How I cope with rejection
Recently I applied to a fancy writing programme for LGBTQIA+ peeps. I knew it would be a competitive process, but I also felt like my voice was perfect for the programme and that my story would be the ideal fit.
Spoiler alert: I didn’t get in.
And I’m not going to lie: when I got the rejection email, it hurt.
The version of the future that I’d imagined where I got in and I wrote a memoir and it got published, vanished into the aether.
I was really sad, and disappointed.
I felt my heart sink inside the ocean of my own chest.
What I wrote in my notebook while processing my emotions.
Historically, rejection for me has always felt like a pang in my heart, followed by a heavy weight bearing down on my chest.
A couple of years ago, I managed to name this feeling: shame.
Shame tells me that I am not good enough or special enough. That I won’t ever make it.
And the thing is… Not getting in doesn’t mean my story isn’t worth telling, or that a publisher won’t think it could be a good book, or that people wouldn’t like to read it. It also doesn’t take away from my inherent worth, as a person and as a writer.
In the past, I would have let that feeling take the reigns, and it would have discouraged from trying again. Nobody wants my story. I’m not a good enough writer. I’ll be rejected again if I try again.
But years of therapy and parts work and coaching have led me to this point. I know better now. Not just intellectually. Somatically. I know my body is processing emotions that it’s not quite ready to let go of, yet. The pain and the fear and the shame are all valid and I let myself feel them. But I also want to take myself further.
So I worked on shifting the pain and rejection and disappointment into fuel for more courage to keep trying and to keep going.
Here’s how I did it:
My process was to write down all my emotions and thoughts, acknowledging them, validating them, and countering their faulty, biased logic.
It went like this:
Feeling shame is normal.
Yes, I didn’t make it this time and it sucks.
And there are so many more doors for me to push open.
Maybe there is even a better one!
I need to keep trying so I can push enough doors open that I find the right one FOR ME.
Writing this down in my notebook felt so cathartic, like I was giving myself the exact pep talk I needed to hear.
Then I decided to make an illustration capturing how I felt, in order to turn my loss into a sense of love.
I’ll leave you with the image.
With big feelings, always,
Laurie xx
