There are few prisons in this world so well decorated as the prison of needing approval. Its bars are not made of iron, nor are its doors locked by any visible hand. It has no guard standing at the entrance, no chain around the ankle, no notice written on the wall. Yet many a person lives inside it from morning until night, asking silently, "Do they like this? Do they agree? Do they approve? Am I allowed to want what I want?" And because the prison is invisible, the prisoner often mistakes it for normal life.
The need for validation begins quietly. At first, it seems harmless. A child shows a drawing and waits for a smile. A student waits for praise. A worker waits for recognition. A young man or woman makes a choice and looks around to see if the world claps. There is nothing evil in wanting to be seen. There is nothing wrong in feeling pleased when another human being notices your effort. Appreciation is a warm fire on a cold evening. It encourages the heart. It says, "I see what you did, and it has value."
But validation is a different thing altogether. Validation does not simply warm the heart; it asks to become the heart's master. Appreciation says, "Well done." Validation says, "You may now believe in yourself." Appreciation is a gift from others. Validation becomes a permission slip. Appreciation can make a hard road feel less lonely. Validation makes a person afraid to walk unless someone else is watching.
And this is where the great confusion begins. People take appreciation and validation to be the same, as though both were merely forms of praise. They are not. Appreciation adds to a person. Validation replaces the person's own judgement. A man may work hard on something, and if others appreciate it, he may feel glad. That is natural. But if he cannot continue without their approval, then he has not built confidence; he has rented it. And rented confidence is a poor shelter. The landlord may return at any hour. Today people approve, tomorrow they ignore, and the day after that they criticise. If a person's spirit depends entirely on such weather, he will spend his whole life dressing for storms he cannot control.
The truth is simple, though not always comfortable: not every choice needs to be understood by everyone. Your life is not a public meeting in which every stranger must vote before you move. If you want to build something, change something, leave something, begin something, or become something, you do not need the whole world standing behind you with raised hands. Some roads are yours before anyone else can see the map. Some decisions make sense only after they have been lived. Some callings are quiet at the beginning because they belong to you first.
Validation will not make the work easier. This is the lie people believe. They think, "If only people believed in me, then I could begin." But approval does not remove difficulty. Praise does not carry the weight. A thousand compliments will not wake up early for you, do the hard thing, sit with doubt, fix the mistake, bear the cost, or continue when the room is silent. Validation may give a short sweetness, like sugar on the tongue, but it cannot feed discipline. It cannot replace conviction. It cannot do the work that only the person must do.
Many people delay their lives while waiting to be approved by those who are themselves afraid to begin. They ask advice from people who have never walked the road. They seek permission from people who secretly envy movement. They soften their dreams so they will not disturb the comfortable. They explain and explain until the original fire becomes smoke. And at last they wonder why they feel tired before they have even started. It is exhausting to carry your own desire and everyone else's opinion of it at the same time.
There is also danger in becoming addicted to being understood. A person who always needs to be understood becomes easy to control. One raised eyebrow may stop him. One cold reply may shrink him. One silence may convince him he was wrong. But silence is not always rejection. Criticism is not always truth. Lack of applause is not always failure. Sometimes people do not clap because they cannot see what you are building. Sometimes they do not approve because your courage reminds them of their own fear. Sometimes they cannot validate you because your path threatens the little rules by which they have survived.
This does not mean one should become arrogant, stubborn, or blind. A wise person listens. He learns. He welcomes honest correction. There is great value in counsel, in friendship, in people who see what we cannot see. But listening is not the same as surrendering. You may hear advice without handing over your soul. You may accept appreciation without becoming dependent on it. You may respect another person's view without allowing it to become the law of your life.
A person must learn to say, with quiet strength, "This is my choice, and I will carry the cost of it." That sentence is not rebellion for the sake of rebellion. It is adulthood. It is responsibility. If the choice is yours, then the burden is yours too. That is why validation cannot save you. Even if everyone approves, you must still live with the result. Even if no one approves, you must still live with the regret of not trying. Better, then, to make the decision from the deepest honest place within you, and not from the noisy market of other people's moods.
In the end, appreciation is beautiful, but validation is dangerous when it becomes a need. Accept appreciation with gratitude, but do not beg for permission to exist as yourself. Let praise encourage you, but do not let its absence bury you. The world may clap late, or not at all. It may misunderstand you for years. It may only recognise the tree after laughing at the seed. Still, if the thing is yours to do, then do it. Not because everyone sees it. Not because everyone agrees. But because a life spent waiting to be validated is a life handed away piece by piece, until one day a person wakes and discovers he has been approved by many, but chosen by himself never.
— Sahil Hooda