying it again. Well, it's funny you say that as a baby,
but I always like giving the example of if anybody's taking their kid out in
public and kid wants toy.
It's so cliched, but kid wants toy. I say, not now, bud. And then they get really
angry and then they throw a fit and I say no. And then eventually,
what do I do to get rid of my own discomfort and to calm them down?
As then I say, okay, just this one time, but I'm not doing this again.
And then I feel like I just said the right things. And then they get the toy.
They don't care at all about the thing I just said.
They just know, oh, so if I get really big with my emotions,
then I get the thing I want. Watching what you say, but watching what you do.
Exactly, right? So then they're learning that this is like the emotions behind
that. Again, it doesn't even matter. Now they we co-regulated wasn't very healthy, but we did.
And they just learned that, OK, man, I got to go pretty big to get the things I need.
And then I tell myself that, OK, but I said I won't do that again.
And I won't right now, except for the next time when they get really loud again.
And you said something earlier that we might not know we exist if we're being ignored.
And I know as adults, we've got the knowledge to know, well,
I do exist, you know, I can touch a door and it responds.
But what we as a child where we might feel like, am I actually invisible?
As an adult, we're going is our value invisible?
Is my need to be needed and valued in this relationship disappearing?
Well, you sent me a nice text about a podcast series I did. I did this two-part
one of Jack and Jill. Which is incredible.
You're very kind. I worked on that one a long time. But you got Jill,
who's her childhood was unpredictable.
Her mom struggled with untreated anxiety, depression, oscillated between emotional
absence and emotional flooding. Then you've got a kid that if she was upset,
her mom sometimes didn't even notice.
And then sometimes she would notice, but she didn't respond.
And then sometimes, even more confusingly, Jill's emotions, and we're talking
when she was a kid, would then trigger this complete collapse of her mom,
and then Jill would then have to go and...
Comfort her mom. And then Jill's dad was really emotionally distant.
These were based off of real people.
So her nervous system now is learning that connection's unstable and it could vanish at any minute.
And that when somebody withdraws, it means I did something wrong.
So you just look at the way that that starts playing out or her feelings are
either too much or not enough.
She's responsible for other people's emotions because that's literally what her mom was showing her.
And then the bigger one is if I can just be attentive enough,
loving enough, perfect enough, then people will stay.
And so you've got somebody that then shows up in a relationship and they become this human doing.
I just have to continually do. And basically it goes back to what we're talking
about where in order to know that I matter or that in a translation that I exist,
she learns that connection is uncertain and I have to continually work to secure it.
If it isn't there, then I'm doing something wrong.
Talk about a disadvantage of somebody just learning how to be or become versus
what do I have to do? And then it will literally never feel like enough.
It sounds like a good explanation of what validation is. is acknowledging and considering.
Yes, I like this acknowledging and considering. And especially the,
because acknowledging, and it's when you're introduced to me with the parenting
information too, I love this nurtured heart approach is the parenting model I love.
And one of the first parts about that is just, they call it active recognition
of just even my kid walks in the room and I say, hey, Jake, Sid,
I just say their name. I acknowledge that you are there.
I remember when I used to do a lot of work with teenagers where I would hear
this, I don't even know if my parents know I'm part of the family.
I think that people do start to think, okay, what do I have to do in order to
know that I exist or I matter?
And unfortunately, a lot of times they don't get acknowledged until or validated,
as sad as it is, until they are in trouble or they do something wrong or bad.
And when they're doing things well, it's almost like the parent saying,
okay, well, I don't want to, I don't want to disturb them.
Or, well, I need, I have to focus more on the kids that are getting in trouble.
And so then this person doesn't even, they're not even seen or understood or
acknowledged. And then what was the other one you said? Was it considered?
Considered. Yeah. Tell me about that. Well, I think that it's,
that someone's willing to look at things from your perspective.
Yeah. If you had to describe or define validation, what would you say?
I'm going to go with the two.
And only because I don't have a go-to definition and I like exploring the concept.
But what I like about considered is that it means that somebody really does
see me. They want to know me.
They want to know the things about me. And I think that does calm our central
nervous system to know that, man, this person is invested in getting to know me.
And I think so often as a couples therapist, and I think I borrowed this from
Jennifer Finless and Fife, but it's the courage to be known and then the courage to know somebody.
And a lot of times we can put ourselves out there, but then if we aren't validated,
we aren't considered, it can feel pretty hollow to then say,
man, I'm really putting out, putting myself out there, especially to a partner.
And then they're not responding with consideration, curiosity.
There's a client that I just love to death and she talks about being nothing.
And that phrase just hits me every time where she could put herself out there
and a spouse who's not saying anything, that that can feel worse than even sometimes
when one is criticizing.
Because criticizing, at least
you know you exist, that this person is willing to interact with you.
But then the nothing is, I just said words out into the void,
and this person's literally in front of me and no response at all.
And are you familiar with the never-ending story?
Oh, is that with the bad animation and the puppets back in the 70s or 80s? No, it is in the 80s.
No, but the never-ending story has this different planet.
And they have the nothing that is like eating the planet. I forgot about that. Nothing.
Yeah, that is scary. We do. We want somebody to know us. We want somebody to
hopefully be genuinely curious about us. And oh, and this is what I like, Angela.
Back to the people that say you don't need validation. Validation is a bad word.
When you're healthy, that you're learning that I am okay.
And now I want to share this thing with another person. I still want a connection,
but it doesn't mean that I don't want validation.
It's, I think it's really good, especially when somebody is giving it to me
who knows me, who cares about me.
And it's the old cliche that if I don't love myself, then I can't truly love
somebody else because if I don't love myself, then I'm trying to figure out
a way to get this person to love me.
And I think that can often be part of that trap of seeking validation because
I'm trying to get this person to validate me.
But if I know who I am and then I'm putting myself out there because I want
to share an experience with another person.
And they respond, then that feels amazing. That can be a healthy form of validation.
But it's when I'm seeking it or I desperately need it, that's where it can really be a challenge.
Because if I'm trying to figure out a way to get this person to validate me
and I'm not being myself, I'm worried about the things I say or I'm not willing.
People pleasing, jumping through the hoops, trying to be the doers so you can
get the reward at the end. Yes.
Yeah. Yeah. You tied that up well. So then if I go back to what we were talking
about with this earlier example, that if I do the right things,
then and then the person says, great job.
Cool. Okay. I just have to do that combination of things again every time and I'll get the good job.
But then I'm so desperate of trying to figure out what those things are.
Did I do them well enough, long enough?
And then why is it that sometimes I do those things and I'm told that those
weren't even the right things to do.
So it can be really confusing versus I have to know they're the right things to do, period.
And I connect in my mind this idea that if we are living to please somebody
else, we're not necessarily living according to our values.
Right. And so if other people seeing us, acknowledging us, considering us is validation.
But one of the core things you brought up is this concept of I am okay.
I would call that self-validation. Yeah. Like you're letting yourself know I'm
okay and I exist and these are my values.
And then you can enjoy living from your values and getting feedback from others
if it's positive, then that validation feels a lot better.
Yeah, it does. And then if somebody is not valid.
Which eventually makes us way all the way to shame. Not, oh man,
I feel bad about that versus I am bad.
I am. I continually think the wrong thing versus this is what I'm thinking.
But then nobody's there to be curious about it. They're just there to tell me,
well, that's not the right thing, champ. You shouldn't be thinking that.
It's like, man. And I would say if that's the response you're getting from a
lot of people in your life, look for some more people in your life. Yeah.
Yeah. See if you can branch out and find somebody who does those. Right.
And it's such a good point about the origin story of this need for validation.
If we grew up in homes, and in this two-part Jack and Jill episode that I did,
I tried to lay out what it would have looked like in a healthy version,
where if Jill, the one we were talking about earlier, grows up where her parents
are grounded, and they're good, they're differentiated, they model.
Accepting responsibility, acknowledging if they did something that they didn't
mean to, or that hurt somebody's feelings, or if Jill comes home and she's upset,
and then they're able to say, man, tell me about it, and they make space for it.
Because there's even a good-sounding version of this where the parent says,
well, don't worry about it. It's not a big deal.
You'll get over it. And everybody has these problems or challenges.
But what they're telling the kid is, hey, I know you're having feelings and
emotions, but you shouldn't be. And they're not a big deal, even though they
feel like a big deal to you.
And so there's even a nice version of that, that the kid is learning. Oh, okay.
So not only are my feelings and emotions wrong, but I need somebody else to tell me that I'm okay.
Exactly. So, this podcast is specifically about mental health and spirituality.
So, I would love to hear what you think about validation from a spiritual standpoint.
Okay. Let me find my soapbox and my wind machine because I want my hair to blow while I say this.
I do want to say where I want to meet people where they're at.
And for some people, spirituality is a really important aspect.
And others deal with a lot of people that have navigated faith journey,
faith deconstruction, faith crisis. this. It's interesting.
It's called this relational frame of where we all have a word,
has a meaning, and it has an emotion behind it.
And so, sometimes talking about spiritual things with someone will trigger them.
And other times, it will be the familiar and that the person wants to have some
sort of spiritual reference or frame.
I have two big concepts that I'm grateful to be able to share.
I've got the atonement and I also have God as a differentiated father.
So, I got, those are my two big ones that I don't get to speak enough about.
So, whether it's literal or metaphorical. The concept about the atonement of
Christ is that he took on the sins of the world, bled at every poor,
has felt everything. So, he has this perfect knowledge.
What I think gets overlooked is that the atonement isn't just about sin.
It's about grief and sorrow and pain and loss and all the big feelings.
So, I like this concept that Jesus had perfect empathy. He's a great empath.
And so, then when we go to somebody and we say, what do you think I should do
or somebody goes to someone, even from a place of confession, is that you're.
Often asking, I don't like the way I feel right now and I need somebody else
to tell me that I'm going to be okay.
I've worked with a lot of people and there's almost like a spiritual roulette
of sorts, a leadership roulette, where somebody can go to a leader and then
they can confess or look for spiritual guidance and leave feeling worse because
the person says, man, that's really bad.
I can't believe you did that. Do you know what you're risking?
And I can have another spiritual leader say, thank you so much for sharing that
with me. That must've been really hard. How am I here to support you?
And you don't know. You don't know which version of that you can get.
And I could talk about that for a long time.
And so the concept of wanting to go to somebody for validation or to be told that you're okay is.
Again, it can work except for the times it doesn't. But if you look at that
concept of the atonement, going to Christ to say, am I okay?
That atonement, then if we say nobody knows exactly how it feels to be you other than Jesus.
Again, this is why I love the concept of it's literal or it's metaphorical,
is that he knows your hopes, your dreams, your pains, your fears,
your sorrows, your grief, your joy, your sadness.
And so no one that you're going to talk to on a day-to-day basis will ever know
what it feels like to be you. My big joke here is when somebody says,
I know exactly what you're going through.
Like they don't. And my most hilarious moment of this was I was doing a big training.
They had a bunch of people that were in these bishoprics and relief side presidencies,
elders horn presidencies.
And this guy got up and he said, hey, can you just give me advice on what's the best way to tell?
He's like, I've got this lady. She's single. She's got three kids. I'm working with her.
And he's like, look, I know exactly what it's like to have three little kids.
And she just doesn't really want to hear what I have to say.
And so I said, so when you were a single mom, it was a guy, right?
I said, when you were a single mom of three, then I mean, this is what you did
that made you feel better. And everybody laughed and he was a good sport.
But it's like, nobody knows what it feels like to be you because we're all this
combination of our nature, nurture, birth, order, DNA, abandonment,
all the things that make us us.
So no one, of course, no one knows what it feels like to be you.
Even when somebody says that, it actually shuts us down a little bit.
Even being able to say, man, I have no idea what that must feel like,
or I can only imagine what that would feel like. But I really want to understand.
It's difficult because even when the person starts to explain what it's like
to be them, our natural almost fix it or defense mechanisms are going to say,
but you're doing a great job or you don't need to worry about that.
Or a lot of people are going through this and it can just feel so unseen.
So, I love the concept of that the atonement is this example of no one knows
what it feels like to be you except for Jesus.
And maybe we need to think before we go to somebody else to say, am I okay?
And asking someone else to then validate something that they could never imagine
that we've been through before.
I love that about the atonement. I would love your thoughts if anything comes up from that.
I was thinking, anytime that we have any sort of revelation or inspiration or
messages from God, even if people have really messed up, the first thing that he says is, I love you.
Yep. Or he calls them beloved.
And then he might address the problem and then immediately tells them how to move forward.
Yeah, moving forward with love and kindness and compassion and charity and love
unfeigned and hope and the bright.
And it actually sets the table perfectly for this other concept is that God,
as a heavenly father, is the most differentiated entity, being,
because he knows, and I will go he, she,
they, the universe, whatever one's spiritual higher power would be.
They're good because they are, because they know they are.
So then I can do things that aren't perfect and they don't look at that as I'm
a bad parent, because that's the lack of differentiation.
If my kids do something and I'm upset because they make me feel bad or they
make me look bad, I lack differentiation. I lack true grounded.
But if I'm okay, then they're going to go and do the things they're going to
do because they are, because they're kids, because they're going to go through
experiences and things are not going to be perfect and life is messy and all those things.
But a differentiated parent is grounded and they're steady. I know who I am.
So you don't need to make me feel better.
And I am not disappointed in you. So then this is where I go with,
if God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, and his love is unconditional,
which I believe in all those things, then whenever I think God's mad at me, that's a me thing.
I can turn to God and say, man, you must be disappointed.
It's like, nope, that's a you thing. I'm good. I love you the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
My love is unchanging and unconditional. And I am here. Now we look at the concept
of repentance, which the definition I wanted was the one about turning to.
So now if repentance means to turn toward a God who is so differentiated,
grounded, and loving, and is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow,
then I will repent all the time because my repentance is me being able to check
in with my grounded parent that's, hey, I can make space for all your big emotions
and your feelings, and you're okay.
I don't have to tell you that you need to do it a different way.
I'm here and I can provide you with what I, if you really want to know what
I would do, sure, I'll have that conversation.
But ultimately, you're going to do the things you're going to do because you're
you and that's how I made you. And isn't that amazing?
So stop trying to outsource your worth and your need for validation to other
people because that has the potential for them to tell you that you're not of
worth. If I'm going to go to somebody else and say, what do you think?
What I'm really asking is, I think I know that I'm okay, but I need another
person to interact with in order to bring up some more feelings and emotions in me.
I may go to somebody and say, what do you think? And they say,
well, I think you should do this. And I can even tell them, hey, thank you.
But on the inside say, oh, wow, that is like the craziest thing I've ever heard.
I'm definitely not going to be doing that, which further helps me solidify the
way that I want to show up. So I think when you put that concept of the atonement
that nobody knows what it feels like to be you except for Christ and Christ said, you're good.
And I can turn to a grounded, differentiated Heavenly Father who says,
not only are you good, I love you always.
I think that is the model that I'd like to think that I'm trying to work toward or achieve.
That's awesome. And it reminds me of the Max Licato book, You Are Special.
That is just one of my favorite things because you go to other people for validation
but sometimes we just need to go to God and to establish our identity and recognize
our worth we don't have to find our worth our worth is there sometimes we want
a mirror and so it's best if we go to the best mirror that there can be which is
And knowing that he loves me because he loves me because he loves me.
And like I said earlier, because I am loved, I am the beloved. So I am loved.
So when I don't feel like he loves me, I think it's so important to know that
is a me thing. Why am I not feeling that?
Because I can turn to him and he's there and he loves me because he does.
I can get a little woo on this too.
I'm not the biggest fan of the concept even of around the feelings or meanings
even the word sin can have with it because we're just going through life the
first time. doing things.
And we do things. And sometimes people say, man, I love the way you did that.
And I think, oh, cool, I did it good.
But the same thing I might do, somebody else, they don't like it.
Then they say, I don't like that you did that thing. I think,
man, darn it, I did a bad thing.
And so I'm outsourcing even my approval or validation on how someone else is
feeling about something and whatever their experience is.
If I say this and somebody's like, oh, so murder is okay. I'm like,
if you go right to murder when I say that, that's probably the problem, you know?
Right. Sometimes when we look at it, a benign example, it can make more sense
because what you're talking about is experience.
Sin sometimes is something that you can never wipe away, but it's not like that.
And my daughter runs cross country and she did a race and it wasn't a really
great time. And her coach afterwards was talking to them and said,
the only bad race is the one that you don't learn from.
And I think that's how it works with sin too. The only unpardonable sin is the
one you don't learn from.
So it's this experience. Yeah, we're going to make mistakes,
but these mistakes are to help us learn.
I know. And I have to tell you, Angela, just because I'm trying to be the most
grounded, authentic, valid, whatever person that I can be, is even the concept
of a mistake is fascinating to me.
Because if I'm going through life for the very first time as me doing things.
Then I mean, I don't think I'm trying to do them in order to make someone upset
or with the hope that this will be identified as a mistake.
But I might not show up the way that I had hoped I would.
And then I like what you're saying, because at the core of that is like,
well, there's more data. That's interesting.
And one of my favorite things is when somebody will even say,
well, why'd you do that? My actual answer is because I did.
But now we can take a look at why I did it, whatever it is, because it sounds
like you're pretty disappointed in what I did.
And so I do want to understand. And then I will take ownership of it,
something that I'm not a big fan of either, because the real reason I did it
was because I reacted to something in that moment the way that I did.
Because I think so much of this is I will have somebody practice in my office
of being grounded and differentiated and curious.
And then they go out and start trying to have the conversation with somebody
and it doesn't go like they had planned.
And they come back and it's all this talk about, man, I blew it and I couldn't
even do this thing. And I know that you're disappointed. And I'm like,
oh, that is a lot of stuff we got to cut through versus.
So check this out. I felt great about it here. I went out there.
That didn't go very well. That's fascinating. So now we can look at it.
We just got so much more session out of that thing than I need to put you back
together for half an hour to then see if we can get to the, well, tell me more about that.
Oh my goodness. Well, I know we have to get you ready to go on to meet some more people today.
I could talk to you for hours and hours. Angela, you're doing great work.
You're in the right place, the right profession. Thank you. is really exciting
to be able to be part of this where things that we can learn ourselves and get to turn around.
And one of the other podcasts I really love is The Full Cup.
And he always talks about how cool is it that I get to sit here and learn from
other people's experiences.
And he calls it turning it to wisdom. And I just think that is,
that's exactly what we get to do. We get to turn it to wisdom.
So thank you, Tony, for coming on and sharing your wisdom today about validation
and especially with a spiritual lens.
I just love that we can apply that. Yeah, no, thanks for letting me do that.
That isn't all the time. All right, until we meet again.
Thanks, Angela. All right. All right, we'll talk to you later. Okay, bye-bye.