The Rosie and Roula Show

203: The Dangerous Side of Validation and When Does it Get Toxic

• Roula Abou Haidar and Rosie Burrows

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In this episode, Roula and Rosie dive deep into the dangers of seeking validation, exploring how craving approval from others can impact self-worth, decision-making, and even social dynamics. They discuss the fine line between healthy validation and toxic validation, including how groupthink, social media, and biased feedback can trap us in a cycle of dependence on others’ opinions.

Rosie shares her personal struggle with relying on external validation as a teacher, while Roula highlights how validation can sometimes be misleading or one-sided. They also touch on the importance of critical thinking, healthy debates, and forming your own opinions rather than blindly seeking agreement.

🔑 Key Topics & Takeaways:

The difference between validating others vs. craving validation

How external validation can affect self-worth

Toxic validation and groupthink in personal and online communities

The role of honest feedback and challenging conversations

Why healthy debate and empathy matter more than always agreeing

References to Previous Episodes:

Episode 186: Praise and Validation – Why Compliments Matter


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Roula (00:00)
In our previous episode, we talked about how validating someone's, if they're venting, gossiping, whatever, how feeling validated is important. We briefly touched on it. But I want to talk about today, and you know, Rosie, we are supportive of validating other people's feelings, experience, whatever they are going through. But today I want to talk about or ask you, do you see

a danger in validation.

Rosie (00:31)
Yes.

Roula (00:31)
And I know

I'm taking you by surprise. We're not prepared for this.

Rosie (00:34)
Never, never.

Now I

think there is a danger and there is a difference between, for example, me validating your feelings and you craving that validation. I think it is a valid need to want to feel validated and heard. It's part of belonging and connection. But when we place our self-worth on being validated by others, my God, that's a dangerous path. It definitely is because

if you're not getting that external validation.

then what? You're gonna fall to pieces. You're gonna be a mess. We, and I struggle with this. I struggle with it. Just bear that in mind as I talk as if I know everything about this. If we, am I? I kind of forgot where I was going with that. But if, so for example, I will feel shit about something.

Roula (01:29)
You're captivating me, I'm all ears.

Rosie (01:40)
But then someone will say, my God, that was amazing, Rosie. And I'll just feel like a million bucks. Why can't I own that I am good at something and give myself the validation? I think we need a bit of that going on too. I'm definitely not saying that we shouldn't validate other people's feelings. We should definitely validate other people's feelings is very important, but we shouldn't rely on having our feelings validated.

Roula (02:09)
Where's your struggle? You talked about your struggle with this. Yeah.

Rosie (02:09)
What are your thoughts? you want to know my struggle? ⁓

Well, with everything, just life in general, day in, day out. Just, okay, here's an example. So I started teaching again recently and I felt absolutely useless and like I didn't do a great job. And then I went, I think I spoke about this actually. We did an episode about praise. So go back and listen to that. I will put it in the show notes, episode 186.

But I was feeling shit until I was talking to the deputy principal and she just validated what a good teacher I was. And I felt amazing.

What changed? The only thing that changed is that someone else said I was amazing. So I am relying on her or other people to have a sense of self-worth.

That is dangerous.

Roula (03:01)
Yes.

I think it's dangerous is because first, I don't want to take your teaching example because then I'll be too harsh on you with my conversation. And I don't mean that. Where I find a danger in validation is when we validate and we only say the things that the other person want to hear, which means, and this means that

Rosie (03:13)
⁓ god, yeah. Okay.

wants to hear.

Roula (03:30)
They are not seeing the other side of the coin. They're not seeing another perspective.

Rosie (03:37)
God, we've really

interpreted this differently, haven't we? Yeah, keep going.

Roula (03:40)
Yeah,

they're not seeing it. And why I came up also with this question, what you're saying is very valid. The question came to my mind is because so much when you look for something, let's say online, and then the feeds keep feeding you what you looked for, validating your feeling, validating your opinion, how you see the world. And then

Rosie (04:07)
confirmation bias.

Roula (04:09)
Yeah, so you're only in this tunnel vision, you're getting so much validation about the things you're looking for that you're not seeing the other side of the coin. And when someone validates you for something, that's only one person's opinion.

Rosie (04:21)
Yeah, okay. Well, I-

And it might not even be their real opinion. They could be blowing smoke up your ass because they want to make you feel better. I'm not a fan of that either. It needs to be genuine. One of my pet peeves, something that ticks me off, again, go listen to that episode, is when people say, don't worry, it's going to be okay. How the fuck do you know?

Roula (04:30)
Yes!

Rosie (04:50)
I know that's not quite, well it kind of is validation, but it's just this thing people say that's not true.

Roula (04:57)
It's nice to bring it with a fact. So when we validate, I feel it's good to back it up. What are we validating specifically? And as question, feel that if I validate, am I really all like, I couldn't be validating. I have totally different opinion. I'm only validating to make the person feel heard. But am I a hundred percent agree in?

Rosie (05:02)
Back it up. Yes.

but you might not actually agree.

Yeah. my God. This plays into so many different things. Like we're talking about validation, it's compliments and it's praise, which we touched on recently. And I think people pleasing ties into this too. And we are afraid of conflict and confrontation because if we give honest feedback, there probably will, it's not all going to be positive, is it?

Roula (05:46)
Yes.

And sometimes validation, Rosie, comes from people who also want to be validated for the same thing, and then it becomes a circle. I valid... Yeah, I find there is something toxic in validation. The person validating without giving another perspective, they're also validating their own feeling. They're craving for this validation. So I validate you because I'm craving this validation, and I'm hoping you will...

Rosie (06:02)
toxic.

my god. It's like, my god. You're like projecting,

⁓ my god. And so you want the other person to reciprocate.

Roula (06:22)
Yes, it happens

so often that validating others without giving another perspective.

It's...

Rosie (06:34)
think it's okay to validate someone, to compliment them, to praise them, and there's not always gonna be a balance, this is good, this is bad, whatever. You might actually genuinely agree, but I do think we're probably all guilty of talking bullshit because we're just trying to keep the peace. Be specific, man. Be specific. Be, be specific. Yeah, no, I agree.

Roula (06:48)
Need to be specific.

Be specific. Yeah. ⁓

You know, it's,

it's, it's, we don't talk politics on our podcasts. We don't, I mean, I know we don't talk about this stuff. I just have this, ⁓ we have to, we have elections for the parliament coming up next week. And I see validation for the wrong thing everywhere around me.

Rosie (07:23)
Wow. Wow.

Roula (07:25)
And then

people are validating each other on, okay, I'm biased on things I don't believe in or I think they should be wrong. And is this correct to validate? Because we are in groups. We just go, we find the people that validate what we think, what we believe is right. And then We are in a tunnel vision.

Rosie (07:43)
⁓ boy.

and think about

think about the extreme end of that it's essentially propaganda and groupthink and brainwashing and we need to learn to use our voice and form our own thoughts be critical rather than just be swept up in what we want to hear and what everybody else is saying and it's easier to just go along with that yuck

Roula (08:13)
I want a healthy debate.

Rosie (08:17)
Yes! my goodness! Yes!

Roula (08:18)
a healthy debate, something

that make us respect the other wrong opinion. Remember my t-shirt? I respect your wrong opinion. Because it comes also from this environment that we're living in now about each group are validating each other and becoming just too sight blinded? Blindsided.

Rosie (08:29)
you

yeah, blindsided, yeah,

I knew what you meant. We knew what you meant. We aren't good at having these conversations in general because we're not taught how to have healthy conflict. Just because you don't agree with somebody's point of view or beliefs doesn't mean you shouldn't engage in a conversation. I think it's really...

Roula (08:48)
I'm glad you corrected me.

Rosie (09:09)
Is beneficial the word? It's worthwhile to try to understand where someone else is coming from. Like in our conversations, you'll say something and I'll think, what the fuck are you, I don't agree with that. But then I listen. I do. I do have what the fuck moments and I let it out, but I don't shut it down. I listen and often, I'm sure you've noticed this rule, often I'll go, ⁓

Roula (09:21)
You have these moments very much when you say, the fuck I'm talking about.

Rosie (09:37)
Yeah, actually, I didn't realize you meant that, I agree. Or, I didn't think of it like that. What's the harm in just listening? You do not have to agree. We are not saying agree, we are saying listen. Have empathy.

Roula (09:53)
And sometimes I challenge and also now that we're saying this and thinking about myself, I wonder if people really have very different opinions than mine. How am I going to get out of this relationship, for example, if it's friendship? Or how am I going to, you know, because I also have the choice, but then this bring me back.

Rosie (09:55)
Challenge, also challenge.

Roula (10:21)
And I think I'm wrapping up the episode because this is going to go into the rabbit hole. This will bring me back to, oh, they're not validating what I believe in, so we can't get along.

Rosie (10:24)
You

Mmm, it raises so many questions.

Roula (10:38)
But I leave it. I don't have anything more to add because... The danger of validation.

Rosie (10:41)
What was the beginning of validation? Yes, yes. To answer your question,

yes, it is dangerous. And it was interesting to hear how you interpreted your own question, because I kind of took it in a different direction. that was, yeah, that was a good conversation.

Roula (10:53)
⁓ Yeah, I took it

to the environment we're living in now because it's doing something to me. Again, we don't talk about this at the podcast, but it's doing something to me.

Rosie (11:05)
I mean, politics, it's one of those things, isn't it? It's so polarizing, isn't it? Interesting that we're not talking about it on the podcast. And you know why? I think validation plays into it because people aren't willing to have an open conversation about differing points of view and to discuss the hard stuff. We don't have to go into that, but I feel like, isn't that interesting?

Roula (11:27)
But also because we want to be inclusive.

We don't talk about politics because if the topics we are talking about, Rosie, speak to our listeners no matter where they stand in their beliefs and in their life, that's good.

Rosie (11:46)
Why shouldn't politics speak to everybody? It affects everybody, without a doubt.

Roula (11:53)
It's very personal maybe?

Rosie (11:55)
Yeah, I'm not convinced with that answer, but I think we should just reflect on that. Not saying we're becoming a political podcast, but just an observation.

Roula (11:56)
It's very personal.

Okay.

Rosie (12:06)
See, I'm not validating you. I don't know. Mental note. Agree to disagree? Yeah.

Roula (12:07)
I took note, I made a mental note of your observation. Mental note? I will forget it in a second.

⁓ Alright, thank you for listening to our rambling episodes. Bye!

Rosie (12:17)
Goodbye everybody!

Bye!