How to Take Rejections Well and Keep Going
Submitting your work is part of the process of being a writer. But the sting of getting a “no thanks” never goes away entirely. We asked four writers how they handle it—and how you can, too.
A few months ago, I received a rejection email from a goal publication that left me feeling a bit bummed. I had been so sure it was a good fit, and yet the form letter stated exactly the opposite: “Our editors were drawn to your writing style, but unfortunately did not feel the piece was quite right for [redacted publication name].” Would it ever find a home, I wondered? Did I need to rework the entire thing? Could I even rework the entire thing? (I looked the piece up on my “story budget” spreadsheet later and was reminded that this was only the second time I’d sent it out in this form, which actually made me laugh out loud. The drama!)
Even though I’ve sent pitches and submissions out for consideration hundreds of times in my career (if not more), I’d venture to say the sting I feel when they get rejected never fully goes away. Of course, as an editor too, not just a writer, I know more than most what goes into a rejection — that publications all have very specific criteria, that it depends on what else is already in the works, if they recently published something similar that didn’t do well, the list goes on, but most importantly, that it’s never personal. And yet…
Does it get easier? Sure. Do I understand it on a fundamental level? Absolutely. But does the urge to lightly throw my strawberry pillow (thank you, Christopher Luu, for making me one) across the room ever dissipate completely? Not yet. So, I asked a few prolific and ambitious writers how they deal with rejection, hoping at a minimum to feel less alone, and at best to score some useful coping strategies. Spoiler alert: I ended up with both.
Parisa Saranj
Writer, Persian translator and longtime editor at literary magazine Consequence Forum
Rejections hurt! But, like most things, the more you do it, the easier it gets. What used to bother me for days now takes a few hours — or less. The hurt quickly gives way to inspiration and a renewed ambition to try again. My advice is first to take the time to acknowledge the hurt and properly mourn the loss of the opportunity you didn’t get. No emotion is wrong or unwelcome. Then, reframe rejections into something positive. Instead of “Rejection is a verdict,” try, “It’s feedback.” Instead of saying, “I failed again,” try, “I put myself out there again.”
In a way, rejection is not the source of your suffering; rather, it’s your expectations that are. If rejections bother you so much that you stop trying, I suggest reevaluating your priorities. This means you are writing for the wrong reasons. If you write solely for reward, money or to make it to bestseller lists, you will be disappointed. If you write for the joy of writing, answering a call to create, or simply to get a story that’s stuck inside of you out, you will always have a reason to return to the page, even when no one’s reading.
Christopher Blackwell
Co-author of Ending Isolation: The Case Against Solitary Confinement and award-winning journalist with clips in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, HuffPost, Narratively and more
When I first started writing, I expected things to just happen and to fall into place, but what I learned over time is rejection is simply part of this work. There have been times I’ve been rejected by places I thought would be a fit and then ended up taking a moonshot to a bigger place, like The Times or somewhere else, and got the piece placed there instead. So, you don’t always know where a piece fits, and it’s not about me or my writing. It’s about finding the right home at that right moment. I’ve never not published a piece I’ve written. There have been pieces — don’t get me wrong — that took a while. I had a piece that I wrote about my relationship with snow, and it took me like a year and a half to publish it. But I just kept knocking on doors, and eventually it found a great home.
I have a list of five goal places whenever I go to pitch a piece, so once it’s a no, I just go to the next one. I know not everybody’s mind works that way, but you can’t dwell on rejection. If you dwell on rejection as a writer, you will literally go crazy. You’ve got to focus more on your confidence and your self-worth, as opposed to letting someone else control what that is through rejection. You’ve got to find passion in what you’re doing. If you can’t find that, it’s hard to have that drive. And maybe it’s the drive that makes me not care about rejection, because I really don’t think about it at all. When someone says no, I usually think, You just missed an opportunity.
Eva Recinos
Arts and culture journalist and creative nonfiction writer, and author of the forthcoming essay collection, Underneath the Palm Trees, and the newsletter Notes From Eva
I’ve been a freelance arts and culture writer for a little more than a decade now, so I’m used to getting lots of rejection. When I first started pitching via cold emails to newspaper and magazine editors, I would constantly refresh my email, waiting for their response. If I got back a “no” and it made sense to pitch the story elsewhere, I would send out another email to a new editor. The “no thanks” emails just felt like part of the process.
But when I started writing creative nonfiction, things felt different: Replies took longer (sometimes months!), and those rejection emails stung more. The material was more personal. I didn’t feel as confident in my creative nonfiction as I did in my articles. Sometimes a rejection email validated my fear that I wasn’t talented enough to try a new genre (we love to spiral). Thankfully, over the years, rejection started to feel a little less personal. As I moved further along in my career, I worked as an editor and a volunteer reader. Being on the other side shows you just how many factors go into a “yes” or “no,” such as the limited number of opportunities versus the high number of submissions. But some days, a rejection still makes me scream in my heart: Am I just not good enough? After sitting with that feeling for a moment, though — or sometimes a few moments — I remind myself that there’s work to be done. There’s writing to finish, so I keep going.
Jerry Portwood
Founder and editor of The Queer Love Project, former top editor at Rolling Stone, Out magazine, and New York Press, and prolific journalist with clips in The New York Times, HuffPost and Town & Country
When it’s for a literary journal or something more creative, I often think, “If I had just zapped more adverbs or written a different metaphor that took your breath away, maybe they would have said yes.” But I also know that it’s all about timing. The person could have been grumpy that day, hungry or just bored. Plus, although we have “infinite space” in the digital space, we still have to be conscious of our readers, our own brainpower and emotional labor.
Because I also know what it’s like being an editor and having to reject people, I have empathy for the people who say no. I often said yes too many times and would labor too long on making a piece work (rounds of edits and lots of emails) because I knew how important it was to a writer. So I understand what most editors are actually saying when they say no is: “I’d love to assign this to you, but I’m already overworked and I just don’t have the time, energy, patience or budget to go there right now.” I compare it to dating. They are saying, “It’s not you, it’s me.” But I applaud the people who persevere and have the persistence to pitch an editor seven or more times until they get a piece placed in a coveted publication. After getting a third no, I either stop pitching, get bored and write something else, or I just go ahead and publish it on Medium or Substack. I think it’s a personal choice. Just don’t think that you are “bad” because you get a “no.” So many things could have resulted in that rejection. It doesn’t mean you should give up.
These interviews have been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
Writers: How do you handle rejection? Let us know in the comments below!
Jesse Sposato is Narratively’s executive editor. She has also written about social issues, feminism, health, friendship and culture for a variety of outlets, including Vanity Fair, InStyle, Shondaland, HuffPost, Gloria, Memoir Land and more. She is currently working on a collection of essays about coming of age in the suburbs and being boy crazy.
So glad to be a part of this! Lots of gems here
So many valuable insights from these incredible writers and editors. Thanks for including me in the bunch!