Internal validation

[athene1399]

I think part of the next process of my healing journey is working on internal validation, however, I don't have the faintest idea how to do that or what "internal validation " really means. I have had it explained to me a couple times, but for some reason I just don't get it. Has anyone else been working on this? And how have you been doing that?

And what does it even mean? I know what validation is. So is it like accepting how I feel? Or being okay and comfortable with how I feel?

I don't know why this concept is so beyond me lol. Thank you in advance 

[bloomie]

athene1399 - I so get the difficulty wrapping our mind around what internal validation 'is'. It has helped me so much to define this as true emotional and spiritual maturity - something I long for and continue to strive toward.

What that is looking like for me is learning shifting from external cues to internal cueing and reliable processes developed over time for validation.  It is learning to have an accurate and sober self assessment. Which is 100% my responsibility.

Learning to recognize and accept my emotions, thoughts, views, choices and holding them up against MY personal core values, goals, desires for MY life is the next level of freedom and coming Out of the FOG for me.

It is a shaking off of the specter of the inner critic and showing myself the same level of grace, understanding, support, and kindness I show others.

I was so quick to harshly judge myself and I have come to understand I was so off so many times when I used another's words or standards or accusations as a measure of who I am and who I should be.

At it's most basic, I have come to believe, inner validation is possible when we develop enough space around yourselves by developing internal boundaries about what we allow to linger in our hearts and minds, that there is room to decide for ourselves what our true intentions are and what needs to be adjusted or what is good and right and can stay.

[Penny Lane]

To me, internal validation is very closely tied to confidence in your own perceptions.

So like, you know the feeling you get here, when you talk about a PD and someone else is like "oh yeah you're exactly right, the PD was trying to hurt you here"? Other people would say "are you sure, would a parent really do that to their child, there must be another explanation," and you feel invalidated. Here, you feel validated, because people get that.

Internal validation is giving that feeling to yourself.

To me, the first step is to hone your gut. This is very important because PD gaslighting is designed to make you not trust your gut. So after experiencing it often we have to re-learn to trust that feeling. The other thing is that being exposed to trauma can make our responses over-react -- for example, panicking when we see someone who looks, but doesn't act, like a PD parent.

So once you have that confidence in your gut feeling, you've calibrated it correctly (so to speak) and learned to listen to it, then internal validation is listening to it.

Ideally you would get to a place where you can say to yourself "you're exactly right, the PD was trying to do X" and trust and believe that feeling. You'd give yourself the same feeling that we all get from being on this board, where people really understand and believe you.

I think there's still a place for doing gut checks with other people (trusted people who get it, not people who might get caught up in the gaslighting). Even with a perfectly honed gut, we all can misread situations and it can be helpful to have a friend say "well have you considered this other thing?" But ultimately the goal would be that you mainly are able to trust yourself and your feelings.

[athene1399]

Thank you both. You have given me so much to think on.

Bloomie- I like your thoughts about seeing if our values match what we are doing and listening to internal cues.

PL- I think this is where trusting our gut comes into play. For most of my life until fairly recently I was told not to trust it.

I do need to work on both trusting myself and being ok with staying true to my own values, morals, and what is important to me.

[athene1399]

I am also starting to think that there's a bit of recognizing that we are good enough that comes into play with internal validation the more I think about it. Maybe that helps with the trusting of self ? I feel it ties in some how. I'm kind of brainstorming out loud now. Lol

[Boat Babe]

That's such a good question Athene. Thank you for raising it.

I think that learning to trust our feelings and thoughts is really powerful. And really difficult if we grew up with PD abuse.   

I love everyone's contributions here, I am going to reread them because I struggle with validating myself to this day.

[bloomie]

Reading through all of the wise thoughts and insights shared here I was reminded of how abuse and manipulative tactics over time had disconnected my head, heart, and gut from each other when faced with more toxic behavior.

Trauma responses that did not serve me well, and often were keeping me stuck, understandably developed.  Learning to cope and trust myself and access all 3 of those essential built in benefactors working together for my good and the good of others is becoming a game changer in terms of confidence.

Using only my gut, or my reasoning, or my heart in response to an individual or behavior is not using all that I am equipped with to make healthy choices and believe in myself.

[Lookin 2 B Free]

There are so many good ideas here.  One thing that helps me is to speak it out loud.  It's less confusing than having a bunch of stuff rolling around in my brain.  I just talk to myself in a validating way, like I would a close friend in an identical situation.  Sometimes I verbalize both sides, the part that is self-doubting or fearful and needs validation, and the part that's doing the reparenting.  Journaling that way helps too, though hearing my clear, supportive, loving voice assuring me is really effective.

[athene1399]

I like the idea of talking out loud, Looking 2 Be. I want to journal but am so afraid it might somehow fall into the wrong hands. I think taking out loud is a good fix for this.

Bloomie, I like the idea of working to reconnect the gut, head, and heart. I think that is a part of it as well. Often I was told what I felt was "wrong" so I think either I buried the connection or just learned to mistrust it when I should be trusting it.

[Drawing_boundaries]

Internal validation is something I'm trying to work on. I am on anti depressants which (for me) stop the rumination & negative self talk.
While I'm still on meds I would like to build up a positive internal version of myself as my next stage of life long healing

This thread has helped me get some tools to do this. I particularly like saying it out loud.
I feel like it's a huge point in Out of the FOG to be talking about internalised self perception & not the PD dramatics.
That alone is further Out of the FOG than I ever thought I would be.

[Boat Babe]

About reprogramming you negative self talk, Marissa Peer has some good things to say on this.  One of my favorites of hers is "I have phenomenal coping skills" which I say aloud whenever I have a little, or a big, wobble.  All of us here have got amazing skills with our dysfunctional family backgrounds and the fact that we're still standing and still growing!

[Sheppane]

Thank you for this thread everyone.
A big realisation for me is how absent a lot of my feelings were, and on the road Out of the FOG I am becoming more aware of my feelings.
I have noticed how I either question my feelings / overthink my feelings often ...as if in some way I fear they are the  " wrong" feelings,  and what " should" I be feeling . Thinking they might be not allowed or approved of I guess,  even if no one says that,  it just reflects how unused I am to feeling a feeling and leaving it at that. There is no right or wrong , it's my feeling and I don't need it to be validated.
And it's exactly for this reason that I will often " check " with others , on this board or else here that my feeling makes sense / I'm not the crazy one! In other words I can't always trust my own feelings and perceptions, as others have shared here too.
It's a lightbulb moment for me to realise that me doubting my perceptions and not trusting my feelings is a large part of my difficulty setting boundaries. ...because often I don't know for sure am I right to set the boundary ? It goes like this ...I feel I'm being abused in some way ...DOUBT sets in ....inner critic shames me for thinking like that ....I stay in my head obsessing over whether the feeling is valid/ am I overcalling it ..making it very difficult to know whether I am right to put down a boundary or not.
In order to put down a boundary I need to be able to internalise my values about what I do and don't accept from others. My feelings are what alert me , so when I invalidate my own feelings , then I get no where and stay stuck. Not sure if that makes sense ! I have a lot to think about here!

[tragedy or hope]

The thing that was the most validating and profound for me:

I found an old picture of myself as a little girl. I enlarged it, framed it and began parenting her. I took the picture from room to room during my time at home. I talked to her about her hurts and basically reassured her as I would one of my own children with all the things I thought a little girl should here. First and foremost her hurts. I realized no one assured me, built up my confidence, made me feel special or validated my soul. So I did.

It didn't take long until the tears came and something harsh broke in me about myself. I then began to build on my own strengths, telling her who she really was. It was wonderful exercise and now I look on that photo with such endearment, as I see myself.

To look in my own eyes (even in a photo) as a child was very profound, since I knew what she was thinking.

By the way, the professional photo was taken moments after my mother had pinched the back of my arm and I started to cry. The photographer was waiting, It was her way of shutting me up. I began to cry because my father had given me a little rubber lamb I carried with me everywhere. It was soiled so she would not let me have it in the picture, though my father was my refuge from her at the time. It meant the world to me. And by the way, I held my hand as if it were empty and something had been taken from it on my lap... for posterity I guess. Children are very perceptive....

This situation came back into my mind by just looking at the little girl in the picture.

I hope you find your way to confidence.

[Boat Babe]

The thing that was the most validating and profound for me:

I found an old picture of myself as a little girl. I enlarged it, framed it and began parenting her. I took the picture from room to room during my time at home. I talked to her about her hurts and basically reassured her as I would one of my own children with all the things I thought a little girl should here. First and foremost her hurts. I realized no one assured me, built up my confidence, made me feel special or validated my soul. So I did.

It didn't take long until the tears came and something harsh broke in me about myself. I then began to build on my own strengths, telling her who she really was. It was wonderful exercise and now I look on that photo with such endearment, as I see myself.

To look in my own eyes (even in a photo) as a child was very profound, since I knew what she was thinking.

By the way, the professional photo was taken moments after my mother had pinched the back of my arm and I started to cry. The photographer was waiting, It was her way of shutting me up. I began to cry because my father had given me a little rubber lamb I carried with me everywhere. It was soiled so she would not let me have it in the picture, though my father was my refuge from her at the time. It meant the world to me. And by the way, I held my hand as if it were empty and something had been taken from it on my lap... for posterity I guess. Children are very perceptive....

This situation came back into my mind by just looking at the little girl in the picture.

I hope you find your way to confidence.

Wow, that's astonishing. Thank you so much for sharing that. We can all relate. ❤️❤️❤️

[Pinkos]

The thing that was the most validating and profound for me:

I found an old picture of myself as a little girl. I enlarged it, framed it and began parenting her. I took the picture from room to room during my time at home. I talked to her about her hurts and basically reassured her as I would one of my own children with all the things I thought a little girl should here. First and foremost her hurts. I realized no one assured me, built up my confidence, made me feel special or validated my soul. So I did.

It didn't take long until the tears came and something harsh broke in me about myself. I then began to build on my own strengths, telling her who she really was. It was wonderful exercise and now I look on that photo with such endearment, as I see myself.

To look in my own eyes (even in a photo) as a child was very profound, since I knew what she was thinking.

By the way, the professional photo was taken moments after my mother had pinched the back of my arm and I started to cry. The photographer was waiting, It was her way of shutting me up. I began to cry because my father had given me a little rubber lamb I carried with me everywhere. It was soiled so she would not let me have it in the picture, though my father was my refuge from her at the time. It meant the world to me. And by the way, I held my hand as if it were empty and something had been taken from it on my lap... for posterity I guess. Children are very perceptive....

This situation came back into my mind by just looking at the little girl in the picture.

I hope you find your way to confidence.

Wow - thanks for sharing. The bolded (by me) made me tear up. Because of course (like many others here I'm sure) I have a similar story. And it made me realize that not only did they invalidate our feelings, they invalidated our right to soothe ourselves. I guess that's why self-soothing doesn't come naturally to me even now. Because I was shown so much contempt for doing it when I was a kid. I now have to really push myself to do it, and I feel guilty even then. Like, I should be spending my time doing more worthwhile things like chores etc. 

[Boat Babe]

That's a breakthrough realisation Pinkos. Well done!  More healing coming atcha!

Seriously, this forum is just wonderful. We are all accelerating eachother's understanding and development..

[WinterStar]

This may not be how it's supposed to work, but my internal validation didn't start until I had built up enough external validation. My family never validated me, any my husband was exhausted and dealing with his own stuff, so I turned to this forum and every self help book recommended to me. The more I read about toxic families, the more I understood what I went through and that my reactions to it are normal and expected. Now I'm able to tell myself that and  can reinforce the support I received from reading.