Walk down any street, scroll any feed, sit in any therapy room, and you can feel it: a culture starving for something. But most people don’t know what they’re starving for. They chase likes, performance, admiration, “proof” they matter—then wonder why they still feel hollow an hour later.
There’s a quiet psychological truth most of us miss:
Love nourishes.
ValidationValidation in CBT involves recognizing and acknowledging one’s feelings or thoughts without judgme... only stimulates.
And we live in a world that confuses the two.
Validation Is a Hit; Love Is a Holding Environment
Validation feels good the way sugar feels good—fast, bright, electric. Someone sees you, approves of you, applauds you. For a moment, the inner critic quiets down, the anxiety settles, the uncertainty dissolves.
But then it wears off.
The psyche has a remarkable way of distinguishing what is metabolizable—what can be emotionally digested—from what is just surface stimulus. Validation is a spike. Love is a steady nutrient. Validation changes your state. Love changes your structure.
Psychodynamically, validation works on the surface self: the part of you that wants to manage impressions, ease shame, and borrow a sense of self from the outside. Love, by contrast, works on the core self—the part of you willing to be known, held, and affected by another mind.
Validation says, “You look good.”
Love says, “I know you, and I’m not going anywhere.”
One soothes your insecurity.
The other transforms it.
Why We Chase Validation
Because it’s faster.
Because it’s safer.
Because it doesn’t require vulnerabilityVulnerability refers to the willingness to expose one’s feelings, thoughts, and experiences in a g....
Validation is the psychological equivalent of an energy drink: all buzz, no nourishment. You don’t have to let anyone close. You don’t have to risk disappointment or rejection. You don’t have to reveal the parts you’re unsure of.
And most importantly:
Validation keeps the real you off the hook.
If you don’t show who you are, you can’t get hurt.
But you also can’t get fed.
The deeper hunger—the one for connection—is relational. It involves two nervous systems leaning toward each other in real time. It requires presence, risk, and the willingness to be shaped. As one of my mentors used to say: “Closeness always costs.”
But in a dopamine-based society, who wants to pay?
The Body Knows the Difference
People come into therapy saying things like:
“I don’t understand. Everyone thinks I’m great. Why do I still feel lonely?”
“I get compliments all the time, but they don’t land.”
“I keep dating people who love the idea of me and not me.”
You can feel it in the room. The body tightens when it’s trying to earn approval. The diaphragm softens when it feels loved. One is performance. The other is surrender.
Even the language around it is telling:
Validation feels like: “Did I do enough?”
Love feels like: “I can exhale.”
One requires that you keep proving yourself.
The other gives you permission to stop.
Society Conditions Us to Seek the Wrong Thing
We’ve built entire industries on validation:
- Social media metrics
- Achievement culture
- Productivity obsessions
- Physical appearance as identity
- Even therapy-as-self-optimization
We treat ourselves like brands needing constant polishing. But that’s not how the psyche works. True connection doesn’t optimize you; it humanizes you. It softens the defenses you developed to avoid shame. It gives you a home in your own skin.
Most people aren’t actually looking for validation—they’re looking for love but using validation to hunt it. And those two roads do not lead to the same destination.
Love Requires You to Be a Person, Not a Performance
Love asks things of us:
- Presence over presentation
- Vulnerability over polish
- Truth over image
- Being seen over being admired
- The willingness to receive care
Validation is passive—you can collect it like coins.
Love is participatory—you have to show up for it.
In real connection, you cannot outsource your worth. You have to let someone see your edges, your history, your contradictions—the unguarded self behind the persona. This is why therapy is so powerful. For many people, it’s the first and only place where they are loved—not in the romantic sense, but in the psychological one: held in mind, remembered, cared for, treated as real.
Validation inflates you.
Love roots you.
The Paradox: Validation Isn’t Bad—It’s Just Not Food
Validation is fine. We all need recognition, mirroring, and affirmationAffirmation refers to positive statements or feedback that recognize and validate individuals’ str.... They are part of healthy development. But they cannot substitute for true relational nourishment. They’re the spark, not the fire.
The danger is when validation becomes the strategy for managing your inner life. When your sense of worth depends on applause, achievement, attention, or aesthetics, you end up like someone drinking saltwater: the more you consume, the thirstier you get.
Only love—being known, being held in someone else’s mind, being chosen on purpose—can quench the real thirst.
The Invitation
If there’s a quiet ache in your life, a restlessness, a sense that despite all the improvement and accomplishment you still feel alone—this might be why. It’s not that you’re unlovable. It’s that you’ve been trying to get fed at a window that doesn’t serve food.
Love asks for your truth.
Validation asks for your performance.
One fills you.
The other keeps you hungry.
And in a culture addicted to the quick hit, choosing love—slow, vulnerable, mutual, grounding—is the small rebellion that changes everything.
