Rejection can become a positive
IN MY view, the young lady, Tia-Louise Renouf, who was turned down for a Saturday job by the manager of Avenue Flowers, should write and thank him.
'I get knocked down but I get up again', goes the song lyric. It doesn't matter if we are Andy Murray, Einstein or Michelangelo, we all get knocked back, disrespected and set aside in life, and that includes the great and the good.
It's not the knock back that's the issue, but what we do about it – it's our reaction to it that counts.
A 14-year-old who is rejected for a part- time job while at the same time having their intelligence questioned is fully entitled to be upset. But with it comes the opportunity to learn one of life's hard lessons. In terms of personal development, it can be explained to the young lady this way.
Visualise the incident, let the mind build a picture. Tell yourself that you have in fact been given the gift of a flare. No ordinary flare but a special one – choose a colour for it even and keep it safe.
Wait until you are struggling to accomplish something in life that's important to you.
When you feel you need just a little extra, reach for that flare. Light it, briefly let it remind you of the injustice and rejection you felt at the time of the incident, be a little angry even. Rejection is a powerful driver. Let the flare give you a little extra and light the way to the end of the task.
Kipling referred, in his poem, If, to 'those twin imposters triumph and disaster'.
I feel what Kipling meant was that we can choose to tell ourselves a setback is only the start of a sequence of events that will end in success. The knock-back starts life as a negative but by choice we can in time use it and turn it around into a positive. If everything went right for us all the time, wouldn't it be a strange life?
In short, it is in facing life's difficulties that we find our character.
ANDREW LE PAGE.