Quite often, I observe that clients, when describing a situation in which they felt a need for reassurance or positive, affirming feedback from an intimate, will acknowledge a concurrent feeling that this is something that is undesirable and which ought not to be a part of their experience of themselves.
I understand this. It is a vulnerable feeling to invite the input of others, particularly if experience has taught us that to do so involves risk that the feedback may be overly harsh, critical, inaccurate or worse still, a combination of all three.
Also, culturally, we tend to discourage such behaviour. Our civilisation holds forth an ideal of personhood that is strong, confident and, above all, independent. Often, our work environments and our personal contexts too seem to value these qualities and reward them.
“Knowing your own mind, and “not caring what others think of you” are generally seen as positive qualities, associated with strength of character. Being concerned with the views of others, particularly as they relate to our personal choices, characteristics and creative efforts can feel like we are expressing an inappropriate level of need or vulnerability. This can leave us feeling weak or insecure or dependent.
Such spaces of vulnerability often touch on our childhood experiences of being affirmed (or not) by parents, teachers and caregivers and so activate feelings that reflect or are connected with those early contexts.
On a larger macro level, I do wonder whether our society doesn’t tend to over subscribe to this ideal of the independent, strong willed and thick skinned person who is less concerned with other’s appraisal of her and more focussed on charting her own course.
What does this ideal sense of ourselves for which we seem to be tacitly striving or expecting ourselves to evince, do with feelings of doubt or the need for reassurance?
I have long been interested in the role that our cultural pre-occupation with the individual plays in our day to day experiences and on the way our societies operate. And this sense of awkwardness that I often see in people when expressing a need for the input of others is I think, at least partially, one such consequence.
I question the legitimacy of this emphasis on individual strength.
First, as a species, one of humanities great strength and evolutionary advantages lies in our capacity to collaborate in groups to achieve a common goal. This requires the calibration of our own behaviour relative to the behaviour of the group(s) that we are a part of. This in turn requires an ability to be open to and interested other’s views of what we are doing.
What this suggests is that to require the validation, accurate empathic feedback about ourselves is a universal human need and essential part, not only of coming to know who we are as people, but also knowing ourselves in relation to the world. Perhaps we are hard wired to require the affirmation that our contribution to the collective is a positive and useful one.
Second, I wonder whether this ideal of the self contained, self validating person, doesn’t in some way weaken the moral order of our society. An individual’s interest in other’s opinions of her behaviour is an important part of regulating that behaviour. This interest is an essential component of empathy and to be personally “on the line” or exposed to others’ scrutiny and evaluation is I believe a crucial part of sensitising us to the effects of our behaviour on other’s and the society.
However we are routinely encouraged not to need the opinions of others in most spheres of our lives and I believe that we are certainly poorer for it. Not least because it disconnects us from networks of validation and approval and throws us back on ourselves and suggests that our own evaluation of ourselves is the most appropriate measure of our goodness.
And I don’t think that is healthy on an individual or on a societal level.
