> What does "validating emotions" even mean. It's a bit of a misnomer for the process of explicitly acknowledging the emotions that someone else might be feeli

> What does "validating emotions" even mean. It's a bit of a misnomer for the process of explicitly acknowledging the emotions that someone else might be feeling, trying to understand the causes of that inner feeling, and prioritizing that acknowledgement and understanding over any subsequent claims as to whether that emotion is unjustified. Saying things like "You're wrong to feel X, because Y!" is corrosive to trust; it leaves our counterparty in doubt as to whether we even care in the least that they felt X in the first place, or might care in the future about any similar situation. "Validating" X means explicitly giving up that option of attacking their feelings in such strong terms - as such, it's a subtle part of day-to-day diplomacy, especially among people who don't trust each other all that much! And the good part is that, once one has achieved that validation, talking effectively about Y only becomes all-the-easier! Added - do you think that children always trust their parents to pursue something close to their best interest, and to never victimize them? Parent-on-child abuse of various sorts is a thing, too. And the parent-child relationship doesn't even start off with that kind of trust. Many kids routinely engage in what we would regard as e.g. pathological lying and gaslighting, if adults did the same thing; we only get to think of such behavior as humorous because they aren't very good at it. They do generally grow out of such things as their moral development leads them to internalize the notions of affective empathy and, yes, trust.