Do you know that scene in Mean Girls when Regina George compliments a girl on her bracelet, and then after the girl leaves she promptly calls it the ugliest bracelet she's ever seen? I think this is the reason we can't truly accept compliments; we can't trust them! And this makes it almost impossible for us to validate ourselves and feel self-confident. Here's why:
Compliments are passed around on the daily without much thought. They are thrown about as if they were a bag landing on the couch after a long day of work, or like an "I love you" before hanging up the phone with a loved one.
We are all guilty of this type of thoughtless phrase once in a while, whether we are simply trying to make our friends feel good, or trying to make ourselves feel better for being the awesome person to give such a wonderful compliment. If you counted in your head how many times a week you gave away compliments like they were girl scout cookies, you would lose track! A compliment to a friend on their hair today, an homage to a sister after they listened to you drone on and on about life last night, or a cutesy text exclaiming to your guy how cute he is this morning, and countless in between. Well…that was my day anyways.
But amidst all of those sweetly phrased sentences, which ones are truly given freely? To those people who repeat these easy phrases on instinct because they need a pick-me-up (all of us), or because they just feel like having some affirmation in return; I get it.
We are all just reaching out into the world for some kind of affirmation or another. Our lives are made up of moments when we strive to be able to think “Yes. I did it." We get this satisfaction from success and we know we succeed when we are told, praised, awed at and most importantly: complimented. So yes, I get it. I get why we all may occasionally say something nice only with the hopes of receiving a flattering phrase in return. We are all seeking validation in one way or another.
But the true question is, why can’t we validate ourselves? We have grown into people who don’t know our value, our worth and our good. We focus on the bad. We focus on improving. We focus on reaching the next level. We can never truly believe that we are enough and we rely on others to tell us instead.
Compliments often run right through our heads, in one ear out the other, skipping our heart all together. It’s like someone is throwing a bouncy ball off of a wall, trying to make it stick there; only the ball is the affirmation, and the wall is the cold exterior of self-hate. So we grow up learning to reject compliments. We learn to deny that they are true and laugh them off, because we either can't believe they are heartfelt from our personal experiences of throwing them around, or we deny because we dare not feel good and confident about ourselves.
No wonder we can’t believe in ourselves; no wonder we find it difficult to self-love; no wonder validation is never in sight; no wonder enough is never enough.
I challenge you, right now, to believe yourself. Believe yourself when you think, "Jeez, I'm wicked smart." Believe yourself when you feel confident and strut your stuff down the street. Believe in yourself when someone gives you a compliment and you really want to accept it. Allow yourself to absorb it, and know that it could be true. And lets all make a promise right here right now, to know that the best person you can be is simply you! You are the only person who can validate yourself.
