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Yesterday was a big day for us...a request casting for Chloe by Nordstrom's.
As her mom, I was especially hopeful because Nordstrom was my first big client and throughout my modeling days I was often booked for their catalogs and store posters.
At the casting, Chloe did everything right. She was excited and radiated confidence. The art director had her try an outfit on to do a few shots of her in and the clothes fit perfectly! She popped off about 5 beautiful frames with variations in expression and poses. I was very proud!
At this point, you are all probably wondering, "did she get the booking?...just tell us!" So, I'm getting to that. This morning while Chloe was at school, the agency let me know that she did not get the booking. I was not looking forward to telling Chloe the news even though I was confident she would take it well. Still, rejection is rejection and none of us enjoy enduring that feeling.
I remembered when I started modeling it took me a couple of tough years to get my career off the ground. In Los Angeles and NYC I must have gone on hundreds of castings that mostly resulted in rejection. I remembered suddenly that how I broke through the ceiling was really the cliche that opportunity happens when hard work meets a stroke of luck, or something like that anyway. This is the case with most things in life worth having but in the modeling industry this is the norm.
In modeling rejection is simply par for the course. It takes a LOT of confidence to be a model and what better way to build confidence than to have it tested and still remain intact and whole. Despite some opinion, modeling is not always the cake life and getting "discovered" really only happens in movies or fairy tales. In actuality, most models endure years of rejection before finally getting that one booking that triggers a snow ball affect and you begin working steadily. This was how it happened for me and I know many other models who experienced it exactly the same way. Supermodel Cindy Crawford for example was told by many photographers, clients and agents that she would never have a successful career unless she had her trademark mole surgically removed! She stuck to her guns by not succombing to that wrongful advice and a supermodel career was launched!
Modeling requires patience, confidence, desire and thick skin. Since Chloe has all that so I began to feel better about delivering the unfortunate news that she didn't get the Nordstroms booking....this time. There would be others! As long as she wants to do this, I will not question whether all the rejection will be damaging to her young self esteem. I will just make make sure she knows she should never take any casting rejection personally and why she should never doubt herself.
