You Don’t Have to Agree With Someone to Validate Their Feelings

Sometimes the problem isn’t that your perspective is wrong. It’s that you’re offering it before the other person is ready to hear it.

It can be hard to know what to say when someone you care about is upset about something, but you don’t see the situation the same way they do. You’re listening, and almost immediately you can see another way to interpret what happened.

Maybe you don’t think they have all the information. Maybe you think they’re making an assumption. Or you simply know that if you were in the same situation, you wouldn’t interpret it the way they are.

So you offer another perspective.

You’re not necessarily trying to dismiss them. You may feel like you’re helping because, if they could see the situation the way you do, maybe it wouldn’t hurt as much.

I know I did.

But I’ve learned that even a helpful perspective may not be helpful at the wrong time. When someone is really emotional about what happened, I’ve found another way to connect with them instead.

I’ve learned that validating someone doesn’t have to mean agreeing with their interpretation of what happened. I can acknowledge that what they’re experiencing feels upsetting, frustrating, or painful without saying that I see the situation exactly the same way.

That distinction has made validation feel much more natural to me. I don’t have to decide who is right before I can understand why someone is hurting.

Why Another Perspective Isn’t Always Helpful 

For a long time, someone very close to me would tell me about things their friends or family had done that bothered them. Sometimes they believed the other person had intentionally done something to them, and I could see another possible explanation.

So I would share it.

The problem was, my different perspective wasn’t always appreciated. I think what this person sometimes heard was that I was dismissing them or that I was never on their side.

And I can understand that.

If I share something that has really upset me, particularly when I’m already in a low or emotional state, I’m not always looking for someone to immediately explain why I might be looking at it wrong. Even if there is another way to look at it.

That’s the part I think I was missing.

Timing matters.

Someone can be so caught up in the emotion of an experience that they aren’t in a place to consider another interpretation yet. 

Trying to give them one in that moment may just make them feel like I don’t understand why they’re upset.

Psychologist and relationship author George Pransky has a way of describing this that I find useful: whatever state of mind someone is in becomes their present reality. 

Trying to talk them out of that reality while they’re still caught up in it may not get very far. That helped me see why a different perspective can be reasonable and still be almost impossible for someone to hear in that particular moment.

That doesn’t mean I can never share what I see. The conversation may come up again later, when the emotion isn’t as high. They may ask me, “What do you think?” They may even start questioning their original interpretation themselves.

There can be another opportunity for my perspective.

It just doesn’t always have to be right now.

So I’ve started using a different strategy when someone is in the middle of the emotion.

How I Validate Feelings Without Agreeing 

Instead of responding to the person’s interpretation of what happened, I respond to the experience they’re having because of it.

Let’s say someone tells me, “My friend is always blaming me for things. We’re supposed to be friends, and I don’t like that.”

My old response might have been to start examining whether the friend was actually blaming them.

“Do you think she really meant it that way?”

“Could she have been trying to say something else?”

Now I might simply say:

“Yeah, it doesn’t feel good to be blamed.”

I can say that honestly. I’ve felt blamed before, and it doesn’t feel good.

I don’t have to know whether the friend was actually blaming them. I don’t have to decide whose interpretation of the situation is correct. Instead of connecting with their interpretation, I’m connecting with the emotional experience underneath it.

That gives me something simple to listen for: not necessarily the part of the story I agree with, but the feeling underneath it. I might say, “That sounds really frustrating,” “I can understand why that hurt,” or “It makes sense that feeling left out would bother you.” 

None of those responses require me to agree about why the situation happened. They simply let the person know I understand something about what the experience is like for them.

And I’ve found that when someone is already upset, that can create much more connection than immediately offering another way of looking at what happened.

I Don’t Have to Agree to Understand 

I think this is the distinction I was missing before.

There’s a difference between saying:

“Yes, your friend was definitely blaming you.”

and:

“I understand why feeling blamed would bother you.”

The first requires me to agree with someone’s interpretation. The second doesn’t.

I’m not pretending to believe something I don’t believe. And I’m not giving up the right to have a different perspective. I’m simply recognizing that this may not be the moment for that perspective.

Some people genuinely want to know how you see a situation. They’ll ask, “What do you think?”

Other times, people need to work through the emotion first. And as you get to know the people in your life, you start to recognize what they tend to be looking for in those moments.

I’ve also learned that I don’t have to spend so much energy trying to get someone to see what I see when they’re clearly not in a place to receive it.

I can listen. I can find the part of their experience that I genuinely understand. I can offer comfort there.

And then I can let that be enough for that moment.

Maybe the conversation comes up tomorrow and they’re more open to another perspective. Maybe a week later they ask me what I thought about the whole thing. Or maybe they figure something out on their own.

My perspective hasn’t disappeared just because I didn’t offer it immediately.

I’m just becoming more aware that there can be a time for understanding and a time for looking at things differently—and they don’t always have to happen in the same conversation.

Sometimes the best way I can connect with someone I disagree with is to understand how the experience feels to them first.

The other perspective can wait for the right timing.