Validation Begins At Home?
Last Friday evening, my husband took me to the golf club. I put on a pair of slip-on shoes and threw an enormous puffer over my in-the-house lounging outfit. He held my hand, and we walked five minutes round the corner. I had two half-pints of Guinness - one after the other, not at the same time. I didn’t have any crisps because it’s January and I have to give up something. I had a quick chat with Sharon at the bar. She grew up in the same street as me. She’d just had a hip replacement and was practising hopping on and off her stool. The microneedling1 was obviously working as it had been at least thirty years since she last saw me. She had to remind me who she was because I have lost the ability to recognise faces and become a bit dopey since I left full-time work. I had the same conversation with a man that I’d had before Christmas. “Do you play yourself?” he asked again. “No,” I said proudly like I still had my wits and my flexibility, “I play tennis”. That was the end of that. I watched two pensioners finish their whiskeys and help each other into their coats. It was beautiful. I was quite emotional at the sense of golfing community, that shared bond, how easy it is to belong. I did not bring my phone.
My husband, who is called Russell, but for the purposes of my writing is only my husband, has decided that as soon as I press publish, it’s best to get me out of the house. It’s supposed to help with my mood. I’m not sure how I’d describe my Friday evening mood - a bit anxious anticipation mixed with total despair. I am surgically attached to my iPhone - checking, re-checking, browsing, refreshing, Outlook, Substack, WhatsApp to see if anyone has liked, commented, shared, sent me a message to say I am the most amazing writer they’ve ever had the pleasure to read, offered me a publishing deal. By around 8pm, I usually decide I made the stupidest decision ever leaving a career to focus on something as tenuous as blogging2.
I’ve had a few lightbulb moments though about how I’m getting on with my life transition from institutionally-imprisoned academic to free-as-a-bird creative, like people seem to prefer when I’m either wildly hilarious or manically depressing. They either want to laugh or cry. I need to instigate an emotional response. I’ve realised I don’t have a niche and if I did have one, it might involve being a critical voice in evangelical circles, but none of my former qualifications count there. I’d need a theology degree for that. I have decided all success is relative. Some people have half-a-million subscribers, but even though I only have 350 and no new ones in the last month, I still have more people reading my words than some churches have members and maybe this is an opportunity. I also like what I’m doing, far more than I liked my job which I mainly did to earn money and get away from my children. In my inbox, I have kept an email from Oliver Burkeman3, not one he composed to me personally, just his fortnightly newsletter. I have kept it because he talked about how we make our lives conditional on outside approval because the alternative is much scarier. It means facing the existential truth that our life isn’t a dress rehearsal for some later, better, realer time, when we’ll finally have earned the right to exist. We have to accept that this is it now. Yet we are always subliminally nominating ‘authority figures’ like parents and peers and influencers and bosses whose endorsement will ultimately validate us. The problem is Oliver’s ‘boss’ is now several thousand people who have vastly differing opinions. When he wings an email out into the ether, he gets a bunch of replies from readers who found it enlightening, motivating, reassuring. Lots of other people will choose to unsubscribe. “This diversity of viewpoints,” he says, “is psychologically liberating because clearly there’s no point trying to win the undiluted approval of such a multifaceted and mercurial boss. Which means the only option left is to accept that I’m the boss of what I’m doing here”.
So, I’m the boss of what I’m doing here but it doesn’t feel like it. I am primarily validated by social media, trying to win undiluted approval, forgetting that my ‘customers’ aren’t my friends. I am seduced by the shiny shop windows of those who have made it but to be seen, I am at the mercy of the algorithm gods and refreshing timelines and other people’s Friday evening moods. I am hankering after silly badges that verify me as being something because somehow, that’s better than being nothing. But then there are long lists of ways I allow others to validate me - my body, my looks, my intellect, my offspring. “You look great”, “Have you lost weight?”, “You should be so proud of her” are all irresistible boosts. “It’s sparkling Deborah,” said my English teacher in a restaurant about my most-read piece and I floated for days.
I read a post by Susan Cain4. I notice she gets 89 likes in eight minutes. As I blink, I can see her validation rising. But there are things she says about her father’s advice that resonate. I am tick, tick, tick.
I have got all this, yet I am still entirely dependent on validation. I’m not Susan who has made a fortune from having a quiet life and who is also exceptionally visible in the spotlight. I bet she enjoys those likes. They’re a drug that feed my soul too. I am either worthy or worthless depending on others clicking a button. I google my addiction. “Validation is best that comes from within. It's tragic that we base our self-worth on external validation”. I decide I am tragic, and that moving from external to internal validation is easier said than done.
At the golf club, my husband tells me about his day. There was post for him at the office – a congratulations on his promotion from the nursery school where he was once a governor, a packet of linguini from a software company, a book about eight unconventional CEOs and their radical blueprint for success, some correspondence about using his position to influence peace in the Middle East.
I understand that validation is tied up with status. He does not have to beg for his. It is automatically handed to him via a title. I stepped out of an organisation. I chose to hand back my validation, lose my status. But am I really so tragic? Isn’t it natural and human to want to hold value in the world? Being a nobody is not fun. I read another article5 about someone who has ditched their career, burned out by being on the perpetual ladder of success, climbing higher only to have to climb higher again, knowing no matter how high she climbed, she would never feel safe.
Being validated by the right people is the key, she says. It’s not about relying on a power system of validation, but about creating the version of validation that works for you, whether it’s the one inside you or the one only populated by the people who truly know you.
When I return from the golf club, I have a like. It is my husband. As he stands at the bar, he clicks a button. Validation begins at home.
It’s My Face and I’ll Do What I Want With It
When I think about my face, I think about that Bruce Springsteen song. It’s what I like to call a story-song. Like a vision, Mary dances across the porch as the radio plays. There was a bit of controversy in 2021 as to whether her dress waves or sways but who cares. There’s a bloke in her town full of losers who realises they ain’t that young anymore. H…
N.B. I am not a blogger, I am a serious writer.
I hope you know I honestly always look forward to reading your work on Fridays (although admittedly I am reading this on a Sunday night because Friday was a bit rushed and I like to settle down to read these and linger over them). Lots of thoughts swirling after reading this piece, but tonight we sang a line at church- “two wonders here that I confess: my worth and my unworthiness…” Maybe there is something in the way we are designed that creates a tension because both are true. At worst our sense of worth/unworthiness becomes distorted. But at best it liberates us.
There’s a quote on humility that I really like-“it’s not about thinking less of yourself, it’s about thinking of yourself less”. I can only aspire!!
Thankyou for sharing your writing 💛
Your post is thought provoking. Reminds me of Henri Nouwen who says that often we equate our identity with what we do, with what we have, and with what other people say about us.
Therefore, for many: “I AM what I do.” “I AM what I have.” And “I AM what other people say
about me.” Surprisingly, here one believes that one’s self-worth and self-dignity come from
external factors. And, of course, our self worth should be an internal project. Jeez, I am so good on the theory. In practice, not quite so accomplished. A work in progress, for sure.