Respect vs. Invalidation – Part II

In Part I of Respect vs. Invalidation we talked about how we treat ourselves and others, techniques for creating respect and personal boundaries.

I’d continue today with this comparison of respect vs. invalidation.  Again, I’d like to give my heartfelt thanks again to my coaching school, International Coach Academy  (1) for their inspiration and support with this subject.  

Do you really love who you are?

What your answer is to this question will depend on whether you have respect. Respect is one of those interesting words that has been used in a range of ways. We begin to understand it when we are children and our parents refer to actions that we have carried out that demonstrate we don‘t or do respect them. It is usually in the negative. Respect is usually used to refer to whether we have respect for someone. It is rarely used to refer to self respect.

We have come to understand that respect is about how we feel about a person. If we respect them then we honor who they. There is a belief that you must respect your parents no matter what. You must respect your elders, you must respect your manager, and you must respect people in authority.

At times we may struggle with showing respect to any one of these people as their actions have not gained our respect, yet we are to ‘pretend’ to respect them out of respect. This kind of message, which we teach to young children, is pretty disturbing. It is filled with mixed messages. On one hand, respect these people even if they don‘t deserve it. On the other hand, what you know as not to be right, ignore that too as their role in life is outside of the rules that you must follow.

These kind of beliefs stick with us.

We have all watched movies where the bad guy is the one that the whole community upholds as perfect and warranting of everyone‘s respect. It is only slowly over time that their actions start to be questioned and finally someone who is ‘brave enough’ speaks out. This person is usually ridiculed and isolated from the community. If the movie follows the theme of good vs. bad as most do, then over time the bad guy will be found out and the good person who spoke out will be acknowledged. As we know in life this can sometimes never happen.

Most of our training, in understanding respect, is built around how we respect others. We will have developed very specific values around respect, all taught to us at a very young age. As we moved through the education system we were taught about respecting our teachers and the system itself. We were taught all about respecting our parents and certain people in the community. Sometime we were even taught who not to respect.

All of the beliefs you were taught about respect were based on the judgment of someone else. If someone respected a particular person or action then they would tell you this is respect.

Respect is a value that can be measured and defined in many different ways. It fundamentally comes down to the type of beliefs a person holds.

A Closer Look at Respect

Respect is being considerate toward somebody, showing consideration for someone, valuing someone, holding someone in high regard or esteem, having admiration for someone or something. You can see with this picture of respect two things or maybe many things.

But let’s look at two things.

The first is that the use of the word respect is related to a person. The second is that every single act of demonstrating respect is subjective and will depend on your values as to how you model it.

Self Application

So check in with yourself. What does your picture of respect look like?

‘Draw’ it now.

In the dictionary, respect is also referred to in relation to someone or something. As part of our earlier training we are taught to look out for signs of respect in others. We learn to gauge respect through our observations. It is like we develop a long list of the actions that demonstrate respect and those that don‘t.

However this long list is built around our judgments of what we have been led to believe is respect. Respectful actions are measured through the eyes of the judge. What ever your judgment, then respect will or will not be given. Respect and judgment are so entwined that you can‘t separate them.

What may be a sign of respect for you may not be for the person closest to you. The judgment we then hold is that our sign of respect is the correct way of measuring it.

Another judgment. And so the judgments continue.

With judgment being part of respect, it means that we need to really understand what judgments we make regarding respect. This is a challenging exercise to do as the two are so entwined. But to really see how we measure respect then it must be done. Observation of how you feel or show respect will greatly help you to understand how you judge and measure respect.

It is now time to think and feel about respect in a whole new way.

Respect is not an outward judgment of someone; respect is an inward feeling about yourself. Respect is how you judge yourself. Respect is about how much you like who you are – inward feelings not outward observations of others. However there is a connection between inward and outward actions. How you respect yourself will be identical to how you respect others. How much self respect you have will match how much respect you have for others.

Inward Respect = Outward Respect

When we judge others, we judge ourselves. What we find respectful in others, we find respectful in ourselves. What we find disrespectful in others we find disrespectful in ourselves. The way you judge yourself and the harshness of it will reflect directly on how harshly you judge respect in others.

Outer Judgment = Inner Judgment

So let’s move into a whole new way of seeing respect. First let go of all negative judgment – it is damaging and harmful to yourself. Now go back to your picture of respect. Above we had words like consideration, esteem, value, and admiration. Describe how you would go about creating a world where you spent time each day creating these feelings within yourself….moments in your day where you felt valued, admired, and considerate, all towards yourself.

Not outward, asking people to consider you or value you or admire you but asking this of yourself. As part of your picture write or draw beside it what activities you can do in your day to bring about a feeling of esteem and consideration for yourself. List as many as you like.

As you go through this process, observe for a moment how you are feeling. You will have shifted away from thinking about how you judge respect in others – a negative energy process, to how to make yourself feel wonderful – a very positive energy process.

This is a very important key to going forward. Each time you feel yourself slipping into judgment then go back to your list of how to make yourself feel valued and admired. Focus on doing something that will fill you with high regard for yourself.

Negatively judging others is a sign of your need to build your self respect.

Discounting and holding negative judgments of others is invalidating yourself.

Remember how you judge others is how you judge yourself. Think about the literal concept of a judge and a jury. They sit weighing up the facts to decide if a person is guilty or innocent, if they have broken a law or not. This is the same way that we judge others and ourselves. We decide if the other person or indeed ourselves is guilty or not.

Invalidation is the process of negating any acts of self respect.

If you have a passport or drivers license or ID card and it expires, it becomes invalid. It is basically worthless. You can cut it up and throw it away. This is something we are very familiar with and have no problems doing.

However we apply this notion sometimes to ourselves or to others. We determine that someone has no use and so we deem them as invalid. Therefore we invalidate them. We understand when its time to throw away and invalid document but why would we do this to ourselves or someone else. We decide that we have no value and so we invalidate ourselves. The greatest gift you have is you. The purpose of life is to be with people. As humans we need to engage and be with other human beings. This is a function of us.

So why would we deem a person as worthless, including ourselves?

The first step to determining if someone else is worthless is to decide we are worthless. If we value ourselves we value others. It really is that simple. To invalidate ourselves is to talk openly of our worthlessness. We use language that devalues ourselves.

The very act of deeming someone invalid is in itself invalidating ourselves. If we see ourselves as worthy then we see everyone as worthy. If we value who we are, we value others.

We invalidate ourselves by the language we use when we talk about ourselves. We invalidate ourselves by the actions we take. We invalidate ourselves by the decisions we make. Others cannot invalidate us. It is our choice as to whether we allow others to invalidate us. If your self respect is low then you may be more vulnerable to accepting an invalidating comment or action.

Building a reserve of self respect is how we live a healthy positive life. Tiredness, stress, and anxiety eat into our reserves of self respect. We need to keep our levels of self respect very, very high. Imagine if everyday you woke up and created an intent for yourself where everything you did was with the aim of building high self regard. Every time you made a decision you considered this intent first. Imagine the result of your decision. Invalidating ourselves is when we don‘t place our need to build our self respect first in a decision making process.

So we can either choose to respect ourselves or invalidate ourselves. It is our choice, no one else‘s. Low self regard is not bought upon us by what others think of us but by what we think of ourselves. Respect is not something to be gained from others it is something to be gained by ourselves. The moment that we recognize that respect is our responsibility is the moment we stop asking people around us to respect us more. Our very actions will show we have a high regard or respect for ourselves.

Invalidating ourselves is when we demand respect from others. We may live in a world of denial and believe that we can earn respect in this way but we are only invalidating ourselves if we do this.

The choice is yours.

Create huge amounts of self respect and then be able to respect others or invalidate yourself and deny yourself of respect and judge others.

Contemplation

• What do you respect about yourself?
• What are the behaviors you demonstrate when you are not feeling self respect?
• Where do you want to build respect for yourself and what is the plan you will create to do this?

Application

Validation is a similar concept to Acknowledgment and is very much related to the present. Sometimes the most valuable thing we can give our clients is confirmation that they are doing the right thing, or at least, are on the right track.

Uncertainty and change can be scary at times. We are conditioned as human beings to believe there is one right choice or course of action to take when there are, in fact, any numbers of positive options.

When I’m validating a client, I’m letting them know I support them in the action they are going to take, as well as in the actions they are currently taking. Support here helps to clear out doubt and disbelief they may haven in themselves. For many of my client I have been the only support person they have. I know the importance of great supports. We’ve all heard over and over the many stories of great people who got to feel great because at some stage on their journey someone believed in them.

I like to work with my clients to help them grow a list of people who can support them. They may have to start at the beginning as they may find that some of the people in their life actually don‘t support them but rather reinforce their invalidation.

As I continue to work with clients, I carefully listen to the language they use.  I write down comments they make and then read them back to them. I ask them if they heard themselves say this. I ask then what was their belief about themselves when they said this? I work with my clients to help them paint a picture of what personal respect would look like for them.

It is always a wonderful opportunity when I ask my clients to describe a person they really respect. Then ask them to outline the behaviors of this person so they can see how they model self respect. What we admire in others is what we value for ourselves.

I enjoy exploring with my clients the actions they demonstrate on a daily basis.

I ask them to keep a journal observing how they show themselves self respect on a daily basis.

There are many ways I work with clients on the area of self respect. But none of these will work unless the client wants to have self respect and is able to understand the impact of self respect on their life. The process and pathway for self respect is with self.

So now…let me ask you…

• How do you model self respect to others?
• What are some questions you could ask yourself if you are uncertain about your self respect?
• What are some behaviors that would reinforce self respect and invalidation?

I’d like to hear from you in the comments below.

If you’re interested in coaching around respect or other aspects of yourself, please Contact Me. 

1 – © Copyright 2009 International Coach Academy Pty. Ltd.