Tiny Buddha

Tag: rejection

  • 8 Ways to Stop Worrying About What Other People Think of You

    8 Ways to Stop Worrying About What Other People Think of You

    “You can’t force anyone to value, respect, understand, or support you, but you can choose to spend your time around people who do.” ~Lori Deschene

    It can be paralyzing.

    The worry about what other people think about you, I mean. That worry can hinder you from pursuing your dreams. It can stop you from expressing your true nature and stand in the way of the life you so badly want to create.

    This worry can easily get your mind wandering to dark places and trigger feelings of insecurity, anxiety, and self-doubt. When it has a grip on you, you do anything to avoid rejection, ridicule, and potential embarrassment. Better to be unseen than negatively judged, right?

    You know that you shouldn’t worry about what others think of you. But that’s just easier said than done.

    For a long time, I felt stuck because I was afraid of other people’s opinions. Due to this fear, I was terrified of pursuing a new career path. Eventually, I reached a point where I couldn’t take it anymore.

    I knew I had to deal with the fear and worry of other people’s judgment, or I wouldn’t be able to live the life I wanted. And I was not willing to compromise on that—neither should you.

    To help you move past the fear of other people’s opinions, I’ve put together a list of ideas that have helped me. Use this list as your go-to whenever your worries about what other people’s opinions get the best of you.

    1. Know that you’re not a mind reader.

    I used to assume that I knew what other people thought of me. But assumptions often lead to bad conclusions.

    When I left my corporate job to travel and pursue my own entrepreneurial endeavor, I was afraid of ex-colleagues judging my decision. I thought they would see me as naive, reckless, or foolish for making that decision.

    Turned out I couldn’t have been more wrong. During the following months and years, many of them became my greatest supporters! Some said I was brave for walking my own path, others opened up about their desires to do something similar. The takeaway here is: You never know what people think about you unless you give them a chance to speak.

    2. Understand that it’s never about you.

    This has been a game-changer for me! Hear this: Another person’s judgment about you is never about you—it’s about them. It’s a reflection of their fears, limitations, and perceptions.

    One of the closest people in my life told me that I was making a mistake by quitting my corporate job to start my own business.

    First, I felt that he judged me and didn’t support my decision. Later on, I realized that his reaction was a mirror of his beliefs, fears, and view on the world. For him, staying at a corporate job meant security, safety, and a good life.

    When I realized that he always had my best interest at heart, I felt nothing but compassion and love for him. To make sure you navigate your choices right, ask yourself: What do I want? What is the right thing for me to do?

    3. Stop judging yourself.

    Many times, we’re so aware of what we find awkward about ourselves that we look for others to confirm our beliefs. So, the judgment we fear from others is really a reflection of what we judge ourselves for. Sneaky, right?

    Be honest with yourself, what do you judge yourself for? It can be related to your health, career, relationship status, living situation, or looks. Then ask yourself why you judge yourself for this. What beliefs are driving the judgments? Do you believe it’s wrong to prioritize career over family? Do you believe it’s bad to be the center of attention?

    Once you challenge these beliefs and stop judging yourself, you’ll be able to make peace with who you are and the choices you’ve made, good and bad. Once you’ve reached acceptance, you won’t fear the judgment of others because you stand behind yourself.

    4. Stop judging others.

    The more we judge others, the more we tend to believe that they judge us. It’s a vicious cycle. So, instead of judging others for their choices, character, religious views, ways to dress, or something else, choose to be curious about the differences and diversity.

    Ask yourself what you can learn from this person? Why this person is in a certain way? Maybe there are reasons for it. As Wayne Dyer said, “When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself.”

    5. Use your worry as guidance.

    What is it that you worry other people will judge you for? Perhaps it’s your job position, living situation, relationship status, insecurities, looks, or intelligence. That worry tells you there’s either something you need to accept and make peace with or something you need to change.

    For example, maybe you can start pursuing a new career path that feels more aligned with your values. Or maybe you can choose to view your situation today as a stepping stone to something better. When you approve of yourself and your life, other people’s opinions won’t matter as much.

    6. Expect reactions from others.

    Instead of trying to avoid getting reactions from others, expect them! If you try a new plant-based diet, change career paths, or decide to go all-in on that geeky hobby of yours, expect people to say something about it. And take it as a good sign because it means you’re doing what’s right for you, even though people will have opinions about it.

    As Aristotle said, “There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.” And that’s not you, right? You are here to live to the fullest, follow what excites you, and be the incredible person that you are.

    7. Focus on long-term happiness.

    Judgment and criticism from others can hurt. But it will never hurt as much as regret. Do you know what most people regret on their deathbed? This: “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”

    Be willing to take judgment and criticism in the short term, in exchange for what will serve you long term. Focus on living life true to yourself and not on the life others expect of you.

    8. Approve of yourself.

    Acceptance of yourself is what it all comes down to, right? Once you approve of yourself, you stop worrying about other people’s opinions. You have the one approval that matters most: your own.

    Look at your imperfections, flaws, and the choices you wish you had made differently and accept it all. Know that you are enough. Know that you’ve done the best you can, from where you once were. We all want you to be the person you are meant to be—including the quirks, flaws, and imperfections.

    —

    Living with the worry that other people will judge you is hard. It can keep you stuck, paralyzed, and separated from the life you want to live.

    It’s time to take your power back. Use this list, choose one or two points that resonate, and practice them. Then, once you’re ready, come back to the list and choose another point.

    Stop living in accordance with other people’s expectations and start living life true to yourself.

    Now, go out and show the world what you’re made of. We are waiting eagerly.

  • What to Do When You Can’t Seem to Love Yourself

    What to Do When You Can’t Seem to Love Yourself

    “You’ll be amazed at what you attract when you start believing in what you deserve.” ~Unknown

    “You just need to love yourself more.”

    I’ve heard that advice so many times when I’ve felt rejected, inadequate, and not enough. And instead of that advice helping me, it has just made me feel even more rejected, inadequate, and not enough.

    Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t angry at the person giving me the advice—I was angry with myself for not being able to love myself unconditionally.

    It’s easier to feel love for yourself when things are going well. When you succeed at something, feel appreciated by someone, or when you feel good about yourself and your life. That’s not when the rubber hits the road. Instead, that happens when things don’t go well. When you fail, mess up, or find yourself with a heart smashed into a thousand pieces.

    It’s in those moments of darkness that love and appreciation for myself have been replaced by judgment, self-loathing, and criticism. That’s when I ‘should’ all over myself.

    It’s in those moments when I’ve been in the company of shame, rejection, and inadequacy that I’ve been told to love myself more. And that’s frankly, much easier said than done.

    Building solid self-esteem is crucial, no doubt about that. But there are different ways to build it. If you also fall into the category of people who struggle with your self-esteem, here’s another approach that truly helped me.

    You Can’t Jump from Inadequacy to Self-Love in an Instant

    In a tough period of my life, I spoke to a therapist. She told me, like so many before her had, to focus on loving myself in those dark moments. When I asked her if she herself was capable of this brilliant advice, her reply was “Oh, I know, it’s actually really hard.”

    Something can sound good in theory, but if it’s not doable to put into practice it won’t make any difference. I needed some more concrete advice I could actually use in my daily life.

    For years, I was under the impression that self-love meant loving yourself in all circumstances, no matter what. In times of happiness, success, satisfaction, gratitude, and joy—as well as in moments of darkness, failure, misery, hurt, and feelings of unworthiness.

    Later on, I realized that the step I was asked to take in those moments was too high. I understood that you can’t go from feeling angry, hurt, or inadequate to loving yourself in an instant. That’s like asking someone to walk a long staircase in one giant step. It’s pretty much impossible.

    In my experience, trying to jump too far too fast means setting yourself up for failure. And what does this lead to? Yep, even more frustration, anger, and feelings of inadequacy.

    Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to practice self-love and to tell ourselves “I love you.” But this may only resonate when you are in a somewhat good-feeling place.

    When I’ve tried to fetch too far on the love scale in moments of stress, despair, and frustration it’s made my mind go: “What the h*ck are you talking about?!” Instead of letting those words sink in, my mind has given me a long list of reasons I don’t love myself at that moment.

    And you know what? I’ve realized that’s perfectly okay. Because it’s hard to think thoughts beyond what we feel in a given moment when that emotion is overpowering. If you’re angry, you access angry thoughts. If you’re feeling insecure, you reach thoughts related to insecurity. If you’re feeling hopeful, you have thoughts connected to hopefulness.

    My point is this: We need to go step by step. We can’t expect ourselves to feel self-love, self-appreciation, and self-respect when we’re not even close to feeling these things. Instead, we need to take the next logical step that will help us feel better about ourselves. Then from that place, we can take another step in the right direction.

    Replace Love with Acceptance

    For me, everything changed when I stumbled upon these words: “I’m enough.” According to Marisa Peer, a world-renowned speaker and pioneering hypnotherapist trainer, these three words will actually change your life.

    “In my three decades as a therapist […], I’ve discovered that the root of so many modern problems— smoking, excessive drinking, compulsive shopping, depression, and overeating—come right back to a need to fill the inner emptiness of not feeling enough’ with external things.”

    Although loving ourselves under all conditions would be ideal, it’s not easy. Maybe it’s not even realistic. And what I’ve realized is that we don’t necessarily need to feel love for ourselves at all times. Instead, what we need to reach in those dark moments is a place of acceptance.

    All of our insecurities and, at times, dislike of ourselves, come from a place of not feeling enough. That time I was standing in front of a crowd, sweating and shaking, I didn’t feel competent enough. Those times I’ve questioned myself in meetings and have kept my mouth shut as a result, I haven’t felt smart enough. Those moments when I’ve looked at other people’s pictures and compared myself, I haven’t felt pretty enough.

    When we feel low on self-esteem we don’t feel enough, simple as that.

    And it’s no wonder that many of us don’t feel enough. That’s what the media and advertising keep telling us over and over again. “You need to weigh this much to be sexy.” “You need this jacket to prove that you’re in style.” “You need this car to show people that you’ve made it.” All in all, they take advantage of our insecurities.

    Self-esteem is about your overall sense of self-worth or personal value. And to truly know and feel that you are worthy, you need to feel that you are enough.

    So, to boost your self-esteem, you need to tell yourself these simple but powerful words: “I’m enough.” To remind yourself over and over and over again (because this is how adults learn: by repetition) that you are enough, no matter the circumstances.

    Realizing this was a huge relief to me. There was nothing wrong with me. There was nothing major that needed to “be fixed.” There was no need to dig into my past to figure out where my self-esteem got bruised. Instead, it’s about repeating and telling yourself that you’re enough.

    If you fail at a project and mess up, remind yourself that you are enough.

    If you come late to a meeting and feel bad for making everyone wait for you, tell yourself that, no matter the situation, you are enough.

    If you get rejected, stood up, or are left with a bruised heart, keep reminding yourself that you are enough, that you’ve always been enough, and that you always will be enough.

    Feeling enough is the baseline to strive for when you feel bad. To remind yourself that, no matter what is going on in your life, you are enough. You are smart enough, pretty enough, valuable enough, kind enough, and intelligent enough. You are enough and that is enough.

    Focus on Your Bounce-Back Rate

    What makes us often fail? That’s right, when we set the bar too high. So even if we’ve put it on a reasonable level by going from loving ourselves to knowing that we are enough, we still can’t expect that we’ll feel enough 24/7 (let’s be realistic here).

    So here’s another piece of advice that has helped me come back faster and quicker than before: When you dip into a dark hole, focus not on why you are lacking self-esteem, but on your bounce-back rate.

    How quickly can you go from feeling insecure, inadequate, and shameful to coming back to feeling enough?

    Take count, not on how many times you fall down, but instead on how quickly you manage to come back. When you fall back into negative thoughts and patterns, use it as your signal to shift and to remind yourself that you are enough.

    Remind Yourself of the Three Little Words

    Developing and nurturing your self-esteem and sense of value is crucial in life. It’s the key to giving and receiving love. It’s the doorway to self-love, self-respect, and self-compassion. And it starts with feeling enough, just the way you are.

    So, use the words “I am enough” as your foundation. Keep reminding yourself of this over and over again, until your mind starts believing you. Put up reminders on your phone, notes in your drawers, and write “I’m enough” on your bathroom mirror.

    Simply, set yourself up for success and solid self-esteem by constantly telling your mind that, no matter what is going on in your life, you are enough. “I’m enough” is the small, but very powerful sentence that will boost your self-esteem.

    Whenever you fall back into a dark hole, remind yourself that it’s not about the number of times you fall down, but about your bounce-back rate.

  • What I Now Know About Rejection and How It’s Set Me Free

    What I Now Know About Rejection and How It’s Set Me Free

    “If someone does not want me, it is not the end of the world. But if I do not want me, the world is nothing but endings.” ~Nayyirah Waheed

    Rejection means a lot of things to a lot of different people. To healthcare professionals, it may mean immunological incompatibility, a body not accepting a transplanted tissue or organ. To a couple that wants to adopt, a rejection letter can be discouraging and devastating news. To a writer, rejection can come in the form of submitting your precious work that you slaved over to a publisher and being told it didn’t quite make the cut.

    I struggle with rejection, and I am no stranger to it. I’ve been rejected for numerous jobs, I’ve lost out on scholarships, I’ve had friends dump me, and boys tell me they don’t like me. It’s impossible to be a human in this world and not experience rejection.

    The hardest form of rejection for me is social rejection. It hurts much more than any other form of rejection because it feels like definitive proof that there is something undeniably wrong with me. Something is wrong with me, and that has just been confirmed by someone else. All of the doubts and shame that have been floating around in my brain finally become real.

    They only invited you to the party because they felt sorry for you. You aren’t cool enough to date that person. Your friends only tolerate you. Who do you think you are? They were bound to find out eventually.

    This fear of rejection has caused more consequences for me than the actual act of rejection itself. This often happens in life, the fear of something being more potent and powerful than the thing we are actually afraid of.

    It’s the anxiety of going to the dentist resulting in sleepless nights and panic attacks. Then when you get there, you realize that it takes thirty minutes and all you need is a routine clean.

    It’s lying in bed at night going over potential disastrous scenarios of your public speech or work presentation, creating a spiral of panic and dread.

    It’s avoiding going to parties, dates, and events because you’d rather avoid any sort of risk, even if it means missing out on the rewards.

    It’s common knowledge that being thirteen years old is one of the worst stages of life for most of us. You feel awkward in your body, your self-esteem is at an all-time low, and you feel misunderstood by the world, especially your parents.

    When I was thirteen, my family decided to move up north to a small beach town, and I started a new school. It was a Christian school that had a shining reputation. I naturally expected it to be filled with loving and kind Christian kids who would accept me with open arms. This was not the case.

    Thirteen-year-old boys are cruel. They immediately heard my Canadian accent and constantly mocked me for it. Growing up, girls are told that when boys are mean to you it’s because they like you. With that mentality, it’s not that surprising that so many women choose to stay with men who treat them like garbage. I’m not sure if these boys had crushes on me, or they just saw an awkward ginger girl who was very out of place and decided to pounce.

    The girls, on the other hand, already had established friendship groups and were not looking to expand, especially to a girl who didn’t fit their cookie cutter Christian image.

    Apart from my very obvious physical differences, I also had very different views to the kids and teachers at the school. I was brought up in a Christian family, but I was still allowed to make up my own mind about issues in the world.

    Being a lost thirteen-year-old who felt very disconnected and dislocated, I gravitated toward the world of feminism and social justice. Sexism and misogyny enraged me, and I found an online community of other women who weren’t afraid to speak their truth and challenge the status quo. It became my whole world, because I had nothing else to subscribe to.

    I was outspoken about my beliefs. I was a proud feminist, I was pro-choice, and I supported LGBT rights. All of these things were completely taboo and blasphemous at the school I went to. I was immediately considered to be the “bad egg,” further ostracizing me from the rest of the school.

    My only friend was Emma, my one shining light in a sea of hostility and judgment. We were kindred spirits, and we felt like it was us against the world. Due to our closeness, rumors started that we were lesbians (the worst sin you could commit at a Christian school, clearly). I remember one kid refusing to share his food with me because I was gay, and another kid spitting on me during P.E class.

    This was the first time in my life I had experienced full on social rejection, loud and clear. Of course, I had experienced exclusion and rejection before that, but never to such an extreme, and none with the clear message of “You are wrong. You do not belong here.”

    And at that vulnerable age, when I was already deeply struggling with self-esteem and teenage angst and disorientation, it had a devastating effect on me.

    I dreaded going to school, I spent lunches sitting alone in a bathroom stall, and I was constantly on the verge of tears. I didn’t even feel like the teachers accepted me or even “saw” me. Even the school counselors felt unsafe; I knew they had ulterior motives and would never truly understand what I was experiencing.

    I only lasted a year and half at that awful school, finally gaining the courage and motivation to leave after some very valuable counseling sessions from an outside source. I moved schools to a public high school, which on paper sounded rougher around the edges, but I truly thrived there.

    My grades soared, I became involved with extracurriculars, I became a prefect, I won awards and scholarships. I found lifelong friends who accepted me, and teachers who became mentors and saw the value and potential in me. I graduated feeling joyous and triumphant.

    Though I had such an awful experience at the Christian school, I had made a change and things got better. It was a confirmation that life could be good, and it wasn’t all loss and rejection.

    The thing is, even though we may feel we’ve moved on from painful experiences, they can still be triggered in our everyday lives and interactions. We can instantly be transported back to those vulnerable and lowest points of our life, and our behaviors and thoughts can still be products of that time.

    Though my schooling experience had a happy ending, I now realize that I am deeply afraid of rejection. I still have this fear inside of me that there is something inherently wrong with me, and once people find that out, they will leave me. This is only made more salient due to this clearly false belief that my suffering and my pain is unique and everyone else in the world seems to have it figured out.

    Though I know this to be logically false, because I am in my own mind, it feels so much more believable and real. Social media, especially Instagram, is known to do this. People can project any image they want out into the world. They show the highlight reel of their lives, the best of the best. They show how much fun they are having, how many friends they have, and how happy they are. How can you not be fooled by that?

    I know that we are all imperfect. We all have insecurities, anxieties, and shame. Brené Brown says “everyone has a story that will break your heart. And, if you’re really paying attention, most people have a story that will bring you to your knees.” When I am at my lowest, I am so preoccupied with my own all-encompassing suffering that I disconnect from the rest of the world.

    I forget that our pain and suffering is actually a connective tissue between us all. Fear of rejection is not a unique phenomenon that I have just discovered. It is an age-old problem that plagues so many of us. It stops us from taking risks, from being vulnerable, and from pursuing our creative passions.

    I notice this fear of rejection creeping up into so many areas of my life. I became more of an “idea” of a person than a real person. I put up barriers so that people won’t get to see the real me. I notice myself embellishing the cool aspects of my life and personality when I’m on a first date, and though we all do that naturally on a first date, I know it stems from a fear of rejection.

    If someone takes longer to reply to me than normal, or their tone changes when texting me, I interpret it as a sign that they are no longer interested or that they hate me. We all see memes about this circulating on Instagram, no doubt a coping mechanism, but it can be truly debilitating.

    The sign of a resilient person, someone whose self-esteem comes from within rather than external validation, is even when you are rejected, it doesn’t break you. You have enough self-worth to know that rejection doesn’t define you, if anything it makes you stronger. If you don’t get invited to a party, if your friends decide to not invite you out, if your Tinder date ghosts you, you are still you.

    My favorite actress/comedian Jenny Slate said in an interview, on constantly drawing and redrawing the picture of who you want to be, “You have to be limber. Every shape that you will be bent into, whether you do it to yourself or you are blown by the wind or someone comes in there and breaks you in half, is still you. No version of myself is permanent, but sometimes those bad parts are trying to fool me into thinking they are permanent.”

    I will never be able to control my life and what people think of me. There will be people who write me off before they even bother to get to know me. There will be people who treat me like sh*t simply because they can. There will be many moments that I could perceive as evidence that there is something wrong with me. But now I know that it’s not true.

    I will always be me, and I can decide if I want to treat rejection as a death sentence or a form of new life.

  • 7 Signs Your Parents’ Love Was (and Is) Conditional

    7 Signs Your Parents’ Love Was (and Is) Conditional

    “The beauty of the truth; whether it is good or bad, it is liberating.” ~Paulo Coelho

    It’s around the time of your mother or father’s birthday. You browse through the card aisles of your local store getting more and more frustrated because you cannot relate to any of the cards you read. You eventually pick out the most generic birthday card you can find and think, “Okay, I’m off the hook until the next holiday.”

    Celebrations often bring up a lot of unresolved issues in families, even in among the most well functioning ones. We are reminded that the relationships we have with loved ones are not only not the way we would like them to be, they are downright unfulfilling.

    Sure, you can accept that your relationship with your family is not what you want. In fact, that’s the healthiest way to look at it, but you still must interact with them, and that just leaves you feeling depleted.

    No one can say that they had a perfect childhood. If someone was to ask a room of people if they grew up in a dysfunctional family, I would be the first to raise my hand.

    Personalities clash from time to time; however, there’s a specific way that people feel when their parents loved them with conditions. There’s a nagging outlook that something was and is always missing, a deep emptiness.

    Unconditional love is when someone loves you without confines. They express their love to you whether you succeed or fail. They don’t hold it against you if you’re going through a tough time. Their love is constant.

    Conditional love is when someone expects perfection at all times, and if you fail, they’re extremely disappointed. They treat failure as a character flaw and have a hard time accepting mistakes. They don’t truly see you. They rarely build you up and instead tear you down.

    The emotions associated with inconsistent parental love are similar to the feelings one may experience during loss. Numbness, anger, sadness, and loneliness are common when you’re working toward acceptance, which is a vital phase of healing after an emotionally lonely childhood. In time you’ll come to the realization that you cannot change your parents and say goodbye to the relationship that will never be.

    Conditional love from a parent is one of the reasons why so many people feel that they will never be enough and have a deep longing for something more in life.

    Not sure if your parents love you conditionally? Here are some signs to look out for.

    1. You feel drained and beaten down after seeing your parent.

    No interaction is ideal from start to finish in any relationship, but if you feel consistently exhausted after seeing your parent, it’s worth looking deeper into your relationship with them. Feeling tired after each interaction with a parent is not the norm.

    2. You never felt like you were good enough as a child or even now as an adult.

    You are perfectly aware of all of your positive attributes in your personal life and career; however, you feel like you’re a failure. Nothing you do makes you feel like you’ve succeeded.

    3. Your parents rarely beamed with pride over your accomplishments.

    Your parent never really talked about you with pride, though you may have heard them boast about your brother, sister, or even acquaintances to others.

    4. They downplay your achievements.

    You accomplish a challenging personal goal. Someone asks you about it and before you can answer him or her, your parent talks over you denying or downplaying your achievement.

    5. They openly reject you in front of others.

    You show up at a family event, and even if you and your parent are seemingly on good terms, they avoid contact with you at all costs. It leaves you feeling deeply hurt and confused, wondering what you did to make them avoid you like the plague.

    6. You dread expressing yourself or talking openly with your parent.

    Your parent says something that may seem insensitive. You’re thrown off and would like to address it, but you’re afraid to express how you feel because you know it wouldn’t be worth the agony. You feel they might lash out, turn the tables on you, or deny your feelings.

    7. You feel they don’t see the adult version of you.

    No matter how much therapy you’ve been through, how many self-help books you’ve read,  how many successes you’ve achieved, or how many people you meet in your adult life that make you feel that you are loved and accepted for who you are, you still feel defensive and attacked in your parent’s presence. You logically know your positive attributes, but around your parent you feel like the child who was trapped in a dysfunctional home with little hope of escaping.

    You may be thinking that all this sounds strikingly similar to the relationship you have with your parent. If so, it’s going to be okay. You are not alone in this. Remember I raised my hand too when the topic of dysfunctional families came up earlier in the article?

    It takes self-awareness, support, self-care, and patience to heal. Just recognizing conditional love isn’t enough to ease the pain. But there is something you can do to create a little relief when you feel those familiar feelings bubbling up.

    First, take a moment to close your eyes and take some deep belly breaths, filling your stomach up with air. Feel the tension in your body. Where are you holding it most—your stomach, chest, jaw, or shoulders? Breathe and release it with each breath until your body feels completely relaxed.

    Next, picture yourself in a bright, beautiful forest or open meadow. You walk through the grass and come to an enchanted pond with a pinkish, golden light. You find a metal pitcher sitting on the edge of the pond and pick it up. You then dip the pitcher into the pond collecting the beautiful liquid.

    You hold it against your body and take another, deep belly breath. Then you hold the pitcher to your nose and smell it, and it smells like the scent that you love the most—like apples, peppermint, lavender, whatever it may be.

    Now allow your heart to slowly open up. This may take some time. Even if your heart doesn’t feel completely open, relax and pour this magnificent liquid downward into your chest area. Let it flow through your heart, your core. DEEP BREATH.

    Your chest opens even more as you sense the space you’re in. Allow yourself to focus on the presence of your surroundings. Now, just sit there for a moment. Take another deep breath and pull the presence back into your chest. Hold it in for a moment and let it flow to your feet. Hold it, then release it into the ground/Earth.

    Open your eyes once you’re ready and feel how this visualization has created space for peace, acceptance, and presence.

    You are and will be okay.

    Take comfort in the fact that, in time, with the help of solid friendships, partners, self-care habits, support groups, coaches, or therapists, you will recognize that your experience with your parents was less about you, and more about the lack of love they may have received when they were children.

    Their pain is not yours and it most definitely was and is not your fault. The best you can do is channel your experience into the changes you’re in control of. The thoughts you choose to believe, the people you select to be around, and the self-care rituals you want to have.

    Recognizing your pain is the beginning of healing. Many loving wishes.

  • Easing a Broken Heart: 5 Ways to Reframe Rejection

    Easing a Broken Heart: 5 Ways to Reframe Rejection

    “When the wrong people leave your life, the right things start to happen.” ~Zig Ziglar

    The end of a relationship triggers many grief emotions, but when a couple breaks up because one person decides that it’s over, there is a very distinct pain: the sting of rejection. It doesn’t matter whether things had been difficult for some time or if the split came out of the blue; either way, rejection feels cruel.

    At the end of my marriage eight years ago, I had no idea that the breakup was coming. On top of the shock that the relationship was suddenly over, I carried the intense and overwhelming feeling of rejection; I was no longer valued, wanted, or needed.

    Rejection can trigger feelings of shame, low self-esteem. and diminished confidence as well as helplessness and victimization. If you are left for another person (which was my experience) the intensity of rejection increases further. I experienced anger and resentment about betrayal; this makes healing feel much harder than in those cases where a decision to split is mutual.

    When I began move through my initial grief, I found that the biggest shift in moving forward came through changing how I viewed rejection. I realized that by identifying with the feeling of rejection I was telling myself that something was wrong with me; that the marriage was over because I hadn’t come up to scratch and, therefore, needed to be let go.

    Of course, this was not true but in the mind of the injured party, it was natural to feel this way. By shifting my perspective, I eventually began to realize that my husband’s decision to leave was not a reflection on me.

    It is always hugely important to acknowledge and process feelings of grief; reframing is not about burying your emotions. However, as I’ve learned from my experience, rather than simply waiting for time to be your healer, you can move through pain far sooner and more effectively by viewing your situation in a different way.

    Here are five ways I helped myself reframe the rejection.

    1. It’s not necessarily about you.

    It’s almost impossible not to take rejection personally. My ex-husband said he left because he wasn’t getting what he needed from our relationship; he needed to follow his “truth,” which no longer included me. His narrative of the breakup became about my inability to be what he needed.

    This is where shame really kicks in. Rejection tells you that you weren’t enough to keep your partner from leaving and, in some cases, you’ve been replaced with someone who can make them happy.

    But what if it’s not all you? As personal and hurtful as the rejection feels, sometimes it happens because the other person is unable to give enough or be enough of what the relationship needs. When someone is unable to love you fully, they will either reject you, or stay in the relationship and treat you badly or indifferently enough until you decide to end it.

    We are all human and it’s very rare that one person is flawless within a relationship. I felt far less rejected when I realized that my ex-husband had his own considerable struggles and issues that led him to choose to leave; it wasn’t all about me.

    2. Relationships are assignments.

    There is a spiritual school of thought that views the people in our lives as lessons. The theory goes that we meet no one by accident; we are all in relationship to further our growth and deepen our connection to ourselves and the universe/each other. Partnerships with a significant other are huge vehicles for growth, but when the learning has gone as far as it can go with one person, it must end.

    Sometimes people leave our lives naturally and comfortably, other times we face the pain of rejection. The lesson is not always obvious at first, especially through the pain of grief, but what is initially perceived as rejection can also be viewed as a release from a completed assignment and an opportunity to learn.

    Consider that you still have much more to achieve with your life, and maybe your partner was not the person to show you the way. Perhaps being released from your relationship will allow you to find what you really need to become the person you are meant to be.

    This reframe can be wonderfully comforting if you choose to find love again in the future. If you learn your difficult lessons from the old relationship, you will grow, and the person you share the next stage of your path with will bring more fulfilment and easier challenges.

    3. Change the ending.

    When someone chooses to leave you, they not only decide that the relationship is over, they also determine “the story” of why it ended. So, why did my marriage end? The event that ultimately broke us apart was his leaving to be with someone else. However, on another level, there was more to it than that.

    I had changed within the marriage; I had been working through a deep personal issue a year or so previously, and had come out of the other side stronger, more content with life, and ready for a happier future with our family. I had grown, but my husband had not changed with me.

    When I became aware of this, I started to view the ending as less about rejection and more about an incompatibility between who we both were. It was an empowering reframe because it allowed me to feel far less victimized. The way he ended the marriage was not excusable, but it held far less of an emotional grip over me.

    Think about ways that you might have been rejected, not for anything you did “wrong,” but for something that altered the nature of the relationship.

    • Did you refuse to have your boundaries crossed or to put up with certain behavior?
    • Have you changed for the better in a way that your ex-partner could not handle?
    • Were you simply yourself and refused to change to please them?

    If you can view the ending in a way that empowers you, even a little bit, it can really ease your pain.

    4. Remember you are still whole.

    The feeling of rejection is greatly fuelled by the beautiful, romantic idea that two people “complete” each other. The conclusion is quite demoralizing; are we are no longer complete because someone doesn’t want us? What is our role in life now that we are not required to complete the other person?

    Losing a partner is painful and the grief of loss is real, but the pain is heightened and prolonged unnecessarily when we believe that we have been rejected by “the other half of ourselves.” It can feel like life has no purpose or meaning anymore. When I began to accept that I was still whole and valuable, it took away the feeling of despair that I was somehow diminished and “less than” because my husband had decided to walk away.

    5. Focus on gratitude.

    I love using gratitude as a tool for helping to shift into a more positive state of mind. Admittedly, in the early days of grieving, it’s not easy to feel grateful for anything at all, so I found it easier to start with making a list each day of the small blessings in my life—the day-to-day things we usually take for granted. I really recommend this as a practice.

    As your mindset starts to shift, you will come to realize that there are genuine reasons to be grateful that you were rejected. Mine included:

    • Finding out about my husband’s affair and my divorce. Who knows how long I could have remained unaware, believing my marriage was something it wasn’t?
    • The chance to learn to value myself more highly and to become aware of how resilient I am.
    • The new life opportunities which came my way once I began to see the loss as an opportunity to have a better life; I know for certain that I would not have the career, and sense of purpose which I have now, without that crisis in my life.
    • The chance to understand myself more fully and begin a new healthier and happier relationship.

    A heart broken by rejection can be a perfect example of a blessing in disguise. The best way to move forward is to allow yourself to feel the pain, then go on to reframe the loss as an opportunity. Trust that the right things will start to come!

  • The Wounds of Rejection Heal With Self-Love and Self-Awareness

    The Wounds of Rejection Heal With Self-Love and Self-Awareness

    “There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn’t matter anymore.” ~Laurie Halse Anderson

    It began in elementary school. I was a chubby immigrant with a thick accent and hand-me-down clothes. I so badly wanted the other kids to like me, and I had no idea why everything I said and did seemed to push them away.

    My jokes and comments would trigger awkward silences or ridicule—especially in groups. Those moments were traumatizing, but they were also confusing. How could I make them like me?

    As I learned English, I found some company in the schoolyard, but I continued to be bullied for my weight, my clothes, my face that turned red so easily. It didn’t help when I started going through puberty at age nine, younger than every other girl in my class.

    In elementary school, I remember walking home one day when two boys followed me, calling out things like “Put on a few pounds this year, haven’t you?” I remember staring at my feet, putting one in front of the other, walking home as fast as I could.

    The wounds of being rejected, bullied, and ostracized buried deep. I never felt safe unless I was completely alone.

    In high school, I remember walking home once and realizing that a popular guy from a grade above was walking behind me. He didn’t say anything to me, but my heart started beating wildly, and I became hyperaware of my arms swinging back and forth. How awkward were these long appendages coming out of my body! How awkward was I!

    Even though I would walk home as fast as I could, I didn’t feel any safer around my family. In my parents’ house, emotional expression wasn’t encouraged or accepted. The only safe place was alone with myself.

    But as time went on, the anxiety I felt about other people’s opinions of me crept into my alone time too. I worried. I ruminated. I overanalyzed.

    It was difficult to live in fear all the time, so I developed all kinds of ineffective habits that helped me feel in control. I starved myself. I lied. I got addicted to anything I could get my hands on.

    I’ve been on a long journey of healing—not only the toxic ways I had learned to avoid feeling discomfort around other people but also the scars that caused that discomfort in the first place. The path has been long and hard. I’m still walking it.

    I’ve learned a few things that have been helpful. For example, I’ve learned to find the thoughts that trigger anxiety in social situations and question them. I’ve found the places in my body where I tense up when I think this way, and I’ve learned how to relax them.

    I’ve learned that the feeling of rejection won’t kill me (while running from it almost did). I’ve learned to sit with all kinds of uncomfortable emotions without running away.

    I’ve learned to reduce my overall anxiety levels with exercise, lower caffeine intake, journaling, mindfulness, and lots of alone time.

    I’ve learned that working out before social occasions lowers the chance of being triggered. I’ve learned that allowing some time afterward to replay social situations in my head actually helps—as long as I give myself a time limit and wrap up with some self-loving thoughts when the time is done.

    I’ve learned that, sometimes, I should actually take the advice of my self-judgment and change how I talk to people. I’m still learning about which advice to take and which to leave. I’ve learned to be gentle with myself while I figure it out.

    When I first went a few months without falling into a deep self-judgment hole, I thought I was cured. I thought I would feel free in social situations forevermore. But life had other plans.

    I have learned to think of social anxiety and fear of rejection as allergies. I’m allergic to thoughts like “Do they like me? What should I do to make them like me? What did I say wrong? What should I do so they don’t think I’m weird?” Most of the time, I can avoid falling into old patterns. I hear those thoughts and think, “Nope, I’m allergic to that. That’s not good for me.”

    But sometimes, I don’t catch the thoughts until it’s too late. Or I start having them when I’m tired or stressed out. Or I experience a series of rejections and don’t have enough time to process through them before my emotions and thoughts weave into a tight downward spiral.

    It happens. It happened last week. It lasted for four days. I’ve learned to forgive myself, be gentle, and know that I’m doing my best.

    I have friends with celiac disease who experience side effects for at least a few days when they eat gluten. At that point, the damage has already been done. The only thing they can do is not make it worse. So that’s what I try to do as well.

    I try not to judge myself for being stuck in self-judgment for a few days. That makes it easier to deal with. I try to think of it as my mind being swollen and sick. It needs time to heal. It needs love and patience. It doesn’t need more of the thing that made it sick in the first place.

    Each time my mind gets swollen with judgment, I have an opportunity to talk to myself with love, patience, and kindness. I also have an opportunity to learn more about myself. I try to extract some wisdom out of each period of suffering.

    I used to want to get rid of this for good, but lately, I’m realizing that maybe I never will be. Maybe it really is like an allergy. No matter how well I can learn to avoid the things that make me feel horrible, they will always be bad for me.

    Although these episodes are still unpleasant, I no longer feel helpless when they come. I’ve been practicing. I feel a sense of accomplishment each time I can navigate through periods of self-doubt with self-love and honesty.

    I can’t control what makes me sick, but I can be a kind, loving nurse to myself when I get that way. And that gives me some sense of control over the situation.

    I couldn’t control what happened in the past. And I’ve realized I can’t control my triggers in the present. But I can control how I respond to those triggers. And if I fail to respond differently, then I can control how I respond to that failure.

    However small, there is always room for a choice. And instead of focusing on what I can’t do, I’m trying to focus on what I can.

    It’s a hard road. If you’re in the middle of a similar journey, I hope you’ll cut yourself some slack and give yourself some credit for how far you’ve come. You’re doing the best you can, and that’s more than enough.

  • The Difference Between Letting Go and Running Away

    The Difference Between Letting Go and Running Away

    “It’s about our ability to leave our death on the battlefield of life. Or having the strength and courage to give them our love and to bring them back.” ~Edward Frenkel

    It took me almost twenty years to realize that running away from ourselves isn’t the same as letting go. That realization, as with so many others, came at a time when I was at one of my lowest points.

    The day everything changed began as one of the worst of my life.

    I was struggling with the breakup of a long-term relationship. We’d been due to move in together when I discovered he’d betrayed my trust so badly that remaining in a relationship was impossible.

    I was working long hours in a job I’d grown to hate and I was exhausted. I was barely sleeping, and when I did it was the kind of nightmare-filled, fitful sleep that took forever to return from.

    I’d wake up each morning feeling as though I’d been in a battle as I slept. My fatigue was so overwhelming that I could barely manage to keep my house clean and parent my son.

    I was beat, emotionally, physically, and spiritually.

    My son was staying with his grandmother for the weekend, and once I no longer had to hold it together for him the floodgates opened. It was more than the loss of the man I’d believed I would spend the rest of my life with; it was the knowledge that my life had become passionless across the board.

    I wanted to live a creative life, to sustain myself and my son via spiritual and creative expression. But I felt blocked at every turn and I could no longer hold in my grief and desolation.

    I spent hours wandering from room to room in my silent house. Every now and then I would curl up on the floor and howl uncontrollably. Eventually, I couldn’t cry any longer and I wrapped myself in my duvet and put videos on autoplay, hoping to distract myself into numbness.

    That’s when it happened. I was half-listening to a talk by the mathematician Edward Frenkel. I’d heard it before and enjoyed it, but this time something he said utterly gut-punched me.

    He said:

    “Do you leave your deaths on the battlefield of life, or do you have the strength and courage to give them your love and bring them back?”

    And that was when I knew Edward Frenkel and I had something in common. We both knew something about dying.

    Frenkel described a time in his life he had only recently begun to understand. It was a moment when he was sixteen and he was refused a place at university in Russia because of his Jewish heritage.

    Despite going on to become wildly successful in his field, he spent years disconnected to the sixteen-year-old adolescent inside of him. To the pain of that moment when his dreams were crushed.

    As I listened suddenly she was there again. The girl I had tried to forget. The girl I had left on my own battlefield.

    I’d spent years training as a contemporary dancer. I won scholarships and top roles in performances as well as competitions in choreography. I was young, talented, passionate, and obsessed.

    One dance school called me more than others and I dreamed of finishing my training there. The day of the audition, on my seventeenth birthday, I traveled to that dance school, floating on a wave of excitement, nerves, and a sense of ‘rightness.’ Of knowing this was exactly where I needed to be.

    The process was emotionally brutal. Only five people out of a cohort of over forty were called to the next stage after doing group classes and individual solos. The rest were told to go home, as they’d been unsuccessful.

    I was one of the five. I waited in the corridor for my physical exam and interview. The instructor told us to relax, we’d passed the dance part of the audition and now it was just wrapping up the formalities. We talked about what it would be like in September when we started.

    I went home and slept in a kind of peaceful joy, knowing my dreams were coming true.

    Three days passed and the letter arrived. I began to tear it open, barely registering that it didn’t look quite right.

    It wasn’t a thick envelope, stuffed full of information about course equipment and places to live; this envelope was small and thin. Inside was a letter that simply said they regretted to inform me I had been unsuccessful.

    And that was the day a part of me died. She stayed dead for a very long time.

    I wasn’t as strong as Edward Frenkel, who continued with Math. I know nothing about his home life, but mine at the time was awful.

    Layers of trauma from a close relative’s mental health issues were taking their toll. I’d witnessed multiple suicide attempts and holding it together for my mother, who was struggling to cope, had torn into my psyche.

    Dance had been my refuge from all that. The one thing that had never let me down. The one thing I trusted, believed in, and knew with everything I had I would do with my life.

    The shock of the rejection floored me. I didn’t know what to do. I cried, once.

    And then? I ran.

    I wasn’t strong enough to pick myself up and audition again the next year. Instead, I ran away. I ran to an older, abusive boyfriend. I ran to university instead of dance school. I ran to drugs. I ran to self-harm that lasted right up until the day I became a mother.

    That day almost twenty years later, as I listened to Edward Frenkel’s words I realized that at aged thirty-six I was still running. Part of me had died that day; the part of me that was filled with creative passion and obsession. The part of me that felt a spiritual flow and call so deep there were no words for it.

    I’d spent years putting a band-aid on the pain. I busied myself with little creative projects, even danced a bit as a hobby. I’d told myself it was okay and I had to let her go. Let go of the passion I’d once felt, the sense of rightness and surety.

    But I was kidding myself. I hadn’t been letting her go all those years. I’d been running away from her, running away from the pain of rejection. And not only that, the fear of rejection was still so great I was running from my current creative dreams.

    That day my head began spinning. Could I go back for her? For that girl I’d left dead on the battlefield of my life? How could I, after so many years of rejecting her?

    I paced my room for a few more minutes and then slowly something shifted. I picked up the phone and I called a good friend. That night we drove to the beach.

    I’ve always had an affinity for the sea. It’s where I feel the most alive and peaceful. The stars were out in the clear night sky and pools of water on the sand held the moon’s reflection. I walked alone to the water’s edge and quietly I began to talk to that girl.

    She was angry. Hurt. I’d rejected her and denied her existence for so many years. But slowly, she began to listen.

    I told her that yes the dream we’d had was over and I was sorry for running away from that dream. I told her I was sorry for running away from her. I told her I loved her. Deeply and completely. And, I told her that if she wanted, we could create a new dream together.

    There were a few moments of silence and then I felt her. She was inside me, still. And I realized that all those years I’d been trying to forget her, to ‘let go’ of her, to surrender her passions, when what I really needed to do was embrace her.

    In order to let go of the pain, I had to accept it, allow it, and integrate it and my past self into who I was now.

    Killing her had done nothing for me. It was only by having the strength and courage to give her my love and bring her back to me that I could stop letting the shattered dreams of the past rule my dreams in the present.

    That night I slept properly for the first time in weeks and when I woke up I knew what to do.

    For so many years I’d played at the edges of a creative career. I’d told myself it was “unrealistic” or I’d get round to it “one day.” But I was lying to myself.

    The truth was I’d been so afraid to feel the rejection of my passion again that I sidelined every opportunity that came my way.

    This is what happens when we cut ourselves off from our passions in an attempt to protect ourselves from pain. Because we’ve been hurt, we try to stay safe by remaining wherever feels comfortable, even if that comfort is actually preventing us from accessing potential joy. But without risking pain, we prevent ourselves from growing, and the irony is that by holding ourselves down to ensure we don’t fall we actually create far more pain in the long run.

    When we go outside of our comfort zones and risk falling it opens up a whole new world of purpose, excitement, and engagement.

    Realizing this was difficult but liberating.

    A year after that morning I’d quit the job I hated and was making a living from writing, my other great creative passion. It wasn’t easy. Facing down every objection my mind could throw up about why I should just go back to what was familiar was challenging and sometimes exhausting. Sometimes it hurt like hell. To date, I’ve had my writing rejected more times than I can count.

    But with each rejection, she’s there. I hold her close. I tell her I love her.

    Together we dance. Then we begin again.

  • Seeing Rejection As Redirection: What We Gain When We Lose

    Seeing Rejection As Redirection: What We Gain When We Lose

    “Every time I thought I was being rejected from something good, I was actually being re-directed to something better.” ~Steve Maraboli

    Rejection hurts. Whether it is from family, friends, co-workers, or a new company, when we experience rejection it hits us right in the heart—the control center to our emotions.

    We may wonder, what is wrong with me? We might begin pulling ourselves apart with self-criticism. However, rejection also has a way of teaching us, redirecting us, and ultimately making our lives better.

    I have learned to look at rejection differently these past couple of years. Actually, many of my greatest blessings have come out of what I perceived as rejection. Yes, there have been many painful experiences, but then again, I always have been one to learn more through pain than through pleasure.

    When I was younger, I faced rejection daily. I was an overweight teenager with crushes on any boy who looked at me. Other kids would constantly make fun of me, and no boys dared to show me any bit of interest. I was bullied and rejected simply for being me.

    I experienced rejection around relationships several more times as I grew older. There was a period when I was so afraid of rejection, I clung onto friendships and relationships that I intuitively knew were not healthy for me.

    Unsurprisingly, these relationships eventually died out. This, of course, validated my beliefs that I was unworthy and that I would always be rejected. More so, it led to significant feelings of loneliness, even surrounded by bodies of people.

    As I got into my career, there were several times I did not get the job I had hoped for.

    I did not receive my professional counseling license in the time I wanted and planned for. I did not get that promotion I had worked so hard for. The rejections just kept piling on.

    Finally, it was like a light bulb went on. These things were all happening for a reason, and they were all perfectly timed.

    I began to spin the way I viewed rejection. I started to see it as an ability to reassess and become more acquainted with different parts of myself. In some situations, I was able to see that maybe I was not on the right path. Or, if it still felt I needed to be there, I was able to look within and see where I needed to improve in order to make it happen.

    My perspective became clearer. Every job I was denied for, opened the door to new (and better) opportunities. Every relationship that hurt me, led me to my true love (and husband-to-be). Every mistake I made, guided me to look within.

    I was able to learn, grow, and ultimately make changes. I forgave myself for not knowing what I did not know until I learned it. I found myself thanking all of the people, places, and things that rejected me. They led me on a process to being the person I am today, a woman of integrity, grace, resilience, and strength.

    But, let me warn you, this epiphany did not happen overnight. Slowly, I began to see my perception and my beliefs were no longer serving me. I started to look at situations differently, and began searching for the blessing in disguise. I know, it sounds easier said than done, but there are some tools we could use to help quiet the inner critic that shows up during these times of distress.

    1. Treat yourself with compassion.

    If there’s anyone that knows the dialogue “You deserve bad things because…” it’s me. But, research shows negative self-talk is destructive and ineffective.

    If I believe I deserve bad things, I will start to attract people or things that validate that belief. What we feel on the inside, manifests itself on the outside.

    We need to work on responding to our inner critic with kindness and compassion. A helpful way of doing this is communicating with yourself like a dear friend.

    When a girlfriend went through a job denial, I encouraged her to trust that new opportunities would evolve. I also acknowledged her courage for just showing up and interviewing. I would never have said she’s hopeless and she ought to give up.

    When friends have gone through terrible breakups, I have always done my best to remind them they are worthy of love, and to help them find the lesson in the situation. I wouldn’t have told them it was their fault because there was something wrong with them.

    2. View rejection as getting outside your comfort zone (where all the magic happens).

    If we never experience rejection, we are probably not taking many chances, and therefore, not making many changes.

    When we get rejected, we can at least be comforted in knowing that we are taking risks. These risks help us better understand who we are and where we are going. More so, they help us build strength and develop skills to deal with inevitable adversity life brings, which helps us build up resilience.

    I worked hard to obtain a professional license, which was denied to me when I first applied due to a history of being dishonest. At the time, this broke me. I felt so ashamed and scared. However, this allowed an opportunity to really challenge and get honest with myself.

    My use of alcohol was starting to have consequences that I attempted to hide. It was beginning to slip into other areas of my life. Ultimately, this rejection directed me to a life in recovery, which constantly gets me out of my comfort zone.

    Not only am I living present and sober, it has taught me to get out of myself and be of service to others. Fast forward a year, I got my license. Boy, did it mean way more to me then than it would have the year before, as I put in a lot of hard work to making changes and re-aligning my life.

    3. Don’t let rejection define you.

    Many times when we face rejection, we personalize it. We make the event of rejection far more than the event. We begin to identify with it. This is a failure, therefore I am the failure. It is important to separate what happened to us from who we are.

    Rejection isn’t always personal. Oftentimes when someone rejects us, it has nothing to do with faults on our part; it just means we weren’t a good fit for that person, job, or opportunity.

    If we take rejection to mean we’re unworthy or unlovable, it’s likely because the rejection is triggering an existing belief formed earlier in life—which is a good thing, since this points toward something we may want to address and release.

    I had a tendency to put my worth into external things, and in a sense, abandon myself. After patterns of rejection, it became apparent I wasn’t meeting myself with compassion. I was meeting myself with shame and attempting to shame myself into making changes.

    I worked on consciously being mindful of my thoughts and shifting them to be more supportive. I learned that failure was an event, but not me as a person. Furthermore, I practiced trusting that things will work out at the right time. If it was not working out right now, I still had something to learn even if that was just to be patient.

    4. Find the lesson in rejection.

    We could easily focus on what we have lost when we experience rejection, but it’s more useful to ask ourselves, “What have I gained?” This way we can learn from the experience. Rather than beating ourselves even more over the head, we can turn our adversity into self-growth and self-exploration. With each experience, we can grow stronger.

    Personally, I have learned to look inside and identify what I need to work on. I have begun to see I am more capable to handling loss than I have credited myself. I have also found the ability to use rejection as an opportunity to humble myself, and move forward with wisdom to do things differently.

    At twenty-five years old, I was divorced from my first marriage. I was in a space of regret and shame. I felt I’d deeply let down my family and friends. I found myself isolating from others and alone. I lost a relationship, a home, friendships, and predictability. But in hindsight, I gained much more.

    I began to see I was codependent in the relationship. I was stagnant and not evolving as a person. Slowly, but surely, I began to learn to truly depend on myself.

    I gained wisdom about healthy boundaries in a relationship.

    I then learned to cherish true friendships. Friends who saw me at my lowest and still loved me without conditions.

    Most importantly, I gained a relationship with myself. I learned to love the woman I am unconditionally. In doing so, I finally attracted real love. I learned to value, respect, and love my now fiancé unconditionally.

    Our thoughts have a strong impact on our emotions. Our emotions, in turn, have a strong impact on our decisions and our behaviors. If you find yourself experiencing failure or rejection, ask yourself what is your interpretation of the situation. What meaning are you giving it?

    If you have a tendency toward negative self-talk, you will find your energy draining quickly. This will eventually take you away from what is important. When we are in a battle with ourselves, we cannot possibly be present for others.

    It could be helpful to create a new belief about the situation. On the surface, I may have a loss of relationship, but deeper down I am gaining a better understanding of myself. Train your brain to look for the blessing, not the curse. I, personally, believe I am always being protected. If you don’t believe in a higher power, you could still choose to understand rejection as redirection to something better.

    I choose to trust the universe and that things are happening as they should for my highest good. It is crucial for me to have that faith in order to be with the sense of peace, I feel, we all yearn for in life. And, to be completely honest, I am extremely grateful for things not working out the way I once hoped they would.

  • The Fascinating Reason We Fear Rejection and the Key to Acceptance

    The Fascinating Reason We Fear Rejection and the Key to Acceptance

    “Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it.” ~Steven Pressfield

    “We need to talk to you.”

    I looked up from my book. The other thirteen girls in my class had assembled around me.

    Part of me was annoyed that they interrupted Indiana Jones’s latest adventure. But another part couldn’t shake the feeling that I was facing the sixth grade execution squad. My heart began to beat faster, my shoulders tensed, and sickening fear spread through my body.

    “We don’t like you,” the appointed spokesperson declared.

    “We think you are arrogant and weird, your nose is always in a book, and your clothes are embarrassing. You don’t fit in here. Do yourself a favor and stay away from us.”

    With that, they left. I could hear them gossip at the other side of the classroom. As if nothing had happened.

    I sat at my desk, alone. My shaking hands were still clutching my book. My throat felt tight and sore as I battled to hold back tears.

    Sure, I would have been kidding myself pretending that I was ever popular. But still, some of these girls I considered my friends. And this brutal, unanimous rejection was a shock.

    I can’t remember how I made it through the next two lessons and the bus ride home. I know I didn’t cry. I didn’t want them to see how much they hurt me.

    It wasn’t until my mum asked me how my day was that I burst. Tears ran down my cheek as I was sobbing. Looking back, it feels like I wept for days and I remember crying myself to sleep for many months.

    I had been judged unworthy of friendship, respect, and approval. I was unacceptable. I wasn’t good enough.

    That’s how it started.

    The Guaranteed Way to be Accepted in Any Social Group

    “Why would you want to be part of their clique anyway?” my mum asked. “They are superficial and blind if they can’t see what a wonderful person you are.” Mums would say that.

    But it wasn’t how I felt. I wanted to be accepted. I wanted to be included. I wanted to be invited to the birthday parties and sleepovers. And I was sick of being picked last in sports.

    For a while, my classmates avoided me, as if I was suffering from a contagious disease. As instructed, I kept my distance. I felt upset, wounded, heartbroken.

    But I watched them. I observed their interactions. I studied the requirements of acceptance. Little by little, I adjusted my behavior.

    I begged my mum to buy me a pair of Levi’s 501 jeans so they couldn’t disapprove of my fashion sense. I left my beloved books in my bag to participate in the shallow gossip during recess. I swallowed my opinions and conformed to the group consensus. I engaged in activities I hated. My sole desire was to be accepted, and I was willing to make sacrifices.

    And I succeeded. My assimilated interests and behaviors morphed into a new version of me that was finally accepted (or at least tolerated) as part of the group. No more lonely recesses, no more exiled lunch breaks, no more involuntary isolation. I had reached my goal.

    I didn’t know then that the cost of acceptance was by far outweighing the benefits. It would be a while until I found out.

    A Painful Wake-Up Call

    Thirteen years after my fateful teenage rejection, now a student at Vienna University, I was waking up in my tiny flat. My boyfriend of eight years was awake, looking at me. I smiled at him, stretching while planning a busy day in my mind.

    “I need to talk to you.”

    My smile froze; my stomach felt like it was filled with gravel; my mind was racing. Please, not again! I did everything expected of me.

    Don’t do this to me again!

    “I don’t love you anymore,” he continued. “I am so sorry. I met someone else.”

    That evening, he moved out, to be with her. I sat on the floor, alone, in disbelief, my back against the cold radiator.

    I was rejected again! How could this happen? I had done everything required.

    But it seemed that no matter who I was or pretended to be, no matter how much I pleaded and begged, no matter how much I changed, adapted, and adjusted myself to please them, they always rejected me. Because I wasn’t good enough. No version of me would ever be good enough.

    I cried for days. I wallowed in self-hatred, blame, and self-pity. I cursed my inferior, unacceptable existence. I grieved for the life I lost and prepared myself for a future of unworthy loneliness.

    But then, something amazing happened.

    The Revelation of the Tragic Price of Acceptance

    Two weeks later, I was preparing to go to work. I opened my wardrobe, and the realization hit me so hard that I lost balance.

    All the clothes I owned were beige! He had preferred me in beige. He said he didn’t like it when I stood out. I had followed his rules to give him no reason to ever reject me. I was whatever he wanted me to be.

    I stared at the rows of neatly folded beige T-shirts, jumpers, and cardigans. There was no color, no personality, no character, no life. Only fulfilled expectations, subordination, and lies.

    I had rejected myself to be accepted by others! My true self was chained and gagged, silently suffering. That’s when I realized that self-rejection is the most devastating rejection of them all. It had to stop!

    That day in May 2005, I started the journey back to myself. Now I want to share what I learned along the way to help you rediscover your own authentic self.

    1. The fascinating reason why we fear rejection.

    Nobody likes being rejected. It sucks! But it’s unavoidable.

    No matter how much we change, bend, or distort, we will always encounter people who dislike us, disapprove of us, or disrespect us. We will always face situations where we lose out, fail, or don’t make the grade. That’s life.

    But we tend to experience rejection as a threat. And I soon discovered that there is a scientific reason for it.

    You see, the need for acceptance is deeply rooted in human evolution. If our early ancestors were exiled from the tribe cave, they were history as soon as the next sabre tooth strolled by. Survival depended on remaining a part of the tribe at all cost.

    Nowadays, we usually aren’t at risk of being devoured by a wild beast when others disapprove of us. But it still hurts! Because, while our life might not depend on it any longer, our self-worth often does.

    We feel worthy only if others approve of us. The issue is that nobody will be acceptable to everybody else.

    It’s important to know that rejection doesn’t mean that you aren’t good enough. Some people don’t click. And that’s okay.

    2. Being myself was harder than I thought.

    When people want to encourage you, they often say: “It’s going to be okay. Just be yourself!”

    Good advice. But if you pretended to be someone else for most of your life, this other version of you, the act, becomes who you believe you are. Once this false persona collapses, and you discover that your life was a lie, all that is left are questions.

    “Who am I? Do I actually like my work, hobbies, style? Or did I choose them to please others? What do I like? What is important to me?”

    In the early days I felt lost, aimless, forlorn. I thought I had to know myself inside out, uncover all the answers, find myself. But the beginning of your journey back to yourself is like the start of any relationship.

    You need to get to know yourself. Bit by bit. It takes time, patience, and lots of honest talks. (Yes, with yourself!)

    Through these conversations with myself, I learned that I couldn’t rediscover myself through my likes and dislikes. They were artefacts, reflecting the passions and interests of the people I wanted to impress.

    I had to investigate what made me happy. I had to identify what made my eyes light up and my heart sing. Because those were the things that originated from my true self.

    3. Denying my true self was hurting me.

    Throughout my teens and early twenties I suffered from several health problems. I now know that they were caused by my self-rejection. Because they all vanished after I accepted my authentic self.

    My social anxiety originated from the belief that anybody could reject me at any time without warning. My night-time crying fits resulted from the grief I felt over losing myself. My bouts of self-hatred stemmed from the fact that I loathed the person I pretended to be, and even my bronchitis was a warning sign that I wasn’t speaking my truth.

    I was emotionally, mentally, and physically hurting myself so others might approve of me. And I didn’t allow myself to see it. I ignored all the signs because my desire for approval was paramount.

    I needed to be accepted to feel worthy, and blamed all the negative consequences on a nervous disposition, a sensiive soul, and the harsh Alpine air.

    4. I never knew what I wanted because I didn’t know who I was.

    By the time my boyfriend left me, playing an act to please others was so normal, I had stopped noticing it. But I always felt unfulfilled. My life lacked direction and purpose.

    I was unsure what I could offer the world or what I wanted from life. Sometimes I sat in the living room of my tiny flat thinking, “I want to go home.” At the time, I didn’t know where this absurd thought came from.

    Now I understand that you cannot find your true calling if you aren’t true to yourself. If you pretend to be someone else to gain approval from others, everything you do reflects your efforts to please, appeal, and impress.

    Once you rediscover yourself, can you walk on your right path. Because every decision made or influenced by others will ultimately be the wrong one for you.

    Finding your direction, passions, and purpose has to start with accepting who you are and presenting this person to the world.

    5. Losing friends is unavoidable.

    And that’s where it becomes terrifying! Your friends, business partners, clients, and colleagues only know your act. But now you have to put the cards on the table and be honest with them. I found that to be the hardest part.

    Exposing your true self to the world leaves you naked and vulnerable. It’s impossible to predict how people will react. In my case, some were disappointed and hurt, some disliked my true self and disappeared from my life, but most neither noticed nor cared.

    The truth is that some friendships may not survive. And that’s okay. Most friendships aren’t constants; they are in flow.

    Your friends reflect what you believe about yourself. If your beliefs change, so will the people around you. A special few may stick with you for life, but most will come and go.

    Yes, it can be heart-breaking but no friend will ever be worth denying your true self. Losing a friendship will never be more devastating than losing yourself. And no rejection is as disastrous as self-rejection.

    The friends who cannot accept your authentic self will be replaced by people who love and respect the real you.

    The Key to an Authentic Life

    I know what you’re thinking. What if not? What if you will never find anybody who loves and accepts you?

    Would you not be better off being an integrated pretender than an authentic loner?

    The answer lies in your self-worth. Think about it. There are 7.4 billion people on this planet. It is statistically impossible that they will all reject you!

    But throughout your life you learned to believe that you are unlovable because you have nothing to offer. That you don’t deserve other people’s approval because you aren’t good enough, and that you are only acceptable if you cover up your flawed and unworthy self.

    That’s why your mind will always caution you. It wants to protect you from the pain of further rejection and disappointment. Because a deep-seated feeling of worthlessness has become your default state.

    But it’s not reality! It’s not the truth.

    The truth is that you are worth personified! Your true self is beautiful, valuable, and infinitely deserving of happiness, friendship, and love.

    Your worth is unconditional. It doesn’t depend on your style and appearance. It exists irrespective of your bank balance, success levels, or qualification, and it isn’t diminished by the lack of other people’s approval.

    Yes, we all make mistakes, we all do things we aren’t proud of, and we all are rejected at times. But as long as you do your best to be a kind, loving, and warm-hearted person, you will always be good enough!

    Once you accept this, once you accept yourself, others will see the amazing person you are. People out there want to know and love you. That much I know.

    Because I worked my way from a conforming, self-suppressing, anxiety-filled, beige existence to a happy woman with a wonderful husband, a beautiful daughter, and genuine friends who love me for who I really am.

    I believed I was unacceptable. But it wasn’t the truth. It was low self-worth.

    And it is low self-worth for you too. You can overcome it; you can heal. And you can attract the people out there looking to meet you.

    Now you just need to have the courage to introduce yourself. I know you can do it!

  • The Big Little Secret to Rejection: How to Get Past It Quickly

    The Big Little Secret to Rejection: How to Get Past It Quickly

    “I am good at walking away. Rejection teaches you how to reject.” ~Jeanette Winterson

    Rejection is something that can impact all the big parts of our lives—friends and loved ones, education, jobs, and romantic relationships. It can change how we see ourselves, paralyze us into not taking chances, and even make us give up on pursuing our dreams.

    There’s a lot of wonderful advice out there about rejection, but I wanted to share a bit of a different perspective. It’s a simple perspective I was lucky enough to hear a long time ago but have only just begun to truly believe and practice. And wow, is it a revelation.

    I was a short-term contract worker for a very large, very popular media company for ten years. Through time it became obvious that no matter how hard I worked, I couldn’t seem to get up the ladder.

    Many of my colleagues were progressing and getting hired as permanent staff, whereas it would take me months to even land a contract. When I asked for extra training to shoot and edit or offered to write scripts, I was refused. My ideas either fell by the wayside or were given to others to work on.

    As time went on, they inexplicably put less and less trust in me. So I worked harder and harder to try and prove myself and spent all my spare time teaching myself skills and making the content that I so desperately want to do at work. I was exhausted and demoralized, and I eventually began taking anti-anxiety medication.

    It was a bewildering experience because I did a great job and was conscientious. Why was this happening to me? What was I doing wrong?  

    It all came to a head after a particular campaign for kids that I was hired to steer from behind the scenes, given my insider experience and knowledge about the campaign topic. Nine months later, when the campaign was extended, my job was just given to someone else less suitable.

    When an email went around to the department announcing the new appointment, my co-workers were as confused as I was. I heard, “Why aren’t you heading this up, Amanda?” at least nine or ten times that day. I had no answer.

    In a fog, I got up from my desk, left the building, and walked into the courtyard. And just then, something clicked in my head. I finally got it. They simply didn’t want me.

    They had been telling me this for ten years. And I had been ignoring it.

    I looked back at the building—at all the people in the windows, happily busy doing their thing—and suddenly it was like there was a flashing neon light saying, “YOU DON’T BELONG HERE!” I burst out laughing. How could I have missed this the whole time?

    We do this type of thing a lot, don’t we? How many times have we refused to see we’re being rejected, no matter how obvious?

    It’s so easy to react to rejection with our egos. We think, “How dare you!” or “I’ll show you I’m right for you.” We need to be right. We need that validation at the expense of that part of us that knows our worth and is powerful enough to walk away.

    Consider this situation that most, if not all, of us have experienced: We date someone, really enjoy it, and see a lot of potential with them. But after a few weeks or months, we begin to feel a noticeable shift on their part.

    Maybe they start texting less often, or they aren’t as excited to see us, or they are less available, or they close themselves off a bit. It throws us for a loop, doesn’t it? We may even panic a bit. So we react by assessing the situation, reading between the lines, trying a bit harder, asking friends for advice, and Googling articles that make us feel better about what’s going on.

    We give this person all of our headspace while we try and figure things out when, deep down, we know exactly what the problem is. They just aren’t feeling us. But we try to convince ourselves that if they just give us a little more time, take a chance on us, they will come to the magical conclusion that we are actually perfect for one another.

    Is this strategy in any way healthy? Does it work? Does it make us feel better? Of course not.

    So here’s the big little secret about every rejection we’ve ever had in our lives. Once we realize and accept it, it can change the way we feel about every past rejection and change the way we see rejection in the future. Ready?

    When someone rejects you, for whatever reason, it’s because you two aren’t a good fit—they just saw it first. Eventually, you would have seen it as well. The fact that they acted on this early realization is actually a blessing because they are saving both of you from wasting time.

    It doesn’t matter why they are rejecting you. Often it is purely about themselves and their issues. So why spend the time worrying about the reason?

    Of course, not every rejector is honest and upfront about their feelings. In fact, many are afraid of confrontation, so they reject in an indirect way. But even when this happens, if we are honest with ourselves, we can admit that we ignored the signs in the single-minded pursuit of what we wanted.

    But if we can understand and appreciate the secret of rejection, we can better recognize the signs when we see ourselves in the same situation in the future. Think of the time, effort, and energy we can save with acceptance!

    So what happened with that media job crisis? After I stopped laughing and went back into the building, I gave them my notice. While I worked that last month, my eyes were opened, and I began to understand that the company was right all along.

    I didn’t belong there because my life perspective and the things I valued did not align with them. That’s why I had struggled there for so long.

    They saw it first, and I saw it eventually.

    After I left the company, I was free to do all the things I really wanted to do, in my own voice. I’m finally a television writer who has begun making short films about mindfulness to help others. This never would have happened if I had stayed at that company and worked trying to fix their constant rejection.

    If only I had done it sooner rather than spend ten years hoping to be accepted by someone who didn’t appreciate me!

    So the next time you are rejected, instead of immediately reacting, consider the situation. Accept your rejector’s judgment that you don’t fit, because they are right.

    Of course, it may still hurt a bit. In fact, it may hurt a lot. But if you keep reminding yourself that you would have eventually come to the exact same conclusion, and if you allow yourself to be grateful for the time and further hurt you have just been saved, you will be much better equipped to negotiate where you go from this point.

    And best of all, you’ll be free to find a place—be it a job, a friendship, or a romantic relationship—that honors who you really are and allows you to thrive, grow, and make the most of your unique gifts and perspective.

  • Overcoming the Fear That Stands Between You and Your Dreams

    Overcoming the Fear That Stands Between You and Your Dreams

    “A few rare individuals refuse to have limited lives. They drive through tremendous amounts of pain—from rejections and failures to shorter moments of embarrassment and anxiety. Because they avoid nothing, they can pursue their highest aspirations. They seem more alive than the rest of us.” ~Phil Stutz and Barry Michels

    If you were to see me in a social situation, you’d think that I’m confident.

    And in most informal social settings, I am. Now.

    I love people, love hearing their stories, so most of the time I trust my ability to relate and connect.

    But this wasn’t always the case.

    These were skills I had to re-learn.

    During adolescence, probably as a result of my parents’ divorce and going to a new school where I felt completely out of my depth, I lost my natural childhood confidence.

    Approaching new people felt very hard.

    I would often spend break times at school pretending to be busy doing work, to avoid the shame of having to go up to a group and ask whether I could sit with them and face the potential humiliation of being told no.

    It was a very lonely time.

    For most of my high school career I avoided reaching out unless I was pretty certain of a favorable response.

    Then I left school and took a gap year and needed to make money, so I started a job waiting tables.

    I was perfectly capable of upgrading to waiting tables after the mandatory month of training (when I was responsible for clearing plates and setting tables but didn’t have to engage much with customers). But I was so afraid of the having to approach people and the deal with the uncertainty of how they would respond to me that I declined and continued to train for another two months.

    Eventually it got ridiculous and I had to take the risk.

    I can still remember my first few months waitressing.

    I was terrified to approach new people and initially would try to avoid it by giving tables away.

    But then something interesting happened. By now I wanted to buy a car, and the pain of being dependent on others for transport was greater than the pain of the potential rejection, so I started to force myself out of my comfort zone—and I started to enjoy it.

    I started to enjoy the uncertainty and the challenge. I realized I loved meeting people from different places and hearing about their lives.

    This increasing confidence and enjoyment of connecting with people has been key in helping me accomplish a number of my dreams, especially in relation to my work.

    I’ve gotten several jobs through being able to connect with people, who then recommended me when an opening opened up (though this was not my initial intention when connecting with them).

    My challenge now is to develop the same confidence I have in informal social situations and apply it to performance situations. This is still an area where I struggle with performance anxiety and feel self-conscious.

    So I will continue to use the ideas below myself!

    1. Our minds play tricks on us.

    As Alison Ledgerwood, Ph.D, says in her TED talk entitled Getting Stuck in the Negatives (and How to Get Unstuck), our minds are built to look for negative information and hold onto it. Failures stick in our minds longer than successes do.

    What that meant for me is that in most cases, I was massively overestimating the potential for shame and rejection from each new interaction. But I was also underestimating my capacity to cope, should my worst fears ever come true. (In hindsight, I don’t think that even the most challenging experiences came close to the horror stories my mind was telling me were possible.)

    My mind kept reminding me of all the pain of failures I had previously experienced, rather than the times it had all worked out fine.

    Alison Ledgerwood advises: “Our minds may be built to look for negative information and to hold onto it. But we can also retrain our minds if we put some effort into it and start to see that the glass may be a little more full than we initially thought.”

    Love that!

    2. Just as our minds play tricks on us, we can trick our minds.

    It turns out that how we interpret the feelings of fear is the key to determining whether we’re able to engage or whether we avoid.

    While most of us tell ourselves to calm down and stop worrying when we feel afraid, research out of Harvard shows that this standard response to stress may be well meant, but it’s also wrong. Instead of trying to calm ourselves down, we should aim to get excited, suggests Alison Wood Brooks, Ph. D of Harvard Business School.

    Huh?

    I was definitely not excited at the thought of approaching tables with the possibility of being shamed and humiliated.

    But trust me, this works.

    Why is that?

    “When people feel anxious and try to calm down, they are thinking about all the things that could go badly. When they are excited, they are thinking about how things could go well,” Wood Brooks explains.

    Even if you don’t believe it at first, when you say it repeatedly, authentic feelings of excitement increase.

    Fake it until you become it!

    The fact that you’re reading this post is testament that this works. For years I’ve been wanting to write, but my own anxiety and self-doubt held me back. Now when I sit down to write and feel myself becoming anxious I repeat “I’m excited, I love sharing ideas with people” over and over again.

    After a few minutes I can feel myself actually start to believe it, and I feel more able to write.

    3. On the other side of fear is your limitless potential.

    This is an idea from therapists Phil Stutz and Barry Michels from their book The Tools. They describe how we all tend to avoid emotional pain, but that this dramatically limits our potential.

    We need to know that our infinite potential exists on the other side of our comfort zones, and if we want to actualize our potential we need to break through it.

    They advise that we need to condition ourselves to get excited about the challenges in our lives, and instead of avoiding fear and pain we need to run straight at them screaming “BRING IT ON!!”

    I know this to be true.

    When I’ve had the presence of mind to remember this idea and keep going, rather than avoid, I find myself in a strange and unfamiliar place. It’s a feeling of absolute freedom—of not being limited by what you fear.

    And as a recovering worrier, that feels very good.

    Here’s how I’m using it to help me develop my confidence in performance situations. Mostly when I think of something that I want to do that makes me feel anxious, my tendency is to procrastinate and avoid it.

    But now, when I notice that fear (and the intense discomfort it can bring), instead of avoiding, I tell myself something along the lines of: “Great, an opportunity to expand my comfort zone and my capability. Bring it on!”

    This allows me to move from avoidance into engagement.

    The more I repeat this cycle, the easier it becomes to do the things I fear (mostly because I see that the thing I’m terrified of happening doesn’t actually happen).

    While I can’t go back in time and change the course of my younger self’s life, every day I’m faced with choices that determine whether I move toward becoming what, deep down, I have a feeling I’m capable of becoming, or step back into my comfort zone to avoid risking humiliation.

    What I now know is that the feeling of letting yourself down—the disappointment and unravelling confidence with each retreat—is far more painful than what is out there beyond the safety of what’s familiar.

  • Dealing with Rejection: It Doesn’t Mean That You’re Not Good Enough

    Dealing with Rejection: It Doesn’t Mean That You’re Not Good Enough

    “The best way out is always through” ~Robert Frost

    I was trembling as I hung up the phone. He’d dumped me.

    It was as if, while I was watching a murder mystery at the edge of my seat, the electricity had gone out. Poof! I wasn’t going to get to see the end of the movie, and I had no control over when the lights would come back on.

    I felt the fangs of rejection sink into my heart like a merciless tarantula. My mind, which is normally going 500 miles an hour, came to a halt. Suddenly I felt nothing. Frozen. I had no thoughts. Total shock. The poison of the rejection spider slowly oozed into my bloodstream, paralyzing me in my seat.

    “Get up! Get up now!” I heard the voice in my mind say. For some reason, it seemed as if moving could unfreeze my emotions.

    I did get up, but stood there as if I was listening to the strange noises coming from the kitchen in the middle of the night. Waiting for someone to tell me that I was “punked” and that he was going to call me back to tell me that it was just a silly joke. Then we were going to make up and live happily ever after. That did not happen.

    “We create what we defend against.” ~Marianne Williamson

    We had a few close breakup calls before, and I always felt like I dodged a bullet when we ended up in a smooth place. Apparently, we had used up all the close calls reserved for us.

    It was official: I was just not good enough. I was too broken to be loved. No one was going to love me forever. Um, can I get that in writing as well? I did. An email followed his phone call. It was as official as an IRS letter arriving on a Friday afternoon.

    The words I had dreaded, protected myself against at all costs from the man who had professed his undying love for me: “Banu, you are too this and that. So I am out.” He said he was sorry.

    Clingy is not sexy, nor is desperate. I had become both. All because I had not done the work to correct a limiting belief that runs in almost every human being on the planet: I am not good enough.

    In the following days and weeks, as my emotions defrosted in the scorching heat of heartache, I felt a strange sense of relief. Finally, it had happened. I was still alive. Still breathing. Still able to work, bathe, and feed myself.

    There was no news coverage on CNN about how my heart was broken, nor did the ending of my relationship break the Internet. Life went on for everyone as usual, except for me. It was the beginning of my freedom and I didn’t know it.

    I had feared being broken up with all my life because, deep inside, I believed that I wasn’t good enough. That belief was so deeply ingrained in me that I had finally created it.

    I was always the one to end a relationship because the fear of the other shoe falling would tap out my nervous system sooner than later. The guy could barely recognize the confident woman he fell in love with, who now was an emotional wreck, clinging to him for dear life.

    “A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.” ~Jean de La Fontaine

    I am convinced of one thing: People come into our lives as mirrors of who we are.

    If we don’t recognize our worth, causing us to seek validation and approval from others, the world mirrors that, and we meet people who don’t see our worth either.

    Rejection seemed like death to me. It was. It was the death of my old self and the birth of a new era of new choices, thoughts, and beliefs about my own self-worth.

    It was unfair to tie my sense of self to the approval of one man. Unfair to both parties, in fact. What if he had died in a car crash? Was I going to become worthless then?

    The gift of getting dumped was that I saw that I could still stand on my two feet and manage not to turn to drugs and alcohol to numb the pain. I allowed myself to feel, journaled to process what was coming up, and paid attention to the self-negating stories I was telling myself.

    You would think that it would be devastating when you are rejected for the very things that you perceive are your biggest flaws. It wasn’t.

    The blessing is that, once we get through the disappointment, anger, and pain, if we are willing to look at the truth of the situation, we will find the door that has been left unlocked, leading us to freedom and our self-worth.

    And it is not the “He was a jerk anyway; it’s his loss” kind of freedom. It’s the “I am worthy of love, and I’ll be darned if I leave my sense of worth in someone else’s hands again” kind.

    It’s about making a commitment to value ourselves, and living as if we do. This affects our choices, from what we eat, what we wear, and how we behave to how fast we get up after we fall.

    “The world is a mirror, forever reflecting what you are doing, within yourself.” ~Neville Goddard

    Looking back, I could see that I had set myself up for rejection so that I could learn that my own self-rejection hurts more than someone else’s.

    I had been unknowingly rejecting myself for the things he recited as he said his final words. He was a perfect mirror.

    And the healing wasn’t going to come from someone telling me how wonderful I am fifty times a day. It was goi­ng to come from me believing it and living it. The importance of self-love and self-appreciation was the lesson.

    Through this experience, I got some insights into rejection by a love interest, which you might find helpful:

    1. Everyone experiences rejection.

    Even the hottest, most intelligent, most successful people on the planet get cheated on or broken up with. If you think that your size 10 body, your negative bank balance, or your dead end job are the reasons why you might be rejected, think again.

    If physical perfection or success could guarantee that we never get broken up with or experience heartache, no fashion model or mogul would know what rejection feels like. That’s not the case, is it? It’s a common human experience, and though it can be painful, what hurts more is the belief that rejection says something about our worth.

    2. Trying to be something we’re not just to please someone else is essentially rejecting ourselves.

    Because then we don’t get to discover who we are and be that person. We get stuck in the role we know they want us to be. We cheat ourselves of an authentic existence.

    What people like or need is strictly personal to them and dependent on where they are in their lives. If someone rejects you because they want something else, that doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you. It just means they’re not the right match for you.

    3. Once you experience rejection and work through it, the fear loses its sting.

    If someone chooses to not be with you anymore, and you use the experience as an opportunity not to reject yourself, you are getting to a place where you will know that you will be okay no matter what.

    You get to a place where you think, “Too bad it didn’t work out. I can see what I need to heal and change more clearly now. It hurts, but I am okay.” You can only go up from there. Unfortunately, we can’t get there without going through it.

    “The best way out is always through.” ~Robert Frost

    Rejection is a part of life. If you have experienced it, consider yourself lucky. You now know that you can survive it. If you have not, believe me when I say this: You will be okay. And perhaps, as it did for me, rejection can lead you to a deeper sense of self-love and self-acceptance.

  • The Truth About Social Anxiety and 5 Ways to Relieve It

    The Truth About Social Anxiety and 5 Ways to Relieve It

    “Perfectionism is a twenty-ton shield that we lug around thinking it will protect us, when in fact, it’s the thing that’s really preventing us from being seen and taking flight.” ~Brené Brown

    About fifteen million adults suffer from social anxiety according to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. Fifteen million. And we’re not just talking about what you’d call shyness. We’re talking about big fears of judgment and scrutinization from others.

    When we hear statistics it can be difficult to remember the humanness of those numbers. These are people who want to find love, who want to make new friends, or who need to talk to new people for work. Maybe you’re one of them. I used to be.

    I remember feeling uncomfortable in my own skin, being highly aware of what I was saying, how I was saying it, and how other people were taking me in. I even remember being in college at a party standing with a group of friends when one of them loudly declared that I looked super uncomfortable.

    Well, I was super uncomfortable, and that statement only brought more attention to my demeanor making me even more self-conscious. It sucked. I didn’t want to feel awkward let alone be known as the awkward girl.

    I was always so concerned with how I was presenting myself. I wanted everyone to feel like I had it all together. I wanted to appear cool, but mostly I didn’t want to do a lot of things.

    I didn’t want to say the wrong thing. I didn’t want to make a fool out of myself. And I definitely didn’t want to be disliked.

    What I wanted was to be able to speak easily to people. I wanted to feel laid back. I wanted to not be “shy” in groups. I wanted to feel comfortable. I wanted to get lost in the moment instead of watching and analyzing my every move. I wanted to just be me, and be okay with it.

    Often times when we talk about anxiety this is where we stop. But I’ve discovered something deeper. I worked on myself a lot in my twenties. I made a very dear friend who was super outgoing. Being in her presence helped me see that I could present myself differently.

    I could open up a bit more, I could smile a bit more, and I could show my happiness to strangers.

    I also learned a lot about my ego. I saw some of the ways my mind was holding me back. I was able to acknowledge that fear was driving me in these situations and that I didn’t have to pay so much attention to my mind.

    I became more comfortable in social situations through practice. I found my edge and worked from there. I became more cheerful, more outgoing, and it worked.

    People responded, and I connected more deeply. It felt great, but it didn’t entirely feel easy. I still didn’t feel 100% in my own skin, and I found myself exhausted after being in social situations.

    Years later I discovered that all along I had been afraid of being seen.

    I’m not talking about being out in the world and observed by others. I’m not talking about being afraid of showing up at a party or an event and having people look at me. I’m not talking about superficial self-consciousness. I’m speaking about a deep, spiritual need to be seen for who it is we really are.

    All this time I had actually been terrified that if someone saw who I really was they would reject me, and I didn’t know that I could recover from that. But if someone rejected the persona I’d created, well, that wouldn’t be as bad—it wasn’t really me.

    I discovered this truth through something we all have at our disposal 24/7. It’s actually something we all need and use: the breath.

    Breathwork is a powerful active meditation, and it’s changed so many aspects of my life including this one. It’s given me access to deeper truths about myself and about human beings in general.

    We all want to be loved, and to be loved means you’re accepted as you are. So if you’re deeply afraid, unconsciously afraid, that you might not be loved, how do you think your body is going to respond? It’s going to feel fear.

    It shows up as self-consciousness because our minds work to remedy the situation. If I monitor my every movement I’ll be safe. I won’t show too much of myself, and I won’t be rejected.

    The problem here, aside from the fact that we don’t want to actually be living our lives in constant moderation of ourselves, is that we expend so much energy watching ourselves, trying to be the person we think we should be.

    That’s why I was so exhausted after being in social situations. It took up so much of my energy to be around people and not feel like I could really be myself.

    There is so much relief in being able to be yourself. There is so much freedom in having deep, unconditional love for yourself and knowing that the only thing that matters is that you have your own back.

    It leaves you feeling comfortable being you. It allows you to have a more intimate relationship with yourself, discovering who it is you actually are instead of living under the guise you’ve created for yourself. That guise was a defense mechanism; it was your shield so you wouldn’t get hurt.

    But you don’t have to worry about getting hurt anymore. Yes, you will still feel pain, but you will have such a deep trust in life that you know you’ll always get through it.

    With this trust and this love and this new life, it’s not scary to show yourself anymore.

    You know that the right people will forgive you if you mess up. You know that the people who you need to have around you are the ones who love the things that come out of your mouth, who don’t push you or manipulate you or judge you.

    From simple, immediate action steps to deeper healing work, here are five ways you can start relieving your social anxiety today:

    1. Use the power poses.

    Power Poses are simple body movements scientifically proven to increase confidence hormones and decrease stress hormones. Before you’re going into a social situation put your hand behind your head or even simply raise your hands wide and high in the air.

    2. Focus on others.

    When we’re self-conscious in social situations we’re so focused on ourselves that it’s extremely difficult to connect with others or to even relax. Try finding someone to connect with by asking them about themselves. Become interested in them and place all your awareness on what they’re saying. This helps us engage and removes us from our own self-concern.

    3. Find your edge.

    Know where you’re comfortable and where you feel like you’re going to have a panic attack. Somewhere in the middle lies your edge.

    Your edge is the place you can go to that feels uncomfortable but not like you’re going to die. Hang out there, take some risks.

    This might look like you starting a conversation with someone on your own, asking someone a question, making eye contact, or telling someone something about yourself that feels personal. Continue to practice living on your edge, and it won’t be your edge anymore.

    4. Look deeper.

    You can remedy things by watching and emulating those who excel socially. Or you could spend time getting to know yourself more deeply, facing the truth that maybe you’re afraid to show who you really are. Once we’re willing to face the things we’re hiding from we can begin to liberate ourselves from these deep fears.

    5. Use your breath.

    You can use your breath in the simplest way to reduce your stress levels. Take deep belly breaths very slowly. The slower and deeper the breath the more you activate your parasympathetic nervous system creating a relaxing environment in your body.

    If you want to go for full transformation you could try breathwork and see what you discover about yourself.

    There is a life free of social anxiety. When you choose to dig a little deeper and take steps to heal yourself, you’ll find yourself on a new path. On that path you may discover that you don’t even know who it is you really are. But once you discover yourself, you’ll see there is a whole world of people out there waiting to meet you.

  • 3 Steps to Help You Embrace and Move Past Rejection

    3 Steps to Help You Embrace and Move Past Rejection

    Sad Woman

    “Wisdom is merely the movement from fighting life to embracing it.” ~Rasheed Ogunlaru

    There were many things I wasn’t prepared for when it came to baby raising: the constant self-doubt, the vocal opinions of others, teething that never ended. But the real shock was when my ten-month-old daughter rejected me.

    It is human nature to avoid rejection. Nothing is more painful than trying your best or giving your heart and being told it’s not good enough or unwanted. In my case, I went beyond avoiding rejection—I denied the possibility of its existence.

    My childhood experiences led me to believe that rejection was the most painful outcome of any situation.

    My biological father won custody when my parents divorced and told me that my mother didn’t love me. At the same time, his alcoholism and own painful childhood didn’t allow him to love me unconditionally.

    My fear of rejection was so profound that fleeing the mere possibility defined every aspect of my life.

    In my twenties I changed friends, jobs, and cities with the frequency of oil changes. I lived in eleven apartments in six cities on both coasts, I had three different careers, and I spent most of the decade single.

    If I perceived that someone didn’t reciprocate my feelings, romantically or platonically, I would walk away. If work required that I move beyond my comfort zone or take risks, I would quit. I was out spoken and passionate, but unwilling to be vulnerable to the possibility of rejection.

    My fear kept me small. I lived a mediocre life. Avoiding rejection started to suffocate me.

    In my thirties, I found the courage to love and to declare myself a writer—two prospects that ensure constant rejection. It was worth it. I was confident that I was healed, until my daughter rejected me.

    My sister-in-law comes to our house and watches my daughter two or three times a week; I remain in my home office but am unavailable.

    Recently, when my sister-in-law tried to hand me my daughter she began to cry and didn’t stop until her aunt took her back. I was devastated.

    She was doing to me what I had promised to never do to her. I expected this from a teenager, not my ten-month-old daughter. Not the infant that I had delivered without a single drug, nursed, made sure never had diaper rash, prepared all her food, smiled, loved, and cuddled.

    This may seem like a small and insignificant event, but it opened a deep wound of pain and sorrow. The rejection felt like walking through high school in my underwear, having my boss humiliate me in front of the entire office staff, and being audited by the IRS—simultaneously. It was horrible.

    I immediately wanted to withdrawal and cut myself off from the pain. Only this time, I couldn’t; a rejection had finally happened with the one person I couldn’t walk away from—my daughter.

    Here is what I learned:

    1. Feel the pain.

    Do you feel rejected? Do nothing that distracts from the pain. Accept what you feel, exactly as it is.

    In moments that I can’t physically escape, I turn to food. The day I felt rejected by my daughter I ate half a bag of chocolate chips and shifted the pain of my heart to my belly. After the bellyache was gone I was left with the pain (and the guilt of overeating).

    For you the temptation may be something else: social media, sex, drugs, exercise, work—anything that moves the ache from your heart to somewhere else. Any one of these things can be healthy and enjoyable, but not at the moment you feel rejected.

    In this moment, allow yourself to feel the pain of rejection.

    2. Know that rejection is not about your worth.

    My terror of rejection stemmed from my inability to accept how it made me feel. I would immediately judge my inadequacy and enter into despair. When it happened with my daughter my first thought was that she didn’t love me and I was a failure as a mother.

    Feeling the pain does not mean that you affirm your worst self-assessments.

    When you feel rejected, do you do what I do and tell yourself that you weren’t enough: kind, smart, pretty, funny (enough)? Do you review every potential error you made along the way and wonder what you should have done differently? Stop.

    You will never be beautiful enough, smart enough, kind enough, funny enough, to avoid rejection, because rejection is inevitable. Everyone gets rejected from time to time. And even if you believe you did something that led to the rejection, the issue would be that specific action, not your intrinsic worth.

    Rejection isn’t about who you are as a person. There is nothing harder to believe and nothing more important.

    3. Challenge your interpretation.

    If you allow yourself to feel pain and don’t spiral into self-criticism, you will be more open to alternative possibilities: maybe it wasn’t even rejection.

    Most of the time what we perceive as rejection is something entirely else. Many people in my life have felt rejected by me, when in fact I was protecting myself from their potential rejection. My daughter’s pediatrician assures me that she was not rejecting me.

    You might have been rejected for that job because they already have someone with a similar background, and they were looking for someone with new skills to add to the team.

    You might have been rejected romantically because that person simply wasn’t ready for a serious, committed relationship.

    We can never know what exactly was happening in the moment that we felt rejected; all we can know for sure is that nothing ever means that we are unworthy. And with that knowledge we can choose not to be defined by any one interpretation.

    —

    If we feel our emotions (pain, sadness, anger, whatever it may be) and don’t get stuck in negative self-assessments, then we can be open to other interpretations. It becomes less terrifying to take risks.

    Embracing rejection gives us the freedom to be vulnerable and moves us to be gentler with ourselves. It increases our potential to love—others and ourselves.

    If we push ourselves to feel, not judge, and challenge our interpretations the potential is great that our sense of self worth will grow and we will have the courage to risk what never seemed possible before.

    This may mean that we will have even more rejection to embrace.

    It is worth it.

    Sad woman image via Shutterstock

  • Overcoming Family Rejection & Finding Strength in Pain

    Overcoming Family Rejection & Finding Strength in Pain

    Man Finding Strength

    “I don’t like being too looked up at or too looked down on. I prefer meeting in the middle to being worshipped or spat out.” ~Joni Mitchell

    Growing up, there were two sides of the kitchen table. On side A, there was my lieutenant colonel of the US Army, hardcore conservative, Wall Street trader of a father who used the word “faggot” while passing the salt.

    On side B, there was little ole me, who was pretty sure that I was that word my father so vehemently used.

    I thought Barbies were a fun toy (Malibu Barbie was my favorite, obviously) and at twelve years old, I got that funny feeling inside when I first laid eyes on Mark Wahlberg in his now infamous Calvin Klein ads. (Thanks for the memories, Markie Mark!)

    So there I was on side B, always feeling as if my side was less than. How many of us have been there before?

    I could never understand the larger than life, imposing, All-American man across from me, whose emotional unavailability and anger kept me at bay. But I tried, and tried, and tried.

    It was as if there was always some sort of divide between the two of us, and no matter how desperately I wanted to close the gap, I couldn’t jump it. There was no safety net in our relationship, and so as I got older, it was one of the many reasons I went down a dangerous path.

    Sure, the fear of my father that was ingrained in me was a catalyst for shame, feelings of unworthiness, and an inability to express who I was within the world.

    It was also the black hole that I learned to fill with perseverance, self-respect, and authenticity, and for that I now see its purpose with gratitude.

    When I hit rock bottom at twenty-five years old after years of drug, alcohol, and sex abuse, all roads led to the forgiveness of my father—and myself.

    I thought back to his absence in my life. All of the athletic accomplishments that he overlooked, meanwhile celebrating my older brother’s football success. All of the dating conversations we never had, and all the times he could never say “I love you.”

    I let those memories burn, and braced myself as the ashes dissipated in the air of my past. Though the immense pain, I cried as I waved goodbye.

    I waved goodbye to the day when I came out of the closet at nineteen years old, and my dad replied that it was “his fault” since he has a gay cousin. I waved goodbye to his belief that there was something wrong with him for “passing along the gay gene.”

    I parted with the memory that every time I brought good news, he could never celebrate it with me, as if it wasn’t good enough. I let go of the belief that I was never good enough.

    With everything I waved arrivederci to, I waved hello and embraced all that I had become and am.

    I welcomed the realization that it doesn’t matter if anyone else deems us worthy, so long as we accept ourselves.

    I hallelujahed the knowledge that I was my father’s son, and his gift for his own self-growth; and if he simply was not willing to receive that gift at the time, this was not my fault.

    It was not his fault either, as every person is doing the best they can at their own personal level of awareness. I could let go of all blame.

    I could just be me, and let him be him, and live with the hope that one day, he and I could become an “Us.”

    Within the larger story of Us, I see that our diversity is to be celebrated, and is the one thing that we all are able to appreciate in this often chaotic and messy world.

    Our uniqueness is unique to us, and is a gift. I learned to be grateful for that. The great thing about gratitude is that it is a predecessor for forgiveness.

    Once I was able to forgive my dad, I was able to see him differently. As I healed myself, my comfort around him healed us.

    When I was freshly twenty-eight years old, I was going through a crippling yet transformative break-up, and on Father’s Day, I needed him.

    I never spoke about men to my father, but I knew this was the moment. I packed my bags and blurry eyes in NYC and drove west to my parents’, where my dad was waiting for me.

    There, in the den with the TV off, through the tension, I cried, opening up about how much I loved this particular man and how much I was hurting.

    I admitted that I had started drinking again; that I felt deeply lost, that I needed help. That I needed my dad.

    “You’re too nice of a person to let people do that to you” was his simple console. In its simplicity, it was enough. I was enough, and so was he.

    The chasm got smaller; the separation united. I had jumped the gap and made it safely to the other side.

    Nowadays, there’s a flow where the river was once damned. We talk more than ever; about how smart Peter Thiel is, or how the stock market is doing, and I also share personal stories with him. I share my authentic self.

    Sometimes he just sits there and nods, and in his big blue eyes, I am given a world of quiet contentment. I no longer am looking to be anywhere but there when I am with him.

    Our relationship makes me realize that if we could all have open and honest conversations with one another, we would be able to realize that we are all similar underneath our differences; that there is never a reason to create a divide between.

    Of course, it takes two, and if the other person won’t meet us halfway, we can end up feeling divided in ourselves. If that happens, remember that you are wonderfully you for a higher reason.

    You are uniquely you and meant to find those whom support you for all that you are. As you are, exactly who you are, there are others who were put here to simply support that person.

    As an individual footprint in the paved path of the Universe, your mission is to be unapologetically who you are made to be. No one can step in your way if you are living a life of pure authenticity and self-respect, not even an unaccepting family member.

    Remember that others’ negativity is a projection of their own pain—and have compassion for them.

    How we feel about others is a direct mirror for how we feel about ourselves, and as someone who has experienced a lot of self-shame, I have seen the danger of taking my frustrations out on others and making it their fault.

    Any sort of judgment stems from self-judgment, so the more another person irks us, the more we need to question what irks us about ourselves.

    It’s important for us to remember that compassion can melt every boundary of anger and hurt.

    Family contention can often be an opportunity to let go of self-blame and find forgiveness in spots that were once hidden to us, if we allow it to be.

    It is often the stepping stone to massive healing if we are brave enough to take the jump. There is a reason why we go through everything.

    Lastly, remember that you are allowed to hurt.

    Some days, it’s important to let your heart bleed. Pain often connects us to our strength, so let it burn with faith that things are only getting better from here.

    They really are.

    The greatest part of my story is that when my father and I are at the dinner table now, there are no sides any longer; there is just one beautifully imperfect, real human relationship.

    There is acceptance, and there is love. I know this not only because he is able to tell me so these days, but because I feel it within myself.

    My relationship with my father gives me hope. It gives me strength. It gives me the belief that one day, between Side A and Side B, we’ll all be able to meet somewhere in the middle.

    Man finding strength image via Shutterstock

  • Why Rejection IS Sometimes Personal (but Not About Your Worth)

    Why Rejection IS Sometimes Personal (but Not About Your Worth)

    “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” ~Eleanor Roosevelt

    It’s not about you. It’s about them. It’s their loss. Don’t take it personally. It doesn’t mean anything.

    Well-intentioned people have told me these things many times to soften the blow of rejection. And I wanted so badly to believe them, but how could I?

    When someone doesn’t want you, it’s hard not to take it personally. They don’t want you. It must mean something about you, right?

    When five college theater programs rejected me, when guy after guy ditched me, when countless potential friends avoided me, I thought for sure it meant I wasn’t talented or lovable.

    I beat myself up, put myself down, and wished I could be someone better, someone people wouldn’t so quickly write off.

    I tried to reframe it, to consider that it really had nothing to do with me. I knew this thought was supposed to comfort me, but something told me this wasn’t right—and it wasn’t my low self-esteem.

    Eventually, I was able to look beyond the simplicity of black-and-white thinking and recognize a beautiful grey area.

    That grey area was the key to bouncing back from rejection. It was the key to learning about myself. And it was the key to changing how I showed up in the world, and how I experienced it.

    In the grey area, rejection sometimes is about us, but not about our worth.

    In high school, I had tremendous potential as an actress and singer. I got cast in lead roles plenty of times, received abundant praise for both my dramatic chops and my comedic timing, and represented my school choir at a national competition.

    I had talent; I know this now. Still, with the benefit of hindsight, I also know that my college rejections did mean something about me.

    I didn’t take care of myself back then. My throat was constantly hoarse due to aggressive bulimia. And I was terrified of judgment, which made it difficult to be present and throw myself into my monologues.

    But none of those things meant I was untalented or unworthy. They meant I needed to be kinder to myself, to strengthen my confidence, and to grow as a person and performer.

    As a teen and in my early twenties, I had a lot to give in relationships. I was compassionate, good-hearted, and loyal to those I cared about.

    I was lovable; I know this now. Still, with the benefit of hindsight, I also know that my inability to sustain relationships and friendships did mean something about me.

    I frequently looked to others to fill gaps in my self-esteem. I obsessed about myself while blinding myself to their needs. And I was clingy, insecure, and unwilling to heal the pain that caused me to focus all my attention on winning their approval.

    But none of these things meant I was unworthy of love. They meant I’d experienced tremendous pain and I needed to heal and learn to love myself before I could truly love or be loved by others.

    Some rejections really weren’t about me—like when a casting director was looking for someone older.

    Most times, there was a lesson for me in the rejection, some area where I could learn and improve. But the lesson never had to do with my worth as a person—only about my potential for growth.

    This isn’t a mindset I adopted quickly or easily. 

    For years, I hated myself when I failed or it seemed people didn’t want me. Even the tiniest rejections would push me down to a dark, dirty place of “There’s something wrong with me.”

    And it was awfully tempting to stay there. In a way, it felt safe. It was a place where I could hang out without getting shut out.

    In accepting my inadequacy, I was free to shut down and avoid future rejections. What was the point of trying when I knew I was the problem, and there was nothing I could do about it?

    If I plain and simply wasn’t good enough—if I was intrinsically unworthy of all the things I wanted—then I could stop putting myself in a position to have this disheartening truth confirmed.

    Or, perhaps even more depressing, I could lower the bar on what I wanted so that it aligned with what I believed I deserved. I could seek out jobs that dissatisfied me, men who looked down on me, and friends who devalued me.

    Because that’s what happens when you conclude that you’re unworthy and undeserving—you find people and situations that confirm it.

    Like I did in my mid-twenties, when I casually dated a man who said I was lucky he spent time with me because I wasn’t really a great catch (while torturing myself by living in NYC but not auditioning because I thought I wasn’t good enough).

    I know now that I am good enough. I deserve so much more than I once settled for, despite all the rejections I received. And I have a light I can share with the world, if I choose to kindle it instead of stifling it.

    In a way, I’m grateful for those rejections. They enabled me to identify areas for growth, to develop confidence while making progress in those areas, and to tame the cruel, critical voice inside that hurts far more than anyone else’s rejection.

    We all have a voice like this, and it has a knack for getting louder right when we need compassion the most.

    When we’ve failed to achieve something we wanted, it likes to obsess over all the reasons we probably shouldn’t have put ourselves out there.

    Really, it’s trying to keep us safe by discouraging us from putting ourselves in a position to be hurt again. Just like our friends are trying to protect us from pain by telling us it really isn’t about us.

    But safe isn’t a place where we learn or grow. It’s not the key to feeling alive, engaged, challenged, or proud of the way we’re showing up in the world.

    To feel those things we have to first tell ourselves we’re worthy of those feelings—no matter how much room we have for growth.

    We have to tell ourselves that we can achieve more than we think, but we are so much more than what we achieve.

    We have to live in that grey area where failures and rejections provide information, but not confirmation that we’re not good enough.

    I’m not always open to that information. On days when I’m feeling down on myself, it’s tempting to interpret “no” as “no, you don’t matter.”

    Even those days are opportunities, because I get to practice telling myself, “Yes, you do. Now prove it. Keep learning. Keep growing. And keep showing up, because you have so much more to give.”

  • 5 Tips to Help You Stop Being a People Pleaser

    5 Tips to Help You Stop Being a People Pleaser

    “One of the most freeing things we learn in life is that we don’t have to like everyone, everyone doesn’t have to like us, and it’s perfectly okay.” ~Unknown

    I have a confession to make: I am a recovering people pleaser.

    If I had a dollar for every time I did something that I didn’t want to do because I didn’t want people to be angry or disappointed if I said no, I would be a rich woman.

    I say that I am recovering because, as with any ingrained pattern, sometimes I slip back into the tendency to put other people’s wants before myself and my needs.

    When I talk about putting other people’s needs before your own as a pleaser, I don’t mean being there for someone or helping someone in a way that you want to. If you want to help someone, or you compromise with someone that you care about to come up with a solution that works for both of you, that’s healthy.

    Pleaser behavior goes beyond this and becomes unhealthy when:

    • You say yes to something that you really don’t want to do just to keep someone happy and have an ‘easy’ life
    • You feel uncomfortable about a situation that you’re in but carry on regardless; for example, being asked to do something dishonest or that isn’t in line with your values
    • You feel exhausted and depleted from putting everyone else’s needs before your own and not taking the time out to practice self-care
    • If you do say no (for whatever reason) then you make excuses and spend a lot of time feeling guilty afterwards.

    Luckily, there are some ways that you can start to manage your people pleaser tendencies. Here are five of the most effective actions and mindset shifts that have worked for me:

    1. Make peace with the fact that not everyone is going to like you—and actually, that’s okay.

    The quote at the start of this article says it all. It certainly set my own mindset shift into motion a few years ago when I decided enough was enough and that I was going to start putting myself first.

    When I feel my own pleaser instincts kick in, I always take the time to remember that it’s okay for people not to like me; I don’t like everyone and everyone isn’t going to like me.

    As a pleaser your main drive will be to do everything in your power to make someone like you. For me, and for many other pleasers, this comes from a place of severe low self-esteem. Basically, when people like you, you like yourself; when they don’t, your opinion of yourself drops.

    The best way to lessen the need for validation from others is to start working on loving yourself and increasing your self-esteem.

    As a starting point list all of the things that you love about yourself. Aim for at least ten things initially, and refer back to it and add to it regularly. Also, start treating yourself as you would a loved one or really good friend, and start connecting with people who love and accept themselves as they are. Model their behavior until it becomes your own.

    2. Learn to say no in a way that feels okay to you. (No making excuses allowed!)

    “No” is a word that many of us could stand to use a little more often. How many times have you said no only to go back on your decision when put under a little bit of pressure from another person?

    I used to do that all the time, or I would say no and then make a number of excuses to justify my decision (many of these were white lies to make saying no more feasible).

    The thing with making excuses rather than offering a firm and honest no, complete with a truthful reason that you can stick to, is that it opens up the possibility of negotiation with the other person. If that happens, your inner pleaser is likely to give in and you’ll once again find yourself doing things that you don’t want to do and putting yourself last.

    So, how do you stop this behavior? Say no in a way that feels good to you, but in a way that is strong.

    You don’t have to use a one-word answer, but you should be truthful; for example, “I would love to help, but unfortunately I have booked a me day that day,” or “That sounds like a great opportunity, but I think someone else would be better placed to help.”

    Stick to the original answer and if someone tries to enter into negotiation them simply but firmly repeat it.

    3. Accept that you will feel guilty when you say no to something the first few times.

    Pleasers often feel guilty when they say no to a request. You probably feel that you are being selfish or that you have let someone down. This is misplaced guilt. You have done nothing wrong, and that person will most likely find another solution to their problem.

    When you feel guilty, honor the feeling, but think about how much worse you would feel if you said yes to yet another thing that you didn’t want to do. The likelihood is that this would feel worse. Remember that the guiltily feeling will fade quickly.

    If you feel that bad, grab your journal and list all the pros and cons of your decision. I bet the pros list is longer!

    4. Start setting some boundaries.

    It’s okay to put yourself first. In fact, you will be a happier, more productive, and more amazing person for it. The best way to do that? Set some boundaries. When we stand for nothing, we will fall for everything, as they say!

    Find somewhere quiet, where you won’t be distracted or interrupted, and list all of the things that you’ve done over the past three to six months that you didn’t want to do.

    Once you have your list, go through and write down the reasons that you didn’t want to do each thing. You will probably notice some recurring reasons; for example, it cut into my time with my family, it made me too tired, it wasn’t something I was comfortable doing because…

    Use these reasons to start setting some boundaries for yourself. For example:

    • Getting enough sleep is important to me. If it stops me getting eight hours a night I will say no.
    • I don’t want to be around negative energy. If something is going to expose me to negative energy, I will say no.
    • If something goes against my values of honesty and integrity, I will say no.

    Start by setting yourself four or five boundaries at first, and then practice upholding these over the next few months. You can then add more and gradually build up knowing what you will and will not accept in your life.

    5. Let go of the people who use your people pleaser tendencies on purpose.

    As with anything in this life, there are people who will try to take advantage of your good nature.

    As you begin to raise your levels of self-esteem and start to assert yourself, you will begin to see those who are trying to trigger your inner people pleaser for their own benefit.

    They will be the ones who deliberately try to push your buttons, no matter how many times you say no. They will continue to overstep the boundaries that you set.

    The best thing to do here is to let them fall away from your life and accept the lessons that they’ve taught you about who you are and what you want in life.

    If it’s not possible to let someone go completely, if they are a family member for example, simply create some healthy distance and prepare for any meetings that you may have with them by reaffirming your boundaries to yourself.

    Remember, this is a process and if you slip back into old behaviors don’t be too hard on yourself. But do keep going and making progress, your life and self-esteem will be much better as a result!

  • 10 Ways We Hide from the World & Why We Need to Be Seen

    10 Ways We Hide from the World & Why We Need to Be Seen

    Man with Bag on Head

    “Don’t hide yourself. Stand up, keep your head high, and show them what you got!” ~Joe Mari Fadrigalan

    Sometime in high school I started to disappear. If I think back to the source of my disappearance, it was probably in sixth grade, the year all of my girlfriends ostracized me from sleepovers, parties, and general friendliness.

    I was resilient, made some new friends, and forgave the old, but I kind of stopped trusting people. And when you don’t trust people, you can’t be yourself around them. So I decided to disappear.

    I remember becoming ghost-like. I remember it being a choice. A conscious choice.

    I decided to slouch in my desk and cover my eyes. I decided to silence my voice when an opinion was provoked. I decided to avoid eye contact. I decided to skip parties, stop making efforts with people who made no efforts with me, and hold my breath until graduation day.

    And this is what I learned: people let you disappear.

    I don’t think I expected to be saved, but no one crawled into my hole, grabbed my hand, and pulled me out.

    If you want to disappear, you will. You’ll meet someone five or six times and they will never seem to remember meeting you. You’ll walk down streets and people will bump right into you. You’ll be looked through and talked over.

    The world does not carve out a space for the voiceless. They do not roll out a red carpet and invite the invisible to parade through.

    This is the great lesson of life: you get what you ask for. If you want to disappear, you got it. If you want to be seen and heard, you can have that too.

    Disappearing is much easier, I have to say. It doesn’t take much energy to shut up and fade away. What’s much more challenging is acknowledging to yourself that you’re worthy of being here and facing the pain that’s required of being seen.

    Here are some of the ways we hide:

    1. We don’t give our opinion because it’s different from what other people are saying.

    2. We avoid eye contact or look away once initial eye contact is made.

    3. We speak very softly and timidly.

    4. We slouch and hunch over in an effort to shrink ourselves down.

    5. We wait for other people to initiate.

    6. In conversation we don’t offer up anything about our lives, our feelings, our interests, our thoughts.

    7. We decline invitations to parties, to dinners, to coffee, to anything new.

    8. We tell ourselves stories about people so we don’t have to like them and, inevitably, let them in.

    9. We don’t tell the truth to others.

    10. We don’t tell the truth to ourselves.

    I was waiting to live. Waiting to feel okay in my skin. Waiting to find people I could trust and open up. Waiting to live the life I wanted for myself.

    This was a dangerous lesson in my life. It taught me that it was okay to hide, that it was okay to shrink myself down to a barely audible whisper. Hiding became a habitual coping mechanism.

    When I moved to LA in my late twenties, I realized that no one knew me. I had some amazing people in my life who lived all over the country, but this was my new home—and no one knew me.

    Around this time I began to heal myself through mentorship and breathwork.

    I learned to value myself, to recognize my inherent worth, and I became more open. I took risks: I maintained eye contact with strangers, I smiled, I gave out information about myself without it being requested of me, I asked people out for coffee, I had presence, I was vibrating at a higher frequency.

    And guess what started to happen? People were seeing me. At cafes people looked me in the eye, and we made small talk, sometimes real talk. Neighbors learned my name. People remembered me.

    We all need to be seen. It’s part of what makes us human. When we don’t allow ourselves to be seen, we diminish our importance in this world. We undervalue ourselves. We hold ourselves back from greatness. We stifle our contributions. And it just plain doesn’t feel good.

    A life of joy is one in which we feel comfortable showing who we really are to the world. It means accepting the fact that we’re going to stumble over our words sometimes, be misunderstood sometimes, and even be disliked sometimes.

    But even in those moments we will still love ourselves first. We will allow the pain of others to be their pain and not our own. We will do our best to continue to give love to those who need it most, even when the remnants of their rejections sting.

    When we shrink ourselves down we diminish our light. We literally become invisible. People look right through us, walk around us, and forget our existence because we have allowed ourselves to disappear.

    There is light that vibrates through each of us. When we love ourselves we are illuminated, and we can’t help but be seen. People flock to light. 

    Hiding in a dark shell of a body is not a life. It’s a holding room. It’s the place where you’re choosing to find safe harbor until the storm passes. But the more you hide, the more difficult it is to come out. Everything feels like a violent storm.

    We avoid our own lives and, in doing so, relinquish our right to living a truly happy one.

    There are some really uncomfortable things we have to encounter in this life. We are all wounded. The only way to get to the other side of any pain is to walk through it.

    Sometimes you have to walk really slowly, and sometimes you have to sit in the pain and feel it deeply.

    Sometimes you have to let yourself be humiliated, heartbroken, and defeated in order to walk through the other side resilient, lighter, and wiser.

    The only way to shed the burden of our pain is to face into it and feel the love buried deep beneath. And we need you to walk through the fire. Because the truth is that we need to see you as much as you need to be seen.

    If you’re hiding right now, please come out. We’re all here, waiting to meet you.

    Man with bag on head image via Shutterstock

  • 7 Things to Realize When You Think You Don’t Matter

    7 Things to Realize When You Think You Don’t Matter

    Woman in a Ski Jacket

    “I wish I could show you, when you are lonely or in darkness, the astonishing light of your own being.” ~Hafiz of Shiraz

    Have you ever felt like you didn’t matter?

    Were you ever held back from pursuing something because the voice in your head said, “Why bother?”

    You’re not alone.

    I once felt that way too, but I discovered a way out of that dark time.

    In my early twenties, fresh out of college, I had my first professional job interview. I had the blissful optimism and naiveté characteristic of most college grads seeing a world full of infinite possibilities.

    And although optimistic, I was understandably apprehensive because it was relatively difficult for a first-time interview.

    It consisted of the following:

    • An interview lasting one to two hours conducted by a panel of eight to ten people.
    • Answering questions in Spanish since being bilingual was a requirement.

    I prepared for a week and hoped for the best.

    In the beginning, the situation was quite unnerving with everyone watching and analyzing me, but then it got relatively easier. Yet, just when I started to feel somewhat comfortable, someone asked me a question in Spanish (my big weakness).

    I wasn’t confident speaking conversational Spanish, so when I answered the question, I completely choked, and my Spanish sounded like I was a toddler learning how to talk. All of a sudden one of the other interviewers belted out raucous laughter, and the humiliation poured over me like a waterfall.

    After ten seconds of awkward silence, the rest of the interview didn’t matter because I felt more insignificant than a speck of dust.

    And, not only did I not get the job, but the resulting humiliation also destroyed my self-worth and bruised my youthful, inexperienced ego.

    I didn’t bother interviewing for another job for almost a year.

    Not until I had some clarity one day looking into my daughter’s eyes did I realize how I had allowed someone to control my life like an invisible bully.

    I wanted to take back control, move on, and not live life feeling so small.

    I had to be strong for my daughter and regain my self-worth.

    I realized seven things we should remember when we think we don’t matter:

    1. We all have the same emotional pain points: insecurity, self-doubt, and fear of not belonging.

    As different as we all are outwardly, we feel the same emotional pain. Some of us hide it or mask it with anger, mean-spiritedness, and insensitivity, while a minority can clearly communicate that pain in a healthy way. In the end, we all want the comfort of belonging to a group and the feeling of sincere acceptance.

    Stop feeding your pain by comparing yourself with others.

    Whether it’s a lack of success in relationships, financial issues, or being insecure about your body, focus on the emotional indirect connection with others instead, and feel less alone by knowing you share this pain with everyone

    2. You were blessed with a “super power.”

    You may not know it, but you can do something so easily that you take it for granted. If you are unsure what that super power is, take the time to deeply reflect on the possibilities: intuitive, artistic, empathic, talented dancer or musician, skilled cook, caring, organized, etc.

    This is your super power or skill you are blessed with. No matter what you think, this blessing is significant, so recognize you have a gift, use it, and share it with the world.

    3. Confidence can be learned.

    You may think that people are born confident, but this isn’t true; confidence can be learned. It also can be rebuilt. For me, the difficult first step of doing another job interview began the process of rebuilding my confidence, and steadily my confidence grew with each interview I tackled afterward.

    Know it’s possible and don’t get shut down by the myth that you either have confidence or you don’t. Learning to be confident will test your comfort levels, but building confidence is a process that even the most timid can achieve.

    4. Look at low points in your life without self-judgment.

    Just like we take care of a physical injury, emotional pain also must be taken care of in deeply caring ways.

    The most important thing to do when you are at a low point in your life is don’t judge or self-blame. Punishing yourself by going through that mental loop of I deserve this, or I’m worthless is like walking on a broken leg; you won’t heal.

    Be gentle to yourself, give yourself time, and rebuild your strength—you’ll get through.

    5. Of all the voices in the world, the loudest and most insidious is your inner voice.

    The inner critic wants you to believe the lie that you must be perfect. Trying to be perfect all the time strips the joy out of life.

    If you don’t accomplish goals, don’t know what you want yet, and make numerous mistakes, that’s okay because life is about discovery.

    The only obligation you have is to be true to yourself. Don’t empower that inner critic by listening. Instead, drown out that voice by talking to yourself in more encouraging ways; you’ll live your life with more joy this way

    6. You don’t need to know what others think. In other words, nobody will please and be liked by everyone.

    Stop obsessing about what others think. You can’t control their thoughts because it isn’t within your control. So let go of that forever.

    Free yourself and know that you can’t possibly please everyone. The greatest creators, dreamers, and innovators faced the worse kind of adversity and were hated by many people. Just be the real you and nothing more.

    Don’t allow others to validate your worth; all you need to know is you are doing the best that you can do, and that’s enough.

    Throughout your life, gather the ideas, thoughts, and opinions of others, but always look within and live your truth. We all want acceptance, but if you never live your truth, you will always be imprisoned by other people’s opinions.

    7. Rejection is not failure; it means something better that you deserve is coming.

    That rejection by a love interest or that HR Manager for the job opportunity you really wanted is not a failure. You are simply in the process of getting what you deserve and what is right for you.

    The doors that slam in your face may be many, but soon you’ll realize they were secret blessings that you will look back on fondly. When people say, “No,” keep trying and eventually you’ll find that one proverbial door that will finally be the one meant just for you.

    Rejection is better than doing nothing because you’re at least trying and building momentum, regardless of how crappy you may feel.

    If you want something, momentum begins when you take the first step, even if it is the tiniest step.

    Make Your Inner Light Burn Brighter

    Regardless of all the curveballs that life throws at you, know that you completely matter.

    You may feel your self-worth has been lost, but don’t lose hope.

    Focus on what connects you with others (both flaws and strengths), embrace your superpower and not your weaknesses, strengthen your confidence one step at a time, and be empowered to accomplish your dreams.

    Know that everyone endures the ebb and flow of life in different ways.

    Before you know it, the bounce will return to your step, and your confidence will radiate the room.

    It’s only a matter of time.

    Let me know which of these points you’ll embrace today.

    Woman in a ski jacket image via Shutterstock

  • Overcoming the Fear of Being Judged for Your Mistakes

    Overcoming the Fear of Being Judged for Your Mistakes

    Sad Woman

    “Live your life for you not for anyone else. Don’t let the fear of being judged, rejected, or disliked stop you from being yourself.” ~Sonya Parker

    For years I struggled with a nagging feeling of guilt. This was not for actual things I did, but just a feeling that anytime something went wrong in my life, it was somehow my fault.

    I came from a religious family of eleven kids. My dear mom, bless her heart, occasionally punished us all because she just didn’t have the time in her busy day to find the perpetrator.

    My older brother, the perpetrator of most of our punishments, found this all to be quite humorous. The rest of us did not.

    Was it our desperate appeals to him to be better behaved, or our mom’s reaction whenever she learned of his latest subterfuge that he found humorous? Such are the trials of growing up in a big family.

    It didn’t help that the nuns in school reinforced the necessity of admitting guilt and the importance of being in need of exoneration. If something bad happened to you, like skinning your knee, well it was just God punishing you for something you hadn’t been caught at.

    One would normally think that guilt stemmed from believing you might have hurt someone. It took me some time to figure out the reasons for my feelings I hadn’t hurt anyone, but I felt guilty.

    How Do We Untangle This Web of Guilty Feelings?

    I wanted to know why I was hanging on to these guilty feelings. Self-awareness is about setting aside things that others have said about you and paying attention instead to what you know about yourself to be true.

    I figured my guilt was very much attached to what I believed others might think of me.

    I was using guilt as a defense mechanism. I would blame myself first, hoping to find and correct my mistakes before anyone else found out. I hoped that extra alertness might allow me to avoid criticism and judgments from others.

    My true nemesis was the fear of being criticized. Keeping a ledger of past mistakes was my way of being vigilant to crush any mistakes before anyone found out.

    My ledger of mistakes: the things that I did or said because it was easy and convenient, what I did not do or say when I could have, blaming others in my thoughts or not showing kindness when I could have. I even kept track of my embarrassing moments so I would never do them again.

    I worried that if my mistakes were exposed, I would be judged, rejected, or disliked for them. And so I punished myself for them before anyone else could.

    This fear of being exposed led me to walk through life feeling guilty for who I was and for all the mistakes I’d made. These fears were controlling my life.

    I believed and feared that these mistakes were who I was, and if they were exposed, I would be exposed.

    So How Did We Conquer Those Fears?

    Fears are challenges that put us out of our comfort zone, and they are opportunities for real growth.

    I found my growth happening when I mustered up the courage to experiment. What would happen if I lived my day the way I wanted? What if I stopped worrying about others judging me?

    I started just doing my best.

    I sought out new skills when I wanted my work to be better, just to make it pleasing to me. I stopped trying to impress others and hide my faults. I let them see me so I could understand and get to know them better and learn from their experiences.

    Most of the time, I wasn’t judged or disapproved by others. Guess who was the biggest judge? Me!

    By facing my fears, I reduced them significantly and could live with them. Knowing that others didn’t criticize me was not enough. I still had to resolve the negative self-judgments I still thought about myself if I was going to really accept myself and be free of the guilt.

    So How Does One Get to Self-Acceptance?

    Accepting ourselves is about recognizing that we’ve done things that we are not proud of, and this is part of being human. There is a process for dealing with regrets: sorrow with compassion, remorse, then leading to forgiveness.

    That same process works for resolving those nagging guilty feelings for doing or not doing things that don’t have apparent negative impact on others. I’m talking about those times when I had negative thoughts or opinions about others, yet didn’t express them, or when I didn’t take a higher road when I could have.

    Our guilt becomes this reservoir of mistakes we made in life. Mistakes are part of being human. Sometimes we are just not prepared for situations.

    Having compassion for my humanity, I forgave myself for my mistakes. This opened me up to genuine acceptance for the human that I am, and that we all are.

    I got to know my real self. The real me was that person who took the risk of being judged by others.

    I was not my mistakes. I started getting to like me.

    Then something unexpected….

    I can still remember this moment. I had this feeling of love for me—faults and all. I am talking about the kind of love that you feel for someone you love deeply. I had never before felt this way about myself.

    You can do this too.

    Time to Be Done With Feeling Guilty

    If guilty feelings are nagging at you, there is a way out. Be self-aware by knowing what is true about you. Get out of your comfort zone and face those fears of exposure.

    You can change and make it better. Forgive and accept yourself inside, for who you really are. Be free of guilt and be yourself. One day you’ll find yourself loving you.

    Sad woman image via Shutterstock