When Joe was job-hunting in his early 30s, getting rejection after rejection, he noticed the pain came from two sources. The first was the external rejection itself. But the second — and far more painful — was that he had rejected himself first. By trying to game what interviewers wanted, he was saying “I don’t trust myself. I don’t trust being myself to get accepted.”
This self-rejection creates a double burden of stress. Not only do you face the pain of others’ rejection, but you carry the deeper pain of having abandoned yourself before anyone else had the chance to. And the attempt to game the system adds a third layer: you’re trying to play 3D chess without knowing the rules, since what an interviewer wants might be determined by how much coffee they had that day.
“I had rejected myself first. And that rejection was far more painful than the rejection of others.”
The antidote isn’t becoming better at gaming — it’s recognizing that the game is unwinnable and choosing authenticity instead. When you stop rejecting yourself, external rejection loses most of its sting.
Related Concepts
- Can’t be seen if not being yourself
- Imposter syndrome means not being yourself
- Grief of self-abandonment