Cover art by Mari Andrew, who will be appearing at School of Life events in June.
Getting rejected doesn’t usually feature as one of our envisioned career goals, yet such painful moments of failure or rejection could be what propels us forward.
In an article by writer Kim Liao, she recounts advice from a writer friend who seemed to effortlessly land residences and publish work in well-known literary journals.
Her friend said to her: ‘Collect rejections. Set rejection goals. I know someone who shoots for one hundred rejections in a year, because if you work that hard to get so many rejections, you’re sure to get a few acceptances, too.’
In this exercise of collecting rejections, our ego and fragility is forced to take a side step, opening us up to new perspectives about our own careers.
Mari Andrew, a New York based writer, illustrator and author of Am I There Yet?: The Loop-de-loop, Zigzagging Journey to Adulthood, experienced this seemingly endless pursuit of rejection when she was trying to get an agent to represent her.
