Many people have had that dreaded feeling. That feeling of FAILURE. The feeling of not being good enough or not being able to deal with the outcomes of not being able to achieve or do something. Sometimes this fear can even be immobilizing and cause us to do nothing and prevents us from moving forward. But when you become stagnant, you miss the ability to seize opportunities that lay in front of you.

 

what is failure?

 

Failure is defined by different people in different ways due to the fact we all have different values, beliefs and benchmarks. This means that failure to one person can be another’s learning experience. However, Atychiphobia (more commonly known as the fear of failure) is when we allow fear to stop us doing the things that can move us forward and closer to achieving our goals.

Fear of failure is more common than you may think and often it can be linked to previous experiences such as childhood events, traumatic events where you may have performed poorly at some stage or instances where you have felt humiliated, undermined. These feelings will often continue to arise for years and can be triggered when you are put in similar situations.

It is almost impossible to go through life without experiencing failure of some sort so when you are having those feelings of doubt, remember you are not alone!

 

Fear of Failure Symptoms

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If you have a fear of failure, there are a number of different symptoms you may experience:

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1. Perfectionism – You will only try things when you know that you will finish perfectly and successfully or you won’t stop attempting something until you achieve this. Essentially, you will feel like a failure unless you have performed “perfectly”.

2. Self-sabotage – You will often use procrastination techniques, allow yourself to get excessively anxious or continually fail to follow through on your action plans for goals.

3. Low self esteem or self-confidence – You will commonly use negative statements such as “I’ll never be good enough to complete this workout” or “I will never be able to lift that much weight”.

4. A reluctance – You will be reluctant to try new things or get involved with new people.

 

So, how do you look at failure?

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You have two options. When you fail you can see it as “this is the end of the world!” and proof of just how inadequate you are. Or, you can look at it as the learning experience it often is! These lessons are important as they are how you grow and learn how not to make the same mistakes again. Basically, failure only stops you moving forward if you let it.

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Think of the opportunities you will miss if you let failure stop you.

 

How to invite failure into your life

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The first step to accepting failure into your life is to realise that in everything we do, there is the chance for failure. The bigger the chance of failure, the bigger the chance for learning.

Often people fear failure as it offers the unknown. You can remove that fear by analysing all the potential outcomes and learning to accept the possibilities before they have happened.

This step leads onto the next one of learning how to think positively. You have probably heard all of the modern day hype about how good positive thinking is! It is an incredible tool that can help to build self-esteem, self-confidence and avoid self-sabotage.

You can also look at the worst case scenario. This may sound off but by recognising what the worst situation could be, you may realise that it isn’t actually as bad as it seems.

Most important, have a contingency plan. By having a Pan B ready to go, you can jump back on the horse straight away as opposed to pondering what your next step will be.

 

Where do you start?

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Often when you are faced with potential failure, you can feel overwhelmed and have no idea what the first step is. It may help to remember that right here is a good place to start. Taking small steps consistently will eventually yield to big results and to someone who has a fear of failure, lots of small steps seems much more doable than giant leaps. What comes back to us is determined by the thoughts and intentions you put out there. Essentially, if you only think negative thoughts about the workout you are about to do, you are more likely to perform poorly!

 

Don’t compare yourself to others

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In situations where you are surrounded by others (both in person and through means of social media), it can be easy to fall into the trap of comparing yourself and your performances to those of others. For example, in a group fitness class scenario, you may catch yourself comparing your weight or how fast you are performing the workout to that of the person next to you. These thoughts can then lead to more negative thinking based on the fact someone may be “beating” you or you feel that others may be judging how “well” you are doing. This can be detrimental to both your mental and physical performance. Although it can be hard, you need to focus on beating yourself, not others. Just because you may have taken longer than others, does not mean you failed. It simply means you completed your goal in your own allotted time.
 

Learning to live with failure

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As mentioned previously, failures are opportunities and mistakes are a chance to learn and grow. It is these imperfections that make growth possible. Think back to when you first learned how to do something eg. A squat. At first you may have found it hard possibly due to your poor mobility. You may have even fallen over a few times. But you got back up and gave it another go. Just like a baby learning to walk. Eventually you learned from your mistakes (either by intention or subconsciously). Now you may be squatting with some weight or have moved on to more advanced exercises. But if you hadn’t of faced your failure after the first time you fell over, you wouldn’t be where you are now.

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The same principles apply to everything else in life you may fear in all different aspects such as fitness and health, career or even relationships. To achieve success, have a go at following these 5 steps:

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1.      Don’t fear failure

2.      Have a plan

3.      Give it a go

4.      Accept your mistakes and learn by them

5.      Repeat steps 1-4 until you succeed 😉