When rejection hurts and how to find worth beyond others’ approval 

When rejection hurts and how to find worth beyond others’ approval 

FAVS News Editor Tracy Simmons contemplates how rejection can reopen old wounds, but like the moon behind clouds, she can remain whole while pursuing meaningful work. 

By Tracy Simmons | FāVS News Editor

The views expressed in this opinion column are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of FāVS News. 

Rejection cuts straight to my bones. Perhaps because it’s a demon I’ve been fighting for decades. So when a letter arrived in the mail a few days ago discouraging me from submitting a full grant proposal to a major funder in the religion news space — the reason being that we fall into “a very competitive funding environment” — it landed harder than it should have.

That reaction isn’t really about a foundation, or even about my nonprofit religion newsroom: FāVS News. It’s older than both. I’ve spent most of my life fighting to be seen by people who made it clear, in their own ways, that I wasn’t worth staying for.

My father left before I turned 2. I don’t have memories of him leaving, only the void it left behind. Somewhere along the way, without fully realizing it, I started building a life aimed at him — not toward reconciliation, but toward proof. I wanted to become someone he would regret not knowing.

My mother stayed longer, but she left too, eventually, largely over religious differences. She never supported my work as a religion journalist. So there’s a second version of the same want tangled up in the first: I want her to see what this work has become, how it’s made a difference to others, and regret not being part of it.

Funders declining FāVS shouldn’t feel like either of those things. But some weeks, it does. When a letter says we’re not worth the investment, some old, familiar part of me hears it as a personal rejection. That part of me responds the only way it knows how: by trying harder to prove them wrong.

Chasing approval

This isn’t the first time. Over the years, FāVS has also been turned down by Innovia, Press Forward, Report for America, the Smith-Barbieri Progressive Fund and countless others. Different funders, different stated reasons — but landing in the same old place. Closer to home, it’s been much the same. Local institutions we’ve covered fairly and generously haven’t always returned that support when we’ve come asking.

Buddhist teaching holds that attachment is often the root of suffering — and attachment to approval may be one of the most persistent forms it takes. It hands our sense of peace to people who may never choose to give it. I recognize that pattern in myself: handing my sense of worth to my father, my mother, and now to whichever funder holds the next envelope.

I think this feeling is familiar to many of us. A lot of people spend years chasing approval from someone who left, or withheld it, or who made love and acceptance feel conditional. We build careers, raise children, chase achievements — while quietly hoping it will finally be enough for them.

In Buddhist teaching, there’s an image that has stuck with me: The moon remains whole whether or not clouds are covering it. On overcast nights, we might not be able to see it, but its wholeness was never actually in question — only our ability to see it clearly. I think that’s the truer thing about worth in general: It doesn’t wax and wane based on who’s paying attention.

Wounds that need healing not approval

My worth was never actually contingent on my father staying, or my mother approving, or a funder saying yes. It just felt that way, because the people whose validation I wanted most happened to be the ones who won’t give it.

I don’t have this fully sorted out. I still want the “yes.” I want my mom — and now these funders — to look at what FāVS has become and regret walking away from it. But I’m starting to understand that wanting proof and needing it are two different things. One is ambition. The other is an old wound, still asking to be healed.

Maybe that’s the real work in front of me — not proving anything to anyone, but learning to separate the two. To keep chasing grants and telling the stories that matter, because I believe in them, not because I’m still trying to win over people who already made their choice. The moon doesn’t argue with the clouds. It just keeps being whole, waiting for the sky to clear on its own time.

Do you want to support FāVS? You can make a donation here, or email MeganGuido@favs.news for sponsorship opportunities.