Rejection stings. If you’re on the job hunt right now, it’s likely something you’ve grown accustomed to, if not entirely numb to.
Considering more than one in four workers without jobs has been unemployed for at least half a year, chances are that comes with a tidal wave of rejection emails. The entry-level job market is also the toughest it’s been in years, with only 30% of 2025 graduates finding jobs in their fields.
One TikTok creator, however, has made it her personal mission to collect rejections like gold stars, documenting her challenge to receive 1,000 instances of being told “no” in one year. Just 71 “nos” into her journey, she’s already seen how embracing rejection has opened doors to a whole host of unexpected opportunities.
For Gabriella Carr, among the rejections were some unexpected yeses. She tried to be rejected for a national pageant title, “but they accepted me. So now I’m a national pageant title holder.” She auditioned for a play, thinking she would be rejected, but instead landed the part. “I actually went and performed in 11 shows,” she says.
“Let this be your sign,” she concluded. “Chase rejection.”
Her original video introducing the challenge has already reached hundreds of thousands of views, encouraging others to, if not chase their dreams, at least put themselves out there and see what happens.
“Because of your video, I was able to get my own apartment for the first time, got a federal job, applied to volunteer for a hospice home and learned chess,” one user commented.
“Because of your idea…I launched a business, applied for a scholarship abroad and decided to try remote work,” another wrote.
One simply put: “I’m clearly not using my free will to its fullest potential.”
Carr’s format is simple and highly replicable. Pick a number of “nos” to chase this year. (If you’re sensitive, no need to start with 1,000. Why not aim for 10?) “Or maybe you want to make your goals more effort based and say, ‘Okay, I’m going to try 100 times’,” she also suggests.
From there, she encourages actively seeking opportunities where rejection is a possibility. Track those outcomes in a journal or spreadsheet, logging both nos and yeses. If you’re feeling brave, share your progress publicly or with a friend to hold yourself accountable and help normalize rejection as simply part of the process.
The challenge is most effective when the rejections are in service of a bigger goal, whether that’s finding a romantic partner or applying for grants, colleges, or a dream job. The math is simple: every no gets you one step closer to a yes.
While the scale of Carr’s personal challenge might be petrifying to some, the core principles are nothing new. Exposure therapy is a commonly used technique in cognitive behavioral therapy, developed to help people confront their fears head-on. Meanwhile, entrepreneur Jia Jiang’s 2015 TED Talk about his “100 days of rejection,” has been viewed more than 11 million times.
Rejection is also nothing new to a generation once described as the most rejected in history by Business Insider. When it comes to Gen Z’s experience with rejection, the article’s author, Delia Cai, points to the fact that applications to the country’s 67 most selective colleges have tripled in the past two decades, to nearly 2 million a year. The current job market isn’t much gentler.
In early 2025, the average knowledge worker job opening received 244 applications, up from 93 in February 2019, according to data cited in the article. Reddit and TikTok are also full of stories of those who have applied to thousands of jobs and been rejected by all of them.
Of course, all this rejection is sure to have an impact on anyone’s psyche, if not their ego. But with Carr’s challenge, the logic goes, aiming for 1,000 nos, a far more attainable goal than 1000 yeses, should take some of the pain out of the process.
And remember, as entrepreneur Chris Dixon once said: “If you aren’t getting rejected on a daily basis, your goals aren’t ambitious enough.”