What I Learned From Being Rejected

I felt my body temperature rise and my jaw start to tense as I clicked on the un-read email:

“Thank you for applying. This year we received an overwhelming number of applications and regret to inform you that you have not been selected to interview for our program.”

Tears started to well in my eyes. I began trying to distract myself with other homework, because I didn’t want to let myself get worked up over this. Even though I had poured my heart out into this internship application, it was competitive and I wasn’t that qualified. I tried to convince myself not to take it personally.

No one likes rejection. However, in retrospect, I really do view it as a learning experience. I tend to get really focused on irrelevant details, and subsequently forget to look at the big picture, and getting rejected helped me broaden my viewpoint and scope immensely. It gave me the impetus to begin thinking about what it really was that I wanted out of an internship, and it gave me the motivation to set up some appointments with people who might be able to help me be more proactive with my search.

Here are a few tips that might be helpful for others facing rejection:

  1. Draw on your resources. There are so many professors, students, and staff members at Scripps and the 5Cs who are more than happy to help and provide their expertise.
  2. Do not take rejection too personally. If you google “Famous and successful people who have failed,” who will find long lists with people like Oprah, Steve Jobs, Walt Disney, and Jay-Z. It literally happens to everyone. Instead of letting rejection or failure get you down, use it as fodder to fuel and motivate you to accomplish your goals. Plus, sometimes you might not get an internship or job position because you don’t have the right connections, or you are not qualified enough. These things will come with time, so try not to blame it on some fault of character or lack of intelligence. 
  3. Map out a timeline. Part of what makes job and internship searching so stressful is that deadlines can be spread-out, and it can be easy to lose track of time. It helps me to write deadlines for myself in a planner so that they don’t sneak up on me.

Heeding my own advice is easier said than done, but so far, I’m doing a pretty good job at not letting rejection define my sense of self-worth. Rejection is pretty much inevitable at one point or another, but so is success. Focus on the small successes, forget about the small rejections, and focus on the big picture; you’ll be a lot happier and more motivated to keep moving forward.

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