Remaining Resilient Through Rejection in Your Career

And the media called up and said, "Hey, Dr. Laura, could you talk to us about the state of the job market these days?" How there's so much rejection, and it's so tough, especially for young people.

And the unemployment rate for young people is double that as what it is for, um, non-young people, people of all other ages, but young people, so let's just say those that are anywhere from 16 to 24 years old are considered young people in today's market, are having a really hard time landing jobs, whether it's summer jobs, whether it is their first employment after getting a diploma or a degree.

It's just plain difficult out there.

And I think all ages are going through struggles when they are searching for an employment because there's more people than ever replying to job ads, uh, submitting their resumes online.

There's thousands of people applying.

There's lots of layoffs going on, and it is a tough job market.

So our mindset and our hope is more important than ever before.

So that's what drove me to want to talk about remaining resilient.

And we can talk about the job search, but we can also talk about rejection in general because rejection is a part of so many of our careers, our jobs, whatever we're doing for a living, we may end up getting rejected.

And rejection is very tough.

It's tough on our ego.

It's tough, tough on our self-confidence, our self-esteem, and I just wanna speak to that, speak about my experience, how I work with clients on this, and hopefully instill some hope in those that are struggling these days.

And if you are struggling or know someone that is, please share this if you find it useful.

Rejection hurts.

[chuckles] It hurts because we are putting ourself out there in some way.

So if you're applying to a job, you're putting your application out there, your resume.

If you are trying to submit yourself for something or bid on something, uh, I know as a professional speaker, I'm often sending applications to speak at events, or I'm being considered against other speakers.

And with that turf, I tell you, comes rejection.

There's a lot of competition, and rejection is just a part of my life.

And rejection feels painful, especially when it's something you really want and you had your heart set on, or you thought you had it in the bag.

You thought, "Yeah, I'm-- I have a really good shot at this." And I always say knock on wood because when you think that, sometimes it doesn't come true, and then it's even harder to come down off of that.

So when you are rejected, let's just stay-- say you did an interview, you thought it went well, you were anxious and, and excited to hear, and then you get the rejection.

It hurts.

And I just wanna say that it's okay to feel the pain, and going through the pain and feeling the emotions is part of it.

It's part of getting through it, getting to the other side, and recovering and being resilient.