Fear of failure is one of the biggest and scariest things you have to overcome if you want to be successful.
Sometimes you just hesitate a little and use an inspiring quote about overcoming fear to make it through the lull.
Other times you need to really decide whether or not the potential of failing is really worth the risk.
I’d argue that the worst case scenario of most situations isn’t as bad as you think it is. Like Joel says, “If you’re scared to death, you’re doing it right.”
Failure is Necessary
Tim Hartford, author of Adapt: Why Success Always Starts With Failure, was interviewed on the 99 percent about the four big lessons you need to learn about why failure leads to more success.
I really recommend that you take the five minutes and read through the whole post, but here’s a quick summary.
- There is a wrong way to react to failure. Accept it and move on.
- There is a recipe for successful adaption. Experiment and try new things.
- Know how to recognize failure. Disconnect yourself from your plan and gather feedback.
- Create save places to fail. Treat life like a “college experience”.
Why Does Failure Scare You?
I get emails from readers every week telling me they are afraid of something and most of the time it is the fear of failure.
In the comments of this post I’d love to hear from you about:
- What part of failure scares you most?
- Do you believe that success always starts with failure?
Don’t be afraid to take risks. Determine the potential outcomes and give things a try. You might surprise yourself.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Caleb,
You nailed it with this post. I am an elite marathoner and write on this subject quite a bit, really enjoyed what you had to write.
Thanks for taking the time to comment Nate. I’m glad you enjoyed the post.
This is so true! Once you discover that you can learn from your failures, failing becomes a lot less scary.
Great Post!
-Chris
Thanks Chris. Failure isn’t usually as bad as people think it is going to be.
Very interesting article, Thank you for that
Caleb,
You really hit the nail on the head so to speak. I hear it said so often that we learn very little from our successes, but so much from failures; such as what was over-looked, I’ll-considered, over-done and so on. Without these defining experiences, success is hollow.
Great post.
I’ve found that PRE-failure is almost always worse than POST-failure. Before I launched my first product, I fretted a lot about “what if all the hours I’ve spent on this turn out not to pay off?”
The product did flop. I was disappointed, but actually not as much as I’d thought I’d be. More importantly, I didn’t stop. I took the failed product, reformulated it and improved it, and the new version has had some modest success!