Do you struggle with fear of failure?
How changing your perception of failure could be the key to your personal growth
Do you struggle with fear of failure?
For some of us it shows up as procrastination, not taking action, or flat out avoidance.
For others it looks more like overworking, proving ourselves and risking burnout.
So what can we do about it?
Well, I’d like to take this opportunity to challenge your perception of failure.
I’d like you to consider the concept that ‘There’s no failure only feedback’. This presupposition of NLP is one that I repeat often to myself, as well as sharing it with my clients.
We tend to grow up feeling like the aim is to get everything right and consequently many of us struggle with perfectionism. It holds us back, slows us down and causes us to doubt our ideas.
The word failure is loaded for many of us. We take the evidence of something going wrong and use it as evidence that there is something wrong with us. That we are the failure. Not good enough, or worthy enough. We soak it in and start to believe that we are somehow less than others. A disappointment.
But what if there’s no failure. What if everything is an opportunity for further learning - for feedback, to help us grow and shape future ideas. What if we approached this journey of life like a series of experiments, testing things out, trying something different, to see what the result is, without attachment to the outcome.
How might that affect the way we approach dating, or taking a new job? Starting a new hobby or marketing our business?
What risks would we be willing to take if we weren’t attached to the outcome?
Will Smith has a video on the same principle. He says we should fail early, fail forward and fail often - we should actually be seeking failure.
What if ‘failure’ is something we reached towards instead of trying desperately to avoid?
How could embracing the idea that failure is a healthy part of growth and progression, change your approach to life?
What would you do differently?
What would you stop putting off?
I’ve been applying the concept of ‘no failure only feedback’ to my life for the past 4 years, and I can say it has truly made a difference. I still have moments where I find perfectionism creeping in, the desire to get it ‘right’. There are still times where I procrastinate or doubt myself, because let’s be real, I’m human and our brains are designed to keep us safe, which means staying in our comfort zone and avoiding risks. But the difference is how long I stay there for.
Now more often than not I catch myself, remind myself that there’s no failure only feedback and that learning through failure actually helps me to achieve the results I want more quickly, which means I can move forward with less resistance or fear, knowing that whatever the outcome, I’ll be learning and growing rather than staying stuck.
I hope you find an opportunity to embrace failure today!
If you want to watch Will Smith’s video here’s the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBUSsP9rDsw