Validation-seeking is a scam

Validation is a scam. It’s a Ponzi scheme for the insecure, and let me tell you, I was the Bernie Madoff of pretending to care. If I had a dollar for every time someone sought validation from me, I’d probably spend it on something equally idiotic—like therapy, because that’s where these people inevitably wind up when the house of cards collapses.

Let me take you back to the moment I realized the utter absurdity of it all. It was my cousin’s wedding, one of those destination nightmares where everyone pretends to have disposable income and emotional bandwidth for a week-long ordeal. I was seated at Table Nine, the misfit table—a collection of divorced aunts, a guy named Greg who was definitely a plus-one, and me, the asshole who didn’t RSVP but showed up anyway.

About halfway through the night, after the speeches but before the cake, an old friend of mine—let’s call her Ashley—cornered me near the bar. Ashley and I went way back, and by “way back,” I mean we’d gotten drunk together a few times in college and made out once in a Taco Bell parking lot.

“Do you think I’m a good person?” she asked, clutching her wine glass like it was a lifeboat.

Now, most people would’ve said, “Of course you are, Ashley!” and then thrown in some generic Hallmark platitudes about her smile lighting up the room or her heart being pure gold. But I’m not most people, and Ashley should’ve known better.

“No,” I said, sipping my whiskey. “But neither am I, so who cares? And what the hell does "good person" even mean?”

Her face fell faster than my GPA freshman year. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” she asked, the tremor in her voice suggesting she was about three seconds away from weaponizing her wine glass.

“It means,” I said, leaning against the bar because I’m nothing if not dramatic, “that asking someone else to validate your goodness is like asking a magician to explain his trick. The answer won’t satisfy you, and it ruins the illusion for everyone else.”