#7
This week I went to see a participant and winner of the show survivor, Parvati Shallow speak. I admit that I didn't know who she was, but my friend asked me to go. She has been on the show survivor a couple of times has even won it before. I was a little confused about what to expect from her. I had no clue what she was going to be talking about. The ticket said it was going to be a keynote speech about how college is similar to survivor. I was curious to see how she was gonna spin that because the similarities between a game show where you are dropped on a deserted island where you are forced to compete physically and psychologically vs an overpriced university where you spend 80% of your time studying, 15% drunk, and 5% sleeping, aren't extremely apparent to me.
The main point she made was how important it is to do what you want to do, regardless of fear of judgment and fear of rejection. She mentioned her five values to live by which were courage, adventure, love, empathy, and fearlessness. She talked about when she got the offer to come on to survivor for the current season she was hesitant. Not only was she worried about potentially ruining her winning reputation but she also had just had a kid. She talked about the importance of not letting fear of people rejecting and ridiculing her. She didn't want people to laugh and dismiss her is she didn't get far in the game, and she didn't want the judgement people would give her for leaving her baby. Nevertheless, she decided to peruse what she knew deep down she wanted to do.
She also gave the example of her father who wanted to started his own business but had many fears. Fears of failure, rejection, embarrassment. She challenged him to play the rejection game. This is something that I had never heard of but found very interesting. This 'game' is to seek out at least 3 rejections each day. Asking for free coffee, asking for strangers to dance with him, and asking to cut in line at the post office were all examples of how her father sought after rejection. This game is a practice of putting yourself out there, it allows you to get used to being vulnerable, and familiar with being told no.
The message of her speech was very inspiring. Almost everyone in their life has not done something they wanted to do because they were nervous. Whether the nerves were due to fear of rejection, ridicule, judgement, embarrassment, we are all guilty of it. She emphasized how miserable life would be if humans always let their fear and nerves prevent them from doing what they want. I will definitely think of her speech the next time I am hesitant to do what I want to do just because I am scared of failure.
The main point she made was how important it is to do what you want to do, regardless of fear of judgment and fear of rejection. She mentioned her five values to live by which were courage, adventure, love, empathy, and fearlessness. She talked about when she got the offer to come on to survivor for the current season she was hesitant. Not only was she worried about potentially ruining her winning reputation but she also had just had a kid. She talked about the importance of not letting fear of people rejecting and ridiculing her. She didn't want people to laugh and dismiss her is she didn't get far in the game, and she didn't want the judgement people would give her for leaving her baby. Nevertheless, she decided to peruse what she knew deep down she wanted to do.
She also gave the example of her father who wanted to started his own business but had many fears. Fears of failure, rejection, embarrassment. She challenged him to play the rejection game. This is something that I had never heard of but found very interesting. This 'game' is to seek out at least 3 rejections each day. Asking for free coffee, asking for strangers to dance with him, and asking to cut in line at the post office were all examples of how her father sought after rejection. This game is a practice of putting yourself out there, it allows you to get used to being vulnerable, and familiar with being told no.
The message of her speech was very inspiring. Almost everyone in their life has not done something they wanted to do because they were nervous. Whether the nerves were due to fear of rejection, ridicule, judgement, embarrassment, we are all guilty of it. She emphasized how miserable life would be if humans always let their fear and nerves prevent them from doing what they want. I will definitely think of her speech the next time I am hesitant to do what I want to do just because I am scared of failure.
The idea of the rejection game is so interesting. I fear rejection. Who doesn't? This fear has ruled my life for so long, and honestly, it'll probably continue to affect my decisions after writing this. Four years ago, if I was in the library and found a desk without a chair, I would either just stand at the desk doing work or leave the library because it made me so nervous walking up to someone and asking if I could take on of their open chairs. I also used to spend so much less money because I was too afraid to ask the salesperson if they had my size and I would end up buying nothing. Doing any of these things took a lot of energy out of me. I would have to spend at least 10 minutes beforehand, building up the courage and preparing myself to talk to them. This whole problem is a mix of the fear of rejection and the fear of talking to people. I absolutely hate first days of school and orientation because I hate making small talk with new people only to find out later, maybe it's a week later or a month later, that they don't want to be my friend anymore. I hate talking to the sales person because just finding the energy to talk to them is so difficult that if they say "no, we don't have your size", I feel like I wasted all that energy only to be shot down. I know it sounds really dumb but I find it so difficult to just walk up to someone and start talking to them, even if it's just asking a small thing like taking a chair. I think over the years, I have started to get over this fear a little more. I don't really know what happened over the four years that changed me to become less afraid of rejection, however, I hope that it keeps happening. Maybe I'll start doing the rejection game, just for fun. It would be a nice way to put myself out there even if I think that I would be rejected. Who knows? I might even be pleasantly surprised with what happens.
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