ABSTRACT
While recognizing the importance of validation in everyday life and in therapy, some clients may have unrealistic or unhelpful beliefs about validation and strategies for eliciting validation. This chapter outlines some of these beliefs, such as the idea that others should agree with everything the client says, that others should have the same emotions about these events or that, if one does not completely agree, then the other person cannot be trusted. Unhelpful strategies such as ruminating, escalating, attacking the listener, withdrawing or rejecting help are described and more helpful—more emotionally intelligent—strategies are outlined. Further, problems in self-invalidation are described as well as the problematic beliefs about self-invalidation.
