Scared of Rejection - wc 10/07/2023

Day 1/Intro - “It doesn't hurt to knock on the door. knock, and wait for the person to respond.”

Welcome back to the blog after a 2 year break. 

Each day this week I will be exploring my relationship with Rejection. 

Rejection: "act of throwing off or away; refusal to accept or grant," 1550s, from French réjection (16c.) or directly from Latin reiectionem (nominative reiectio) "act of throwing back," noun of action from past-participle stem of reicere.

Above is the origin of the word rejection, it gives us some clues about how rejection is understood at an intuitive and intimate level. 

The words used here are "Throwing Back"; not giving, or passing.

As in something was thrown at you, or to you.

Or perhaps it was given to you, but you wanted to return it quickly because it wasn't what you expected. So you threw it back.

Some of my interactions with people do feel like something I have thrown at them.

Frantic, mismatched and kind of random.

Day 2 - "experiencing rejection is one thing, but anticipating it is another."

When you anticipate rejection, you are either rejecting other people by keeping them at arm's length, or rejecting yourself. 

The phrase that came to mind on Day 2 was, "it is important to provide yourself with a soft landing." 

We don’t want anyone to feel rejected, whether it's ourselves or other people, whether it is out of fear or disapproval; it's not ideal. 

You need to let your interactions with people land, and provide them with a soft landing. It's easy to be self critical but this isn't helpful. 

We try to give our time and attention to people in an intentional way. If you've done the best you can, the ball is in the other person's court.

Day 3 - "seeing yourself through other people's eyes."

My assumptions about how people see me, makes rejection even more intimidating. 

They can be quite negative, but more importantly they are shallow. They are limited to a small facet of who I actually am.

One thing I am working on is sharing myself with others in a more generous way. 

Maybe my interactions with people feel frantic and random, because I am providing them with such a small part of who I am.

This day I thought about how I see myself through other people's eyes. I think I have outgrown this view of myself. I had been clinging onto it because it's what I am used to and it feels safe.

This day I realised it's okay to "update" how you see yourself through other people's eyes.

Day 4 - "slow down."

Not a lot happened on this day, but I found myself actually having time to pause when I found myself falling back into unhelpful thinking patterns. Anticipating disapproval is learned through past experience, and then it just runs on autopilot. 

Day 5 - "sometimes strength is demonstrated by not doing."

I think there are active demonstrations of strength and then more passive ones. I definitely lean more on the active side.

Doing, saying, going, seeking, holding on. Passive demonstrations of strength look more like not doing, not saying, attracting rather than seeking, and letting go rather than holding on; but these are still demonstrations of strength. 

I consider myself a strong person, but is it really strength when it's all skewed in one direction? When it's skewed like this it might actually be a weakness.

I think that anticipating rejection, is using an active approach where a passive approach might be more useful. A passive approach might look like:  leaving behind certain assumptions, being curious about other people and letting them fill in the blanks, allowing things to emerge naturally on their own. 

Day 6 - "This week may have been helpful."

I can definitely notice that I have a bit more confidence. This may or may not be the result of writing. I feel like it's been easier for me to approach people, and easier to leave unhelpful assumptions behind. 

Day 7/Close - "rejection is still intimidating, but I can choose not to make it a thing."

Another passive demonstration of strength is letting go of baggage, or trying to. 

The term baggage has quite negative connotations, but it just means a reluctance to change with your circumstances.

Unfortunately, my baggage has made me more sensitive to rejection. I usually take the more active approach of being hyper vigilant of disapproval, anticipating rejection, and playing down my strengths and accomplishments to rationalise all of this. 

A more passive demonstration of strength would be; letting go of this baggage, letting go of unhelpful assumptions, and just "allowing life to happen for me" rather than experiencing life through my biases.

I'm not saying it's easy, that's why it is a demonstration of strength, but for someone like me it would be quite a different approach.

Writing about this topic has made me realise that it's important to check your assumptions, as some of them might be out of date.  

Going forward I will be providing myself with a soft place to land, and leaning into my softer/more passive strengths.

If you got this far thanks for reading.