On Rejection

delia
delia
Aug 22, 2017 · 3 min read

This year, I got into my dream college. In a week, I am going to be living at MIT, taking classes at the same institution that created Iron Man and KhanAcademy and a whole bunch of astronauts. Since getting that improbable acceptance letter, a small part of me has thought that doors will open for me simply because I am going to MIT. In high school, this was true: the second half of my senior year, I relaxed, and teachers accepted it because I had already gotten into college. In the real world, however, this is not the case.

Since my acceptance at MIT, I’ve faced more rejections than acceptances.

I have been rejected by Google, Microsoft, NASA, the University of Washington in Seattle, and the Air Force. I have failed the MIT Freshman Essay Evaluation, been rejected from their blog program, and turned down by my preferred Freshman Orientation Program. I might have been a standout in high school, but the world is much bigger than our School on the Hill, Lord, and there are lots of incredible people out there hunting for the same opportunities as me.

These rejections have forced me to face some of my deepest fears: that MIT was just a fluke, that I don’t deserve to be there, that I’m even more incompetent than I thought I was. It’s been easy to think that some of these rejections are just because they are “looking for something else” or that I didn’t put my full effort into the application because I just didn’t care (and maybe that’s true), but the reality is that I am just not as exceptional as I thought I was.

I am writing this blog post after receiving my results from the MIT Freshman Essay Evaluation. For this extended test, we had to read and summarize articles about technology and provide an argument about modern education. I thought I was going to nail it — I’ve been told I’m a good writer, and I flew through high school English. Instead, I got these comments:

That paragraph is simply too dense and full of too much information to be effective.

As a result, the details you provide regarding Wieman’s observations on active learning cannot work as supporting evidence and the essay is more of a summary of Wieman than a fully realized argumentative essay.

Despite your interest in the topic, the essay itself does not present a clearly articulated recommendation.

I agonized over those essays, and I still failed. Instead of taking a class like “Modern Art and Mass Culture” or “Modern Conceptions of Freedom”, I have to take something like “Introduction to Contemporary Rhetoric” or “Writing on Sports.” My English class the first term will focus more on writing mechanics and revision than it will understanding something that genuinely interests me, and I’m pretty bummed out about that. I thought that writing was one of my strengths, but maybe writing is just another weakness.

The Freshman Essay Evaluation was a slap in the face. It stands as a stark reminder that success is not a certainty and that there is always room for improvement. I am not sure what the next few months will bring me, but one thing that I am sure about is that I will continue to face rejections and failures as I find my footing in a much bigger pond. Maybe it’s a good thing that I am taking a less accelerated writing course because my workload is about to become much more challenging.

Staring at all of these rejections, I can make a choice: I can choose to let them define me, or I can take them as inspiration to work harder and do better. Just because a bunch of people sitting at a table thought I was “good enough” one time does not mean that everyone will, and it is up to me to continue to push for what I want. Rejections are an inevitability, a predetermined part of anyone’s journey, but it is up to the traveler to respond. And I want to respond with determination to become just a little bit better next time.

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delia

real life human

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