I Asked for Critique—So Why Did I Feel Rejected?
- karenmrubinstein
- Mar 17
- 6 min read
When I Walked In Too Big
This weekend was the culmination of four months of training in National Speakers Association New York City’s Speaker University.
Four months of lectures on stage presence, branding, identity, what we want to be known for, and finally, script writing.
I poured myself into it.
The class already knew the first two minutes of my final five-minute talk, but being who I am — a perfectionist in a way that is not nearly as charming as it sounds — I kept tinkering. I changed the opening again and again, chasing the perfect hook, the perfect beginning to the perfect speech.
If I’m honest, somewhere in me lived a very specific hope. Like Ralphie in A Christmas Story, handing in his “masterpiece” essay to his teacher Miss Shields, I was sure they would see my brilliance.
I imagined them impressed by my insight, my wisdom, my unique ability to craft something extraordinary.
Maybe not just the best in the class.Maybe not just the best in the chapter.Maybe, if we were really being honest, the best anyone had ever given on this topic.
In my private daydream, they would rise to their feet.They might even hoist me on their shoulders.
So I volunteered to go first.
When they asked what kind of feedback I wanted, I said, “Bring it on.” What I meant — though I didn’t know it yet — was tell me how well I did. Offer a few tweaks on where to stand, what word to emphasize, how to pace the room. Polish the diamond.
A few minutes after my final sentence, I realized I had misunderstood the assignment.
They took me seriously.They went to work.
They talked about places the opening could be stronger. They wondered if the ending really landed. They offered structural thoughts, clarity notes, places where the writing itself might be tightened.
At ten minutes in, I felt shock. By then I was certain I had written the worst thing anyone had ever put on paper or spoken aloud.
At twenty minutes, my ears were buzzing. My head felt hot and far away at the same time, as if my brain were slowly powering down. I remember standing, walking back to my seat, aware of the tears, trying not to make a scene and already feeling like one.
I listened to the next two people and heard only one thing: they are good, and I am not.
I raised my hand and said I needed to leave.
The room changed instantly. Faces softened. People spoke to me with love. Someone reached for me. It helped for a moment, but the story had already taken hold. When we broke for lunch, I walked outside, suddenly not hungry, nauseous, unsteady. I went back in, packed my bag, and when someone asked why, I said I needed to for my mental health.
Then I made the long walk to Penn Station, crying, telling myself I had failed, that I had let my husband Barry down, that I had embarrassed myself by ever believing I could stand on that stage.
In three short hours, I had gone from the best in the world to the worst.
There is no middle in that universe.
Billy Joel sings it as a confession about his own extremes, but I hear it now as a pretty accurate description of my brain.
I don’t seem to know how to live in the middle.
I can see now my mind was trying to protect me. If I’m either spectacular or nothing, I never have to live in the vulnerable, ordinary middle where I’m just human, visible, and still learning.
That middle is where disappointment can happen, where people see me as I am, where growth takes time and there are no guarantees.
I later learned there’s language for this way of thinking — turning everything into “perfect or pointless.” Therapists call it all‑or‑nothing thinking, and it’s one of those patterns that quietly fuels perfectionism, anxiety, and shame. Realizing it had a name didn’t fix it, but it helped. It meant I wasn’t uniquely broken. My mind was running a very common, very human pattern.
Somewhere on that walk, another voice came in — harsher, colder — the one that shows up when I am already wounded.
Who do you think you are to believe you could do this?
The Balloon I Didn’t Know I Was
Later, when the noise settled just a little, I began to understand why the fall had been so violent.
I hadn’t walked into that room moderately hopeful. I had walked in inflated. I had quietly required myself to be exceptional. Anything less would not simply be information about the talk; it would be a verdict about me.
A balloon blown to its absolute limit looks enormous, triumphant, almost impressive in its size. It is also at its most fragile. The tiniest prick can take it down.
That was me.
What the professionals in that room were offering was normal, healthy, generous critique. What I heard was annihilation.
Because if I am supposed to be extraordinary, then improvement sounds like failure. No wonder feedback can feel like rejection.
What I Was Really Protecting
I am beginning to see how protective this inflation has been in my life.
If I am spectacular, I never have to feel ordinary.If I am exceptional, I never have to risk blending in, being unseen, being just another person trying her best.
It is a clever system.It is also exhausting.And it makes a person very easy to pop.
The women who called me that night were kind beyond measure. One of them, a professional speaking coach, told me she had no idea how raw parts of my history still are. She sees someone vivacious, strong, resilient. She assumed I could take the heat.
I realized, listening to her, how good I still am at the front I present to the world. I have healed so much. And I am still healing. Both things are true.
Humility as Right‑Sizing, Not Humiliation
Humility, I am discovering, is not humiliation.
It is right-sizing.
From there, critique becomes survivable. Growth becomes possible. I can be teachable, reachable, useful.
I went back the next day to present my final speech to a room of professional speakers and a videographer.
Our final exam.
And something had shifted. I wasn’t walking in to be hoisted onto anyone’s shoulders. I wasn’t there to prove I was extraordinary. I walked in knowing I had something to give.
When I stood up, I didn’t speak from the frantic place in my head that wanted approval. I spoke from my heart. From the part of me that wanted to be useful to the people in front of me.
I wasn’t scanning their faces for a grade. I was finally with them.
And the irony?
They had seen me the day before.They had watched me melt down, and knew how close I had come to quitting.
So when I stood there and spoke — not polished, not performing, but honest — they weren’t just listening to a speech.
They were watching someone come back.
That’s when people leaned in.That’s when a few eyes filled with tears.That’s when connection happened.
Not because I was perfect.
But because I was real.
Maybe There’s a Middle
I suspect many of us live in some version of this swing — from grand expectation to total collapse, from “I will change the world” to “I am nothing at all.” It is dizzying, and it keeps us trapped in ourselves.
What if there is another way to stand?Not enormous.Not invisible.Just real.
This weekend, that felt like enough.
❤️
Questions to Sit With (If Feedback Feels Like Rejection)
If any of this feels familiar — the high of “I’ll nail this” followed by the crash of “I’m nothing” — here are a few gentle questions you might bring to a journal, a meeting, or a quiet walk:
Where in my life do I feel I have to be extraordinary just to stay in the room?Is it work, parenting, recovery, friendship, creativity? What happens inside me if I imagine being simply “good enough” there?
What do I imagine would happen if I were just a regular human in that area?Would I be ignored, replaced, forgotten, unimportant? What’s the real fear hiding under “I have to be amazing”?
Where am I mixing up humility and humiliation?How does it feel different in my body when I’m right‑sized versus when I feel shamed or small?
What would it feel like to let myself be human here—today?One small place I could let myself learn, take feedback, or not be “the best” and still belong.
Maybe we don’t have to live at either extreme. Maybe there really is a middle, where we’re allowed to be learners, to be right‑sized, and still worthy of being on the stage at all — even when our hearts are pounding.
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