A common way of turning pain into suffering is by perceiving that one needs validation from others. Tragically, this substitutes the approval of others for the empowering motivation of self-validation and the vital need to heal and improve oneself.

If you think that validation is what you need, you will try to get someone to confirm that your pain is justified. This keeps you hyper-focused on the pain and the reasons for it. We know that mental focus amplifies and magnifies the object of the focus; the greater the focus on pain, the more intense and more generalized it grows. If........

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