Overcoming Fear Of Rejection The Easy Way

When I was about 16 years old I had an overwhelming fear of rejection. This showed up most obviously when I was around women I was attracted to. But I experienced it in almost all other areas of my life.

I was afraid of meeting new people in general. I tried to stick with my own clan I knew from school.

When someone new was introduced to me I’d get super nervous and awkward.

Anxiety would pump through my veins.

I felt inferior to others, and worried about others noticing that. I also blushed at the drop of a hat…

… and when I did, I’d beat myself up for that (rejecting myself) endlessly.

I felt helpless and out of control.

When others noticed me blushing, my face going red, it was even worse.

My thoughts around getting rejected at the time were that I might communicate interest to a girl and she would reject me.

And then the whole world would come to know about it.

Or someone would see that I was interested in a girl, and point it out to me.

Or, that someone would see me uncomfortable, see some weakness within me, and take advantage of it and make me feel bad.

They’d then laugh at me and lose respect for me.

Now, years later, having done just about anything possible to overcome my fear of rejection, I have managed to completely free myself of it.

And because I’m not worried about it, it practically doesn’t happen anymore. Or maybe I don’t notice it, who knows.

I’ve tried a wide variety of things to overcome my fear of rejection. But the biggest transformation happened for me once I actually released the deep pain of rejection I was carrying within me.

Once that was gone, clearing the remaining fear of rejection was pretty easy.

I’ll get into what I used -and you can use this too, I’ll teach it to you- for this in a second.

Let’s first have a look at what it really is so you can properly understand it.

When you understand what’s going on it’s easier to get rid of it.

Fear of rejection…

  • Is an irrational belief that no one will accept you for the person you are, what you stand for and how you behave.
  • Causes you to put more importance on what other people think of you than your own opinion of yourself. This puts other people in charge of your emotions. Other people can “push your buttons”.
  • Causes you to act cautious out of a fear of saying or doing something “wrong”. You are constantly “walking on eggshells”. You withhold your true feelings and opinions out of this almost continuous fear of not being accepted and respected.
  • Causes you to look for reassurance in other people, seeking their approval. You fear their disapproval of you as a person. This drains other people’s energy and chases them away from you.
  • Can cause you to act needy and jealous in relationships. Driving the other party away from you.
  • Can cause you to want to be in a relationship too fast, looking for security. Same thing, it pushes the person away from you.
  • Can cause you to reject others out of the fear of being rejected yourself.
  • Can cause you to constantly try to fit in to society’s norms and standards. You want to blend in and are afraid of owning and presenting your own unique self to the world.

Why You Suffer From Fear Of Rejection

You fear getting rejected because you carry the hurt, sadness, shame and other bad feelings from getting rejected in the past within you.

This is an emotional wound. And this wound in most cases has been formed as the result of many repetitive, smaller rejections during early childhood.

In most cases, these come from your mom or dad.

Having critical, judgmental, perfectionistic parents is often at the root of it. When you are constantly criticised, your brain starts to form beliefs like:

  • I’m not OK the way I am
  • I’m not good enough
  • I’m bad/wrong
  • I’m unacceptable
  • There’s something wrong with me
  • I’m unlovable

Psychotherapist David Richo who I interview on my “Social Anxiety Solutions podcast” talks about emotional wounds at great length. Listen to that below:

When you have this emotional wound, you’re afraid of experiencing this emotional pain again. Whenever you find yourself in a situation you might get rejected, your brain (who’s prime directive is to move you away from pain and danger) alerts you that you might get rejected again.

As a result you feel fear and anxiety.

Strategies For Overcoming Your Fear Of Rejection

Now the initial strategies I learned when I was in my teens were all mindset-based and behavioural-change based.

They were a form of have this mindset, change your thoughts, and face your fears in this way.

The mindsets were things like “see meeting new people as a social experiment”, “give a different meaning to rejection such as this person is in a bad mood it says nothing about me” and so on.

That was mildly helpful.

The behavioural approaches were helpful in that I now had something I could actually go and do.

I make it sound easier than it was, because I was absolutely terrified doing so.

I was approaching girls, I was purposely embarrassing myself, I was purposely rejecting myself, I was doing public speaking and all these things I learned that would make me become “rejection-proof”.

Days in advance I wouldn’t be able to sleep, so scared I was in anticipation of facing my fears.

I did it, and I did feel more confident after it. Bu that hard-earned confidence was short-lived.

None of these strategies actually helped me to get rid of the feeling of rejection I was carrying around inside of me.

They didn’t change these subconsciously held beliefs that there was something wrong with me.

And while forcefully facing my fears did diminish some of my fears, the results weren’t lasting.

And that was because the fear of rejection was just a symptom of a deeper underlying problem.

The problem that I carried that feeling of rejection within me. The strongly held belief that I wasn’t OK and there was something wrong with me didn’t change.

That people didn’t want me around was still my experience. So this mindset and forcefully facing my fears approach wasn’t dealing with the underlying problem…

I’ve eventually by luck stumbled on a simple technique to get rid of the feeling of rejection.

It’s a technique to rapidly release painful emotions like fear, hurt, anxiety and shame.

This sounds like a stupid wonder drug commercial coming up, but this is not like that at all.

This is a technique with which you can heal those inner wounds.

When you are free of this fear of rejection you will experience an unbelievable security, confidence and freedom.

I share with you what that technique is for free. I’ll tell you how I used it to overcome my fear of rejection, and my social anxiety. I’ll demonstrate to you visually how to become anxiety-free. I’ll teach you the basics of it. And I’ll give you an experience of it over a series of videos.

If you’re willing to give that a go, put your name and email below and I’ll send it over to you.

 

RELATED PAGES:

Changing Your Beliefs 101

Go to part 1/3: How To Change Your Beliefs

Go to part 2/3: Challenging Beliefs To Change Your Beliefs

Go to part 3/3: Changing Core Beliefs To Improve Your Self Esteem
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