So Right But Just Not Ready

As I was channel surfing and ran across a reality TV show called Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team. The program didn’t catch my attention necessarily because of the cheerleader tryouts (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it), but the program caught my attention because there is all this big hoopla about the Dallas Cowboys being America’s team when there are so many other great teams out there to choose from.

Let me digress a moment and say that I was traumatized by the Cowboys because I am 49ers fan and my former girlfriend’s father Bill Roach was good friends with the Cowboys owner Jerry Jones. Mr. Roach never thought I was good enough for his daughter and when Kathy and I lived in Chicago and use to visit her parents, he would wield the Cowboys’ superiority over every other football team as an analogy that any other guy would be a better choice for his daughter than me. So for decades since then I have not liked the Cowboys.

At some point in the TV show one of the judges, Kelli or Judy, tell this very beautiful and very talented African American cheerleader contestant, “Honey you are so right for this squad. I mean, you are really so right for us…but you’re just not ready.”

I was stupefied probably as much as the contestant. How can someone be so right but just not ready? What did that really mean? Was that a backhanded compliment, or the new slap in the face? The contestant handled rejection really well for the cameras but I wonder how she handled it after the cameras were turned off. This was yet another reason for me to dislike the Dallas Cowboys.

I thought that was just a bunch of croc until I had lunch with Jennifer, an administrative assistant who use to work for me and was looking for a job. Jennifer was so good that she would often run the office all by herself and we desperately needed to fill the vacuum at the office. After working for me for 5 years she took another opportunity with my blessings, but after two kids, a failing marriage, and addiction to pain killers, when I saw her I could tell that the last four years since I had seen her had not been kind to her. She was still going through several transitions and although she needed a job and wanted to work for me again, by her own admission she wasn’t sure of her availability until several transitions played out.

Jennifer was right for the job, but she just wasn’t ready. I then understood that comment.

Two years after that I ran into Jennifer who was looking a whole lot better. Her and her husband had reconciled and she was working a steady job. At lunch she thanked me for not giving her the job and allowing her to work through her transitions. She and I realized that taking my job would have done more damage than good. The rejection proved to be her better friend.

I am like most people—I dislike rejection. It is more painful than going to the dentist for a root canal. But I have learned that rejection is a learning, development, and guiding tool just like any educational course that I have taken in school, and over the years I’ve learned to fear it a whole lot less than I use to. In fact, I have learned the GudeJob principle of gratitude and have been thankful for the number of times I rejection has spared my life:

• My father refusing to sign my acceptance papers to Annapolis Naval Academy when I was 17 which allowed me to stay home and develop a great career.
• Getting fired from Chadwell & Kayser law firm for rebuffing the advances of a partner’s secretary which caused me to leave Chicago and go on to graduate school.
• Being told by Leslie Bilbro that I wouldn’t amount to much because I was still (at that time) a grown man living at my parent’s home which paved the way for me to meet my wonderful wife.

I am at a point when I am tempted to fear rejection I do these three things:

• Remind. I remind myself that rejection is a normal part of life and that it is unavoidable. Because there are so many people in the world with their own agendas, what I want and what they want will at some point in time be in conflict. Therefore, I will find rejection. I also need to remind myself that it’s not about me—even if others make it their point to say it’s about me it’s really not about me. We all have selfish tendencies—those dishing out the rejection as well as those fearing the rejection—and so the more we remind ourselves that the issue really isn’t about us the better we can put the rejection in perspective and not let it get under our skins.
• Remember. I must remember that there have been tens and hundreds and thousands of times in my life already that I have heard the word no to some request of mine, and although I felt bad about it I am still here today living this life and for the most part still being able to take advantage of the many opportunities that life has to offer. A thousand no’s still hasn’t stopped me from living. And although I hate reliving the pain and shame and stupidity of past rejections, my focus is not on what I loss, but on what I have accomplished and achieved despite all of that. Remembering the bright shining sun after the storm deadens the negative impact of the rejection.
• Reflect. On the flip side of things if I take a moment to reflect upon the thousands of times that I have told others no, thereby letting them experience rejection from me, I have to admit that after I rejected them I really didn’t spend a whole lot of time afterwards thinking about the impact upon them or how they felt or how embarrassing it was to them. To me I just simply said no and had to move on. In the same vein when I am rejected people don’t spend their whole lives thinking about the impact of their decisions upon me. They have moved on and so should I.

I may never feel so right about rejection, but if I choose to remind, remember, and reflect upon it, I can be so ready to use rejection as a tool to teach, develop, and guide me as I continue from Point A to Point B on the road to on the job success.