Rejection due to Pornography

Today I would like us to look into the topic of rejection and how it affects an individual as a whole.  Especially when the rejection we feel stem from the affect of pornography on our partners.  Now many times the people would say but it is not about their partner, I disagree for it does fall on our partners too.

Many of us do not even know that certain situations may bring about the fear of rejection.  Now although it does not always stem from the specific situation that we find ourselves in this specific moment that the feelings come up, it is important for us to understand how important that we fully grasp where this fear comes from.

The primary reason the fear of rejection is prevalent in your life is often due to a lack of self-esteem. You fear rejection because you have a low value and opinion of yourself. As a result, you look to others for cues to help you feel better about yourself. Often low self-esteem stems back to childhood experiences.

Now we need to sit and go back within our own minds and find that very first time that we ourselves experienced our first feelings of rejection.  It is important and we have to pinpoint it to the exact point in time when we felt this way.

What was the circumstances?

How old were you?

Did it happen continually, or was it a once off?

How many times after this did you experience it, and how did it make you feel?

We find that individuals who suffer from the fear of rejection, are not able to trust others. 

This is called Pistanthrophobia: People Who Suffer from the Fear of Trusting.  Pistanthrophobia is the actual word for the fear of trusting people due to prior negative experiences with romantic partners.

Again I would like to highlight the fact that even though this is about negative experiences possibly from a romantic partner, it did not start of here. 

Now I would like to go over some of the areas where people tend to experience these strong feelings.

Impacts of the Fear of Rejection

Although not every person experiences every impact, the fear of rejection tends to affect our ability to succeed in a wide range of personal and professional situations. These are some of the most common.

Job Interviews

Have you ever felt warm and uncomfortable while waiting to be called for an interview? Sweaty palms, labored breathing, an increased heart rate and trouble speaking are common symptoms of the fear of rejection. They are also potential reasons for an employer to reject a candidate. Confidence and an air of authority are critical in many positions, and those suffering from this fear often come across as weak and insecure. If you have a fear of rejection, you may also have trouble negotiating a work contract, leaving valuable pay and benefits on the table.

Business Dealings

In many positions, the need to impress does not end once you have the job. Entertaining clients, negotiating deals, selling products and attracting investors are key components of many jobs. Even something as simple as answering the telephone can be terrifying for those suffering from a fear of rejection, and picking up the phone to call someone else may be impossible.

Dating

First dates, and especially blind dates, are scary for anyone, but those with a fear of rejection may quickly become overwhelmed. Rather than focusing on getting to know the other person and deciding whether you would like a second date, you might spend all of your time worrying whether that person likes you. Trouble speaking, obsessive worrying about your own appearance, an inability to eat and a visibly nervous demeanor are common.

Marriage

Married life consists of an unending series of negotiations and compromises. No matter how compatible you may be, it is impossible for two people to agree on everything. Those with a fear of rejection often have difficulty expressing their own needs and standing their ground. You might also develop feelings of jealousy or distrust in your partner as your fear of rejection turns into a fear of being abandoned. This is sometimes expressed in such unhealthy behaviors as checking your partner’s phone messages or social networking accounts.

Meeting New People

Humans are social creatures, and we are expected to follow basic social niceties in public. Most of the time, idle chatter in the grocery line or at a festival lasts only a few moments. Occasionally, however, short conversations lead to lifelong friendships. If you have a fear of rejection, you may feel unable to chat with strangers or even friends of friends. The tendency to keep to yourself could potentially prevent you from making lasting connections with others.

Peer Pressure

The need to belong is a basic human condition. In high school, we tend to self-select as jocks, cheerleaders, nerds, geeks, goths, preppies, or any number of other small groups. As adults, we tend to organize by shared interests, relationship status, and other commonalities. While dressing, speaking and behaving as a group member is not unhealthy, peer pressure sometimes goes too far. If your fear of rejection leads you to do things that are illegal, immoral or simply distasteful to you, then peer pressure might be a problem in your life.

Common Behaviors in Those With a Fear of Rejection

Phoniness

Many people who are afraid of rejection develop a carefully monitored and scripted way of life. Fearing that you will be rejected if you show your true self to the world, you may live life behind a mask. This can make you seem phony and inauthentic to others and may cause a rigid unwillingness to embrace life’s challenges.

People-Pleasing

Although it is natural to want to take care of those that we love, those who fear rejection often go too far. You might find it impossible to say no, even when saying yes causes major inconveniences or hardships in your own life. You may take on too much, increasing your own risk for burnout. At the extreme, people-pleasing sometimes turns into enabling the bad behaviors of others. Worried that you will lose the other person, you might make excuses or even assist the person with behaviors you know are wrong.

Unassertiveness

People with a fear of rejection often go out of their way to avoid confrontations. You might refuse to ask for what you want or even speak up for what you need. A common tendency is to try to simply shut down your own needs or pretend that they don’t matter.

Passive-Aggressiveness

Uncomfortable showing off their true selves but unable to entirely shut out their own needs, many people who fear rejection end up behaving in passive-aggressive ways. You might procrastinate, "forget" to keep promises, complain, and work inefficiently on the projects that you take on.

In addition, the fear of rejection often stops us from going after our dreams. Putting yourself out there is frightening for anyone, but if you have the fear of rejection, you may feel paralyzed. Hanging onto the status quo feels safe, even if you are not happy with your current situation. Whether you want to travel the world, write the Great American novel or ask the girl that sits next to you for a date, the fear of rejection may stop you from reaching your full potential.

Reactions of Others

The fear of rejection leads to behaviors that make us appear insecure, ineffectual and overwhelmed. You might sweat, shake, fidget, avoid eye contact, and even lose the ability to effectively communicate. While individuals react to these behaviors in very different ways, these are some of the reactions you might see.

Rejection

Ironically, the fear of rejection often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is well-known in pop psychology that confidence enhances attractiveness. A 2009 study at the University of Florida actually shows that confidence is nearly as important as intelligence in determining our income level! As a general rule, the lack of self-confidence that is inherent in a fear of rejection makes us more likely to be rejected.

Manipulation

Some people prey on the insecurities of others. Those who suffer from a fear of rejection may be at greater risk of being manipulated for someone else’s personal gain. Expert manipulators generally come across as charming, suave and genuinely caring -- they know what buttons to push to make others trust them. They also know how to keep someone with a fear of rejection feeling slightly "on edge," as if the manipulator might leave at any time. Almost invariably, the manipulator does end up leaving once she has gotten what she wants out of the other person.

Frustration

Most people in the world are decent, honest and forthright. Rather than manipulating someone with a fear of rejection, they will try to help. Look for signs that your friends and family are trying to encourage your assertiveness, asking you to be more open with them, or probing your true feelings. Many times, however, people who fear rejection see these attempts to help as signs of a possible future rejection. This often leads friends and family to "walk on eggshells," fearful of making your fears worse. Over time, they may become frustrated and angry, either confronting you about your behavior or beginning to distance themselves from you.

https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-fear-of-rejection-2671841

What does it mean to feel rejected?  To me personally, the sting of feeling that someone rejects me as an individual goes as far back as when I was little.  I find that in many cases, this seems to be the place, where we as individuals had experienced  rejection for the first time.  However, we find that if we look deeper into the subject, we find that this feeling of rejection was added onto from that moment onwards.  We might of felt rejected as school by our classmates, who bullied us, and made us go deeper into this pit of feeling that no matter what you do, or how you are as a person, people would always reject us, which will also add onto the feelings of feeling that we are not good enough for others.

When these deep seated fears comes up in our everyday life, we find that it also consists of a root of fear in itself.  The fear from not being able to trust other people, so rather than building healthy relationships with other individuals, we go into the world pushing people away, in fear of being rejected.

Trust, in itself, also comes into this category, for if we had learned how to trust, we would know and understand the people who we should allow into our lives.  So again our trust was broken in our early development, and we are not able to understand that it is important in life to have relationships where we can trust.

What is it that we as humans put so much emphases on rejection?  We find that in our society today, people are totally addicted to the internet, searching for other people out there in social media platforms, that we could add to our friend lists, and going in every few hours or even minutes, to see who likes them, and this comes from the feeling that if we are feeling rejection, we can stop feeling like a reject, just because we have X amount of followers.  This is how the devil had intercepted the way we perceive ourselves, as well as others.  First he will break this weakness down even further, and then he will come and give us the outlet of feeling wanted.  This way he is able to get the people to become so involved with other peoples lives, that we forget to live in the here and now.  We have become a society of following the followers who follow us, and this keeps our attention away from God.

We need to realize that we live in a time where we are running out of time, and we need to unplug, and not be so much addicted to the social media norm.  It is not normal for people to add people onto your name, if you do not know them.  This is not good, for it gives the individual a false sense of who they really are.