What is Validation?
Validation is affirming that what a client is feeling makes sense. That there is something ‘valid’ about their emotional experience to an event.
Providing validation is a very common skill used by therapists. It is a way to communicate understanding and acceptance of the human in front of them. In doing so, the client feels understood, which can lead to increased feelings of trust in the therapist and that treatment will be successful. This is important because alliance and hope are two key factors in positive treatment outcomes.
At its heart, validation is very simple and answers two questions: 1) “What is this person feeling?” and 2) “What makes sense about how they feel?”
What isn’t Validation
Validation is not just about casual chit chat, giving kind words, or providing vague compliments, such as “You’re doing just fine!”
In fact, paying someone a vague compliment when they are having troubles in many areas of their lives can be invalidating. It can make someone feel that you are not truly listening to their struggles and are just providing a blanket statement. In this case, saying “that really does sound tough” can be much more validating than saying “you can do this” or offering solutions like “just go get some exercise.”
In some treatments like dialectical behaviour therapy, we talk about the idea of “validating the valid.” Therefore, if a client says: “I hate people – they all suck,” then validating would not be agreeing that people suck. Rather, it’s about finding the ‘grain of truth’ and communicating that piece. For example, you might say: “It makes sense that you feel that other people are not trustworthy because loved ones have been dishonest to you in the past.”
Benefits of Validation
There a are number of different benefits to validation. Some are listed below:
1. Validation helps with emotion regulation: The act of naming a person’s emotions in and of itself has a downregulating effect. What this means is that if you are accurately identifying the client’s feelings, they literally feel better through just validation. This can be particularly helpful if a client is experiencing some really distressing feelings. If you can identify their feelings and why it makes sense, this is very therapeutic.
2. Validation supports move towards change: When a person feels adequately heard, then they feel more at ease with changing their situation. It’s quite common to hear of people immediately moving towards problem-solving (“go for a walk” or “just push through”), which can be very invalidating for the person who is struggling. By providing validation and showing to the client that you hear and understand them, this facilitates movement towards change.
3. Validation improves the therapeutic alliance: Again, validation shows the client that you are truly listening and understand their experience. When a person feels heard and understood, they are more likely believe that you can help them. This can foster trust and willingness to commit to therapy.
4. Validation helps client’s trust their own emotions: Sometimes client’s feel ashamed or guilty for feeling certain emotions. They may be unsure whether the feeling they have is legitimate. By providing validation, you allow the client to feel a sense of relief that what they are feeling is valid, which then allows them to properly express and process these emotions.
Examples of Validation
Some folks in the DBT space have identified six levels of validation. For the vast majority of purposes, there’s no need to go through and remember them all. However, I’ll go through a few that I often use. Remember: the goal is to communicate understanding and acceptance of an emotion and why it makes sense. It does not have to be a precise science.
At the basest level, you can provide validation by simply showing interest through verbal and non-verbal cues, such as saying “gotcha’ or nodding your head and keeping eye contact.
Then, you might get more specific by working to identify the specific emotion. For example, you might say: “You are feeling powerless” or “You are really anxious about this situation.”
Further down in the validation strategies, you might label an emotion and let them know why it makes sense given their situation or past experiences. For example: “It makes so much sense that you feel like a bother to other people, because your mother always called you a burden growing up.”
The last level is called radical genuineness. Here you are coming from a place of authenticity (providing a very human response). An example might be: “Wow, that’s so incredibly upsetting. I feel like they are missing out on your beautiful compassion and talent at making other people feel good by not inviting you to that party.” Of course, with radical genuineness, the other person must feel that you are being authentic in this situation and coming from a place of total honesty. As you can see, validation can be provided in lots of ways. The main part is just trying to answer the questions of “What is the emotion?” and “Why makes sense about it?” Although it sounds tough, there is always something about a person’s reaction that makes sense.
What to do after validating the client
I like to think that once you have provided validation, you get these ‘validation credits’ you can spend as a therapist to support further change.
For example, you might follow up with validation by saying: “These emotions and thoughts keep you feeling helpless and distressed. I wonder if there’s a specific skill we can use to make sure you are acting effectively based on your goals.” In this case, we are balancing acceptance (validation) with change (skills).
Another possibility is simply to allow the client to fully experience and process the emotions: “Can we stay with this emotion for a little bit?” In doing so, we learn to sit with unpleasant emotions instead of pushing them away.
A third possibility is to explore more about where these emotions come from. For example, tying it back to past experiences or relationships with family. This can increase client insight about the reason why they are feeling this way. Awareness is the first step to change, which can be brought about through validation.
Conclusion
Validation is a very flexible and powerful tool that all therapists should incorporate into their practice. There is a ton of benefits associated with validation. At the same time, it is important to remember not to validate what is not valid and focus on the ‘grain of truth.’
Perspective-taking can be helpful to consider from your own standpoint the question of “if I were in this situation, how might I be feeling?” By doing so, you can access your own inner wisdom to support understanding of how the client may be feeling.
Best wishes,
P
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦on Unsplash
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