Rejection

Post by @painexplained sparked a pretty intense discussion. My opinion about it doesnt matter for this post. I felt bad for @painexplained_tms because i knew how id feel if someone called me a disgrace online. I would go into a breakdown. I feel a literal shock when someone online scolds at me. I’ve been through it a bunch of times where im in a social space and i get completely torn apart by the group. Im an independent thinker so i usually get quite a lot of negative responses.

I know these online strangers dont know me and there words shouldnt matter, but they do. How do we combat this? Is it exposure? Self compassion

I saw @painexplained posted about the whole thing on insta and i found pretty insightful by her. I know how comments like those would make me feel and I would like to do better.

When I was in a ton of shit last time i was violently dropped by al my friends so i know why i have such an intense fear of rejection. It feels the same as when they did that to me, although a little less intense. Stomach drops, flashbang to the head, blurry vision heart starts racing. Its a trauma response. I have done some trauma work on this and written about it a ton.

I would like to hear thoughts

 

Perhaps you could reach out to Emily and see if she can give you some insights on how she learnt to deal with this particular issue herself?

Just a thought.

 

But that might cost him $4,000! (Sorry, I just could resist! lol)

 

Further to what @CalmIsTheCure suggested above... they're right, you can actually learn from Emily's reaction, but even without reaching out to her... She 'made lemonade out of lemons' -- she used the experience to add content to her Instagram account and by doing so endeavoured to save any possible detrimental fall out to her business with an offensive. She believes she knows her worth. And that's what we all need to do when faced with brickbats and other types of adversity. Your old friends dump you, don't stand by you etc... know your worth... move on and endeavour to find some new friends.

 

Oht hat made me chuckle.
It does make me wonder though, if she really wasnt bothered would she have posted about it on Instagram.

 

I couldn't read her Instagram piece (as I'm not on there myself), but from the heading—"Online hate and how I handle it as a person who used to fear rejection"—it seems she turned it into a coaching lesson for her followers, thus making 'lemonade out of lemons'.

Apart from sociopaths/psychopaths—who react to criticism but aren't 'hurt' by it like most of us—we're all bothered by it to one degree or another, whether the criticism be just or not. For the rest of us, it's about how much we let it get to us. To not let it, we need to truly value ourselves and know our worth. Many TMSers struggle with this—we don't value ourselves enough.

There's a danger, though, of swinging too far the other way: overvaluing our worth, which can erode humility.

To some, using the forum to advertise coaching services—without contributing anything much beyond her success story that I know of—can come across as ruthless.

 

Kudos to her for taking it in stride. Although I’d hope for some more nuance on that IG post. I think people who are through the bramble can sometimes forget what’s it’s like on the other side. People here are in their deepest darkest moment. Many with this degree of dysfunction and pain end their lives. If she sees nothing wrong with the manner of how she went about advertising on here, and why there were criticisms, then more power to her. But it was tactless. That doesn’t mean she deserves hell, or pain or anything awful. She didn’t kill anyone, she didn’t really hurt anyone. She just made a small error in judgement. Which we all do. And guess what, sometimes there are repercussions. And in this case, those repercussions were some mild criticisms by random people online. Not that big of a deal. Nevertheless a learning opportunity. For me as well, I could’ve been nicer and articulated myself better. I’ll be better.

 

@Rabscuttle

Would you say meditating improves your life outside of meditation? Someone was talking about a clear headspace and real improvements and suddenly it clicked that meditation wasnt just a nice calm down moment, it actually is supposed to do something to the rest of your day.

I have seen a ton of Ben Smith videos and ive been doing it everyday. Ive been doing better than expected meditation wise.

Symptomwise still feel desperate as ever…

 

Absolutely 100% yes it translates elsewhere, it helps detach from our thoughts (which fuel symptoms), live more in the moment.

it takes time to see results, don’t put timelines on it or expect or rely on it to cure your symptoms (it absolutely can help but if that’s the goal then you’re setting yourself up for disappointment). Just go with the flow and take the wisdom you get from it any apply it elsewhere. My goal with meditation is to connect with god/the universe and my higher self, but at times I lose sight and focus on using it to eliminate symptoms. Meditation can absolutely help get us out of fight or flight. When I started back in December after about 4 weeks I had a few days with no facial muscle tension at rest (this is after a year straight of chronic jaw tension and nonstop headaches), naturally when you feel good you can lapse back into old thought patterns (brain is less preoccupied with pain) so pain returns. Then last week for several days I had zero jaw tension again, but repeated the same error-started putting pressure on myself, negative self talk etc. I actually became kinda fixated on how my mouth felt with no tension so I obsessed about not being in pain, a quick way to go back to being in pain lol. It’s all a learning process. It’s clear my symptoms serve as a distraction from being cruel towards myself. The gist is to take that wisdom you get from all this work (meditation included) and apply it as much as possible throughout the day, both when symptoms are low and during flares. I focused way too much on my thoughts during flares I didn’t prepare for whenever symptoms lowered. The brain should be getting constant positive reinforcement (praise etc), like a puppy, which I’ve seen some people here reference. And you absolutely may have to force it at first, but meditation makes it easier for us to think we deserve that inner kindness.

 

I love that mate. Thanks for the write up.

 

I haven't seen her Instagram post, but her forum response suggests she either doesn't see the issue with using this space mostly for promo (after just sharing her recovery story twice) or isn't ready to own it. Instead of humility, she points to charity on another platform—'Sorry' really is the hardest word, as Elton John sang.

She's clearly boosted her self-valuing through TMS recovery (huge for most of us!), but over-egging it risks undoing that progress. A simple 'I see how that came across—thanks for the feedback' could have turned it around positively. Like you said, she didn't kill anyone.