Quotes About Validation

Keats longed for fame, but longed above all to deserve it.

Everyone recognizes reality (or recognizes what, in their experience, clearly pertains to reality) only because others designate it to them as such. Reality suffers from a species of inherent fragility, such that the reality of reality must incessantly be reinforced in order to endure.

I boiled every equation down to these simple terms: was I lovable or was I ugly?

I used to stand in front of the mirror in the bathroom to see what they were staring at. I wanted to know what made their heads turn, what it was about me that was so incredibly different. At first I couldn't tell. I mean, I was just me. Then one day, when I looked in the mirror, I understood. I looked into my own eyes and I hated myself, maybe as much as all of them did. That was the day I started to believe they might be right.

I sigh. "But if you'd talked to Jules—if she could hear you . . ." My voice trails off. "Then you wouldn't feel quite so crazy?" Oliver asks gently. "Can't you believe in me, if I believe in you?

Don't say it. Don't say nobody's going to stare at me, because they will. Don't tell me it doesn't matter because it does. And don't tell me I look fine because that's a lie. I'm a freak, Mom. Look at me.

You don't have to say I love you to say I love you.

You are not an impostor," Sam Hallowell told me. "You are not there because of luck, or because you happened to be in the right place at the right moment, or because someone like me had connections. You are there because you are you, and that is a remarkable accomplishment in itself.

It is such a heady rush to be the object of someone's attention in a good way, not as a freak, that I keep forgetting to hide.

I've always sort of wondered though: If everyone else's opinion is what matters, then do you ever really have one of your own?

they accepted any baggage that came with you and made you believe you were more than you actually were

I suppose there's only so many times you can take being rebuffed before you need some validation.

She believes in me, and if someone believes in you wholeheartedly, you start to believe in yourself as well.

heady rush to be the object of someone's attention in a good way, not as a freak, that I keep forgetting to hide.

He made the mistake of imagining that his possessions were a measure of his own worth, and strutted and crowed, parading his things like a schoolboy with a champion catapult.

NEED SHAME BINDS When these needs are neglected, children are given the message that their needs are not important, and they lose a sense of their own personal value. They are not worth someone being there for them. They get the feeling they do not matter. As their needs are chronically rejected, children stop believing they have the right to depend on anyone.

Being requires no measurement; it is its own justification. Being is grounded in an inner life that grows in richness. "The kingdom of heaven is within," says the Scripture. Toxic shame looks to the outside for happiness and validation, since the inside is flawed and defective. Toxic shame is spiritual bankruptcy.

A racket is a family-authorized feeling used to replace an unacceptable and shameful feeling.

High achievement is often the result of being driven by toxic shame. Feeling flawed and defective on the inside, I had to prove I was okay by being exceptional on the outside. Everything I did was based on getting authenticated on the outside. My good feelings depended upon achievement.

Firestone came to the conclusion that "appraisals and evaluations from others, when they validate a person's distorted view of himself, tend to arouse an obsessive thought process." Since we are already tortured by our own critical thoughts and self-attacks, we feel very threatened whenever others attack us the same way.

In science the credit goes to the man who convinced the world, not to the man to whom the idea first occurs.

The highest compliment you can give someone is to ask them their opinion.

You shouldn't become too concerned about what others might think of you. You should be more concerned about what you think of yourself.

SELF-RESPECT IS PRODUCED BY INNER TRIUMPHS, NOT EXTERNAL ONES.