#21 Validate Yourself in 3 Steps and Build Confidence

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Ever hit a milestone and still feel... kinda hollow? Or find yourself needing everyone else’s opinion before you can trust your own? Been there. And spoiler alert: It’s not because you’re broken.

It’s because most of us were raised in homes where self-validation wasn’t modeled—so now we second-guess everything from our feelings to our freaking lunch order. In this episode, I’m breaking down why learning to validate yourself is the foundation for real confidence, calm, and clarity.

We’ll talk about:

• Why “outsourcing your reality” leaves you anxious, resentful, and stuck
• How your inner critic got installed (and how to replace it)
• Three self-validation practices that actually work—no journal prompts required

This isn’t about toxic positivity or pretending everything’s fine. It’s about naming what’s real, responding to yourself like someone who actually likes you, and learning to separate past triggers from present-day truth.

If you’re done twisting yourself up trying to be palatable, likable, or agreeable—this one’s for you.

Ready to become your own biggest ally? Hit play. Then send this to the friend who needs to hear, “You make sense. You’re doing great. You don’t need permission to feel how you feel.”

👉 Grab your FREE Audio Training: Get Unstuck- 3 Strategies to Break Free from Unhealthy Patterns

👉 Follow me on social @notyourtherapist.kayla

👉 Ask me a question [e-mail]

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
What's up friends?
It's Kayla.
I'm a licensed therapist, I'm agroup practice owner and I'm a
cycle breaker, and this is Notyour Therapist podcast and I'm
so freaking happy you are here.
On this podcast, we talk aboutall things mental health, all
things mental health becauseit's important and mental health

(00:22):
is health All right.
So I've had a lot of stuffgoing on lately.
I have been working on anonline course for individuals
who are healers.
So if you are a healer and youhave a private practice or
you're trying to grow a privatepractice or you're thinking
about going into privatepractice, I've been building an

(00:45):
online little bootcamp, a littlebusiness bootcamp, if you will.
So that's pretty exciting.
That's on my website.
I have also been working onposting more on the gram,
because social media is the wayto get more people to listen to
the podcast and more people tocheck out my website and the

(01:06):
services I offer.
I have created a really awesomecoaching package.
It's three months long, it's anintensive and you get Voxer
support in between sessions andall these amazing things.
Anyways, I've been creating allthis stuff to offer y'all
because I want to help people, Iwant to serve people and if you

(01:27):
want to hear more about myoffers, hop on over to
KaylaRileycom.
But I digress.
I'm not here to talk to youabout that.
I'm here to talk to you todayabout why self-validation
matters.
So many of us struggle with aninner critic voice, or the
little part of you that says didI just say too much?
Why do I always sound so needy?

(01:50):
Am I overreacting?
Am I crazy?
Why don't I look like that?
I should be doing more?
Whatever, it might be thatlittle voice of somebody who's
never been taught toself-validate, or somebody who
knows how to self-validate butjust isn't doing it enough.
But for most of us, we wereraised with emotionally immature

(02:11):
parents and we never weretaught how to self-validate,
nevermind validating others.
We got to start somewhere right.
Start with yourself.
You deserve it.
So today, on this episode, we'regoing to unpack why validation
from others is never going to beenough y'all.
If you're the person who is anoverachiever because you think

(02:32):
that's how you're going to feelgood about yourself, you're
wrong.
You can achieve everything inthe entire world and still feel
like cuckoo, poo, poo.
You can have the marriage, youcan have the house, you can have
the white picket fence, you canhave the babies, you can have
the dog and you still might feellike shit, and part of that is
because you've been seekingexternal validation your whole

(02:54):
life and you've never learnedhow to give it to yourself.
Well, I'm going to talk aboutit, let's get into it.
So self-validation mattersbecause if you grew up being
ignored, mocked, told to calmdown or your emotions were just
invalid, maybe for a lot of menyou were told that you know,

(03:15):
don't cry about that.
Like, be tough, grow up, rightThings like that.
Or for women thinking abouttaking care of others, like, oh,
we don't have time to sit downand process.
Or for a lot of us, don't belazy, sitting down and
journaling is foo-foo.
Well, that's crap, but a lot ofus were raised that way.

(03:38):
A lot of us were raised by ageneration who didn't have a lot
of psychology.
Therapy was not normalized,there wasn't the internet, where
so much information is beingshared about the quality of
relationships and how to improverelationships and how to
improve our mental health.
So we're in this beautifulstate of the world where that's

(04:00):
becoming better known, that'sbecoming more popular, more
accepted.
So that's your sign, y'all.
It's your sign that it is timeto develop a better, stronger,
loving, compassionate, softinner voice towards yourself.
And let me promise yousomething If you can do this for

(04:21):
yourself, you're going to havebetter results, relationships.
You're going to be a betterparent.
You're going to be a bettereverything boss, employee,
colleague, friend You're justgoing to be better.
Because when you can show upfor yourself emotionally and
validate yourself, you're goingto build that self-esteem and

(04:42):
you're building the capacity toshow others compassion as well.
Okay, so if you grew up withthis invalidating voices around
you, this emotional immaturityfrom your family, it's going to
create self-doubt, it's going tocreate anxiety.
It's going to create a habit ofoutsourcing your reality, right

(05:04):
, and what I mean by that islooking outside of yourself to
see how you should feel, insteadof looking within yourself and
knowing how you feel andallowing yourself to feel.
So, if you're always lookingfor someone else to say you're
okay, you're doing great, wow,great job.
But what if you could be theone to say that?

(05:27):
Wouldn't that change so manythings?
Wouldn't that take awayperformance, anxiety, stress,
overextension, right, likethere's so many things that this
takes away?
Now let me tell you something.
This doesn't solve everything.
However, it's a really freakingimportant first step.
So let's talk about whatself-validation actually is.

(05:49):
Self-validation is the practiceof acknowledging what you feel
without needing someone else toco-sign on it.
It doesn't mean that you don'twant connection.
It doesn't mean that you'regoing out.
You know you don't care aboutwork anymore.
You don't care about how yourpartner feels, you don't care

(06:09):
about.
That's not true.
Acknowledging how you feel andgiving yourself permission and
validating your own realitydoesn't mean you're
disconnecting from others, right?
So what does this sound like inyour brain?

(06:31):
It's going to sound like thingslike this.
Your thoughts might sound likethis feeling is real, even if
they don't get it, and they'reminimizing it.
It makes sense why I'm hurt orI'm feeling disappointed, and
that makes perfect sense.
Or I understand why this ishard for me.
I understand why thisexperience is hard for me and

(06:55):
painful because of my past, andI'm going to give myself some
grace.
Can you imagine if your innerdialogue sounded like that?
It's something we can allstrive for.
I know a lot of us in thebeginning of this journey, when
we're trying to overcome anxietyor depression or stress, or
being spread thin, or trying tobe the best mom ever, ever, or

(07:16):
trying to deal with a crazy assfamily.
Our inner dialogue does notsound like that.
And a lot of times I ask myclients who is that inner voice?
It wasn't you that created that.
Who carved that path, thatpathway in your brain?
Whose voice is that?
And a lot of times they willsay, oh, it's my critical mom,

(07:38):
or oh, it's my selfish father,or my narcissistic sister,
whatever.
Okay, so let's talk about threequick self-validation practices
that you can actually starttoday that are easy and are
going to change everything.
Remember that when we start toheal, there's ripple effects on

(07:58):
everything else.
That's why healing takes time.
It's a marathon, not a sprint.
This is a really importantfirst step.
So first, you're going to nameyour emotion without judgment.
I feel anxious, it's as simpleas that.
I feel stressed, I'm feelinghurt.
It's as simple as that.

(08:18):
And if you don't have thelanguage I've said this before,
I'm going to say this again youhave to build a vocabulary,
because language is power.
If we don't know how to definesomething, it's very, very hard
to process.
So what I want you to do is goon your phone and Google emotion

(08:40):
wheel, take a screenshot of itand set it as the background of
your phone and start practicing.
Every time you unlock yourphone, identify what you are
feeling right and try to getmore specific and build a range
of vocabulary to try todetermine how you're feeling.
A lot of us are like I'm eitheranxious, I'm pissed off or I'm

(09:02):
calm and that's about as far asit goes.
No, no, no y'all.
There's an emotional spectrumand you're probably feeling it,
but you have to be able to labelit and allow other feelings to
exist.
So naming emotions really doeshelp regulate them, and shame
festers in silence, all right.

(09:22):
Step two respond like a safeparent would.
So.
A lot of us didn't have this,so we have to make it up or
listen to Unruffled, which is apodcast of this woman who has
this beautifully soft voice andshe talks about parenting
toddlers.
But I assign that as homeworkto my clients who are doing some
inner child work to learn howto develop a kind voice even if

(09:47):
they don't have kids, because alot of us don't have the example
.
No one modeled it for us, so wehave no idea what that sounds
like.
So if you want to check outUnruffled and utilize that to
help you create this innerdialogue, great, but you're
going to.
Step one name your feelingwithout judging.
Step two respond like a safeparent would.
So you're going to channel theinner voice you wish you had

(10:10):
heard growing up from a parentSay things like hey, I'm here,
I've got you.
It's okay to feel this way.
You know, being heard is normal, it's a part of life.
Or wow, you're angry, Iunderstand that.
Or hey, you're feeling reallynervous about this social event.

(10:31):
I'm here for that, I get it.
I'm not going anywhere.
So use mirror work or voicenotes if that feels powerful to
you.
Use the podcast Unruffled todevelop this voice.
If that feels powerful to you,talk about this with your
therapist.
Hire me for coaching.
I've got an amazing three-monthintensive program called the

(10:52):
Rewrite Intensive.
Check that out on my website,kaylareillycom, if you're really
into that.
But anyways, okay, name withoutjudgment, respond like a safe
parent.
And step three, reflect on theroot, not just the reaction.
Ask yourself, when have I feltthis before Y'all?
Healing happens when we face it, trace it, erase it.

(11:15):
So you're facing it by namingthe emotion.
Yeah, now this part is tracingit, understanding where this
comes from and why this feelingis ingrained into you.
Right, this is probably afeeling that's familiar to you
and that's why your nervoussystem is reacting to this

(11:36):
feeling familiar to you andthat's why your nervous system
is reacting to this feeling.
It also helps you separate thenow from the then, because a lot
of times, 80% of what we'rereacting to is our trauma from
our past.
And a lot of people that I workwith say, well, I don't have
trauma.
And I'm like, oh okay, so tellme about your parents growing up
and eventually they share withme that their mom was super

(11:57):
critical and judgmental ofothers.
And I'm like, oh, okay, so tellme about your parents growing
up and eventually they sharewith me that their mom was super
critical and judgmental ofothers.
And I'm like, hey, you know, Ineed you to start to understand
that is a trauma.
Trauma is just a learnedreaction that something is
dangerous.
Right, that's all it is.
Something felt dangerous to youthat really wasn't and you've

(12:19):
learned it and now it's in yoursystem and a lot of these
experiences we have.
You can call it whatever youwant micro traumas, or little T,
big T, whatever you want.
There's lots of differentterminology in the psychology
space, but the important thingto know is trauma doesn't always
look like being in a caraccident.
Trauma doesn't always look likea parent hitting you or a

(12:43):
parent hitting another parent infront of you when you were a
kid.
Trauma can be being emotionallyinvalidated, being minimized,
yeah, so when have I felt thisbefore?
It helps you separate the nowfrom the then, so that you can
respond instead of react.
A lot of us react to emotionsinstead of calming down and

(13:07):
taking a time to really process.
Hey, I'm going to name thisfeeling, I'm going to respond to
myself like a safe parent would, and then I'm going to reflect
on when have I felt this beforebefore I take action.
That is validating yourself.
So self-validation is thegateway to healthy boundaries of
confidence, emotional stability.

(13:27):
It really is a stepping stoneto all of the beautiful things
that you deserve.
You deserve it.
It really does take practice,but the more that you do it, the
less you're going to twistyourself into a knot and try to
seek external validation and allthat nonsense.
If you loved this episode or youknow somebody that needs to

(13:48):
hear it, please share.
Please share.
Help others.
Assign it to your client.
Share it with your therapist Idon't know Whoever you are.
Share and hey, you make sense.
I see you.
You're doing a great job.
Hop on over to my website,kaylarileycom, to check out some
of my free resources and I willcatch you next Monday.

(14:10):
Bye.