How to Overcome Your Fear of Failure and Achieve Your Goals

I’ve been pondering loads about failure these days. It sounds odd and maybe unconventional to strategy this rose-colored glasses start-of-the-year with such an outlook. However it isn’t pessimism, neither is my intent to drown myself in others’ shortcomings. As an alternative, alongside this journey to overcoming my concern of failure, I’ve realized that the adage holds true. Each failure is a chance to study, change, and develop.

This philosophy on failure proves it all of the extra: our missteps and defeats aren’t the top of our story. They mark a degree on our roadmap towards success. And in fact, after we take a look at failures with out criticism and as a substitute analyze the knowledge they’re providing, we’re capable of transfer ahead with extra knowledge and energy.

Featured picture of Simone Boyce by Michelle Nash.

woman smiling reading at desk fear of failure — *Image by Michelle Nash*

Overcome Your Worry of Failure and Obtain Your Targets

Culturally, we’ve posited failure because the worst doable expertise. We’re meant to really feel disgrace when a enterprise fails, a relationship fails, or perhaps a exercise plan fails. However is there a technique to redefine failure—to launch our concern of failure—in order that we are able to freely discover the alternatives round us? Maintain studying for my tried-and-true ideas for embracing failure, honoring your efforts, and taking over new challenges with grace.

Our missteps and defeats aren’t the top of our story.

Nothing in Life is a Zero-Sum Recreation

I picked up this lovely perception from Holly Whitaker’s restoration memoir/social critique, Give up Like a Lady. In a piece on “Relapse Failure,” she walks us by way of the various truths about failure that we regularly overlook. Particularly, that failure by no means sends us again to the beginning line. You’ve in all probability heard that progress (or therapeutic, success, insert no matter you’d like right here) isn’t linear, and that’s precisely the case. Alongside our journey, we come into contact with challenges that ship us in new instructions, epiphanies that pace up our progress, and setbacks which will sluggish our progress. However we’re nonetheless on the trail and nonetheless pushed by hope. And now, armed with our failures, we’ve a better understanding of how we are able to attain the success we’re after.

Whitaker writes: “[…] I failed a number of instances. These failures weren’t some setback; they had been rungs on a ladder—valuable, painful, and defeating experiences I needed to endure as a way to study the issues I wanted as a way to succeed.” Failure is data and an exquisite, inextricable a part of your story.

woman creating vision board fear of failure — *Image by Michelle Nash*

Practice Failing

In many ways, failing says you aren’t scared because you’ve been brave enough to innovate, pursue passions, and grow in ways those who have never acted on their fear of failure can’t ever know. As a woman in her late 20s, when I think back on my journey so far, I can see with such clarity the many ways I’ve failed over the years—and the many ways those failures have rewarded me in the long run.

I didn’t get into my dream university. But you know what? I wouldn’t change my college experience for the world. I didn’t get any of the 68 jobs I wrote individual cover letters for my senior year (yes, really). But going through rejection after rejection helped me get intentional about the professional path I wanted to pursue. And when I didn’t get into graduate school to become a therapist, I knew: being a writer was the dream I wanted, and have always wanted, all along.

Everyone fails, and the more we embrace its inevitability—and push forward without fear—the more deeply we can connect with an honest and passion-driven life.

shanika hillocks — *Image by Michelle Nash*

You Have to Honor Your Growth Before Anyone Else

While failures are a built-in part of the process of growth, others often won’t see it this way. Here’s the hard truth: until you achieve visible success, you won’t receive external validation of your efforts. The only way to combat that? Stop seeking it. I’ll say it again: you have to honor your growth before anyone else does. In Atomic Habits, James Clear is quick to emphasize this reality, contextualizing it through our habits and what he calls the “valley of disappointment.” He writes:

“[…] people feel discouraged after putting in weeks or months of hard work without experiencing any results. However, this work was not wasted. It was simply being stored. It is not until much later that the full value of previous efforts is revealed.”

Like Whitaker’s belief that failure teaches us what we need to succeed, those moments that go without praise or acknowledgment from others still remain significant parts of our journey. And perhaps even more than those moments of reward, they teach us what we’re working for—and why we really want it.

Keep in mind: Failure Is At all times Value It

From this second onward, everytime you fail (since you will fail), do not forget that no matter we pursue, no matter we strive or try, is each a follow and an endeavor. And it’s one which’s price pursuing simply as a lot the purpose itself.

For instance this, I’ll share what’s maybe my favourite line from Give up Like a Lady. Reflecting on the expertise of quitting, Whitaker writes, “It’s onerous, and never in the best way that it’s unimaginable, however in the best way that makes it price doing.” Once we strive, fail, and maybe ultimately succeed, we show our resilience to ourselves. Over and over, we remind ourselves that we are able to overcome the obstacles we encounter and navigate the roadblocks alongside the best way.

In releasing my very own concern of failure, I’ve discovered that reflecting on the expertise of failure—what it appears like and the feelings that come up together with it—have been a few of my best lecturers alongside the best way. So if you fall in need of the mark, miss that chance, or expertise a perceived setback, ask your self the next:

What is that this expertise telling me?

What’s the subsequent step I can take that acknowledges the place I’m coming from and units me within the path I need to be headed?

A Last Observe on Failure

For those who’re in a spot the place you’re feeling paralyzed or unable to maneuver ahead due to your concern of failure, you’re not alone. Society, social media, and the world round us make us assume that we’ve to be excellent earlier than we are able to pursue any purpose. However you’ve gotten my permission to be your messy, superbly imperfect self as you navigate the ups and downs of your journey. Keep in mind: It gained’t seem like anybody else’s, and in fact, that’s precisely the purpose.

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