When you're rejected

(for a job, a team, a date, or a school)…you really have just two options:

1. Convince yourself you’re not as good as you hoped. 2. Double your efforts and try again.

That’s it. Two options: Do you quit? Or do keep at it?

You can spend a lot of time doing the former. Marinating in self-doubt and disillusionment. But it won’t help anyone, especially yourself.

The latter, on the other hand, is just as viable an option. It's scary, because you might be wrong. You might try and fail again. And that might be true. But the only way you’ll ever be wrong—indefinitely—is to give up on yourself endlessly.

Which is to say, today. Tomorrow. Next time.

Doing the opposite takes courage and confidence and probably are a flair of ignorance. But it's worth it. Because it's the only way to sustainably persist when you inevitably don't get picked.

Giving up on your dreams and fighting for them are both self-fulfilling prophecies. It turns out that long-range success--in most cases--is simply a matter of which one you habitually choose.