Quotes
40 Rejection Quotes From People Who Kept Asking
Most rejection quote pages are the same 15 quotes recycled with stock photos. This is different. Every quote here comes from someone who faced real, documented rejection and kept going. We added context so you know what each person was actually going through when they said it. Because a quote about rejection hits different when you know the person saying it was actually rejected.
Jump to a Category
On the Pain of Rejection
“I used to save all my rejection letters. I have hundreds of them. Then one day I just said, you know, I have enough wallpaper.”
“I have been rejected for everything, from jobs to dates to my own ideas. But every rejection has just been a redirect.”
“Rejection is a common occurrence. Learning that early and often will help you build up the releasing process.”
“I think that you have to believe in your destiny; that you will succeed, you will meet a lot of rejection and it is not always a straight path, there will be detours.”
“You have to know how to accept rejection and reject acceptance.”
On Asking Anyway
“I really wish I was less of a thinking man and more of a fool not afraid of rejection.”
“Every time I thought I was being rejected from something good, I was actually being redirected to something better.”
“Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It is quite simple, really: Double your rate of failure.”
“If they say no, you are no worse off than before you asked.”
“The way to develop self-confidence is to do the thing you fear and get a record of successful experiences behind you.”
On Persistence After No
“I was turned down by 12 publishers. Then the 13th publisher, a small London publishing house called Bloomsbury, said yes.”
“By the time I was fourteen the nail in my wall would no longer support the weight of the rejection slips impaled upon it.”
“We got turned down by everybody in the record business.”
“I got fired from a furniture store for telling a customer the truth. Then the TV station fired me right before I was about to go on the air.”
“I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I have been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed.”
“I did not fail the test. I just found 100 ways to do it wrong.”
“The master has failed more times than the beginner has tried.”
On Rejection as Fuel
“A rejection is nothing more than a necessary step in the pursuit of success.”
“There is no failure except in no longer trying.”
“This manuscript of yours that has just come back from another editor is a precious package. Do not consider it rejected. Consider that you have addressed it to the editor who can appreciate my work and it has simply come back stamped Not at this address.”
“I am thankful for all of those who said no to me. It is because of them I am doing it myself.”
“I take rejection as someone blowing a bugle in my ear to wake me up and get going, rather than retreat.”
“Rejection does not mean you are not good enough; it means the other person failed to notice what you have to offer.”
On Fear of Rejection
“Do not waste yourself in rejection, nor bark against the bad, but chant the beauty of the good.”
“The greatest barrier to success is the fear of failure.”
“If you are not willing to risk the unusual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.”
“I knew that if I failed I would not regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not trying.”
“One who fears failure limits his activities. Failure is only the opportunity to more intelligently begin again.”
On Reframing Rejection
“Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.”
“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated.”
“I have not failed. I have just found 10,000 ways that will not work.”
“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all.”
“Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.”
“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.”
On the Practice of Getting Rejected
“You cannot be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer.”
“Collect rejections. Set rejection goals. I promise you, you will collect a lot of yeses along the way.”
“Do one thing every day that scares you.”
“If you really want to do something, you will find a way. If you do not, you will find an excuse.”
“The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that is changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.”
“Go for no. Yes is the destination. No is how you get there.”
Stop Reading Quotes. Start Collecting Rejections.
Quotes are nice. But the people quoted above did not read quotes about rejection. They went out and got rejected. Repeatedly. Publicly. Painfully. And they kept asking. The only way to join their list is to start making asks of your own.
One ask today. Pick one from the list if you need an idea. Log it. Add it to your counter. That is worth more than every quote on this page combined.