Right With Validation — Or Wrong With Life Lessons

“You don’t want anyone to tell you, you are wrong.”

“Why must you always behave as if you are stupid?” Illiana fights with Leslie, her oldest sister, as they sit inside her office.

“And you don’t!” Leslie fought back swaying her head left to right.

“Look at my life?” she said in frustration. “It sits on both right and wrong decisions that I made and learn from.”

“So, you are jealous because mine sits on the right decisions?” Leslie threw out.

Illiana’s body unconsciously jerks back and forth as her breathing increases. She straightened herself upwards, pulled a long breath from deep within her, stamped her feet, and released, staring into Leslie’s eyes, “Are you sure you want me to walk you back into the mess you made of your life and ours in the name of being right all of the time?”

“Go ahead. Make my day,” Leslie taunts.

“You don’t want anyone to tell you that you are wrong.”

“And you do?” she asked with furled brows.

“Being right is packed with validation which boosts egos and teaches nothing. Being wrong is filled with pain and life lessons. Which lasts longer than all of the validation you demand by refusing to admit you make a mistake.”

“I am still going,” she continues boasting.

“And your mistakes go with you and keep sabotaging your life,” Illiana informs. “In twelve years, you have lost two husbands, and you are RIGHT.”

“Their loss,” she said shrugging her shoulders, turning away before her sister could see the pain the memory of two failed marriages was erupting. “And yes, I am right!”

“They got your house, half of your business, which you had to sell to them because you didn’t have enough money to buy them out. Because you are RIGHT,” Illiana refreshes her memory.

She huffed and puffed, rolled her eyes as the memory forced open a sealed door to a room packed with pain.

“The judge hands full custody of your two children to your ex-husbands,” Iliana kept tugging her memory unaware of the pain that was erupting inside of her sister. “And you are RIGHT.”

Illiana didn’t see the pain on her sister’s face, she was busy sending her message, “Your children will grow up without much memory or life lessons of and from you. They don’t know you because the four hours you see them on Saturdays isn’t enough to create lasting memories. But you are RIGHT, so it doesn’t matter.”

Swaying her head as the pain sent tears that she couldn’t control, Illiana saw it and went on.

“You must be RIGHT, and you used your need to be right all of the time to sabotage your life, relationships, friendships and everything else in your life that is productive and progressive,” Illiana nailed into her heart.

Silence maintained as the truth and pain forced Leslie to realize that all of the efforts, she put into being RIGHT all of the time was a mistake.

Illiana reached out and hugged her sister as she wept.

Minutes later, Leslie admits. “I can’t believe that I am that stupid.”

“There is nothing wrong with being stupid,” Illiana soothes her eyes touching her sister’s tears and she said to lessen her pain, “But it is if you continue being stupid and not learning from all of the things you do to wreck your life.”

“How come you are smarter than I am? I am the oldest. You should be learning from me. Not teaching me,” Leslie questioned wiping her eyes.

“Life lessons come from understanding, common sense, curiosity, innocence, love, and pain. It also comes from the life, living, choices, actions, decisions, consequences and outcome of those around us,” Illiana explains.

Staring at her sister in awe, she asked, “you have been paying attention to all of the nonsense I have been doing?”

“How did you think I learned to be smarter than you? I saw the consequences of your decisions,” Illiana explains. “I saw how it affects everyone in your life.”

Leslie said hugging her little sister, admitting, “Being right has made a mess of my life and taught me nothing valuable. Will anyone forgive me?”

“We will, if you are willing to admit your mistakes and learn from them,” Illiana assures her.

All of us know and have people in our lives who must be RIGHT all of the time, at whatever the cost. I don’t have a problem with being wrong. That’s how I and millions of smart people learn to be and do better after seeing the mistakes we make, and the ones made by others. The smart humans in our world will tell you, that being wrong teaches lessons, being right can’t. Heck being right leaves no room for learning anything. We get validation and gratification from being right. Pain and lessons from being wrong.

Being right boosts egos and brings joy. Being wrong hurts but teaches valuable life lessons that improve life and living. Acknowledge your mistakes. Then learn from them.

That’s the RIGHT way to go.

For 2024, what will it be? Right with Validation? Or Wrong with Life Lessons.

A Happier and Kinder New Year to all.

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