I haven’t failed, I’ve found 10,000 ways that don’t work. – Ben Franklin
I got word on Friday that the media outfit that I’ve been pitching my Real Joe radio show proposal to for the past four months has decided to pass. Shit shit shit.
I’d gotten an email the day before. I started getting very nervous just seeing the email sitting in my inbox. Not knowing what it said, I hesitated to open it up. Instead, I backed away from the computer and sat down to just write in my journal to try to put it in perspective. I reminded myself that there’s no way to know if the decision is ultimately good news or bad news, that I’m entitled to the joy of working on what I’m doing but not the results, that I have so much to be grateful for already. This helped, but I was still excited and nervous.
I wrote, “Ok, now I’m going to go read the email. Breathe easy. Let go.” And then I opened up the email and it read, “I must have your number wrong because I just tried to call you. Call me on Thursday, ok?”
Pfffffffttttt. I laughed at the big build up, only to have no news at all. Pretty much the same routine repeated itself on Friday, only via voicemail. I wrote in my journal, “If it’s rejection, I’ll not be deterred. It’s my vocation. I have to obey.”
It was a short phone conversation. The caller liked the stuff I submitted but a higher-up decided to pass on it. No reasons were given, and after I hung up, it occurred to me that I had a right to ask for detailed feedback so I cranked out an email asking for it.
So this weekend I took a little break from writing Joe to Gos, my first since I started them back in November. I kept thinking, “Well, c’mon, show your persistence in the face of rejection, get back to writing, work on the web site, etc.”
But without really deciding, I ended up wallowing in the other good things in my life the whole weekend: family dinner followed by board games with my daughter on Friday night. Coffee with my friend Jim on Saturday morning. A long nap on Saturday afternoon, followed by a movie, dinner, and a romantic Saturday night with my sweetie. A leisurely Sunday morning of reading the paper. Great progress on doing the taxes on Sunday afternoon. A late afternoon racquetball match in which I played better than I have in a month. Another delightful family dinner tonight.
And tonight I feel energized. There are 10,000 different ways for this to work, and I’ve just found one that, for now, doesn’t.