Do you ever feel like your feelings don't matter? That they're swept under the rug or simply overlooked? This episode, we, The English Sisters, take a deep dive into the world of emotional validation, exposing its vital importance in our lives. We engage in a thought-provoking discussion about the dangers of dismissing emotions, both our own and those of others. We explore how this dismissive behavior can lead to isolation and inhibit the growth of meaningful relationships. Our real-life examples shine a light on the negative effects of ignoring someone's emotions and how it may prompt them to withdraw.
As we proceed further, the focus shifts to the value of self-validation and its role in understanding and articulating our feelings. We explore how external influences like the media can negatively impact our self-perception and the significance of giving a voice to our experiences. We also delve into empathy's critical role in our interactions and offer gentle tactics to inspire someone to break free from their comfort zone. Come and embark on this enlightening journey of self-discovery with us, where we put emotional validation under the microscope. Together, let's step out of societal confines and give our feelings the acknowledgment they deserve.
Do you ever feel like your feelings don't matter? That they're swept under the rug or simply overlooked? This episode, we, The English Sisters, take a deep dive into the world of emotional validation, exposing its vital importance in our lives. We engage in a thought-provoking discussion about the dangers of dismissing emotions, both our own and those of others. We explore how this dismissive behavior can lead to isolation and inhibit the growth of meaningful relationships. Our real-life examples shine a light on the negative effects of ignoring someone's emotions and how it may prompt them to withdraw.
As we proceed further, the focus shifts to the value of self-validation and its role in understanding and articulating our feelings. We explore how external influences like the media can negatively impact our self-perception and the significance of giving a voice to our experiences. We also delve into empathy's critical role in our interactions and offer gentle tactics to inspire someone to break free from their comfort zone. Come and embark on this enlightening journey of self-discovery with us, where we put emotional validation under the microscope. Together, let's step out of societal confines and give our feelings the acknowledgment they deserve.
Don't you hate it when someone just doesn't acknowledge or understand how you're feeling? Yeah, and they might just say, oh, just get over it, or do the eye rolling, and things like that. Yeah, I've got much more on my plate than you have what you're moaning about. Exactly so that's what we'll be talking about in this week's episode of Get Real With the English Sisters. Thanks for joining us, and please do remember to hit that follow or subscribe button, because it really makes a difference. It's really helping us grow. It really is so right. Yeah, what is what is it? What's the definition?
Speaker 1:
Well, I think it's when someone just invalidates your feelings and your emotions. Yeah, emotional invalidation. It's awful, isn't it? It's so bad because I know that we've all got different things going on in our lives and we've all got different problems, and someone you know might have some really serious drama going on, drama like, or a serious illness, or a tragedy in the family or something. But I think everyone's in. We should, we need to take care of our own personal emotions, though we do, we definitely do, because there is nothing really worse, I think, than not validating your even to yourself. So I think that's where you have to start with. Start with, yeah, validating your own emotions. So instead of just saying, oh gosh, I really need to get over this. You know what's wrong with me, or I'm an effing idiot, or I'm so weak, I'm so feeble why do I cry all the time? Just accept it, you know, and say it's taking you know, instead of just thinking why am I so weak? Just think I'm a person that feels things in different ways, perhaps to my friends or to other people. Thus, it's going to take me a certain time to heal from whatever it was, and it doesn't mean it has to be some big deal.
Speaker 1:
It could be something, anything. You could be grieving over anything, as the word grieving sounds like it just has to be associated to death. It might not be just death. It might be that you might even be grieving because you haven't reached a particular stage in your life where you'd want to be at. You might want to be become a parent, for example, and you can't. Or you might want to be already in a certain position in your life and you find that you're not. You could even be grieving that, yeah, and you could be really upset about that.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, because it's like grieving something that never was, and someone else might say why are you grieving that you never had that in the first place? Well, they wouldn't even use a word grieving. But they say what's wrong with you? Just get over it. Okay, so what? You're not married yet. You're not. You haven't got a kid yet. Who cares? Get on with it. Let's go out and have a drink, you know, and they're not. And they're just thinking, oh, they that you know they're not, they're not fully getting you, they're not getting you. But you have to get yourself first and understand that you are going through this. Yeah, because I think if you don't take yourself seriously, no one else will either.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, exactly because if someone, just like fobs you, often says, oh, that doesn't really matter, or I'm going through much worse than you, or they just start talking about their own problems, usually that's what happens. Usually you might just stay quiet and think, oh god, they just don't get it, do they? They don't get me. But if you, if you learn that, you can say, yeah, hey, okay, we'll get round to you in a minute and I'm going to listen to what you have to say as well, and I'm going to validate your feelings too. But this is how I'm feeling right now and it's really, it's really important to me to be able to share this with you. Yes, exactly, it's important for you not to invalidate my feelings and I think once you have the vocab and you know how to express it verbally, then you're like it. It helps because you understand what's going on and you know how to express it to other people, to other people in your family, to your friends. You know how to to make yourself clear. I think it really really does help. It definitely helps because you can express yourself and when you do, it also makes you feel better as well if you're listening to, because otherwise, sometimes what can happen is that you end up shutting yourself down and you end up isolating yourself because you might feel a certain way and your friends and your family maybe aren't listening to you. So you go the opposite way and you think, well, I'm just gonna, you know, shut down kind of thing and just stay in my own company and I'm not even gonna bother going out with them or going to meet up with them, because they're really just not getting me and they're not listening to me, whereas if you kind of, I know it's difficult to stand up to yourself, especially if you're feeling vulnerable about it, but in the end, I think your friends and family, especially if they're real, if they're real friends, they will think oh, yeah, sure, sorry, yeah, I wasn't really, I wasn't really understanding your point of view, I was just thinking.
Speaker 1:
Now, a program that I was watching came to mind about this girl that was suffering from anorexia nervosa and she was actually put into a clinic and she was in hospital for a long time, and her brother, who was going through a lot of the time of his own personal stuff. The parents just weren't even bothered with him because they were just saying look, there's nothing, you know nothing compared to your sister. You get on with your right. Okay, you know, she nearly died and everything was around the sister. Yes, the friends as well, her friends, this girl's friends, all their lives were just irrelevant because there's something so much more serious going on, right, yeah, so everybody was invalidating everyone else's feelings, except for this girl, who obviously was. She had a very serious problem. She had to have her feelings validated as well, surely?
Speaker 1:
But that doesn't mean that other people that are going through different stuff, yes, shouldn't get the attention they deserve. Yes, yes, and it often happens with these kind of diagnoses, serious diagnoses like cancer or like what you were saying anorexia whereas the carers and the rest of the people that are still suffering from the diagnosis they're suffering. They have like post-traumatic stress from it, don't they? Yeah, but they're like, okay, you're not the one who's got this. So, like you know, they say that to themselves. It's like my smaller problems can't matter, surely, but they do matter. They do matter. So do not invalidate your own feelings, except what you're going through, even if we've given these particular cases of you know, very serious.
Speaker 1:
But the person, it doesn't matter though the other person in the family, they might not have a serious problem, they might not be able to give their homework in on time or something. They might be worried, sick about it. Yes, and that's also why they want their parents to go to the parent meeting and they're not going because they're worried about this or the daughter, but for them that's really important. Yes, exactly. So everything else goes like on the back burner, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah, or otherwise, in a more like something that might happen more often, even though most of us have someone with a chronic illness, or in the family Often it is yeah or in the distant family or one of your friends.
Speaker 1:
But if we want to talk about something that's not so serious, say that it could just be that you just have a friend that's like quite loud and wants all the time for you to listen to her or his or their problems. Yes, because they're always the problems that seem to be most important at the time. Yeah, and it could be just dating or some friv that you might consider a frivolous thing, but for them it's important. So there, always, it's always. It always becomes like kind of their show. Yes, so it's always about them. And then you might think, oh, no, how can I? You know, I can't even speak up here because A lot of the times they kind of dominate the conversation. Yeah, they don't even realize it, they don't realize it.
Speaker 1:
And a lot of the times it's important to recognize that when, even if your feelings are being invalidated, it might not be for the person doing it might not have bad intentions. No, they might be saying, all right, you know, let's just get over it. And because that's all they know how to do, they're not used to showing all the signs of affection or they just don't know how to verbalize in another way. So I think you know, if you recognize that they're not doing it because they're cruel, they're not doing it with intent, exactly A malicious intent. A malicious intent yeah, I couldn't get around it now. But, yes, what I'm doing is subconsciously, without realizing. That's why I think they might think they're doing it for your own good, yeah, but that's why I think, if you stand up for yourself and say, hey, I just need to sit with this for a minute and I just need you to give me a hug or just listen to me, yeah, and you know, and I know that I will get over this and I'll be okay and thank you for being there for me in this moment, yeah, yeah, I think and I think a lot of people Not being shy to express that they won't be able to, sometimes, they're not able to just sit with you, but they'll offer you like, okay, then let's go and eat a big tub of ice cream together, yes, which might not be the healthiest option for you at that time, but it's because they don't know how to express.
Speaker 1:
They might say I'll come with you and do that. What do you have to do? They might be actually want to take an action together. That's their way. That's their way of saying you know, it's okay, I love you, but I don't know how to deal with this, because you're expressing your emotions they might not be used to it, you know and they just say, oh, it's alright, you know, you'll get over it.
Speaker 1:
I think this thing about all these emotions and it's quite a new thing, isn't it? It's a new thing Because most people For years people have been We've been told to just shove them under the carpet yes, and they have. That. That's caused a lot of psychological distress. Yeah, it's still going on throughout masses of generations.
Speaker 1:
So this is a generation that is learning to say things like hey, you're invalidating my emotions. I mean, if you said that 50 years ago, people say what the hell are you talking about? You're crazy, yeah, some kind of. But now, if you can learn to say things like that, you know you've got to start with yourself first, to validate your own emotions and realize that you're not being too sensitive. You're not being, you're not too sensitive, you're just somebody that processes emotions in a certain way. Be proud of that. You're not being whatever it is. You know, in all the circumstances, it's important for you to validate your own emotions, to realize that you're different from the next person and to know how you feel and how you want to live your life as well.
Speaker 1:
Because if you feel as if you're a real introvert and for you it's a really big deal, say, to go to someone's birthday party and they're all saying, oh, come on, just get on with it, come with us. You know, don't be a weirdo, don't be this, don't be, you know, party pooper or whatever yeah, they're dismissing you, they're dismissing how you're feeling, and said, if they sat with you and they say, well, I know how much, just really it's a really big effort for you to have to do this, but you know it would really mean a lot to so. And so if you came, do you think maybe you could just turn up at the end or at the beginning just to say hi, or, if you really don't feel, you know, maybe send a card or something, send a good message. But I think if you acknowledge how someone's feeling, in the end they'll think, yeah, maybe I could do that. It kind of gives them courage, because it gives them a lot of courage and it connects, it makes them feel understood. So maybe they think, yeah, maybe I could, you know, just go and do that just for a little bit, or, you know, turn up there and make that extra effort. I think you know it's like a gentle. Well, it's a way of connecting with somebody, it's a way of saying I understand you. A gentle, nudge, you know I might not understand what you're feeling, but I'm here for you. I see you, I can appreciate the fact that you're telling me this and, yeah, you know, you might even just say well, okay, what about if you came and then you just hung out in the kitchen and I'll come and be next to you for a bit? Well, in this particular case, if you don't like social occasions, and they're just yes, exactly, yeah, that'd be really sweet.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, there are so many occasions where we invalidate our feelings all the time. I mean who? These are things that, like what you said, we weren't. People are not even to do this. And even before, I mean all this partying and that people didn't used to do all this partying.
Speaker 1:
It's not really what humans like to do. We're mammals, we're a bit like you know, like our pets, our dogs. The dogs go and party. No, no, in the winter. What do you want to do? You want to go and stay at home, cut the line. Yeah, you want to be warm. So it's like you can say this is it's normal for me to want to do this. It's an effort for me to have to do that, but I will do it because I know, you know it means a lot to someone and maybe I can compromise and do something else, but it's just.
Speaker 1:
I think it's just really taking care of yourself and just thinking about yourself and thinking, yes, what do I want to do? Yeah, starting to understand yourself a little bit more and what you're feeling, understand your feelings and to express how you're feeling as well. Yeah, to learn to express and say I am overwhelmed by this, I'm overwhelmed by that. And like, what you say doesn't mean that you know you might be going under financial stress and you might be thinking, gosh, that's really overwhelming. You go and tell somebody I'm suffering from this and that and I've got this, and then might say, well, that's nothing, I've got this, I've got a business. Oh, it all works. You just get alone, you'll be fine. Use your credit cards Exactly. Well, yeah, not the best of advice, but, yes, nobody knows you. Just, instead of saying, yeah, I know how stressful this must be. It must be really hard for you right now. Yeah, those are exactly the words that you know somebody might be like yeah, that, wow, that's stressful. Yeah, you know. And Is there any way I can help? Can I lend you some money? Well, yeah, well, yes, yes, because that's that's taking action. Yeah, that's taking action as well, because sometimes you need that as well in your life. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:
So I was watching the Take that Robbie Williams and he was saying how he's not seen that yet. Yeah, he was saying how terrible. He suffered so much after he left Take that. He said he was very famous in Europe and in other countries but he was so unloved because of what the press did to him in the UK. And he said he suffered from terrible, you know, depression, addiction and anxiety about performing and just being. Just remind me of what happened. And he was okay, I can't. No, he was just part of Take that.
Speaker 1:
But the press found yeah, no, I know that, I know that, but I can't remember what happened with the press. But what happened with the press? They started demonising him because he left, because he wanted to leave oh right, yeah, because he wanted to leave the band, and then he started his own solo career and then in Europe we used to see him on it and it's on, the X-Factory was on and things like that, and he was very popular here. But when he was in the UK they were still demonising him and he said that he felt really, you know, really, I suppose he validated, of course, nobody, they were just being mean. The public wasn't understanding the fact that he wanted to, I know, and this caused a massive crisis in him, emotional and depressive and terrible really, and he just talked. The fact that he was talking about it openly in his documentary is good. It's a big deal. Yeah, that's very important Because it's like I'm showing how I felt and how I was feeling over these years and hopefully it'll stop people being so cruel and wicked like people in power, like the press, right, yeah, and then they had to sell newspapers and stop them getting away with just trashing people really, because in the past they've been able just to trash people and just this was acceptable.
Speaker 1:
How could this be acceptable, especially the UK press? Yeah, very bad. Yeah, it's terrible really. Yeah, so well, thankfully nowadays there are all the means of communication. You can speak up, but the actual person can speak up about it and say how terrible it was for them, because it's really awful Finally validate his feelings, even though it took a long time to do it.
Speaker 1:
I suppose that's like a story of it's never too late, really, so you can always speak up about how you felt about a certain particular thing. You know you can always validate your feelings. It might be like a massive weight lifted off your shoulders when you finally think well, you know what. That was really tough, what I went through and whatever it was. Yeah, who's? Obviously we're talking generally here. So, yes, definitely validate your own emotions, understand your own feelings.
Speaker 1:
I mean I'm just thinking now about just something trivial, like, years and years later, you may still be dreaming about your exams you haven't handed an exam paper in, or something like anxiety dreams, and that shows how you're not validating how, how, how, how traumatic and anxious it must have been for you at the time. Yeah, your subconscious mind is probably still trying to process that. That may be in other areas in your life You're still going through some stress or anxiety, yeah, and it's. It's coming out as that particular incident. Oh God, I hate those times, but I mean you know how hard it was for you, yeah, and if you're going through them now, just validate it and say it's really tough.
Speaker 1:
This is tough and you know, and that's why I'm feeling anxious and understanding that you can, you can like be kinder to yourself. I think you can gentle, you can still do everything you need to do, but you can acknowledge how tough it is for you to do it, particularly tough, and it's a difficult thing and you're doing it anyway. If you can do it, and if you can't do it, you get help or don't do it. But acknowledge how you're feeling. I think that's half the battle. Absolutely, yeah, definitely. So what do you think? Do you think you've been too hard on yourself? I bet you, most of you have, because I think most of us are. We. We tend to dismiss our feelings and our emotions and just get on with it. And it's really important, I think, to acknowledge how you're feeling and then just say and then when you because I mean most things in life are hard, yes, and there is suffering and hardship, but worthwhile things are really tough and difficult to do as well, but then, when you've done them, you're really happy. But if you acknowledge the fact that it's a tough thing you're doing and you can appreciate how you're feeling.
Speaker 1:
It could even be just, you know, leaving your house if you've got agoraphobia or whatever, getting out the door or going to see your friends. It could be doing admin stuff. It's admin Anything, yeah, anything. You can say, wow, I've got to be brave. I understand I'm feeling scared, and not be ashamed of being scared. You're scared, you've got to fill in all these forms, you're scared of it. Just say, yeah, I'm feeling scared. Now I've got to be brave. Either ask for help or try and figure this out myself.
Speaker 1:
But figuring out how to be an adult, I mean, when do you become an adult? When do you become an adult? I'm still thinking I still got, I still want to hide under the blanket when I've got admin stuff. I've got stuff to do still, I mean, I'm still learning. I still think I've got to be brave. When do you have to be? You know this adulting, this myth of the adult, yeah, the myth of the adult that we talk about. It's a myth. Adults have it all sorted out. No, they don't. They certainly do not have it all sorted out. So it's step by step, day by day, validating your emotions and getting through it and understanding and living in the now. I think helps to just sit in the now and say, yeah, it's going to be okay, it's going to be okay. Lots of love and smiles from the English sisters. Please remember to come and see us on YouTube too, and wherever you get your podcasts, you'll find us. Thank you so much. Thank you, bye, bye.