We are all part of human society. So what is a society? The word comes from the Latin word socius which means a friend or ally. We all want to be part of society because we are social beings. This makes it particularly difficult to deal with rejection because it is the equivalent of being denied our desire and need of belonging.

Repeated rejection can make a person feel depressed. Not to mention this results in low self-esteem or can even lead to aggression. It is important to learn to properly deal with rejection so you can find a group of people where you belong. Belongingness is a fundamental motivation for the human race. If you don’t learn how to deal with rejection it might lead to isolation because you will lose the will to interact with new people. Inherently you can end up losing one of the fundamental motivators that can result in depression.

To understand how to deal with rejection we need to know why rejection is necessary.

First, let’s take a look at rejection from a college or university. You might be rejected from an educational institution because you do not have the skills or grades for the particular field or level of competition. For example, you might want to be a singer but you got rejected from all the schools. This is probably because you are not a good singer and you don’t even realize it.

This rejection should make you reconsider your goals. Maybe you are good at another skill like drawing. You wouldn’t trust a surgeon without steady hands. Nor are you going to listen to a singer who can’t hit a single note no matter how much passion they have.

Now let’s examine social rejection from a group of people. Let’s assume that you are part of that group and you get a new person that wants to join. You like all the same thing and expect this person also loves to torture animals and talks about it all the time. You would immediately reject that person as soon as you found out about it. The rejected person would feel the same amount of pain as anybody else would feel from rejection. Your reason for rejection would be that that person would have brought harm to the group.

These types of rejection seem to be extreme but it’s easy to understand the underlying reason and purpose for it. The interesting thing is that a study has shown that African-American students feel the same pain of rejection when they were told that they were rejected from members of KKK. This means that rejection does not respond to reason. It is important to understand this to help you better deal with it.

Since rejection doesn’t respond to logic, how do you deal with it?

Understand that rejection was meant other purposes:

• Explore different paths
• Reconsider our goals
• Opportunity for  change
• Learn to become more resilient

You never let rejection define you, but always remember that you need to learn from rejection. Instead of looking at rejection as something negative inflicted on you, look at it as a reflection of the other person. If you are rejected it’s not because of who you are or what you’re like, think of it as who the other person is, their values and what they are like.

Never take it personally. And don’t try to be somebody you are not. Be yourself! Everybody experiences rejection and everybody feels pain it is perfectly normal. Don’t be consumed by it.

Also, widen your circle of friends by going out to events that interest you and leaving yourself open to new experiences. Remember that you are not limited to socializing with people at school and that meeting new people at events, university etc will provide opportunities to find people who share with you and your values.

Rejection is part of life but so is acceptance of others.