an old familiar feeling

I remember when I first started in sales, it was the summer of my sophomore or jr. year in college. And u know sales, everyone thinks they are good at sales! I was back in Norcal for the summer and took on this job that turned out to be a scam and illegal operations, a lot of people may have heard of this. Basically we had to go door to door sales to businesses selling credit card processing and machines too. So I would go into your mom/pops business(anything that wasn't a big corporation) and convince you our rates are cheaper and make you cancel your plan and go w/us. It was a real tough sale... real tough... and I was just a rookie. The company sent a mentor along with you for first few days of training, then after you get the hang of it, you go out alone into a your own "territory" and start selling door to door. We got paid NO wages and gas money was NOT reimbursed. Sounds like a rotten deal. I still remember the feeling... the feeling of "what the hell am I doing?" as I go door to door to get rejected in the first few days(first few days me and trainer didnt sell jack). I just remember sitting in the car in the passenger's seat and thinking "damn, what a whacked ass job" everytime we go door to door to get rejected. And people look at you like your some kind of thief trying to get them. I learned a lot during that job and it really humbled me. I still remember that feeling of rejection and the first few moments of soaking in "dude, this is not easy, I don't think your gonna be good at this".And this brings up why I am even writing this entry. That same familiar old feeling came back to me as I got my first rejection letter from the Asian Film Festival of Dallas rejecting "600". And right now i'm right back in that seat thinking "what the hell am i doing? am i even good at this?", and I know by tomorrow morning this feeling will be gone and I'll be back to my old self. But for now, I want to soak this moment in and drinking some tiger beer helps giving me a lil buzz to just relax and forget about it. I think a lot of times, I've had things come pretty easy for me and I take them for granted and think everything I do, it's of the highest quality. Every now and then, I'll get a gut check and brings me back to humility and say to myself "your stuff is whacked". And especially right now is a critical junction with "Drowning" on its way out of post. I just watched our 1st rough rough cut this past week and was quite happy with it. Sometimes, as people we care too much what others say/critique our work. I mean, so what if my film gets rejected from one festival so far, 0/1. But it does kill your psyche a little bit since I'm thinking "I spent like $500 entering all these film festivals", what happens if all of them rejects me? am i done for? I feel like I expected to get the acclaim I think I deserve and not getting it makes me feel extremely insecure because I thought it was something "good" and I thought people agreed with me on that. shrug, and i guess the email killed me even more: " This year's number of entries far surpassed our projected estimate and the quality of work was above our expectations, making competition very tough.  Although we increased our short film programs this year, we still could not fit your entry, 600, into one of our short film programs." makes it sound like there's a few hundred films better than mine in there. hahaha. and then you ask yourself "maybe i'm in the wrong business"... but like I said, tomorrow morning I'll be all good. But let me soak this one in a little longer to feel the paws of humility a little longer and remember all the cats that took 10-20 years to make it and I'm only at 2. This really reminds me of that same feeling from doing door to door sales. I eventually came on top in that "scam" regardless of the shadiness and made the nation's hot list(top 10 salesman in the nation) within that first week of employment and went on to be on it again the next week =P. I quit after 1 month b/c I found how it was a scam on the internet. But I'll never forget the first 2 days of that first week at work and the feeling of inadequacy and thinking "you think your good at sales? you are WHACKED at sales" for those first few days. Eventually things rolled my way when I just said "your already here, don't quit, persevere and just do it(and i wasn't thinking nike), make the best out of every situation". I kept telling myself that and it made me stick with that job and i went on to earn a lot of commission for the month i worked there. And I'm hoping those roots planted there will take its effects here as I keep striving to be a somebody in this business. Maybe it won't end up well, but i'll never know until I give it a shot and stick with it. Make the best out of every situation, that's all I can do right now... One love.