Way back when I was 22 and about to graduate from college, I wanted to be the valedictorian of my class. I was already getting pretty darn interested in speaking at that point, and I thought doing this would be a big deal.
I practiced my speech a ton, gave the audition my all, and didn't get picked.
In fact, none of the people who auditioned for the role got it. The judges just picked someone who didn't even try out.
Being a young lad, I was devastated. But, my very good coach, Pratt Bennet (who you know from the free courses you get from being on this newsletter), gave me this perfect little nugget of wisdom:
"There will be more, and there will be better."
And 4 years later, I gave 2 TEDx talks and have gone on to do over 100 talks worldwide both in and out of the game industry. He was right.
Again, in 2013, I lost out on what was, at the time, a really big sound design gig for me (it would have been my first game on Steam).
The client said they wanted me to work on it, invited me to their office to play it, then just before I got to work, they ghosted me.
Then, I remembered Pratt's wise words. "There will be more, and there will be better."
3 months later, I got hired to work on Hyper Light Drifter.
So if you just lost out on a gig, or feel like nothing is working out...
There will be more, and there will be better.