During my recent podcast with Drs. Arellanes and Ferraro, we talked about the benefit of leaning into awkward situations rather than avoiding them. Approaching (rather than avoiding) situations where we fear rejection can often be helpful for our mental health, and may create new opportunities that we could not have foreseen.
It reminded me of an interesting story I heard a few years ago. Jia Jiang experimented with being rejected. He spent 100 days getting rejected, doing things that would likely be looked at as awkward, or he would ask for things that most people would not give him. He decided to NOT play it safe for 100 days, and see what would happen.
Some of the things Jia tried were things that my kids would call “total cringe” if I tried them, but interestingly you’ll likely see these types of things on TikTok racking up millions of views. These are things like asking to borrow $100 from a stranger, dancing while being filmed by a security camera, or fixing a PC at the Apple store. Jia’s experiments with rejection landed him the opportunity to give a Ted Talk and he now even has a rejection therapy game where you can try out some of these “reject-able” activities yourself.
Doing the Things We Fear
I’m not advocating that you do strange things just for the sake of doing strange things (unless of course, you want a TikTok following…). But, I think Jia’s experiment with rejection has some important connections that might be relevant to mental health.
- Sometimes our fear of being rejected is worse than what we will actually experience if we try an activity. It turns out that we are pretty bad at predicting the future. So, our idea of what will happen does not always turn out to be what actually happens. People end up not rejecting us, but embracing us; people might just ignore us or not pay attention; people might actually be kind; life might be a bit more fun.
- People habituate to rejection. Habituation basically means that the same stimulus stops eliciting the same reaction. This goes for pleasant stimuli, but also for unpleasant stimuli. Six months after buying a new sports car, life with that car starts to feel boring and mundane again. That’s habituation. It’s the same with rejection. The first time hurts, as does the second (but a little less), and the third, and the fourth. But by the 10th time, rejection elicits a noticeable smaller reaction and less pain. Sales experts understand this because their jobs involve getting rejected all the time. Exposure to rejection makes rejection less scary, and less unpleasant.
- People regret not being courageous. James Pickering, a hospice nurse writes about the top 5 regrets he’s observed from people on their deathbeds. Number 1 is “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.” If you have a chance, I recommend reading the other 4 regrets — courage is a big part of almost all of them.
Pushing Through Fears of Rejection to Live a Better Life
The purpose of all of this is to develop courage — the ability to do something that you fear. Courage is a virtue, and like all of the virtues, it is inherently rewarding.
A few weeks ago my family was visiting the old summer camp I used to work at in my late teens and early twenties. There is a tree swing there that you have to climb up onto a tree house to get on, and once you’re on–it swings out 30-40 feet. My daughter wanted to do it, but when she got onto the tree house, she started doubting herself; she was ready to back down. Fortunately, the people who were there helped encourage (interesting how courage is the root of that word…”put courage into”) her, and she swung on the swing. After she did it one time, she wanted to just keep doing it, and doing it, and doing it. Courage helped her experience the joy that her fear was preventing.
Alfred Adler, one of the seminal figures in psychology in the 20th century (even has a professional psychology school named for him in Chicago) understood the importance of courage. He believed that most people were not sick. but demoralized. They don’t need to be fixed, but to be filled with courage. They need the courage to do important things, and that courageously trying to accomplish their goals would lead to true self-esteem–more than any affirmation or compliment could provide.
Ichiro Kishimi explores Adler’s ideas in great detail in his book, The Courage to Be Disliked: The Japanese Phenomenon That Shows You How to Change Your Life and Achieve Real Happiness.
If you had all the courage you needed, what would you try this week?
Disclaimer: the content on this site is for informational or educational purposes only, and does not substitute professional medical advice or consultations with healthcare professionals.
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