A big part of growing up is getting rejected from things. Whether it’s a sports team or the top band, teenagers will inevitably be disappointed by rejection throughout their adolescence. My most devastating high-school rejection was from the elite group at my community theatre. I know, I’m really cool. I was in the Junior Varsity of musical theatre for three years before I finally got into the top group. The first two years in this group of self-proclaimed «rejects» were expected, but when I didn’t get in at the beginning of my freshman year of high school, I was devastated. Luckily, my mom comforted me in that moment of understandable disappointment. She didn’t take pictures of me crying after receiving the news, didn’t shame me for not working hard enough, and she especially didn’t compare me to her when she was younger. Unfortunately for a young girl who got rejected from her middle school’s volleyball team, her mom did not extend the same courtesies.