What is the worst thing that can happen if you ask someone a yes/no question? They say no or they ignore you. That is all. No massive riots occur outside of your home, you’re still alive, and everything in the Universe is still operating normally.
Overcoming the fear of rejection is undoubtedly one of the hardest, but one of the most important things you will ever do. Despite the fact it is so important many people don’t even try to battle the fear of “no”. Instead, they make excuse after excuse to not ask someone something. They let it run their lives, which is plain stupid.
Here are some tips to help you overcome the fear of rejection:
The Worst Outcome Is Nothing - The worst things that can possibly happen if you ask someone a yes/no question is they say no, or they ignore you. And do you know what? That outcome is nothing. There are much worse things in this world than “no”.
Rejection Adds Strength - The more you get rejected the stronger you get. Why do you think there are marketers that don’t have a problem going around asking for links and reviews like it’s no big deal? They learned early on not to fear rejection, and they realized each “no” is a learning experience.
Get The Right Mindset - There are 6.5 billion people on this planet. Odds are someone is going to say yes. While it might be depressing to go around thinking “only one person out of 6,500,000,000 is going to say yes”, thinking “someone WILL say yes” is much better. Getting the right mindset is half the battle. Be optimistic - not pessimistic.
What Will Happen If They Say Yes? - I tend to believe that it is in our nature to always assume the worse. “What if she says no?”, “what if they don’t want to link to it?”, “what if I don’t get the job?”, are all perfect examples of that. Well, have you ever thought about what would happen if they said yes? Maybe that “yes” will be exactly what you need to succeed? Why not take a chance and ask the question?
You’ll Never Know Unless You Ask - You’ll never ever know the answer unless you ask the question. This may seem obvious - but to many people it is not. If you want to know something then ask, it isn’t hard to do.
Don’t Overthink It! - Perhaps the most crucial tip I can give you is to not overthink the situation too much. Thought is what makes us human - but at the same time thought is what holds us back. Overthinking the situation will always lead to fear of rejection. Just ask - there is nothing to worry about - you’re not going to all of this sudden die if the person says no. If they say no, life will go on as normal, and you can use it as a learning experience.
If you want to see an example of overthinking the situation, here is a rough draft of an e-mail I got a while back:
I liked your blog and linked to it from mine. If you like my blog could you link to it too? Linking to each others blog gets you better search rankings and will help us. Thanks bye
All they had to say was “I thought you might like this article I wrote” or “You might be interested in my blog…”. There was no reason to go on and on about search rankings and junk - most bloggers are busy people and don’t have the time to read long e-mails.
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November 11th, 2007 at 2:31 am
Agreed. If you don’t ask now, you probably will regret it later on. It’ll just gnaw at you when you sleep at night, just wondering what if he had said ‘yes’?. What’s there to lose anyway, if you get a YES, so much the better , if you don’t well… Life goes on.