I love statistics!
My business coach does not love that I love statistics.
However, I want to share some interesting numbers with you today that I recently read in Brendon Burchard’s book The Charge.
Brendon is a high level business coach. His resume is unmatchable so when he speaks, I listen.
He has spoken in front of hundreds of thousands of people so his statistics are believable!
Brendon says that he has asked this question all over the world and the numbers are always the same. It concerns social rejection, which is a reason often used for people not moving forward toward their dreams – how others will judge them as they embark or maybe even fail.
Brendon’s Question 1: “How many times have you been rejected in a way that really, deeply hurt you?… I mean the kind of rejection that really hurt, that stopped you from being you or forever altered your identity… How many times?“
“Among hundreds of audiences and hundreds of thousands of people, the average of the response has never changed: seven. Most people, in the course of their lives leading up to retirement, have been rejected in a way that really hurt just seven times.“
Brendon’s Question 2: “How many times have you been encouraged by another person in your life in such a way that it had a very positive effect on your life?” “How many of you have been accepted, cheered on, and encouraged in this way…?” He offers them choices starting at one, two, fives times… but when he gets, amid lots of laughter, to a thousand and more than a thousand “Every hand in the room is still up.“
He continues “While seven may be the average number of people who have significantly rejected us by the time we hit adulthood, the counter to that is the thousands of times we’ve been supported or encouraged.“
Brendon’s Question 3: “On the road to your destiny, who and what are you going to pay attention to? The seven or eight mean people – whose judgments were much more about themselves than you – who are in your rear view mirror? Or the thousands of cheers and encouragements you’ve received that are now lining your path to progress? You choose.“
So what do you think about those statistics? They are so impressive they had to be shared.
I’ll conclude the same way Brendon did: You Choose!
(and of course a post script: if you are ready to reclaim your inner diva, your secret maven-self, click the Contact button above and talk to me!)
I just returned from Brendon’s High Performance Academy in Phoenix. It was awesome. He did that activity with us. We also got 7!!!!!! This is such a good lesson and a good reminder that we have too much negativity bias and we should be paying more attention to the positive things!
I’d love to attend one of Brendon’s HPAs sometime!! His energy is so contagious! I follow him a lot and he speaks so many truths that we forget to give light of day to.
Hi Agnes what a positive post and although I hated studying statistics I loved yours. We don’t stop often enough to think about all the good things that have happened or the wonderful ‘cheerleaders’ we have had in our life. We naturally focus on the negative and that ‘mean girl’ in our head highlights the rejections louder than the ‘nice girl’ reminds us of our successes. A great read and thanks for sharing at #MLSTL. Have a great week. x
Hi, Sue! I think even though we all know this down deep inside, we still needed to be reminded from time to time. Maybe I’ll repost every 6 months! 🙂
Yes, a very interesting topic, and one I hadn’t thought of before today. Must get hold of Brendon’s book and have a read, I might learn something else new! Pinned, visiting from MLSTL. 🙂
I love that Brendon does so much research that his stats have credibility, Cheryl. I’ve read all his books and recommend them all!
Oh I loved this post! We so readily take criticism to heart and let it kill our souls, when in essence, it is such a very small part of our lives. I want to listen to those thousands of cheerleaders and I want to be one of them too! Great post and thanks for linking up with us at MLSTL and I’ve shared on my SM 🙂
We all have an abundance of cheerleaders, I think, Leanne… we need to let their voices in more often and numbers like that should rule!
How very interesting. Yes I have heard of Brendon. Food for thought there. Thank you so much for sharing. Denyse #mlstl
Hi, Denyse! It seems to be a universal truth, and one we all needs to remember when we let the naysayers influence us!
It does seem like more than seven….but Brendon is absolutely right. Why spend more time replaying the words of rejection, as opposed to our affirmations?! #MLSTL
Seven probably is accurate for the crowd that Brendon attracts… but even if we double, triple, quadruple that number, our affirmations still hugely outnumber the rejections. I agree with you completely!