Do you often find yourself scared of being rejected? Maybe you stay in your comfort zone out of fear of being judged or rejected? Perhaps you find that rejection affects both your love life and your career? Whatever it is affecting, there are ways that you can overcome your fear of rejection.
For some, the fear of rejection can have a big impact on their life and how they live it. For example, maybe you don’t try and progress in your career from a fear of being told no, or you haven’t asked out your crush because you are scared about what they might say.
It’s common to not want to be rejected in life, however developing a fear of rejection can sometimes cause problems. Before we talk about how to overcome the fear of rejection, let’s look at the causes.
Why Do We Fear Rejection?
There can be a variety of reasons as to why we might develop a fear of rejection and it can be different for everyone. Here are some of the most common reasons that we may develop a fear of rejection:
- Past Experience. - You may fear rejection because of the experiences you went through as a child or in the past. You could have old trauma that triggers the feeling of rejection.
- Anxiety or Low Self-Confidence. - You could suffer from anxiety or low self-esteem which can heighten your fears of rejection and judgment.
- Fear Of Being Embarrassed or Judged. - Perhaps you have been embarrassed or judged by people in the past. If so, this could be one of the reasons that you have developed a fear of rejection (because you don’t want to be judged by others).
These are just a few of the reasons that some of the reasons as to why we may fear rejection.
7 Ways To Overcome Fear Of Rejection
There are some simple techniques that you can do to help you overcome the fear of rejection. Most of them you could even start practicing today.
In your everyday life, you could face rejection; whether it be from a potential partner, a work colleague or maybe at a job interview, so it can be extremely beneficial to have your own way to overcome this fear.
Here are 7 ways to overcome the fear of rejection.
1. Practice Being Vulnerable
Try and be kind to yourself. Accept yourself for who you are and practice being vulnerable. Rejection can be hard, especially when we are stepping outside of our comfort zone, so practicing being vulnerable before can be important.
Try to be more open with yourself and others. Know that it’s OK to be vulnerable and that you can express your thoughts and feelings in a respectful way. Try to listen to your emotions and feelings without pushing them to the back of your mind.
Being vulnerable lets people know that you can be open and express how you feel. This can make it easier to deal with slightly negative situations such as rejection.
2. Learn From Rejection
Try to look at rejection from a different perspective. Think of rejection as a lesson to learn from. You can learn from being rejected (whether its work related or love related). It can help you to make improvements and focus on yourself.
Say you are rejected for a job interview, you can ask them for some feedback so that you can improve on the skills you may have lacked. This sort of rejection has positive and negatives.
Sadly, you can’t go through life without facing some rejection. If you can use rejection as ways to improve yourself and also learn an important lesson then this can really help you to overcome the fear of rejection.
3. Practice Mindful Breathing and Meditation
Mindfulness can really help you to stay in the present moment and focus on one thing at a time. This can be particularly helpful when your mind is racing with worry about being rejected, for example.
This can help you to clear your mind and calm you down - which is great if you are facing stress. You could even practice mindful breathing techniques before a job interview (where you may be worried about rejection) and this can help to calm you down before.
So next time you feel your fear appear, try some mindful breathing techniques or meditation techniques to help calm you down.
4. Develop A Resilient Mindset
Try to be more resilient when it comes to handling negative feedback or recovering from difficult situations. A good way to develop a resilient mindset is by trying to focus on the positives and learning from past mistakes.
If in your mind, you know that people might reject you or judge you, you can build on your resilience and learn to handle rejection easily and positively. Instead of focusing on the bad or what might happen in these situations, try to focus on the good that could come from it and what you can learn from too
5. Find The Root Of Your Fear
Try to think about why you have this fear and if there was anything in particular that could have caused it. Maybe you faced rejection when you were a child? This could have a negative effect on how you deal with rejection in the present.
Maybe you’ve always had a hard time when it comes to job interviews or first dates? All of these factors can contribute to your fear of rejection. It’s important to know why you have developed this fear so that you can work on overcoming it.
Think about past experiences you’ve had and ask yourself why you think this fear has developed over time.
6. Know That People Will Judge You
Once you can come to terms with the fact that people will judge you or reject you, regardless of how hard you try, it can make rejection seem less scary. Unfortunately, you cannot control how people feel about you and you can’t make people accept you if they don’t want to.
If you can understand this, then you should become more open to the fact that you may be rejected by someone. It’s common to think the worst and blame yourself when you have been rejected, but it’s important to realize that everyone will go through rejection at some point in their lives.
Knowing that people will judge you and possibly reject you and that it is out of your control can help you to overcome your fear of rejection, or at least, make facing rejection a little easier.
7. Self-Hypnosis
Another great way to overcome a fear of rejection is to change your mindset and replace any negative beliefs you might have. Self-hypnosis can help to do this. If you have negative and limiting beliefs (which could be causing your fear of rejection) then self-hypnosis can help to replace these beliefs with more positive and helpful ones.
As well as helping you to stay relaxed and clear your mind, listening to the ‘Overcome Fear Of Rejection’ self-hypnosis track can also help you to see rejections and even your past rejections in a more positive light.
Self-hypnosis can be a great way of changing your subconscious beliefs and overcome your fear of rejection.
8. Acknowledge Your Emotions
Try to not push your emotions to the side and ignore how you are feeling as this could only make things worse. It’s always better to acknowledge your emotions and understand that you might feel stressed or worried when facing rejection, but that it isn’t the be all and end all.
If you ignore your emotions then it can cause you to push things aside until you reach a breaking point. This can make situations seem a lot worse than they actually are and cause you to feel worse.
Try to understand that how you feel is OK and that acknowledging your emotions can help to deal with difficult situations.
Overcome Fear Of Rejection With Self-Hypnosis
Having a fear of rejection can sometimes hold you back from stepping out of your comfort zone and keep you feeling negative about certain situations. That’s why it’s important to try and change your mindset.
Self-hypnosis is one of the best ways to do this, as your subconscious mind can be re-wired to develop more positive thoughts and let go of the negative thoughts. All of the other tips suggested are very effective too, so you can try as many as you like.
