Rejection is one of the feelings many humans don't like to deal with because of how it makes them feel. I have a few rejection stories and I can confidently say that most of my experiences left me with majorly negative effects. It is either I feel worthless or embarrassed in response to being rejected and sometimes, I wished I never took the step which I thought was necessary for me.
The feeling harbors lots of unpleasant feelings which makes things worse for its victims. It is a feeling that can invite shame and it is capable of killing your self-esteem in one strike.
Just because of how terrible rejection makes people feel, a lot of people avoid anything that can bring rejection as an outcome, and avoiding it has prevented many of us from taking some vital steps in life just because we don't want to be turned down.
In the world today, we see cases of people who end up making a wrong choice of a lover just because they don't want to face rejection at the hands of the person they truly love. For some, it is a business idea that can change their situation for good but they will keep the idea to themselves just because the people around them might turn it down.
Its impact on people has mostly been negative and it is usually hard for many people to carry on easily after being rejected. Some people struggle with it for days, weeks, months, and even years depending on how badly the feeling of rejection strikes them.
Rejection respects no one and it can make one feel ridiculed regardless of your status in the society.
After bagging our first degree in computer science, a friend thought of taking teaching as a profession. He wanted to have a team of teachers that would teach only computer education in schools.
He shared the dream with me and I told him how great it would be, we rubbed minds together and I even agreed to work with him since I was job hunting too. He was happy and told me how our other friends had condemned the idea.
We went to different schools separately and it was a "no" from them despite sharing the goals plus how we wanted to help students improve in different Microsoft packages, simple repairs, maintenance, and others.
We were on this for weeks and got no positive response. I started losing interest but my friend's motivation was strong enough to keep the two of us going.
I arrived at an Islamic school on a Friday and I met the person in charge. After discussing with the lady, I felt she would understand the quality of what we were offering because she is young.
She invited me to their computer room and gave me a storybook to type, I wasn't sure why she did it but out of everything we discussed, I didn't mention anything about typing.
The book was written in English but it had the Arabic language as well. She left me with it and when she returned, I was through with the fourth page.
She went through it and told me that I wasn't fast enough. What we were offering is bigger than just teaching kids how to type and in the end it was a "No".
I told my friend I was quitting because the rejections were getting on my nerves and it was affecting me mentally. I stopped but my friend didn't and he kept on pushing through every form of rejection he encountered until he got his first job. He went on to get more schools and even employed teachers.
Today, he is doing pretty well in the field and those rejections became things we joke about now.
Not everyone can fight through like he did, I would have quitted if the dream was mine and I learned from him never to give up even in the face of rejection.
All cases aren't about work or trying to be successful, some people are been rejected by society and even their families just because they wouldn't discard their good morals for the immoral things happening out there.
Not all fight for acceptance is worth it, you really don't have to change the good you're doing just because you want to feel accepted by others and as long as anyone accepting you won't add any value, don't bother about it.
Getting over rejection isn't as difficult as many of us think, it only requires the mindset of not giving up just because people aren't seeing the good in you yet. If my friend gave up as I did, he wouldn't have achieved that dream by now.
To keep this mindset, you have to believe in yourself, and what you do or stand for. It is impossible to stand for rubbish and expect people to accept you but when whatever you are offering is good, be rest assured that you will definitely be accepted one day if you don't give up. Whoever wants to be successful in life must not think too much about the rejection he or she will face and instead of letting that hinder us, we should prepare our minds to be strong enough to repel the feeling of rejection.
And sometimes, rejection opens our eyes to things we need to improve on. In cases like this, we have to be patient enough to know what that thing is and work towards improving.
While we think of it as a terrible thing, we can utilize the effects positively if we channel our imagination and efforts in the right direction. After being rejected, noting why we were turned down and improving on them will go a long way in helping you become a more valuable person.
If we keep on improving ourselves for every rejection we face, it will get to a time when those who once rejected us won't have a reason to do so anymore.