When You Are Rejected

I was passed over for a role in a school play. My teacher gave it to her favorite student. I was deeply hurt. I asked, “What was wrong with me?”

What does rejection look like? It’s like having a hole in your bucket.

Someone’s going to get a wet surprise. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There’s song that goes, “There’s a hole in my bucket, dear Henry, dear Henry. Well then, fix it dear Liza, dear Liza.”

Nothing can stay in a bucket with a hole.

Rejection can be defined as “To refuse or accept a person. Throw away, discard, or to cast out. To refuse or unsatisfactory.”

When we are rejected, we build walls around ourselves to protect ourselves. We don’t want people to see our insecurity, loneliness, self-pity, or vanity. We project a negative self-image upon ourselves; and become critical and reject ourselves and others. This cycle of rejection undercuts our relationships with God and others.

No matter how much love you receive, you still do not feel loved. It’s like being in a love vacuum, because you cannot retain the love you receive. Thus, to compensate for feeling unloved, we fill our lives with things such as possessions, recognition, careers, etc. Some of us go the negative route of becoming pleasure and addiction seeking.

When my husband left me, I felt devasted. I felt insecure and less than. I felt like a failure and I had disappointed God.

Being rejected breaks down your value. I would often second guess myself. I went through the process of inner healing, because only God can heal those hurts and seal up the hole in bucket. He gave me stability and a sense of value in my life. Nothing could fill up that hole, only a revelation of God and how much I meant to Him.

Sometimes, as a woman, we feel that marriage is a completion of us, but God reminded me that I am only complete in Him. Marriage does not define my womanhood. I am a woman by God’s design. He sealed that bucket when I became a daughter of the King.