It's so hard, isn't it?
Years ago, I applied for a non-credited writing program. It was rather expensive but I thought it might be a good alternative to getting an MFA in creative nonfiction. I was still living in Nigeria, and they wanted a hardcopy submission, so I had a friend bring my application in, along with a writing sample. It was a scene, set in Lagos, in which I had been evicted in the middle of the night. I thought the scene worked pretty well. I was rejected almost immediately with a note that said I should, "become more familiar with the genre" before continuing to write.
I was crushed. I was so bad I didn't even know the genre well enough to know why I was bad!
It was not until many months later and several offers from fully-funded MFA programs that the penny finally dropped. They didn't believe I was actually living in Nigeria, being evicted by armed security guards. They thought the whole thing was some fantasy I had concocted and, of course they didn't want me to be a part of their little creative nonfiction program!
The book went on to sell and I've had many compliments on that particular scene. So now, when I get a critique that is just off-the-wall negative, I try to remember that, in many cases, it really is not me. It's some internal bias of the reader that I don't know and have zero control over. And, yeah. Now I think it's kind of funny.