I Got Rejected But I Still Won

It’s taken me 28 years to embrace the fact that winning has exactly nothing to do with coming in first place. It has nothing to do with the outcome at all, really. 

I first started thinking about this a few years ago when I watched Brené Brown’s Netflix special for the first time. It had such an impact on me that my life feels split into two volumes: pre- and post-Brené. 

Her stories are so funny and relatable that you don’t even realize until months later how profoundly they’ve transformed the way you think and connect with others. It’s amazing. 

One anecdote, near the very end (spoiler alert), cut so deep that I constantly find myself revisiting it whenever I’m navigating a tough spot.

She recounts an incident that occurred several years ago at her twelve-year-old daughter’s swim competition. Brené’s daughter, Ellen, wasn’t a very strong swimmer at the time, and yet her coach signed her up to race one of the hardest strokes—the 100-yard breaststroke. 

Everyone knew it was going to be a disaster—Ellen, Brené, her husband, the coach. Brené even admitted that her second-hand nerves led her to ask her daughter if she was really sure she wanted to compete, giving her an out. 

In the end, after much deliberation, Ellen got up there and raced. And, it was a disaster—she finished her lengths long after everyone else in her heat had exited the pool. 

But when Brené and her husband ran over to console their daughter, through tears Ellen said, “That sucked. But I was brave, and I won.” 

I swearrrr if you watch it (which I couldn’t recommend more), you’ll cry too. 

That’s the little pearl of wisdom that has stuck with me: we win when we do the hard thing, when we face our fears. Which place we finish in or whether we get the prize is neither here nor there. 

Last week, I had my own version of the disastrous swim meet.

I had been talking to a guy I liked for a few weeks and we’d seen each other in passing a few times. Our messages had been pretty flirty and there was that awkward-cute, high-school-crush energy that hung in the air every time we saw each other.  

I knew he liked me back. 

But one day, the energy shifted and I could feel him pulling away. It was confusing and honestly a little stressful—this was the first guy I had genuinely liked since my ex-boyfriend, so feeling it slip through my fingertips sucked. 

As someone who does not shy away from confrontation, I decided to ask him straight up what was going on. I’d rather be flat out rejected than live in a limbo of uncertainty any day of the week. 

So, the next time I saw him, I went for it: “Hey, I have a bone to pick with you,” I said with a giggle. 

And then I told him how I felt. I told him that it had been fun getting to know him, that I liked him, and that I’d felt his hesitancy. I told him I was confused about his behavior. I was honest and raw and vulnerable. 

As far as I know, he paid me the same kindness in return, and we ended up having a real, grounding conversation. The gist was that, though he also enjoyed the evolution of our dynamic, he’s not in a place where he can prioritize a relationship right now. We left it as “not now, but not never.” 

Obviously, this wasn’t the outcome I wanted. But as I was walking away—admittedly a little bummed—-I couldn’t help but smile. 

Why? Winning didn’t mean getting the guy. Winning was being honest and vulnerable, even though it was really scary. 

I did that. And he did that, too. 

So, we both won.