Overcoming Fear of Failure, Part II
How to prepare for, confront, and recover from life's setbacks
This article is the second of two parts. Part I was published on Monday (3/18).
Confronting Fear of Failure
When confronting the fear of failure, a person must accept fear as an emotion and move past it.
The steps to moving forward instead of letting fear stop a person include:
Let the Fear of Failure Run Its Course
Change Goals as the Situation Develops
Build Confidence
Everyone feels fear because fear is a human emotion. Business leaders describe feeling the fear of failure when they started their companies. However, they acknowledged that fear and kept moving forward.
If a person’s goals are powerful enough, they can confront their fear of failure with a strong plan. When the desire for success is greater than the fear of failure, definite goals can help a person overcome the fear.
People are often paralyzed by fear of failure when their plan isn’t working. They may start strong but begin to fear failure during a difficult process. Psychologists suggest changing the goals as the situations change.
Redefining failure by adjusting the goals limits fear. When forces beyond a person’s control block the path to success, a more limited goal can help a person to still achieve some success without fearing a complete failure.
During the process of carrying out a plan, a person also needs to build their confidence. Leaders at the Harvard Business Review suggest focusing on what a person learns along the way to build confidence for the next step in the process.
The fear of failure decreases when a person has confidence in their prior decisions and achievements. By reminding themselves of past victories, a person limits the apprehension that may accompany talking the next step.
Recovering from Failure
Even with the best intentions, any plan can lead to failure. Many successful people, like Richard Branson, Henry Ford, Colonel Harland Sanders, and Milton Hershey, have failed multiple times. When a person does fail, they need to recover positively from the experience.
The steps to recovering from failure include:
Treating Yourself Kindly
Accepting Mistakes
Learning from the Experience
People often berate themselves more harshly for failure than they would another person. Here again, the scientists at the University of California Berkley point out that treating yourself kindly after failure helps stop a person from fearing failure in the future.
If a person makes the repercussions of failure too hard on themselves, they may develop a negative self-image or negative self-talk that causes them to fear the next challenge.
A person also needs to accept their mistakes when they fail. Without admitting responsibility, they will repeat their errors over and over, limiting their success and developing a greater fear of failure each time they face a challenge. Recovering from failure includes preparing for the next challenge by accepting missteps and correcting them.
If a person views failure as a learning experience, there is more to gain from it and less to fear. Educators teach students that failure isn’t the end of learning. Instead, failure is the beginning of success.
Recovering from failure involves learning from the experience, so a person is better prepared to succeed when another challenge presents itself. Fear of failure often masquerades as fear of an unknown outcome. Learning from failure involves picking yourself up, dusting yourself off, and applying what you’ve learned while trying again.
“Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.” — Marie Curie
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