Culture

The Upside of Professional Rejection

There’s a better way to approach no’s in your work life.

First published in The Atlantic on January 22, 2026.

by Anna Holmes, The Atlantic

January 29, 2026 | reading time: 6 Min.

My relationship with rejection, professionally speaking, is complicated. I’m a writer, and although I’ve been hearing “thanks, but no thanks” in response to pitches since the ’90s, that hasn’t made the no’s easy; I still smart when I think of story ideas that editors swatted away years ago.