What to Do if Harvard Is Just Not That Into You

Are you one of the 93% of applicants to Harvard College, or a similarly mind-boggling percentage of would-be Harvard Business School students, who were not accepted at Harvard?

1. It’s your party and you can cry if you want to. I’m warning you, though, that serious scientific research has shown that although tears do contain suicidal hormones that are now no longer in the weeper’s body, even more science has shown that crying just gets you more upset. And about what? Let me ask you: Do you actually know any Harvard alumni? I will say no more. And I would prefer not to hear complaints from the people I do know who are Harvard alumni, because this is not the moment. Thank you.

2. Log on and check out the weather stats for December in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Wait: make that Alston, MA.

3. Give some serious thought to the Harvard Business School’s most famous alumnus. That would be George Dubya Bush.

4. Read What They Teach You at Harvard Business School. It seems that HBS often brings alumni back to campus to talk to current students. These alumni regularly deliver a certain very important message: Get a Life. Now, you could get yourself a life this very minute.

5. Pick another school and go to it. Six months from now, you will be hard pressed to remember the name of a certain large, northeastern university. You will have a life.

There is one thing I would urge you not to do: Do not ask Harvard to reconsider. If they were that into you, they would have called.