FROM THE EDITOR
Exactly two years ago this month I was offered a job I never thought would come my way. It was on a magazine that, throughout my career, I had been rejected from, time and time again. Ever since I was a 23-year-old rookie writer, it was the only magazine I had ever wanted to work on. I had so many ideas about what I would do and what I would write once I got there… but sadly, it was not to be. After the final rejection, I remember my mother telling me to move on. It was the wrong time, wrong place… the usual redundant platitudes well-meaning mothers give you when you feel like the biggest opportunity of your life has passed you by. So that’s exactly what I did. For regular readers of this magazine, you’ll know that the job I was offered was on Cosmopolitan. Except this time the job was not that of writer (the first job I applied for), or even section editor. It was to edit the magazine. Editor’s jobs are funny old things – you don’t write, you don’t interview and you very rarely, in fact ever, leave the office. And yet you are the first person people come to with complaints. You must stand up for everyone and everything that goes into the pages of your magazine. You must bring new ideas every single day and make sure those ideas do not stay simply as thoughts on pieces of paper, but that they take flight and land in people’s lives. It is not always, as many believe, a glamorous job (if you ever catch the 9.37pm from King’s Cross to Ashford International, I’m the one reading magazine proofs over an M&S salad), and it is rarely easy. So I often ask myself whether I could have done this job had I not been rejected from Cosmopolitan so early on in my career. And the answer is… probably not. Because failure, more than success, is what helps us progress. Success, particularly early on in life, can keep us stagnant. But failure? It’s a priceless opportunity to learn. So if you’re out there, slogging away at something that just won’t stick, don’t worry. Just know that it’s part of the essential process. Because when you finally get to the place you’ve always dreamed of, it’s the nos and the slammed doors along the way that will help you the most.
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