How to Overcome Your Fear of Failure

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Categories: self improvement

A fear of failure is one of the most common fears. It can be so scary that some people decide not to try at all in order to avoid failure altogether. In the end this just ends up being another kind of failure because you’ll never reach your full potential if you don’t even try.

Accepting Yourself

An important first step to overcoming fear of failure is accepting yourself. Once you accept yourself, you need to take it one step further and believe in yourself. This will come naturally to some, and some people will find that they need more work.

Think about specific situations in your life that you approached with confidence. That extra belief in yourself was likely the deciding factor between success and failure. You need to use that strong belief in yourself to combat fear.

Keep reminding yourself that success starts in your own mind. You need to have the right attitude because as soon as you don’t believe in yourself then failure is sure to follow. You might start to make excuses for yourself and you may even start blaming others or external sources. The way to get over the fear of failure is to stop making these excuses and take responsibility for your success.

Being Positive

Everyone has a bad day from time to time. That’s unavoidable. However, you do have the choice to think positively. You can turn a negative situation into a positive one with the right mindset.

You can stare failure in the face and combat fear with your outlook alone. Think about what the worst case scenario would be if you did in fact fail. Would it be the end of the world? What would be your game plan to pick yourself back up? Chances are that part of your fear of failure is a fear of the unknown. Once you think it through it may not seem quite as bad.

Ways to Combat Fear

You can work towards overcoming fear of failure in a number of ways. For starters, you can look at the situation as a chance to learn something. Always be on the lookout for the silver lining. If you do come face to face with failure, have the courage to pick yourself up and spend a good amount of time going over why you failed in that circumstance. That particular failure may have been required in your life in order for you to be lead to the path to success. If you allow the fear of failure to get the best of you, you wouldn’t have found the courage to even proceed.

Taking action is also a way to combat fear. If you have the right attitude, and plan for success, you just need to push yourself to go for it. Don’t overanalyze or think too much, just take some small actions.

When you’re in a particularly tough spot, you can always look for help from affirmations. These are short positive statements that are in the present tense. Tell yourself that fear is not getting the best of you. Tell yourself that you’re in the process of achieving great success. It may help you to relax and get out of the fear of failure mindset.

No One Is Perfect

When all is said and done, you should realize that no one is perfect. Of course you already know this, but many times that doesn’t stop people from being too hard on themselves. A fear of failure is also a fear of making a mistake. You can’t lead your life with a fear of making a mistake, because you’re bound to make them throughout your life. Just keep working on your attitude and your reactions and you’ll soon find success.

Author’s Bio:

Ever wondered how great successful people achieved great success? You can find the answer in The 77 Traits of Highly Successful People. Mark Foo has brought together 48 personal development bloggers and writers to co-author the success eBook that spells out all of the success secrets of the very successful people. This eBook is available to you FREE and you can grab your free copy now at http://www.77SuccessTraits.com.

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  • http://qupfromtheashes.blogspot.com/ Quinn

    Good article. I think it is important to remember that failure is also a teacher, by knowing what does not work we can change our methods to find a way to accomplish the task at hand. In the end as long as you continue to work towards a goal you have not failed. It is only when the opportunity or the will to put effort into a project is taken from us that we are defeated. Failure is not defeat it is just an opportunity to learn.

  • http://www.motivatedsista.com Prosechild

    One thing that helps me get over the fear of failure is analyzing the times that I HAVE failed. First I’ll recognize that I haven’t failed at that many things I’ve tried to do. Then I analyze those situations and try to understand why I’ve failed. When I see that failure was my fault because I didn’t give something my all, it really helps me to move past the fear that I’ll mess up and give the best effort that I can.

  • Sam

    A fear of failure is different than a fear of failing. To me, “fear of failure” means the fear of BEING a failure — of discovering that you’re not as grand or capable as your boastful but untested self-image.

    Facing up to yourself and your limits can be fearsome, indeed. Challenging your self-image is the hardest thing ever, but working on and eventually achieving a self-image resonant with who you really are is worth every hardship along the way!

  • http://www.mysticworship.com Ramesh Raghuvanshi

    Those who did not experienced failure in life they did not learn anything in life.Only failure teach us how to get success in life.Success always make man arrogent and from success man donotlearn any thing.Accept the failure as part of live.Always take risk. Be remember which did not kill me make me stronger.

  • Pingback: Don’t Let Fear Stop You | Things Are Good

  • http://www.77successtraits.com Mark Foo | 77SuccessTraits.com

    @Quinn: Absolutely. I agree with you. Failure is just feedback telling us what we are not doing right. If we can utilize the feedback to our advantage, we can succeed.

    @Prosechild: Kudos to you for being able to face your ‘failures’ bravely. I can tell that you’re taking personal responsibility for your results and that you’re taking actions to move toward your goals. That is the kind of attitude that will bring you to success. Keep rocking!

    @Sam: “Achieving a self-image resonant with who you really are is worth every hardship along the way!” True. Too many people aspire to become somebody they’re not so that they can be well-liked and accepted, which eventually will lead to them feeling even more disconnected with themselves. To be courageous, one needs to accept who they really are and be who they really are deep within their heart.

    @Ramesh: I’d have to say success can be a good teacher, too, although failure is almost always a better teacher. Failure not only teaches us the right strategies required to succeed, it also teaches us to be a more humble person.

    Thanks so much for your comments guys! I really appreciate your participation.

    Cheers~

    Mark

  • http://www.projectjunto.com Cory Alfers I ProjectJunto.com

    Fear is often a product of catastrophic thinking. We become scared of doing things because our thoughts have already created the worst case scenario and we believe it will be the result. To achieve greatness in our lives we must allow the posibility of positive outcomes!

    Thanks!

  • http://www.gainselfconfidence.org/sub Get An IRON-SOLID Self-Confidence in 21 Days

    The best way to kill your fear of failure is to fail, and realize that it is not the worst thing that can happen. This way you take the force out of this scenario and reduce the pain of failing.

  • Andrew

    There is an 0ld says goes in china that failure is the mother of success, if you want to be successfull,failure is indispensable.By the way,i appreciate this sentense, The way to get over the fear of failure is to stop making these excuses and take responsibility for your success.keep on going.

  • Medhanie Kiflom

    the best one,!   go out and make an intelligent mistake. there is nothing more motivational than begin to face your fear. in a level of thought or action every human face fear . coward person make a choice to be  a victim of his own imagination .courageous person make a serious decision.