Listen to This Episode

“Being Seen Is Scary When Rejection Feels Personal” on:

APPLE  | SPOTIFY | PANDORA

Being Seen Is Scary When Rejection Feels Personal

There is a particular kind of fear that comes with walking into an audition room.

You’ve prepared.

You know the scene.

You’ve made your choices.

You walk into a room and allow people to watch you do something that matters to you.

Then they decide.

Yes.

No.

Maybe.

Next.

And sometimes the fear underneath all of that isn’t simply:

“What if I mess up?”

It is:

“What if they see what I can do and still don’t choose me?”

That is a very different fear.

Because when your art is personal, rejection can feel personal too.

Visibility Is More Than Marketing

We talk a lot about visibility for artists.

For an artist, being visible often means allowing somebody into something that came from inside you.

A writer hands someone the manuscript.

A musician releases the song.

An actor enters the audition room.

A dancer performs.

A filmmaker submits the film.

A painter puts the canvas on a wall where strangers can stand in front of it and decide what they think.

That takes courage.

And once the art is visible, you cannot completely control what happens next.

People can love it.

Ignore it.

Misunderstand it.

Reject it.

Pass over it.

Or say nothing at all.

No wonder hiding can sometimes feel safer.

If they never see it, they cannot reject it.

But they also cannot connect with it.

Being Seen and Being Chosen Are Different Things

This is the distinction I keep coming back to:

Being seen and being chosen are not the same thing.

Think about an audition.

An actor can give a strong audition and still not book the role.

The reason might be height, chemistry, schedule, accent, casting combinations, what a producer imagined, or a hundred other factors the actor will never know.

But it is incredibly easy to leave the room and translate:

“They didn’t choose me”

into:

“What they saw wasn’t good enough.”

Then one decision about one job starts becoming something much bigger.

Maybe I don’t belong here.

Maybe I’ve lost it.

Maybe I’m not as good as I thought.

Maybe I shouldn’t keep doing this.

This is where rejection begins taking territory it was never entitled to.

A casting decision gets to decide who receives that particular job.

It does not get to decide whether you are an artist.

You Don’t Control Both Sides of the Room

There are two jobs happening when your art is seen.

There is your job.

And there is theirs.

Your job is to prepare.

Create.

Show up.

Offer something.

Let yourself be seen.

Their job is to respond.

Choose.

Buy.

Cast.

Publish.

Hire.

Share.

Pass.

You cannot do both jobs.

And trying to do both is exhausting.

You start reading faces.

Second-guessing choices.

Changing yourself before anybody has even asked you to.

Trying to predict what will make somebody say yes.

Eventually, showing up stops feeling like sharing your artistry and starts feeling like sitting an exam on whether you deserve to call yourself an artist.

That is too much weight for one audition.

Or one post.

Or one pitch.

Or one person’s opinion.

A Different Question Before You Show Up

So before your next vulnerable act of visibility, try changing the question.

Instead of:

“Will they choose me?”

ask:

“Can I let myself be seen here?”

That question puts you back inside the part you can actually control.

For an audition, I like this sentence:

My job is to be seen. Their job is to choose.

You might use it before sending a manuscript.

Before posting the painting.

Before performing the song.

Before pitching the project.

Before walking into the room.

It does not protect you from disappointment.

Rejection can still hurt.

But disappointment does not have to become identity.

A “no” can belong to the opportunity without becoming a “no” to you.

The Audacity to Show Up

One of the ideas I explore in Audacious Artistry is the audacity to show up.

And showing up is far more than simply being visible.

It is choosing to let your artistry exist in public without demanding a guarantee that everybody will understand it, approve of it, or choose it.

That takes courage.

You cannot wait until rejection is impossible.

You cannot wait until everybody agrees you belong.

You cannot wait until visibility feels completely safe.

At some point, the art has to leave your hands.

So perhaps the question isn’t:

“How do I stop caring what anyone thinks?”

I’m not sure that is even the goal.

Maybe the better question is:

“Can I keep showing up without handing somebody else the authority to tell me who I am?”

That is a very different way to walk into the room.

And maybe that is the real audacity.

---

A QUESTION TO TAKE WITH YOU

Where are you asking for guaranteed acceptance before you are willing to be seen?

There may be an audition, submission, performance, pitch, post, or piece of art waiting on the other side of that question.

Your job is not to guarantee what happens after you show up.

Your job is to show up.

Let yourself be seen.

And allow somebody else’s decision to remain somebody else’s decision.

Go Deeper with Audacious Artistry

If this episode spoke to something in you, my book Audacious Artistry: Reclaim Your Creative Identity and Thrive in a Saturated World goes deeper.

---

This article is adapted from the Healthy Wealthy Wise Artist Podcast episode:

Listen to This Episode

“Being Seen Is Scary When Rejection Feels Personal” on:

APPLE  | SPOTIFY | PANDORA

Or visit the podcast page:
https://larabiancapilcher.com/podcast

With you as you keep creating,
— Lara Bianca Pilcher

---

Connect with Lara

Website:
https://larabiancapilcher.com

Instagram:
https://instagram.com/larabiancapilcher