on rejection...

I am in the middle of the 2nd Twilight Saga book, “New Moon” and a single paragraph caught my eye that I can’t help but blog about it. Here it goes:

I’d cried myself to sleep over this boy. His harsh rejection had punched a painful new hole in what was left of my chest. He’d left a new nightmare behind him, like an infection in a sore – the insult after the injury. And now he was here in my room, smirking at me as if none of that had passed. Worse than that, even though his arrival had been noisy and awkward, it reminded me of when Edward used to sneak in through my window at night, and the reminder picked viciously at the unhealed wounds.

 

Certain words from this paragraph scream to me like how an alcohol spray paints to an open surgery… words such as “cried” “harsh rejection” “painful new hole” “new nightmare” “insult” “smirking”… Aaarrrgghhh… Opens up an array of memories come playing in my mind like a distorted film playing a scene over and over.

 

How do you put a stop to it?

 

Then I remember one scene from the very first chapter of this book... So I flipped through those pages again and re-read the following lines:

 

“Bella I don’t want you to come with me.” He spoke the words slowly and precisely, his cold eyes on my face, watching as I absorbed what he was really saying.

 

There was a pause as I repeated the words in my head a few times, sifting through them for their real intent.

 

“You… don’t… want me?” I tried out the words, confused by the way they sounded, placed in that order.

 

“No.”

 

I stared, uncomprehending, into his eyes. He stared back without apology. His eyes were like topaz – hard and clear and very deep. I felt like I could see into them for miles and miles, yet nowhere in their bottomless depths could I see a contradiction to the word he’d spoken.

“Well, that changes things.” I was surprised by how calm and reasonable my voice sounded. It must be because I was so numb. I couldn’t realize what he was telling me. It still didn’t make any sense.

 

Reading those words was like a bucket of cold water being splattered right to my face. The realization on the harshness of rejection… Bella took it calmly. She said she was surprised but then again it must be because of the numbness…

 

I had my fair share on rejection. I used to kid around saying that no amount of rejection will ever make me feel like I am the tiniest person on earth. I thought I’ve endured all I possibly can in the realm of rejection. I used to say “I had a very thorough lesson in rejection last year.”

 

But who was I conclude that?

 

I recently had another encounter with this unwelcome feeling. Like Bella, I believe I took it calmly. I wasn’t hysterical. I shrugged it off and “moved on.” But reading these words from this book opens up the unhealed wound that I tried so hard to pretend does not exist.

But it’s still there, you know, lurking in the darkness, hidden in the shadows, buried in the ground.

 

What hurts the most in being rejected? Is it the slashed ego? The humiliation? I’d say it’s the realization that you aren’t good enough.

 

“You’re not good for me, Bella.” He turned his earlier words around, and so I had no argument. How well I knew that I wasn’t good enough for him.

 

“Not good enough.” “Not interesting enough. “Not pretty enough.”

 

Aw!

 

Sometimes I hate myself when I realize how stupidity results in having memories such as these. If I am in my logical mood, and thinking things through, I can see where in the series of events did I stumble and where did I become susceptible to harm. But most often than not, I don’t recognize it until it’s over and I’ve been stumped upon.

 

Is it my fault that I am too trusting, that I am too eager to please and that I am such a simpleton that I can’t say No?  

 

Yes, I admit those are my faults without any excuses.

 

Aaarrrgggghhhh… It is such a complicated and agonizing world we live in.

 

But thanks to words like these in the book, when presented in black and white, makes you see the reality in its ugliness. It makes you realize how it hurts like hell to be rejected. But then you realize another thing. Compared to the first lesson in rejection, this time I am way composed than before. I am handling it better than the first. I am stronger now than the last time.

 

Or

 

I am just way too numb now to really tell the difference.