American Idol's Life Lessons on Rejection

Are you watching American Idol? I DVD it and then zoom through it. A few weeks ago, as the judges whittled the hopefuls down to twenty-four, there was something Ellen DeGeneres said that stuck with me. She was talking to the annoying girl-with-glasses who wouldn't go home.

(Just to quality that...I didn't mean girl-with-glasses was annoying because she wears glasses. I wear glasses. She was just annoying.)

It's a little long...you can click it off when you're tired of listening to her begging.



Anyway...Ellen said to her, "This is just one 'no' in your life. You will get many 'no's. It doesn't mean it's 'the' no."

Those words just resonated with me. That's a writers' life! Lots and lots of no's. I'm heading over to a writers' conference tonight and teaching a workshop tomorrow. I'm going to reference Ellen's wise lesson about getting no's. Rejection is part of the package when you are trying a creative endeavor.

By contrast, look at this young woman's attitude about rejection. AWESOME!!!





I worry about people like girl-with-glasses. She may be incredibly talented, but there's an extra quality that she is going to need if she ever wants to get anywhere with her music. It's called: perseverance.