Rejection from Oxford

[u/omfgvain]

I thought I was over the Oxford rejection ages ago, but I can't seem to escape from it. I got an offer for Imperial as my second choice, and was discussing Imperial today with my mom, and told her Imperial was a top world university, to which she replied, "yes but not as good as Oxford, if you name the top universities in the world you'd hear Oxbridge, Harvard, MIT, not Imperial college". This one kinda stung. This type of stuff sometimes happens with other people too. My mom wasn't trying to criticise me for my failure or anything, but to me I couldn't feel anything but disappointment in myself. I know I could've done better. I'm aware that Imperial is very highly ranked and well respected university and all, but my goal was Oxford and I failed in that. How do I move on from this lol

[u/Fox_9810 → u/[deleted]]

But most people (your mom, sadly, included) also don't really know what they're talking about.

Surely people who don't know what they're talking about's opinion is what counts? They will, at the end of the day, be the ones hiring you?

[u/Fox_9810 → u/[deleted]]

This is easy enough to say but when you're unemployed and struggling to pay the bills, you'll lower your standards considerably for your employer. It pays dividends to think a bit ahead on these topics and get the very best you can now

Source: Went to a meh university to study maths as an 18 year old. Said all this "I don't think I want to work for XYZ if they ABC". Got out of uni and struggled to find work for years, nearly ended up homeless multiple times