On Rejection and Fantasy Football
First off, thank you for actually opening this email. I know many folks will see mention of sportsball in the header (not even sportsball… FAKE, pretend, Dungeons & Dragons-type sportsball!) and walked right on past thinking this had nothing to do with them. So thank you for your… curiosity? Patience? Indulgence?
I swear this will be worth your time, if for nothing else than to know that there’s a very large shared experience out there, and not many people want to talk about it. But we will.
To begin: I’ve been playing fantasy football for about the last 15 years or so. Football has always been one of my favorite sports, so when fantasy began to creep its way out of obscurity (and scoring became automated, instead of having to scour box scores in the sports section of the newspaper), I hopped in as an opportunity to extend my enjoyment of the game and scratch a bit of my competitive itch. Currently I’m playing in 6 leagues (which is admittedly probably too many), and am the picture of mediocrity across all of them (undefeated in one, winless in another, and a sprinkling of records just above and below .500), and I just enjoy the game. I win, I lose… I’m just having a good time and trying each week to make my teams better and messing around with my friends.
That wasn’t always the case.
Once upon a time, a fantasy loss would RUIN my day, week, season. I stressed, I raged, I was unpleasant to others who had nothing to do with my fantasy team. It sounds ridiculous to those outside of fantasy football, and looking back… it was. But WHY did fantasy football push me to such an extremity of rage?
Because at that point? Fantasy football = me. My identity and self-worth was wrapped up in a stupid game with stupid rules and stupid people who were better than me. Losing at fantasy football meant I wasn’t good enough. I wasn’t smart enough (and we all know how much I pride my smarts). I wasn’t cool enough.
And of course, this is all even more absurd because around those losses were plenty of wins (championships, even!). But they didn’t matter because all I saw was the big fat “L” where a “W” wanted to be that week.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was exactly the same response I used to have when rejection letters came in for my writing. With every rejection, I wasn’t good enough. I wasn’t smart enough. I wasn’t cool enough. And just like with fantasy football, when enough losses piled up… I wanted to quit.
But I didn’t.
Because, and I wish I could pinpoint the moment it happened, but at some point I realized how unhealthy it was to equate myself with my work (or my fantasy team). I also realized how much fantasy football and writing submissions coincide in their process:
Every opportunity you do your research to determine your strategy
Every opportunity you pool your assets and put together what you hope is a winning team
Every opportunity you take a deep breath, say a silent prayer, and click “submit”
Every opportunity is then completely out of your hands and subject to the whims of fate, jurors, referees, and plain dumb luck
Every opportunity gives you a pass / fail grade. Either you win or you lose
Every opportunity gives you the chance to grow. Either you learn from your mistakes, or you continue to miss the mark
I think it was the realization that so much of both fantasy football and writing submissions is completely out of your hands that gave me my freedom and peace of mind back. I could roster a stacked team of A-list pros and still lose… because someone got injured, because someone had a bad day, or because someone else was just better that week. And so with submissions… you can do everything right and still “lose.”
But what do you do with that L?
Do you let it define you? Do you let it stop you? Or do you continue to play the game. LOVE the game, and do the work?
In the history of the modern NFL there is only ONE team that went undefeated all season and won the Super Bowl. ONE. In DECADES of football.
Everyone has a bad game. But there’s always next Sunday.
Write on, champions,
Eric Webb
