S1:E4: Rejection Happens For You, Not To You

In this episode, I will be sharing how I reframed rejection as happening for me instead of to me. I take you through my thought process from what I’ve learned in cognitive behavioral therapy. The power is always within the way we choose to view things.

Transcript

Intro:
Welcome to Mental Breakthrough, a memoir podcast about owning our most vulnerable stories so we can live a life of authenticity.

I’m Maryann Samreth, the woman behind the pen name, Sincerely Miss Mary. Together, I take you through my healing journey as I share stories of moving through pain to get to the other side where the light shines again.

In this season, I carry you moment to moment, starting with a tumultuous breakup, then multiple breakdowns, and eventually a breakthrough.

I share stories of how my gift of writing guided me through the darkest moments of my life, leading me to reconnect with my Cambodian ancestors and break the cycle of generational trauma.

There is power in storytelling and sharing our vulnerabilities with the world. It opens doors to cultivate deeper connections with others on the same journey so we can heal as a collective.

By sharing my truths, I pave the way for others to feel safe sharing theirs. We all have a story to tell. Stories that can be someone’s silver lining. Stories of hope.

Episode 3 Intro:
Hey dear friends!

I have decided to mix up some of my episodes with ones that are lighter...to be honest, retelling my stories of overcoming trauma has been re-triggering for me. So this week, I will be sharing how I reframed rejection as happening for me instead of to me, as I shared in last week’s episode, The Blessing of Rejection.

I will be walking you through the way I reframed my mindset to overcome the most traumatic rejection I faced after publicly condemning the man that sexually assaulted me.

I take you through my thought process from what I’ve learned in cognitive behavioral therapy. If you’re not familiar with CBT, it is a type of therapy that guides you to reframing your mindset and helps you control the only thing you can. Which is your thoughts and your response. The power is always within the way we choose to view things.

As a disclaimer, I am not a mental health professional or a certified life coach. I am only speaking from my experience and what I’ve learned from these healing modalities from a mental health professional. I hope this episode can help you reframe the pain that comes with rejection, but as always, take my advice at your discretion.

Episode 4: Rejection Happens For You, Not To You
Rejection is trauma (whether it is little t or big t), it’s an event out of your control and is always a painful experience.

This could be in the form of a job loss, a friend breakup, or in my case heartbreak, and a mass social media ghosting frenzy from people who knew my perpetrator.

Whatever rejection you experienced, give yourself permission to feel the pain that comes with it. What I will be talking about is rejection in the form of a discard by a person in your life that is unhealthy.

These are 4 steps to process and heal from a painful rejection:

1. Grieve

Give yourself permission to cry, scream, rage, or punch a pillow.
You’re allowed to grieve an event out of your control.
It doesn’t make you weak.
Giving yourself permission to grieve in the way you need to is a way of validating yourself.
It is a way of honoring your pain.
It is a way of moving through the pain, so you can eventually move out of it.

There is no way around painful emotions.
We often label negative feelings as something bad...or meaning we can’t get over someone...but what we don’t realize is that by sitting in our pain we learn more about ourselves.

We learn about our core values.
We learn about behaviors of other people that trigger.
We learn about relationships that don’t serve us.

When we allow ourselves to feel the necessary painful feelings for however long we need to, we also witness that pain fade, and what is left is a stronger, wiser you who is closer to knowing what you want.

I give you full permission to feel your feelings. This was the first thing I learned in therapy..and once I allowed myself to feel all of my negative emotions, I saw the beauty in the way it faded, and how I became closer to my most authentic self.

2. Acceptance

Acceptance that it happened.
Acceptance that there is nothing you can do to change it.
Acceptance that people are who they are.
Acceptance will teach you to be kind to yourself because rejection is out of your control.

You are not responsible for the way people perceive you, especially if you stand up for yourself.

The way people perceive you is a reflection of who they are on the inside, based on their lived experiences, and their capacity to look within.

Having acceptance for what you can’t control will bring you peace.
You deserve your peace.
It’s difficult to not spiral into the what ifs and what you could have done differently to have a different outcome.

But the hard truth is people who reject you do not want to change their views of the world.
They want to stay where they are and you are not meant to stay where you are.
You are not meant to settle.
You are meant to move forward, take this pain as a lesson, and evolve into a new version of you.

That being said, if you are rejecting someone that is unhealthy for you, that is totally acceptable and totally necessary for you to evolve and transform.

That will be in another future episode where I talk about boundaries.

3. Reframe Rejection as Happening For You Instead of To You

One important human behavior I learned in therapy was that people who reject you, first reject a belief within themselves.

If they are incapable of standing up for themselves, inserting boundaries, or advocating for what they believe in, it makes it easier for them to reject anyone who breaks these limiting beliefs they have on themselves.

People who do not respect your boundaries will walk away from you.

It shows that they liked you better when you made your small,  when you didn’t stand up for yourself, when they were able to walk all over you.

This is when you realize that people who walk away from you for inserting your boundaries or speaking your truths are not your people.

If these people stayed in your life they would be holding you back from being your most authentic self.

When people walk away from you for speaking your truths, you're redirected to people who accept you as you are...and most importantly you are redirected to yourself.

When people walk away from you using your voice, you hold on to your truths that you did nothing wrong and you then you find realignment in the choice of how you show up to the world.

When people walk away from you, it’s not showing what’s wrong with you, even if it may feel that way, it’s actually showing that you are tapping into your power and your understanding of having a sense of agency.

People who reject you are actually showing you how capable you are at inserting boundaries.

They are basically doing the work for you by removing themselves from your life.

Saying no to you, is because you are starting to learn who you are.

Saying no to you, is reaffirming your power.

Saying no to you, is because they do not belong in your life.

4. Lastly, you’ll get to a place of compassion

This is the final and last step of healing from a painful rejection...and absolutely take your time to get here. Healing from rejection is a process and a cycle of high highs and low lows.

There is no timeline for healing, so take all the time you need to.

A way to help you get here, is to imagine who you would still be if this person or group of people stayed in your life.

Who would you still have to be, for them stay?

Is it someone who leads a life of fear?
Is it someone who doesn’t use their voice?
Is it someone who plays small so small-minded people can look bigger?

Who would you still have to be, for them stay?

Sit with that discomfort of who you no longer are...because you were meant to grow, evolve, transform and move forward to bigger and better things.

You’re meant to live a life where you can spread your wings and be yourself fearlessly.

So, I hope this helps you heal in whatever rejection you are facing now or have faced in the past and I will leave you with this final poem called, Healing.

Healing is a beautiful journey and an ugly process.

Healing is crying on the kitchen floor pounding the earth with all your rage.

Healing is laughing so hard until your stomach cramps as your lungs fill with joy.

Healing is finding stillness and serenity as the sun rises above you.

Healing is complete surrender.

Surrender to the open wounds of the past and of the present.

Surrender to the unbearable pain and emotions that need to be felt.

Surrender to the good, the bad, and the ugly that all intertwine to strengthen your soul and set yourself free.

Outro:
Thank you for listening to this episode. Let me know what you think of it. You can DM me on IG @sincerelymissmary

The healing journey is a path that not many take. I want you to know you are not alone. I hope this episode about reframing rejection brings you closer to the peace you deserve.

I’m Maryann, the woman behind the pen name, Sincerely Miss Mary.

Please subscribe to my podcast for more stories of healing and words of encouragement. If you loved this kind of episode, please leave me a review!

The poem, healing is from poetry collection you can download for free at https://www.sincerelymissmary.com/poetrybook

I’ll also add the link to my show notes.

Talk to you all next week!