What to do when you’re feeling upset about being disliked
is a clinical and forensic psychologist practising in Melbourne, Australia. She writes for Psychology Today and is the author of the books Reclaim: Understanding Complex Trauma and Those Who Abuse (2023) and Life Skills for a Broken World (2024).
To be liked by others is often treated as a paramount aim. The quest for social approval begins in childhood, and it continues in a range of ways throughout the lifespan as people try to find their friend group, hunt for a partner, seek promotions at work, or organise playgroups with other parents. Most of these activities are predicated on being accepted and liked by others.
So, for many of us, there is little that’s more unsettling than learning or suspecting that someone dislikes you. The signs of dislike could be subtle or overt. You might find that you are being excluded by a group you thought you were friendly with. Or you might notice that a colleague is suddenly giving you the cold shoulder. More overtly, a friend might reveal that some behaviour of yours annoys or upsets them, or even tell you that they no longer wish to be friends.
In my work as a clinical psychologist, it’s common for people to come in for help with social anxiety – a debilitating fear that they will be evaluated and found wanting. Approximately 12 per cent of adults will experience social anxiety disorder in their lifetime, and many others experience subclinical social anxiety. Numerous people have also spoken to me of pivotal moments in childhood and adolescence: times when they were bullied, ostracised, picked last for team sports (this is an experience I too recall, with a twist of anxiety), left to work on a group project alone, or had friends turn against them. The impact of experiences like these – when many of us first realise that we might be disliked and even treated cruelly by some – can bleed into adulthood, through ideas about not being ‘good enough’ or not fitting in. Early experiences are often at the root of the distress felt by someone who is especially worried about being disliked. But anyone can occasionally experience such worries.
