Validation Games

The thing about processing life is that I am mostly frustrated by things that don’t make sense: irrational choices, emotional accusations, you know, the whole gamut. Acceptance is the dirty word here-you call it acceptance, I call it resignation.

It goes against my nature to just give up. Sometimes, the right thing to do is to give up-I need to accept this. This is true especially when I don’t really want the thing that I’m pursuing-I’m simply playing to win, to prove to myself that I can win, that I always win. What’s with me and winning? Maybe I don’t realize how competitive I am.

The natural next question is, ‘Am I pursuing a win for validation?’, “Do I really need these people to accept me?” I don’t think so. I think I simply am proving to myself that I am acceptable-these other people on the outside are tools that confirm where I stand on the scale of acceptance. They are replaceable-which tells me that I view my life as a series of challenges where I prove to myself that I am acceptable using people on the outside as my gauge in this effort.

Who is this God inside me that I am proving this to? If this God is me, why can’t I accept me without these validation games on the outside? I don’t seem to be comfortable gauging self by my own standards. I want to be objectively acceptable. If they accept me, I can accept me.

The danger with self-standards is not knowing where you stand objectively. Of course, the key is to reach a middle ground between my own and objective standards. This means, I am not going to be acceptable to everyone out there-I was running that risk either way. I need to be able to accept that as a possible outcome-that I will not win all the time and that’s ok. Sometimes, I am worth more to myself than the win is.