rejection therapy day 9 - december 7th
“I think it is high time I lived up to my potential, don’t you?”
This is what I told myself (don’t worry, not out loud) while sitting in a coffee bar in Birmingham. I had just been wondering around looking to take street portraits of people. After convincing myself that “that person didn’t look right” or “they look in a hurry” I finally gave up when I thought “the light isn’t good enough anymore” and retreated with my tail between my legs to the comfort of a latte.
What a coward.
I know rejection therapy is supposed to make you feel good and it is just a game, but I can’t help feel bad when I don’t take opportunities. What is worse is that I know, maybe a year or so ago, I was a person who had no qualms doing an activity such as this, walking up to a complete stranger and not having my confidence knocked. So obviously I have changed, but I really don’t like it.
Before I could back up excuses of my lame attempts at objection therapy as just building up momentum or palm off some other excuse, but the reality is my self esteem and confidence is shot. A scrape on the bottom of what used to be a full brimming barrel. As the foam stained the edge of my coffee mug and job application drafts with half arsed notes scribbled across them, I sunk in my chair and sighed. I need to live up to my potential and I need to do it now.
I visited a friend who I have not seen in about five years and now works as a graphic designer. He is hopefully going to do some printing for me and, knowing he usually charges for advice, I asked him whether he could give me some tips anyway and go through some ways of making my work better, and do you know what? He did. Failed Rejection Further to that, we got discussing about what we each like to do now and he said that he goes rock climbing, something that I used to do in a past life. He said he goes every Monday, so I wondered if I could tag alone, which did not only he agree to, but explained he could get me in for free. Mega cool. Failed Rejection
It turned out I had made the oh so silly mistake of writing down the interview as the deadline for a job application instead of the actual closing date. The closing date turned out to be Sunday, but wanting the job and seeing it as a way to get rejected, I rang up the company and asked if I would be able to be considered if I send in my application right now. They said applicants had already been shortlisted. I asked if they could at least take a look? He said no. Hooray! Rejected
For an explanation of Rejection Therapy see this post
