Rejection: Just one step closer to your bashert!

Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israeli Independence Day, is of special significance and a cause for celebration for Jews around the world. At Yeshiva University, Yom Ha’atzmaut is of great significance and a cause for celebration for an additional reason: It is the only day during the entire year when ALL the Stern girls come up to the boy’s campus! Every meidel, from the Michlala girls to the French girls, the Accounting girls to the Pre-Med girls, and the Long Island girls to the LA girls are in attendance and dance hand in hand in celebration for the Jewish State. Naturally, given this incredibly unique occasion, it is only logical that all the buchrim from the YU community, regardless of religious observance, attend the festivities as well! Whether a buchur is a black hatter or a clubber, a Torah shteiger or a weed smoker, the odds are that at least one meidel at the event will pique his interest! With all the tremendous upside potential that such an affair can have, naturally there are some drawbacks, which I learned later that evening.

After several moving speeches about Israel, the crowd proceeded to go to the Max Stern Athletic Center for some Israeli style dancing. As we made our way to the dancing floor I got a huge waft of Israeli styled BO as the doors were opened. YU really thought of everything to help authenticate the experience! After about 10 minutes in the gym I came out for some fresh air and figured that I’d check out what types of exotic Israeli cuisine was being served. As I walked into the cafeteria, I ran into my good friend, Avrumi, who had a very troubled expression on his face.

Me: Avrumi, come get some falafel balls and shawarma with me! I’m starving!
Avrumi: They don’t have any shawarma and I think I’m going to head back to my apartment! Tonight was pretty intense…
Me: WHAT!?!?! No shawarma! What kind of Israeli celebration is this? I mean they have the BO in the gym to go along with the dancing, which is a nice Israeli touch…and the Hebrew speeches were pretty good… how can they not have any shawarma? That’s a staple of any Israeli celebration!
Avrumi: Forget the food! I have other things on my mind tonight!

(Seeing that I wasn’t going to get to the food anytime soon, I decided to inquire as to what transpired over the evening that was so troublesome to Avrumi.)

Me: Avrumi, what’s wrong?
Avrumi: Well things started off nicely…saw some cuties, got into the dancing!
Me: Cuties are good! I like cuties!
Avrumi: Then I came in to the cafeteria for food and that’s when things went downhill!
Me: Oh no! You lost track of the cuties?
Avrumi: Well, I took a large plate of food then looked for a seat. I only spotted one seat in the entire room, so I went to sit down. As I do so, I see that the seat is next to some girl I asked out and got rejected by.
Me: Ouch! So what did you do?
Avrumi: There was nothing I could do! She already saw me…so I just sat down and pretended that I was happy to see her!
Me: Eh…that stuff happens. What’s the big deal?
Avrumi: I’m just getting started! After 2 minutes of me sitting there stuffing my face and listening to her blab on and on about her new boyfriend, another girl walks over. This girl went on two dates with me then gave me the ax! So she starts talking to the first girl and after a couple minutes of her yapping away, I see a girl walk by that I currently have a thing for. She comes over and starts talking to me.
Me: Wow, that’s a lot of girls! So what happened with you and the girl you currently have a “thing” for!
Avrumi: Oh, she rejected me a few weeks ago! Whatever…so after a few minutes, I finished devouring my food so I wouldn’t have to sit there anymore, and then I start walking to the other side of the room and who do I run into? Another girl I asked out and got rejected by!
Me: You should stop dating Stern girls. That would limit the awkwardness at these events.
Avrumi: 1) This last girl goes to Columbia. 2) I never said things were awkward! They were just not pleasant situations. Things only become awkward when you make them awkward!
Me: Note to self!
Avrumi: Anyway, so as I’m walking away from Ms. Columbia, I walk into some girl I dated and I rejected! I think she still has a “thing” for me, so I tried to be pleasant and friendly. Finally, after another boring/waste of time discussion, I make my way to the exit and as I’m 10 feet from the door I run into another girl who was into me, asked me for my number, and I rejected!
Me: I’m getting confused with all these girls!
Avrumi: That’s fine, she was the last one. I told her I felt like I was going to vomit and she left me alone!
Me: Well, that’s a lot of girls, and a lot of rejections! Over what span of time did you date/get rejected by all these girls? 2 years? 3 years?Avrumi: Hmmm, maybe 8 months.
Me: 8 MONTHS! You dated all these girls in 8 months? You’re a machine!
Avrumi: Are you joking? I’ve dated over 30 girls in the past 8 months. There just happens to be around 1/3 of them in this room right now!
Me: 30!?!?! WOW! You are a god amongst men! Your perseverance amazes me and your smoothness and lack of awkwardness is awe inspiring.
Avrumi: Thanks! Wow, I worked up quite an appetite from sharing all that with you! Let’s go get some food. I think that girl standing by the French fries told me she wouldn’t date me last June because I wear jeans…

It is important that I mention that by no means is Avrumi a neb. He is driven, frum, has his act together, and is a solid looking buchur. He’s even pretty smooth with the meidels! What I’ve learned from my discussion with Avrumi is twofold: 1) Everyone, no matter what you have going for you, will get rejected at some point in life! It’s just the way things work. 2) You must persevere regardless of how many times you’ve been rejected! Even though Avrumi seems to get rejected regularly, he gets right back on the shidduch dating train and asks out another meidel! Vince Lombardi, the famous football coach, once said "It's not whether you get knocked down; it's whether you get back up” Michael Jordan had a similar quote about failure, which was: “I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." Despite how talented, good looking, frum and awesome we might be…we are all bound to fail! It’s not a negative way of viewing life; it is just an accurate observation of the way life works. Although at times it seems like the search for your bashert is an endless barrage of horrible experiences at Starbucks, boring trips to the Marriott, or dinners where you are more interested in your food than the person sitting across from you, the fact of the matter is the odds are in in your favor! My friend and Shidduch Advisor, Usher, summed up this idea beautifully with one of the best pieces of advice on the seemingly endless quest for one’s bashert. He said: “Bro, just keep in mind, you only need ONE of these girls to work out!” Shidduch dating is not baseball, where every swing of your bat can potentially hurt your batting average! The shidduch game is a numbers game, as Avrumi clearly understands! The more people you go out with, the better odds you have at finding that special someone who is in fact your bashert!