Dealing with rejection

This week’s letter is a little longer and feels quite vulnerable. It is about a recurring theme in life: dealing with rejection and its aftermath.

I devoted my Spring to writing a PhD proposal that I felt, and still feel, incredibly excited about. I have been exploring affect theory, which investigates how dominant affects—subconscious forces that move through our bodies—influence how we perceive and act in the world. Nature’s influence on all domains of life continues to fascinate me, and for the last seven years, I’ve shared what I have learned through my work.

During this time, I also became convinced that commingling and merging our identity with nature’s affective forces, such as the seasons and the elements, is a viable strategy to sort out the environmental mess we are in. I am passionate about this, and a PhD felt like the next logical step to validate my findings within an academic context.

After a solid month of work to write a good proposal, I felt a mixture of grief and frustration when it got rejected this week. It hurt, even though I was well aware of the vulnerable position I put myself in. It even rattled my foundations for a few days because I was not as confident about myself in this context, and I secretly hoped to prove my insecurity wrong by being validated by some other authority.

A day before receiving the response, part of me already knew the outcome. I was reading the final chapters of Thomas Merton’s autobiography The Seven Storey Mountain, in which he describes his journey to becoming a Trappist monk. A few years before the Cistercians initiated him, he was rejected by the Fransciscans because of some bad choices he had made in the past. He explains how his crushing disappointment at the time made him realize he attached his security and salvation to the decision to become a munk. Merton was sure it was his only way out of the hardship and emptiness he experienced, but ultimately realized he was seeking peace in the wrong place.

Reading Merton, I realized I had projected similar hopes onto the pursuit of this PhD, and some part of me knew it was already decided, at least for now. That night, I wrote in my journal:

``I want my desire to be pure, and daring to consider the possibility of not being accepted clarifies how motivated I am in my pursuit, regardless of the outcome and the external validation I desire. I know the fear of being a failure is the wrong reason to pursue my passions. Conditions are secondary. I want to live by my dedication and be invested for the right reasons.''

Life has ways of course-correcting us when we rely too much on external circumstances for our happiness and well-being. My invitation to you this week is to investigate to what degree your motivations for pursuing your goals are free from desires to be validated, accepted, loved, celebrated, and so forth.

With the coming of Summer, we are commencing our journey to maturity and will again realize that our desires are here to serve something greater than ourselves. By carefully observing nature, I am often reminded how selfless acts of service are encouraged and rewarded. Through sheer force of will, hubris and a desire for personal success may get you far in this society, but the road to happiness and fulfillment is not as straightforward. Make sure you are in the game for the right reasons.