“To make somebody feel valued as a person, or feel that his or her ideas or opinions are worthwhile … is precisely what the second step of Imago Dialogue, validation, is meant to do. Very simply, it sends the message from the receiver to the sender, ‘You make sense, and what makes sense is …”(p.206)
What Validation Means
Validation means that you recognize and accept that the other person has also had an experience, and that his or her point of view, while it may be different from yours, has equal validity. Remember that others are not you.
Tim Horton’s Example
I used the example, last week, of going to a Tim Horton’s drive-thru as an example of mirroring. When I asked for a small black for me and a medium decaf with milk for my wife, the person immediately repeated back to me: Was that a small black and a medium decaf with milk? A perfect mirror. The employees have been taught to repeat back the order to the customer to cut down on wastage from mistakes because they cannot see the person giving the order and there might be static in the system.
Using the same example from a validating point of view, the person on the inside didn’t say, “Are you crazy? Don’t you want a large double?” because that is what they prefer. No, they just repeated back the order to make sure they heard it correctly. There is no judgment!
The authors do go on to say:
“Of course, validation may be more difficult to pull off than we’re making it sound; in our experience, validation seems to be the most demanding step of the Dialogue for many couples. Yet, it may be the most important step of all, and here’s why. Being validated – receiving the explicit message that what we are experiencing makes sense to another – is precisely the opposite of what many of us experience much of the time. Invalidation, unfortunately, is the norm in many kinds of relationships – between parents and children, between boss and employee, among siblings, and between romantic partners.” (p.206)
The Validation Experience
“The experience of validation reverses the messages we received from our childhood caretakers and others, who, wittingly or not, left us with the impression that we were wrong to feel what we felt or to want what we want or to think what we think.” (p.211)
Steps of the Imago Dialogue Process
The first two steps of the Imago Dialogue Process (the Safe Conversation Process) are
- Mirroring
- Validation
With mirroring we make sure we get the content of the sender’s message – the what. Validation is about understanding – it makes sense that is how you think about something. Next week, I’ll explore the last step of the process – empathy, which shifts the focus from how the sender feels, to the emotional experience behind the message.
