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Dealing With School Rejections...

Louis CK

Louis CK

Bluelighter
Joined
Sep 10, 2011
Messages
100
Graduate school rejections (and acceptances, I guess) started coming around. I don't know why getting rejected bothers me so much, but it just fucking does. Makes you feel like you have an inflated image of yourself and you're in over you're head for applying to a school you couldn't get into. It's a good time for drugs...I'm in a bad place right now :(
 
It looks like you got accepted somewhere, even if it wasn't your first choice.

Put it into perspective I guess, a lot of people would love to be in your position right now, contemplating which grad school to go to.
 
Yea, hell, it's certainly not the end of the world. But I can understand. Then again, anything can be a reason to go ballz deep and get all fucked up and self-destructive like.

Ideally, might not it be the best for one to feel like, "Well, I didn't get in, so, that means I'm not going there right now." In other words, not getting accepted to a certain program doesn't mean you're less of a person. You aren't somehow worth less than someone who did get accepted. They didn't get accepted because they are a better person than you. They got accepted, and you got rejected, for reason(s) established by the institution you've applied to.

Don't let it get to you. I mean, in a sense, their reasons for rejecting your app are somewhat arbitrary/artificial. A something which is man-made, it would be a mistake to treat such standards as the embodiment of some absolute universal truism. The institution that is rejecting your app set the standards by which apps are measured in the first place... So...

If anything, you and the institution weren't meant for each other. You two aren't a good fit.

On the other hand...

Fuck the institution! They don't know what they're losing by rejecting your application and not accepting you into their community. So, whatever. Go off and find yourself an even better community that does accept you and recognizes your talents and attributes.
 
Hey Louis CK,
I recently applied to colleges to finish my bachelor's degree, and I think I got rejected by 3 of the 5 to which I applied. It sucked, but it sucks even more that I probably wasted a year just getting the courage up to apply in the first place!

I bothers me a lot too. I heard a theory once that helps me put these feelings in perspective:
The idea is that, although folks like you and I live in societies where we're not likely to get murdered or to starve to death, our aversion to rejection evolved when people were part of hunter-gatherer tribes; and in this environment, tribe members were reliant on each other for food and protection from danger. Thus, a strong aversion to rejection improved ones survival rate by encouraging behavior that kept one in the good graces of their tribe. Anywho, when I feel real bad about rejection, I try to remember that these feelings are normal, but also that rejection is no longer that big of a deal, in the long run.

Good luck in grad school!

J G
 
OP - just recognize, and remember, never forget, you are the most important thing. You already posses a whole host of talents and attributes, things other might not have. Yet, you do need to learn how to use you talents. You must put the work in, and hone your skills. It's up to you.

If you are in reality doing badly or have made a bad decision, or if something bad happens to you due to external forces, first just simply recognize such has happened. Understand what's going on. You must do this because you are responsable for what you do. This is the greatest fact of life - that we are responsable for our own doings.

Be proud of yourself when you've done something well.

When you've done something bad, acknowledge it and correct it.

Then be proud of yourself for doing good.

When something good happens to you, acknowledge, respect and make the most of it.

When something bad happens to you, recognize and determine the degree to which you are at fault yourself.

For those things you are at fault for, address them.

But don't punish yourself for things that are not your fault.

Love yourself, because you are the most important thing.
 
Op, I am an artist and a huge part of my life consists of rejections.=D I have had many years experience learning how not to personalize rejection. There are so many factors that go into acceptance or rejection. Sometimes it is nothing more than numbers. Sometimes it is for balance of an exhibit in my case, a program in yours. It is entirely possible that you could apply two years in row and get rejected one year and accepted another.

Still, as the above poster pointed out, rejection always deserves our scrutiny. It is a fine line between recognizing our own shortcoming and allowing feelings of inadequacy to dominate. If rejection stimulates us to improve it is a great tool. When it causes us to give up or undermines our confidence and motivation it is time to do an internal re-set.

Good luck! What's the program BTW?
 
Thanks for the positive replies everyone :D

I guess rejection is something we all have to put up with at some point. Toothpaste, you're definitely right - it's best to see it as an opportunity to improve yourself.

herbavore, some were law schools and some were grad school econ programs. I might just take a year off and reapply next year.
 
That's a great attitude to take. When it comes to education, there's no such thing as 'too late'.

BTW: great name/avatar! I've recently discovered Louis CK, and find him hilarious! Easily one of the better comedians that I've seen in recent memory.
 
Louis CK said:
Graduate school rejections (and acceptances, I guess) started coming around. I don't know why getting rejected bothers me so much, but it just fucking does. Makes you feel like you have an inflated image of yourself and you're in over you're head for applying to a school you couldn't get into. It's a good time for drugs...I'm in a bad place right now :(
Click to expand...

How are you now?

Are you feeling better, worse, or about the same?

I don't like rejection either. I have been applying for jobs, and getting back rejections.

The economy is fucked and I know this. However, I feel awful about not being able to land any interviews. I have friends in the exact same situation, feeling the way I feel, and sometimes it helps me to commiserate with them. Other times, there will be two form letters in the box for me and I just go crawl in bed and sleep for a couple days.

I have to believe that things in my life happen for my ultimate benefit. I can't make the blanket statement I often hear: "Everything happens for a reason."

I don't know if everything happens for a reason!

My experiences over the last 52 years have taught me that all my problems worked out well eventually.
I have kept a journal for the last 40 years and it is basically a record of my problems, my complaints, my worries.
and how they all came out ok and I need not have worried so much.

Your ideal situation might be something that is totally wrong for you 20 years from now. You have finished your Bachelors, congratulations. You have a positive plan for successful action but the plan looks flightless at the moment.

I believe you are ok now, and that you will be more than ok as a result of the rejections.

I don't know if this fits in with your personality or not, but if you decide to save those rejection letters, and write about them when they hit, you may learn valuable stuff. Not that college wasn't valuable, but college did not prepare me for my future. I guess its possible that you are learning on a whole new level now. You may have started your graduate work already without realizing it.

I believe the best for you.



Maybe life is going to happen that way for you.
 
I think the most important thing to remember is to not give these rejections any more significance than they actually warrant. Remember- these rejections don't determine your ultimate future, they don't even determine weather you can eventually go to grad school. For now you can't but that doesn't mean you can't beef up your transcript with some classes in the field in which you want to study, or even get an internship in that field.

You still control your own destiny.

Please don't do what I have done in these situations and generalize the rejection as having some deep commentary as to who you are as a person, or your worth, or even your ability and potential in the field. I've wasted valuable time engaged in such shenanigans and it was so unnecessary.
 
I know where you're coming from. I finally got so fed up with rejections that I stopped opening the "thin" envelopes. That was about four years ago. Last month, I finally got around to opening them. I found that one wasn't a rejection at all, but a check for $350. So keep opening those letters! :)
 
School rejections are hard for anybody and it's totally understandable... you get your hopes up and they get squashed, you don't get something you really want and that you feel will have a mayjor impact on your life, and you take it personally and feel like you're worthless... but I'm a firm believer that everything happens for a reason. You will get into the right school for you, even it doesn't feel like it at the time. I wanted to go to NYU so bad and I got rejected and must have cried for three days, but, years later I'm glad I didn't get in because it would not have been the right place for me and I would have been miserable there. Just remember that you'll get into the right place, you don't want to go somewhere where you won't be appreciated, especially for graduate school. And people get rejected for all kinds of different reasons, so don't take it personally or feel like it means you aren't intelligent, creative, talented, whatever. Applications show such a small part of who you are and what you're capable of, and admissions people have SO many they're looking through they can't spend enough time trying to see who you really are and what you can do. And just because someone gets into Yale or Harvard doesn't mean they're neccesarily going to be succesful, just like getting into a bad school doesn't mean you won't be succesful, it's what you make of your degree when you graduate and what you make of the school while you're there that counts. And if you decide to to use becasue you're upset, you won't be able to excel in graduate school, so it won't really matter where you get in. :(
 
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