Rejected from your dream college - now what?

   Last week, we discussed dealing with rejection in a relationship with no reciprocation - tough topic, I know. Today, we are also talking about rejection, but now instead of talking about love, we are going to discuss something else - how to deal with rejections from your dream college? Again, this is a very tough topic to talk about, but bear with me, because I hope that through this post you can start preparing yourself mentally in case you get rejected from your dream school (although I hope that this won’t happen to you). Imagine that you have worked so hard in high school, done a lot of things, and spent a lot of time building your college application, so that you can get into the college that you have always dreamed of getting into. You send your application to that school in the strong hope that you will get in … and a while later, it turns out that you didn’t get in. That is going to be extremely frustrating, right - imagine spending years aiming for that school, only to realize that you have been rejected. I understand that fear (because I sometimes think about that too), but personally, I think that by dealing with this appropriately, it can help you go through this tough time, in case that happens - and now, without any further, let’s talk about this right away.

   First is to validate your feelings - I understand the disappointment and the sadness that you don’t get into your dream school , and I think that instead of trying to hide away from the truth, you must learn to accept it, as the rejection is certain and there’s no way to set the time back. Similar to the post last week when I talked about dealing with rejections in a relationship, personally, I will advise you to tell your school counselor or peers and family for emotional support (so that you don’t have to go through this alone). Of course, if you don’t feel comfortable talking about this, you shouldn’t do so, but again, if you let your feelings bottle up in your head, then that is essentially going to be harmful for you. Next up, please realize that being rejected school doesn’t mean that you can’t get into other good schools, In order to elaborate on this point, let’s refer back to the post when I have talked about applying Stoicism into your life: you can’t control what is happening to you, so it’s best that we accept them and do things that we can control. Instead of grieving too long over the rejection, try to do things that are in your ability, such as to build your application for another school (focus on your college application!!!), and focus on trying to get into your other options - which is certainly going to be as good as the dream school you’ve missed.

   Talking about the idea of “dream school”, ask yourself about “what makes that college the “dream college” in the first place?”. Is it because of the ranking, the location, the people, or just that the area around there is beautiful? In that case, I’m pretty sure that there are a lot of other schools that can fit your criteria of a “dream school”, actually! By looking at what do you mean by a “dream college”, try to find other college choices as well - there are thousands of colleges in the US and a lot of other schools around the world, so I can ensure you that after you have conducted further research on other colleges, you may actually be able to find colleges that you have just missed the opportunity! At the end of the day, every college has to offer something that makes students want to study there, right?

   Last but not least, realize that in life, we can’t always be perfect and that things can’t always go the way we want it to be, even though we have worked so hard for it - at the end of the day, perfectionism is not always the key. You don’t have to get into top colleges in order for you to succeed in life, you know? There are kids out there who have succeeded without having to enter a very prestigious college - don’t exaggerate on the importance of getting into top colleges (though I know that it is important), and realize that other colleges are very good as well. By saying this, I’m not indicating that you should join a college in the place - the moral of the story that I want you all to get from this post today is that don’t place too much stress on what university you can get yourself - be open to options, because you will never know if any options are good or bad for you until you try, right?