What no one ever told you about the hidden gift of being rejected

It has happened to all of us.
When someone says they will come at a certain time or do something and you really believe them, and they don’t show up…
When you wake up so hot and horny next to your sexy lover and he or she pushes you away…
When you are in a relationship with someone you love deeply and you feel that you still have so much to discover together, and they choose to separate from you…

We feel rejected when someone is not available to fulfil what we want.

The intensity of pain that you experience as a result of this varies according to the specific circumstances or how deeply you are involved with this person.
But more than anything the degree to which you will be affected depends on how much awareness you have of the wound of your abandonment and how much work you have done on facing it.

We all have the wound of abandonment. Yes, each and every single one of us.

Generally, if when you were growing up your parents were not really there for you or if you felt abandoned or not accepted, Life will give you opportunities to have a more acute awareness of this wound.
If that’s the case you have probably noticed that in your relationships you keep playing out the same scenario over and over again. Perhaps you’ve been finding yourself falling for people who are not available for what you really want, and you keep being disappointed because your partners simply keep saying No to what you need.
You may feel as if your happiness depends on whether your partner is there and willing to show up in the way you want them to.
This is co-dependence at its finest. And it is the ultimate prescription for suffering. Because no one is ever responsible for your happiness. Or for how you feel.
You might find yourself on the other end of it: you feel that you are the one who keeps having to hurt and disappoint other people. And that’s a really unpleasant place to be.
If that’s the case, I must assure you that if you are willing to grow, you will be graced by the experience of being rejected too.

I know both sides very intimately.

For a long time I kept feeling as though I was constantly hurting others. My partners would become disappointed because I couldn’t be the normal, good stable partner that they wanted me to be. This is probably because I have been focused on my mission in this world, on the guidance of my spirit. And my spirit didn’t seem to be guiding me towards “normal stable relationships”, garden and babies.
My partners used to say that I was challenging and not available. They wanted more of me than I could offer.
That felt terrible and incredibly suffocating.
It may sound detached and “cool” but actually I hate this place.
Even though I know that each of us is responsible for our emotions and none of these men were ever forced into a relationship with me, at times I felt like I was the one having to tell a child that Santa didn’t exist, and it was a terrible place to be. I had to disappoint people.
At some point I asked the universe to stop sending me men who become co-dependent with me. Even though such overflowing affection can be pleasing for my ego for a bit… What I really want is to stand tall and strong, side by side with someone who is as committed to their spiritual path as I am, and who would not compromise it for anything, even the sweetest, most convenient co-dependent relationship.

I became very humbled when I was rejected, for the first time in many years.

It was incredible. It was wild! It made me cry for three days almost without stopping.
It triggered a whole phase in my life where I had to take a really close look at my inner seductress – the part of me that has all sorts of strategies for how to feel lovable because she doesn’t believe that she IS love.
I was looking at her so closely (and sharing very openly) so I got invited to two shows to speak about my findings about how and why people seduce each other.
Anyway, was I blaming the guy?
One day he approached me and asked timidly: “… are we ok or are you mad at me?”
To which I answered: “what are you talking about! I am so grateful, I love you so fucking much!”

Even though my heart was in pain, I had nothing to blame the guy for.

I saw he was just being himself, and it was just not the moment for us to connect. I felt a deep respect for his authenticity. And more than anything I was so deeply grateful that through that experience I could experience my abandonment wound.

Through the pain of rejection, we can go deeper.

We can go deep into the core of our heart.
It can be a deeply spiritual experience because when you get to the bottom of the abandonment wound… if you ever dare to bear the pain… you find something that is beyond price.
You find the very source of all wounding that humankind has.
You find the Wound caused by the excruciating pain of separation from the Divine.
You find the pain of the Fall.

The pain of forgetting our divine nature.

THIS is devastating.
There is no deeper pain than that.
And if you can be with it… at least a little bit at a time… you will see that something miraculous starts happening…
Each time you dare to open to it a little bit more… you receive a priceless gift.
You receive a taste of freedom.
And you remember the biggest secret of the abandonment wound.
The biggest secret is that there is no Wound.
But in order to remember it we need to go through the pain, and get to the bottom of it.
And then we remember.
That we have never been anything but God.
*
So, today when I felt rejected by a beautiful beloved, followed by a few rejections via email, and my friend was terribly late for our dinner date… I saw that there was a part of me that was really disappointed and sad.
I saw my co-dependant parts (I cannot feel safe with him!) and my manipulative parts (I want to tell him he is unreliable and if he continues to be that way I won’t be able to do anything that we planned together!) and parts that wanted to pretend that I was cool and I didn’t even notice…
I saw all that and I made an outrageous choice.
I chose to stay with the tenderness of my heart. I chose to stay open, vulnerable and… free.
And I believe that we can only be truly free if we can truly be vulnerable.
And if we can truly let ourselves feel.
All of it.
Down to the bottom.
Down to the edge of existence.
photo credit: @redmahan