Approval — The driving force
Approval, the driving force behind human actions and perception. Career, our relationships, and our view of the world to some extent are shaped by our attitude towards approval. Approval of your mentor, your senior, or someone you love dearly. Humans tend to alter their perception based on the approval they are seeking. For a loved one, you desire to be accepted, you desire to be wanted or to be loved at least as much as you do. To seek this approval, many go out of their way. Our general perception of a person is, in my opinion, based on the sort of approval we are trying to seek from that certain individual. If you want to be accepted and loved, you tend to perceive the individual in question as someone close to perfection. In this article, I will be discussing approval in different scenarios.
Human motivation is fueled by approval. I recently watched Black Swan. While I could go long about how great the movie is, why everyone should watch it and how great Natalie Portman performed, I like to look at the idea underneath all the dark that is in Black Swan. Approval. The leading character seeks approval in different forms, from her mentor, from her mother, and maybe from the audience. Throughout the movie, we see her struggling. She is dedicated to dancing more than anything. The source of her motivation is simply approval. We see her life going downhill, her personality degrading, her social life being close to none. While she achieves great success, but she is not able to enjoy the success she has achieved. Over-reliance on approval from others can lead us down dark paths. Whiplash, an amazing movie on a dedicated drummer. Black Swan and Whiplash are the same movies other than the storyline of course. Both of the leading characters seek approval from their mentor and their parent. So human motivation is partly, or largely fueled by our sense and level of approval.
Love has been defined, over the ages by many different people. Most have many theories on why it fails. The process of love, however, is largely revolving around approval. Approval from someone we love drives us to do things differently or even perceive certain situations differently. It’s not only about intimate relationships. Your relationship with your parents or other family members also revolves partly around approval. Both parties are actively seeking approval and go to lengths to make sure their efforts are approved. That is the case in a healthy relationship at least. Most relationships die because relationships require two people to work not one. It requires you to put the other person first and you being put first by the other person. Above all, it requires approval. Approval that you are doing a good job and you are doing well.
A healthy amount of seeking approval is good. It can drive you to put effort into all the important things in your life. Seeking too much approval from someone else can often result in bad situations. We tend to keep pushing forward until we are approved. But if we possess a certain level of control over how much and from whom we seek approval, I think we can use approval to be the best version of ourselves.
This article was purely based on opinion in addition to my knowledge and understanding of human nature. Thank you for reading this far. I really appreciate it.
