when rejection gets you down...

rejection comes in many forms:

a rude comment,
a nasty look,
a shared murmer a midst a group
                    that you are  not a part of,
a polite, impersonal letter
                    or email
not being given a second chance
                     and the opportunity
                                  to improve,

but at least these are private wounds
                     that only one or few know about.

then we can escape, wallow, and lick our cuts and scrapes alone and move on without wondering who's watching, who noticed, and without trying to prove ourselves to anyone who cares to judge, criticize, and, sadly, watch us fail again.

as aspiring authors (for my unagented, unpublished friends), we are not only preparing our writing for better sentences, better story lines, and better characters, we are also in preparation of receiving, digesting, and bearing public rejection.

reviews....
moving past a hugely populated crowd of eyes can be much tougher, so therefore, we must be tougher as well.

however, whether it's private or public scrutiny, we must take it in, let it become part of us, toughen us up, and move on from it.  BUT we can't let it harden us into stone. we should only become hard enough that we can learn from it, and become that BETTER we are striving for.  we can't be so rigid that we can't change and grow.

when rejected, time after time, we must put aside whatever fear we have of improving, and of trying again.  we, first and foremost, have to hold the belief that we can do better, that we deserve the chance to fail again and the opportunity to become that better self, better teacher, better mother, better neighbor, better writer.

take time to learn the graceful way to accept rejection.

take the time to learn how to hold the rock of rejection in the palm of your hand for a few seconds, to feel its cold, hard edges, before crushing it into grains of sand.  take the time to read each grain, to figure out the why of them, the pain of them as they flow through your fingers.

take the time to heal.

take the time to walk over them and past them.

take the time to enjoy:

smiles,
pats on the back,
handshakes,
congratulatory letters
                         and emails,
raving reviews,

even though pebbles, rocks and boulders may rain down on you again a time or two.

be graceful.
be better.
be deserving.
be you.
because you want to and because you can.

you can do it.
i believe in me, and i believe in you.

do you?