Validation, much?
There is no such a thing as an overdose of compliments. Keep dropping. Keep receiving. At no point are you to utter the most powerful word in English — “Enough!” — because we live in an era of constant validation. True that the unprecedented rise of social media contributed massively to this insatiable hunger, often beckoning absolute strangers, but it’d be unfair to suggest that it’d be the only cause. If anything, social media merely threw light on a behavior while quietly facilitating it.
In such an embarrassing scenario, let’s try to find a middle ground, shall we? For instance, how about we compliment without really complimenting, thus rendering the whole process futile.
For instance: “For somebody with average looks, you appear rather great.”
Or how about: “It’s amazing how you crack terrible jokes with so much confidence!”
Wouldn’t these statements create an atmosphere of utmost unease between you and a person who perhaps is short on humour and tall on ego? The answer is yes. And it better be yes because what we’re trying to do here is distil the very notion of validation. Very few societal features are as overrated as politeness, especially between people who already know each other; they know exactly how the other person is and yet speak in a manner that doesn’t overstep the set boundaries. Think of 5 reasons why we gift each other and then think of 1 reason why we should stop presenting each other gifts.
With the above exercises, we not only confront others’ hollowness but also shatter our own fragility. Why do we do what we do when we don’t know where will it end? The equation remains simple though: we grant validation in the hope that we’ll receive some in the future. If we are fair, others might be too, and that’s the fertile ground on which our society is based. However, what we’re actually doing is perpetuating a ceaseless cycle of words, leading to wastage of time and energy.
Who’s going to stop this nonsense? Certainly not me. I am that guy who feels good about himself when he wins 5 games in a row on chess.com and gives his wife silent treatment when he loses 10 games in a row. I wonder why do I bother with playing chess, particularly when I’ve understood that I am way past the age of masterly reckoning. At most, I’ll be a 1200-rated player and there are millions across the world in that category. So, what’s the point? One word. Validation.
