Fear of Rejection

I imagine we have all felt abandoned at some point during our lives. Some of us spend the majority of our lives with a feeling of not belonging or fitting in. It stems from a fear of rejection. Struggling time and time again with this fear of rejection leaves us focusing on what didn't happen rather than what did.

For example, if you attend a new class and you meet two people who wanted to talk and then the third person walks away after a minute, we tend to focus on the person who walked away rather than the people who stayed and wanted to speak to us. Or not being able to hold down a job because you don't get on with the people you work with. Someone might look at you the wrong way and you feel like they are rejecting you. This preempting of relationships in the work place then leads to you either leaving or being fired.

Seeing rejection where it is not. We then turn inwards and wonder what we have done wrong, why was that person not interested in us? And the feeling of not belonging increases.

How can we change this? Small steps! Can we broaden our view and stand back and look at the class as a whole? Who did talk to us or who looked friendly and might have wanted to talk if we'd tried.

Focusing on the one negative rather than seeing the positive interactions will increase the energy we are projecting on ourselves of feeling left out and that no one is interested. This can be exhausting!

One small step could be setting goals that are achievable like speaking to 3 new people at the class regardless of what their reaction is or joining an online group and commenting on a post each day. This develops your skills and stress tolerance by putting yourself out there. Focus on skills rather than outcomes that we can't control.

Nicki

Journal posts share Nicki's experience and aren't medical advice. If you have a health concern, please speak to your GP. Wellbeing note and crisis support

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