We all know how it feels to put out our best voice-over work and feel great about an audition…and not get the job. We’ve all been there at some point and we know the letdown, the frustration. You might start questioning your choices, your reads, and maybe even if you belong in the industry. You find yourself wondering what it is that you’re doing wrong?
But guess what? This is natural. Rejection can be a very painful experience.
“How could this be?”, you ask yourself. “Man, I know I killed it!”
Maybe, if you’re honest with yourself, you weren’t really at the top of your game. But what if you felt you were truly on point? You’re sure you nailed it. If this is the case, then not getting the job makes for a more painful rejection. You may have turned in a stellar audition and the client just preferred someone else’s sound. It’s a simple truth that happens to all of us and might have nothing to do with your talent or skill, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less, does it?
Rejection can make you feel like you’ve stopped dead in your tracks. But the reality is that it’s actually more of a momentary pause that’s giving us something that we can push against. It can help show us just how resilient, strong, and capable we really are. You’ve heard the phrase, “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger”. The truth is that we don’t grow stronger when everything is going our way – we need to push through our habits, our blind spots, and our comfort zones.
So, what if you start looking at rejection, (like not landing an audition) not as a negative experience, but as more of a benefit. Any time you’re turned down for a job, start looking at it as insight into tweaking your skills or honing your style, and focus on your long-term goals instead of this depressing moment of rejection.
Listen to feedback very carefully and you’ll begin to hear if you need to start doing something you’re not or stop doing something you are. Look for any repetitive feedback which might point out something that you’ve been overlooking. Rejection doesn’t have to be an automatic negative but instead, it can give us a new way of looking at things and ourselves. Everybody gets tunnel vision once in a while and losing a job might be the lightbulb moment to a major breakthrough. Dig for the little gems that will put you on a positive path to becoming your very best voice-over self!
Perhaps now, you can start looking at rejection not as something negative, but as a blessing in disguise. It might not be easy at first but start viewing each time you don’t land a job, not as a rejection (let’s not even use that word anymore) but as an opportunity to grow stronger.
So, the next time someone hands you that “sour lemon” at the end of your hard work, how will you react? The choice is yours.
Will you set that lemon on the counter and forget about it, letting it whither or grow an amazing shade of blue-green. Or, will you take it and slice it open? Look inside. Smell that amazing bright fresh scent. Squeeze every last bit of wonderful juice into a tall glass and add your favorite sweetener. Add the clink, clink of a little ice for sound effects and finish with a long clear splash of fresh water.
When was the last time you made a nice big glass of lemonade? Mmm, delicious.
Looking to improve your voiceover reads? Check out this exercise! And if you missed last week’s article, read that here.
