Are you an approval addict? Do you need a daily fix of affirmation? If you don’t get it, do you suffer from validation withdrawal?
These may seem like whimsical questions. No one’s ever overdosed on validation, and people don’t get the shakes if they fail to mainline their everyday jolt of approval. Everyone likes positive feedback from a significant other or boss, and it’s unlikely anyone’s ever staged an intervention for someone whose need for kudos is making his or her life unmanageable. “Approval addiction” isn’t a medically recognized mental disorder. But some people have an unhealthy need for affirmation, says Frieda Birnbaum, a research psychologist and psychoanalyst based in Saddle River, New Jersey.
Seeking approval can be a negative “when you’re doing things because you want someone to say you did a good job, if you’re constantly seeking attention to feed the need to feel good about yourself,” Birnbaum says. “When you do something you wanted to do and people compliment you and you feel good about it, that’s healthy. When you’re doing something because you want someone to say you did a good job, then you’re only defined by how other people see you rather than how you really are.”
[See: 7 Types of Friends You Need to Break Up With.]
This approval-seeking dynamic can play out in personal relationships and in the workplace, says Melody Wilding, a licensed social worker based in New York who coaches entrepreneurial and professional women. Within a family or group of friends, an approval-seeker might take on the caretaker role, swooping in to the rescue whenever someone has a problem, no matter what’s going on in his or her own life. In the workplace, an approval junkie may volunteer for every holiday or weekend shift. Seeking constant affirmation can soften one’s resilience, she adds: “I see it a lot in my work with people who are very easily thrown off or set back by any little criticism or negative feedback.”
Research has shown that humans have “esteem needs,” in which they require feelings of achievement and respect from others. Seeking approval can be a positive, provided you don’t need it too much. Faith Salie, a panelist on the NPR show “Wait Wait . . . Don’t Tell Me!” and a contributor to “CBS News Sunday Morning,” chronicles her quest for validation in her 2016 book “Approval Junkie: Adventures In Caring Too Much,” in which she describes her lifelong search for kudos, from getting good grades in school to working out furiously to win her high school beauty pageant (“no one stood a chance against my emaciated, spastic resolve,” she writes).
Salie recounts how she underwent an exorcism of sorts at the suggestion of her first husband. Seeking his approval, she participated in a Panchakarma, an Ayurvedic “cleansing of the body, mind and consciousness.” That husband became a “wasband,” Salie writes — or ex-husband. In her narrative, Salie describes how she remained resilient in the face of setbacks and eventually achieved success in her career and personal life, landing the gigs at NPR and CBS, launching a happy second marriage and having two kids despite two miscarriages.
For her, seeking approval has been a positive, Salie, 45, said in an interview. “If I hadn’t been born this way, for instance, I wouldn’t have been the studious kid whose GPA earned her unbelievable educational and life experiences,” she says. “If I didn’t love the sound of applause and laughter, I never would have tunneled through countless rejections in order to be able to have an intensely gratifying performing career. Being an approval junkie has made me resilient rather than needy.”
Working for validation can be useful, as it has been for Salie, or it could be destructive. Approval junkies often don’t recognize their addictive behavior, which becomes “patterns that burn grooves in the brain,” Wilding says. Experts offer these strategies for identifying whether affirmation is too important to you, along with steps you can take to deal with your approval addiction:
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1. Know the first step to getting better is realizing you have a problem. To determine whether the approval of others is too important to you, ask yourself these questions: Do you have a hard time saying no when asked to do something, even if it’s something you don’t want to do? Do you spend most of your time doing things for others, but not for yourself? Do you spend hours on Facebook, anxiously watching how many likes your latest post accumulates, or obsess over whether your clever tweet was retweeted? If you do some or all of these things, you may be too invested in obtaining the approval of others, says John Huber, a clinical forensic psychologist who is the chairman of Mainstream Mental Health, a nonprofit organization in Austin, Texas, which helps educate young people and veterans about mental health issues and works to destigmatize those issues.
Shying away from trying things because you’re afraid of failure — like not applying for a promotion because you might not get it, or taking a pass on joining your office softball team because you fear you won’t be a good player — can also be signs that you value the approval of others too much, Wilding says. “A growth mindset sees challenges as learning experiences and criticism as feedback. It lets you embrace the idea of improving instead of staying stuck in what you’ve always done. Applying for and not getting a promotion doesn’t fill you with resentment,” she says. “You instead focus on taking productive action, like asking the boss what you can do differently to get promoted six months down the line.”
2. Venture out of your comfort zone. If you suspect your desire for validation is unhealthy, try things out of your comfort zone, Wilding says. If you’re not a great dancer but want to learn, take a Zumba class. Have you always thought how great it would be to play the guitar? Sign up for lessons. “If you try something different that you’re not good at right away, and see that the world’s not going to end, it promotes a growth mindset, as opposed to a fixed mindset,” Wilding says.
3. Listen. Instead of interacting with people to seek their approval, ask about their lives and listen closely, Birnbaum says. “When you listen, you learn other people’s needs and issues,” she says. “You’re not looking to have them say something good about you. It also helps puts things in perspective — you see that they aren’t perfect either, and you don’t need their approval because they have their own issues.”
4. Volunteer. Working on behalf of a cause you believe in can help you get away from obsessing about whether a specific person approves of you. Volunteering at an animal shelter, a senior citizens’ home or for a cancer fundraiser will help you escape the mindset of seeking affirmation and change your perspective, Huber says.
[See: How to Find the Best Mental Health Professional for You.]
5. Consider therapy. A good therapist can help you identify why your need for approval may be out of whack and to see your positive characteristics, regardless of the approval of others. These insights can help you see yourself more clearly, including your positive characteristics. Such clarity can help you realize your sense of self-worth needn’t be tied to the approval of others.
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Are You an Approval Addict? originally appeared on usnews.com
