Get Rejected!

POINT TO PONDER

“If you stand up and be counted, from time to time you may get yourself knocked down. But remember this: A man flattened by an opponent can get up again. A man flattened by conformity stays down for good.” 

                            - Thomas J. Watson Jr. 

 

STORY LINE by Rajiv Shah

So what is the secret of success? Failure. Don't believe me? Check out some of these photos of rejection letters that have been circulating around the internet recently. The recipients have bounced back from these different types of rejections to long and successful careers. 

 

1. The Standard Rejection...

RECIPIENT: U2

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: U2 have released 12 studio albums and are among the all-time best-selling music artists, having sold more than 150 million records worldwide. They have won 22 Grammy Awards, more than any other band, and in 2005, they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their first year of eligibility. Rolling Stone ranked U2 at number 22 in its list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time" and has labelled them the "Biggest Band in the World". (From Wikipedia)

 

2. When You Can't Even Give It Away For Free Rejection... 

 RECIPIENT: ANDY WARHOL

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Warhol has been the subject of numerous retrospective exhibitions, books, and feature and documentary films. He coined the widely used expression "15 minutes of fame". Many of his creations are very collectible and highly valuable. The highest price ever paid for a Warhol painting is US$105 million for a 1963 canvas titled "Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster)". A 2009 article in The Economistdescribed Warhol as the "bellwether of the art market". Warhol's works include some of the most expensive paintings ever sold. (From Wikipedia)

 

3. The Feedback Rejection...

RECIPIENT: TIM BURTON

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Timothy Walter "Tim" Burton is an American film director, producer, artist, writer, poet and stop motionartist. He is known for his dark, gothic, macabre and quirky horror and fantasy films such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Dark Shadows and Frankenweenie, and for blockbusters such as Pee-wee's Big Adventure, Batman, its first sequel Batman Returns, Planet of the Apes, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Alice in Wonderland. Burton has directed 16 films and produced 12 as of 2012. (From Wikipedia)

 

4. The "You're Not Ready Yet" Rejection... 

 

RECIPIENT: MADONNA

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Madonna has sold more than 300 million records worldwide and is recognized as the best-selling female recording artist of all time byGuinness World Records. Madonna is the best-selling female rock artist of the 20th century and the second best selling female artist in the United States, with 64.5 million certified albums. In 2008, Billboard ranked her at number two, behind only The Beatles, on the Billboard Hot 100 All-Time Top Artists, making her the most successful solo artist in the history of the American singles chart. The publication also declared Madonna as the top-touring female artist of all time. Due to her major influence in contemporary music, Madonna has been included in the list of "25 Most Powerful Women of the Past Century" by Time and was crowned the "Greatest Woman In Music" by VH1. She became one of the five founding members of the UK Music Hall of Fame and was inducted into theRock and Roll Hall of Fame in her first year of eligibility. (From Wikipedia)

 

5. The Humiliating Rejection...

RECIPIENT: GERTRUDE STEIN

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Gertrude Stein was an American writer of novels, poetry and plays that eschewed the narrative, linear, and temporal conventions of 19th-century literature, and a fervent collector of Modernist art. In 1933, Stein published a kind of memoir of her Paris years, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, written in the voice of Toklas, her life partner. The book became a literary bestseller and vaulted Stein from the relative obscurity of cult literary figure into the light of mainstream attention. (From Wikipedia)

 

 

Comments

[Beatles' Fan]

Here is one more
On 1 January 1962, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison, and Pete Best were auditioned by Decca producer Tony Meehan and performed a total of fifteen songs in just under one hour. All the material was from selection of covers the Beatles had performed in various clubs over the years, interspersed with three Lennon–McCartney originals.
Decca Records rejected the Beatles, saying "guitar groups are on the way out" and "The Beatles have no future in show business

[Valley of the Sun]

Thanks Anand…this is just what I needed today 

[Pulao Penang]

Good one. Failure is lesson of life and never give up.

[Friends (received in direct emails. Posted by FR team)]

1. Awesome content & truly inspirational. I like the way Rajiv phrased it “Key to Success is Failure!!!”

I sent it to my daughters

2.The Gertrude Stein rejection is classic!

[NJ]

Each one of us is like a gem stone buried underground. It takes a special miner to discover it and someone to polish and make it shine. For human, fortunately, we can be our own miner and that special someone to make us shine. Believe in yourself and work toward your goal!

[MS]

Nice One Rajive. I heard the FEDEEX Guy paper at IVY college was graded C or rejected for FEDEX Concept. Today FEDEX = $137 @NYSE.
MS

[micro CEO]

Thanks for sharing. Very interesting examples. It should be heartening to us all.

I have read of several more examples in this vein. Surely there are many, many more stories of failure than those of success. Not all of them end happily during the lifetime of the brave challenger. But their post-humous recognition should only serve to help reinforce the importance of believing in what we do, regardless of what others may say.

Here are 5 more instances (though without the rejection letters to show).

1. Vincent Van Gogh was not able to sell any of his paintings during his lifetime (Well there was 1 exception, "the Red Vinyard"). Now of course, they go for millions at auctions, and Van Gogh probably sits near the top of anyone's list of best 19th century painters).

2. J.K. Rowling's first Harry Potter book (which became a multi-million seller in English and in every conceivable other translated language...all during our modern times when kids have are reading fewer and fewer books) were reportedly rejected by a dozen large publishers before one small publishing company picked it up. That was only on account of the CEO's daughter who apparently begged the man to publish it.

3. Anne Frank's Diary (collected and submitted by a surviving relative) was repeatedly rejected and poorly reviewed by reviewing publishers, who felt that it had nothing special to offer. It was finally accepted only after being featured in a newspaper article. Now it is widely counted among the most famous novels in history.

4. Lynn Margulis, evolutionary biologist, who pioneered the theory that evolution of nuclei in cells is a result of symbiotic relationships with bacteria (not random mutations), saw her paper rejected by 15 journals before finally being published. She later got a national medal of science for the research finding, which is heralded by many as a watershed in modern evolutionary science.

5. Ludwig Boltzmann, physicist who established statistical mechanics (without which we could have neither thermodynamics nor quantum physics), put used his research to demonstrate theoretically that all matter consists of atoms (later proved by Einstein's paper on Brownian Motion). His theories were vehemently rejected by Ernst Mach and other illustrious scientists. Tragically, Boltzmann was driven to commit suicide. Today, he is remembered as a giant in the history of scientific discovery.

Boltzmann's story is mentioned by Jacob Bronowski in the 1973 BBC TV series, Ascent of Man. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2p9By0qXms