Rejection - How a Horrible Feeling Can Actually Be a Good Thing

We have all been rejected at one point in our lives or another. It hurts, plain and simple, but it is a learning process. We as humans learn the most from our negative experiences. A small child learns not to put his hand near a hot stove, not by his mother's incessant repeating of the word no, but by touch, when the child places his hand near the burner. I just as any other person on this planet have experienced many a rejection in my twenty five short years. Each one notched into my mind. Most I can say I have learned from, some I believe I am doomed to repeat. There are many forms of rejection, a lost or a one sided love, a lost job or job offer, the list goes on. The New Webster's Dictionary defines rejection as: "reject v. refuse to take; deny; cat away; discard".

Yet these are seemingly such overly simple terms for something so painful.

As I have previously stated I have had quite a few rejections in my life. I can't pick just a single case that completely stands apart from the rest, as they are all painful, they have all left a memory or two behind. It is because of this I regretfully cannot tell you about a single rejection in my life. To mention only one would be as if I were telling you only about one star in the sky, overlooking the rest of the three hundred billion twinkling lights, passing them off as mere fireflies.

I have been talking to a few random people I've come across and their answers about my queries of their biggest rejection all remain relatively the same: peers, love, jobs, all were common answers and the looks on the faces of the people also remained of the same, remembrance, regret, and pain. All of the emotion boiling down to one thing, loss. Even if it is merely the loss of a hope, nothing you truly ever had.

I suppose in a sense, the simple fact remains that rejection is pain is learning, and in the end it's not always such a horrid thing. No matter who you are, you will experience it, feel the feelings that come along with it, and hopefully learn from it.

So, although I sincerely doubt that anyone will truly embrace the dreaded rejection, maybe for a bit allow yourself to simply learn from it.