On Receiving Acceptance Letters to School
By Sophia Nguyen, written April 2026
To be honest, I was prepared to strike out and spend a year personal training for a living. To accept the shame of moving back in with my parents and spend all my free time revising and rethinking and doubting and sinking into a cycle of self-immolation and sadness and apathy.
So when I received that first acceptance email, I read it until my vision blurred. Not with tears, my shock didn’t allow for that, but with screen fatigue.
When I was putting together my MFA application, I knew that the quality of my writing was what mattered the most. But I couldn’t help but fixate on my resume, the lack of literary journal publications, writing awards, or anything that would point me out as a writer worth noticing. It didn’t help that I was submitting speculative work, which is historically known to be not received as well as literary fiction by a large majority of the MFA programs in this country. Things are certainly changing, but there was no way for me to know how fast.
In any case I knew I had to give my best work and just hope that no matter the genre, it would be well received by at least one program. I sent in the stories that excited me, that made me love this craft no matter how many times I wanted to throw my laptop at the wall. They were the stories I was the most proud of, the ones closest to my heart. That’s what made the whole process even more nerve wracking. I had heard of the endless cycle of rejections, the years people had spent revising and submitting, over and over again. And I’ve always known that this field was one rooted in subjectivity, that there was no right answer or golden goose story that could get you in anywhere. So I tried to steel myself, to encase my nerves in cement all 19 times I clicked the submit button.
And then came the hardest part: the waiting. I was afraid. I had never received any validation on my writing outside of encouragement from my mentors. But what did that mean against the monolithic face of my future? I wanted to move forward. I wanted more focused time in the classroom, I wanted a community of people that I could understand and be understood by, purely through the sharing of each other’s drafts in workshops and in readings. And most of all, I wanted someone to see value in my work. Because as much as I loved those stories, a parent typically falls in love with their child. I wanted to hear someone else tell me that they wanted me to keep going. I wanted and I wanted until my stomach turned and my skin crawled, and I made myself sick with longing.
I started with the rejection emails. The “we regret to inform you,” the “we receive so many wonderful applications every cycle and we regret that we cannot admit them all.” And I’m ashamed to admit that the first one hit as hard as it did. And the second, and the third. I’d managed to build an emotional dam during the waiting months. It was strong, it seemed to be just what I needed. I was ready. Until I wasn’t, and the cracks formed, and my days began to lose their color as winter swept my college campus, as I trudged through the snow and skirted the ice. I spent hours staring at the ceiling, staring at walls. I’d applied to 19 schools and all of them could reject me. I applied to 19 schools, what if I had to read 19 rejection letters? My shoulders curved into themselves more and more noticeably as the weight of my anxieties grew heavier. It didn’t help that the country was quickly deciding that the humanities were not necessary anymore. What if the programs I coveted admittance to were axed before I could even step foot on campus? And then there was the question of my age, my inexperience. What if people didn’t believe I could contribute to their community, because I had lived so little life? It didn’t matter that most days I had lived a little too much life. The numbers were hard to argue against. I tried to accept my fate, to accept that I might have to wait before I could be a student again. I wondered who I’d be if not a student. I worried that the thought, in itself, was an issue. And I worried that who I was right now, was not enough.
But then, the word “Congratulations” appeared.
Now that the new chapter I desired so much is unfolding in front of me, it’s easier for me to talk about the application process now. But I haven’t forgotten the wintry days I spent hating my work, hating the life I had chosen for myself. I haven’t forgotten the self-doubt. And from what I’ve heard, unfortunately, that doesn’t go away.
I have no doubt I will get even more intimately acquainted with rejection. I think by the end of my life, it will be my most consistent companion. And right now, that fact is easier to bear than it was. I will learn how to better harden myself, and to better protect myself and my work.
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to write this. I was afraid it would come off as arrogant, as if I were bragging about my success. But I wanted the space to reflect, and so selfishly, I am writing this now.
I harbor a lot of guilt for the way I treated myself while I waited. The wounds are still fresh, and I am continually reapplying salves and bandages. I hold even more regret when I remember the cruel ways I thought about my work. Because if I don’t see the value in it, then why do I write in the first place? And if how I see my work is the most important thing, then doesn’t that mean I should take a little more care of my feelings? Doesn’t that mean that I am also worth something, with or without an acceptance letter?
Sophia Nguyen is from Pembroke Pines, Florida, with a BA in English, with a concentration in creative writing, and minors in comparative literature and Japanese from Indiana University, Bloomington. She will be pursuing an MFA in fiction at the University of Kansas in the fall. Sophia primarily writes speculative dystopian fiction but has experience writing literary fiction, poetry, and prose. She has worked as a reader and in editorial and social media marketing roles with academic and literary journals and has both participated in and helped organize writers’ conferences. Sophia is looking forward to continuing her experience of and helping to bolster up the literary community.
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