The Validation Trap | Day 3 of 100

Mistaking Validation for Meaning

This is day 3 of 100 days investigating the role of meaning in the way we think about work and leadership. I'd be grateful if you subscribed to follow the journey or passed it along to someone who'd appreciate it. (See this post for the origin story of this series and check out day two’s post where I construct our [working] definition of meaning)

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"Is This It?"

My dad is sitting on the edge of my bed after opening the shutters to rouse me for school.

It's a new day in our new house, the nicest house we've ever lived in. The nicest neighborhood, too. Outside my window that overlooks our driveway and his new company car and the new basketball goal is evidence of a life he's long worked for.

As I rub the sleep from my eyes and the blue-grey dawn seeps through the slats in the shutters, my father says something I'll never forget.

"Reagan - I want you to remember this. I'm no happier now. This house, the car, the neighborhood—none of it has made me any happier."

He looks out the window in silence after that, as if he's listening to the echo of his own words. I don't know what he expected me to say or think. Maybe he said all that for himself.

But I remember it.

Looking back on that moment (particularly as a new dad), I can see a struggle I've felt many times since. The feeling of disillusionment that quickly follows getting something I thought would make my life better. Disillusionment coupled with a bit of confusion.

It causes a question to arise. I’m sure you’ve asked it yourself:

Is this it?

You know the question, right?

After a new job, promotion, relationship, dog, kid, tattoo, city, blender, pair of jeans, haircut, journal, computer, piece of luggage, cologne, magazine subscription, phone, glasses, church, dishwasher, candle, car, friend, board seat...

You find yourself wondering, is this it?

I thought there would be a greater sense of accomplishment, fulfillment, satisfaction—meaning.

But there isn't. Or if there is, it's temporary. It fades.

You get it. I don't need to talk to you about the fleeting nature of happiness or how the acquisition of things won't give us what we really want.

You already know the new car will only smell new for so long. And even though you swear you'll keep it clean so you can preserve the excitement of its newness—give it four months (tops) and there'll be loose change clanging under the seat and a french fry in the ash tray and a receipt on the floorboard along with that crumpled paper tube that once protected a straw.

You know all that.

We know stuff isn't going to fix our lives.

We know outside things don’t fix inside things.

Right?

"Why Doesn't This Work Anymore?"

A brief snapshot of what life looks like for most of us:

Something like rushing between meetings, trying to get new business, answering emails, running errands, doing something for the kids, attending another event, wondering if you're doing enough while simultaneously feeling like you're doing too much.

Why do we keep this pace? Because we want to feel like we're doing life right; like we're checking the boxes and others approve of us. So we keep playing the same game we've always played, following the same strategies that used to work, but with more intensity.

But after a while of this blind intensity, something begins to come undone. Something feels...off.

Have you ever woken up one day and all of the sudden you just—can’t—anymore? You look at your calendar, your to-do list, your life, and you feel a deep sense of malaise? Maybe after a vacation or a day off. Or maybe you got a cold and finally slowed down long enough to see your whole life and you’re like…

Why doesn't this work anymore?

Remember, the first question was, Is this it?

But we normally keep going—until we can’t—then we ask ourselves, Why doesn't this work anymore?

One day we wake up and it feels like we’re strangers to our own life playing a game we never signed up for, forgetting that been conditioned to play this game since we were little kids.

It started with school, clubs, sports, church, childhood play groups, and summer vacations. Nice, small, clearly defined containers.

And in those containers was a set of rules and norms and culture. Get the grade, get the merit badge, do the extracurriculars, score well on the test, get invited to the birthday parties, play your position right, get into college (which is another container), etc.

…check the right boxes, get them to approve of you…

Whether you were an A student or a C student, whether you were a joiner in all the clubs, or you judged those kids, whether you played a lot of sports or a lot of video games - what you wore, what you listened to, what you read and whose attention you craved was all rooted in a desire to find and fit into a container that gave you the kind of external affirmation and validation that told you: You're OK. Which made you feel safe.

Then adulthood hits, and we're catapulted into a new reality where we've got to focus on work and relationships and parenthood. Now it's no longer school—it's life.

The containers are still present, though, but they're way less defined. Now we've got kindergarten carpool and neighborhood associations and taxes and the difficult work of maintaining adult friendships. Nobody tells you exactly what to do or how to evaluate whether or not you are where you're supposed to be.

Your freshman year of school was one year, then you figured out where the bathrooms are and settled into place. But your freshman year of life? I'm thirty-nine and just had my first kid. Maybe you have two kids or two chihuahuas or two businesses—but do you feel like you've got it figured out?

I don't know about you, but I still feel like I'm a freshman at this life stuff.

No longer do we have clean external rules and clear indicators to tell us we're doing this right and we fit in.

At first, the wide open plains of adulthood were freeing. There are certainly folks who continue to thrive in the lawlessness of bigger and more loosely defined containers.

But most of us struggle in the transition, confused that the old strategies don’t work anymore.

We start feeling like we're behind, like we missed the day in class when they taught you how to be independent, self-motivated, confident, and disciplined. We look around and even though we're doing what we think people our age are supposed to be doing, we don't have the simple measurements of grades and gold stars to tell us we're on the right track.

The Validation Trap

As much as we believe we value independence, most of us are still looking to external sources of validation to help us feel like we're doing OK at life.

We mock ourselves for thinking a new vacuum would make us happy, but we still refresh our social media to see who liked our last post. We roll our eyes at coworkers we judge to have too much ambition, but we still feel a thrill when someone compliments our contributions on the job. We know external validation is a trap, but we keep walking into it because it's the only navigation system we were taught.

The problem isn't that we're shallow or materialistic. The problem is that we're still playing by the rules of a game that no longer exists. We're trying to find safety via validation (which we confuse for meaning).

So we benchmark ourselves against others' highlight reels. We consume information hoping it will give us the answers. We bulldoze through our days trying to check enough boxes to feel worthy.

We stay busy trying to outrun the nagging feeling that we're somehow behind, somehow not enough.

So, What Now?

Here's what I think is really happening:

We're experiencing withdrawal symptoms from a meaning-making system that no longer works.

For decades, external validation was our primary source of direction and self-worth. But what got us through childhood and adolescence won't helps us flourish as adults.

Think about it. The containers that once gave us clear feedback about our worth and direction have either disappeared or become so large and undefined that they provide no guidance at all. But instead of developing a new way to navigate, we're still wandering the plains of adulthood, squinting at the horizon, hoping for familiar landmarks that aren't going to materialize.

Both questions we then ask ourselves—"is this it?" and "why doesn't this work anymore?"—are symptoms of the same problem. We're trying to satisfy a deeper need with surface solutions. We're not actually looking for the next purchase or promotion or perfect relationship. We're looking for a sense of meaning and direction that external validation used to provide but can no longer deliver.

And until we recognize this—until we understand that we're not broken or ungrateful or behind, but simply using an outdated operating system—we'll keep looking for evidence outside ourselves that we’re OK, and feeling more lost and more confused when the evidence is not found.

The question isn't whether we can find our way back to those old containers and clear rules.

The question is whether we're ready to learn a different way to navigate.