Heart-Centered Guidance | Community Engagement | Newsletterish

The Surprising Ways Fear of Failure Can Manifest

And how you can stop it from trashing your life

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”— Thomas Edison

Throughout my life, both personally and professionally I’ve met countless people who have a fear of failure. Many of them had never even considered the roots of certain thoughts and behaviours until the subject came up. And there it was, smacking them in the face.

I’m not talking about that little bit of “wanting to do well” or “not wanting to fail an exam.” I’m talking about a fear of failure that creates problems, destroys happiness, and trashes well-being. The kind that drives people to work far too hard and too much. The kind that stresses students to the point of adversely affecting them, pressuring them about grades or trying not to make mistakes.

It’s the kind that compels people to be perfectionists, which doesn’t have to show up in every area of their lives either, but it will be there somewhere. Perhaps only in schoolwork or career. Perhaps only in the way they keep their homes, their rooms, their drawers and cupboards, their collections of CDs, their rows of shoes.

For these people, making a mistake is almost a fate worse than death. They feel deeply ashamed and stupid. They can’t stand to disappoint anyone by producing a less-than-perfect result in anything they do.

It’s the kind of fear that makes people be competitive and drives them to be the best, to beat “the other guy” at everything they attempt to do. Terribly demanding of themselves, they expect to get the best marks in the class, the best job performance evaluation, the best praise from parents, partners, friends, volunteer organisations — they need to be “the best”, the winners, the ones who accomplished the most. To be less than the best is unacceptable; the pressure must be unbearable after a while.

It’s the kind that makes people fear failure to such an extent that they dare not even attempt to succeed. They feel as though there is no way that they could cope with getting it wrong, not reaching the goal, not being successful — whatever that means specifically. Afraid they’ll make a mistake or they won’t be the best or get it 100% right, they don’t even bother to try. If they aren’t absolutely certain that they can do it exactly right and be perfect, they won’t do it at all.

And so, we end up with wasted brilliance, wasted lives, wasted opportunities, wasted creativity. There might have been miracles in the making. But we will never know.

What is it that could make people feel this way? What could possibly be behind such a debilitating fear?

It is another fear, an even bigger one. It is the fear of not being loved, or the fear of being rejected, being abandoned — all of which are tied up in one another. Somewhere deep inside, there will be an issue like this, a deeply-rooted fear which then leads to the fear of failure and its resultant behaviours.

“If I could just be perfect, or be the best, then I would be good enough — then I would be loved and I would not be rejected or abandoned.” These are the secret thoughts that torment the perfectionist.

The problem is, you can never be perfect. It does not exist; it is an unattainable goal so as soon as you aim for it, you’ve shot yourself in the foot.

And although you may be the best at some things sometimes, you will never be the best at everything all the time. And therefore, this expectation sets you set up for failure, too.

So what can you do about this?

Examine why you feel that fear of failure. What is it that needs healing? Are there rejection and abandonment issues that you can identify? They don’t have to be physical abandonment issues either. For example, it may have been that a parent was emotionally unavailable to you, even if you were in the same house.

There could be a million reasons for it so I cannot speculate about all of them here. The point is to look at the fear of failure. Dig deep and see where it begins. Then find ways to heal the wounds that are causing it, through affirmations, self- help books, surrounding yourself with loving people, through journal-writing, spiritual guidance, meditation or any other way that will help you.

You can give up the fight to be perfect or to be the best. You can turf your fear of failure because you’re already just as good, just as perfect as everyone else on the planet. On a human level, all of us mess up, all of us make mistakes.

Granted, some of us make a lot more than others, but so what? As I’ve said on numerous occasions before this one, behind human behaviour, its foibles and flaws, there is always a perfect spirit. It resides within us and it guides and directs us — when we let it.

When we get caught up in human foolishness like greed, jealousy, envy, dishonesty, or something really silly like believing we’re undeserving of love, that’s when we run into trouble. We must remember that we will always have all the love we could ever want, as long as we accept ourselves and love ourselves first.

If you don’t think you’re lovable, you will never feel the love that is given to you.

You will reject is because if you think you are not lovable, you would not believe that anyone really loves you; therefore you will not feel it, no matter how many times someone says “I love you” and no matter how much love you are shown. You will be like a bottomless pit of need and emptiness, aching for someone to fix it, for someone to love you. But even when they do, you don’t believe you deserve it…and so you don’t feel it…I’m sure you can see the chicken-and-egg problem with this.

We are all deserving of love. We are always loved by someone, and usually by many “someones.” Depending on your spiritual beliefs, there is Universal love from a Divine Source available to all of us, flowing through us and around us all the time. We can choose to feel that love, which is pure and unconditional, and let it heal those human wounds of rejection, abandonment and unworthiness. We can let it heal that human need to be perfect, to be the best, and accept ourselves as being perfectly imperfect, as humans should be.

When you can reach that point, you can love yourself unconditionally, which will allow you to move forward in your life, taking risks, trying and failing, trying and succeeding. A whole new world will open up to you once you understand that you are still lovable and still as perfect as a human can be, remembering that mistakes are inevitable. There is no shame in making them. And besides, they are better seen as opportunities to learn and should be welcomed.

I am reminded of the bridge in “Broken,” a song I co-wrote and recorded with Dave Moffatt. The lyrics started coming to me while I was out driving one day. It’s a conversation with God/Source/the Universe (pick your word). I couldn’t get home fast enough to write them down.

Then in my darkest hour, there came a whisper clear, Have faith and know that I love you, know that I’m always here, In every way, you’re perfect exactly as you are, Divinely flawed and flawless, a brilliant, shining star.

If you won’t risk failing, then you don’t try at all. That’s called “giving up” — and isn’t that the true definition of failing? If you don’t even allow yourself the opportunity to try, you show no belief in yourself. And it makes it harder for anyone else to believe in you.

You’ve basically abandoned yourself in the worst way.

I prefer to think of the “tried and it didn’t work” situations as not having got the outcome I expected or hoped for, rather than as “failure.”

However you look at it and whatever you choose to call it, risking failure is the only way you will ever find success.

The invitation today is to write about your thoughts and experiences with this topic. I know it can stir some deep feelings but that’s the best way to uncover those sticking points and become a little (or a lot) more self-aware.

I would love to see your submissions on this sensitive topic and hear how it might have impacted your life, or the life of someone you know.

Celebrate our growth with me!

Hope, Healing and Humour — 132 followers

Shorties But Goodies! — 211

And Witchy has gained another handful! She’s up to 53 and is so excited, she’s now twirling through my cotta — oof! She just spun herself into a wall. I can see little birds twittering in a circle over her head.

Hang on…I’d better make sure she’s all right…

…yup. She’s fine.

Speaking of Witchy…today is the day she promised to reveal the lucky (?!) winners of her (highly questionable) Tarot reading contest. There were supposed to be ten but she changed her mind. She wanted to pick 11.

“I’ve been paying attention to what you taught me about numerology,” she said. “I like 11.”

Well, she’s got me there. It’s a great number, and when it shows up as your Life Path / Destiny, you are meant to be a Master Illuminator. Your purpose is to bring enlightenment and “show people the way.”

Witchy liked the sound of this but she doesn’t have a birthday. Well, technically she has one, but when she made her transformation from a magical blue tree to a witch several centuries ago, no one in the Transylvania Forest was looking at a calendar.

Therefore, I can’t do a numerology report for her. So she has adopted the number 11 as a concept that she would like to bring into her life wherever possible.

And the Winners Are…

Witchy and I are both deeply grateful to those of you who submitted entries to her contest. She was amazed that so many people wanted her readings! Thank you so much for your participation!

I’ve left the decision-making entirely up to Witchy and have no idea what her process was. She did say it was “terribly difficult” to choose; she received a lot of wonderfully creative reasons as to why people thought they should have a reading.

“Difficult” is an understatement. I don’t know how many times she said, “Oh, goodie! I’ve figured it out!” And moments later, “Oh, wait!”

And the lucky winners are:

Sally Prag, Mary V, Hollie Petit, Ph.D., Krystal Mossbarger, Sara Burdick, Jimmy Misner Jr., Leonora Watkins, Rebecca Romanelli, Carrie Kolar, Raine Lore, and Trista Signe Ainsworth.

Congratulations (I think! Heaven only knows what sort of reading you will get…)! Witchy will get to work on these and each of you will be notified when your reading is complete.

Annnnd…don’t forget to check out the, um, “drawing of a story from her life” (she gets mad at me when I call them “jokes”). 👇 It’s after all the splendiferous articles below. 👇

And on the subject of Witchy contributions, did you see her interview of our lovely Sally Prag? (It’s in the links below) Sally is an absolutely fascinating woman! She shared some super interesting tidbits that I’m sure you’ll enjoy — like how she built her own yurt from scratch?!? — like, taking-branches-off-trees kind of of scratch??

And she shared a link to her own splendiferous line of T-shirts!!

👉 Next Sunday, Witchy will share her interview of our beautiful Hollie Petit, Ph.D. Can’t wait!!

Woohoo! Terrific Stories!

As always, we had some truly inspiring and thought-provoking submissions this week! I am so blessed to have such beautiful souls contributing to my pubs and in our Pub Family.

Take a look at these treasures from the past week:

Trista Signe Ainsworth has a beautiful story of another way to appreciate the littler things in life:

BichoDoMato offers up a rather unusual story! I’m sure at least some of us will relate to this particular kind of writer-angst!

Carmellita asks questions about social media…I don’t know about you but it’s something that does my head in on a regular basis. Check out her short piece and see what you think!

Sahil Patel offers a brilliant poem about authenticity:

Margarita Sayed shares another stunning painting with a simple but meaningful story. Such a beautiful message…

Neha Sonney, Author has written an incredibly creative poem in response to How To Stop Being a Victim:

Christina Sponias offers a simple solution to communication conflict…if only more people would do this, life would be much simpler!

Mary V is restless!! Change is a-comin’! Read about the beautiful confirmation she received!

Annnnd…Mary wants us to eat cake! — with the loveliest of messages!

Yay, Mary! Yay, cake!

Christina has a deeply meaningful, heartfelt story to share:

…and an incredibly inspiring story that really lit me up!! She lives such an interesting life!

Asim Nori has some profound insights to share on a concept that can dramatically improve your quality of life — first in this short piece:

…and then in this slightly longer one with an unusual view and thought-provoking explanation (which I found to be fascinating!):

Robin Oakman offers some interesting insights about being an introvert:

Witchy’s first interview seemed to go over well! And Sally Prag was an absolutely stellar interviewee! Wow, she is fascinating! Did you know she built her own yurt?? Including stripping the bark off the branches for its frame? Check out her amazing story here:

And there was this super short piece on how to follow the path of your heart, contributed by yours truly…

My heartfelt gratitude to all of you for your beautiful contributions to Shorties But Goodies! and Hope, Healing and Humour this week. Thank you for your ongoing support!

And now, for Witchy’s story contribution for this week…

I hope you have a beautiful week filled with everything you wish for yourselves! 💜

Sharing our current list of Pub Family members:

Dr Andrea Polzer Kris Bedenian Rodney Brazier Patti Murray Voncannon Carrie Kolar Croix Sather Deb Fiore Dina Alexander DL Nemeril Donnette Anglin, Loren Lieberthal Jimmy Misner Jr. Judy Millar Julie Gaeta Pene Hodge Karen Schwartz James Knight Laura Izquierdo Dr. Preeti Singh Radhika Iyer Sam Branstner Sharon Sayler, Author Umme Salma Susie Kearley Tamil T Mann Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles Lion~ Wendy S. Bradfield Yana Bostongirl Jo An Fox-Wright Maddox Suma Narayan Penny Walsh Shameem Anwar Irene Fassler Sandy Peckinpah Trista Signe Ainsworth Slow train A.H. Mehr Alex Frederickson Ashley Nicole B.R. Shenoy Carolyn Hastings Christina Christine Vann, MSc. Ellie Jacobson ✍🏻 The Soulful Scribbler Isabel Young Kaz Rochford Nia Simone McLeod Nicole Hilbig Patricia Wright Pam Winter Rachella Angel Page Jodian Marie Thomas, MS, Bsc, Asc L Burton Muhammad Abdullah Kate Aries Danielle Hestand Sahil Patel Jessica Rabel Sharing Words Malky McEwan Belinda Castle Barbara Cook Tyra Jaide Megan Llorente Eko BP Drashti Shroff Evergreen Eden Bernie Pullen Hamsalekha Rhea Anglesey CARMEN F MICSA Robin Oakman Mary Vraa Libby Shively McAvoy Kristina God Niall Leah Debbra Lupien, Voice of the Akashic Records Toya Qualls-Barnette June Kirri Vashni Stories Dawn :) Divya Goswami BichoDoMato Evon Carole Olsen Cosmin Firta Jennifer Dunne Kylie van Gelder Neha Sonney, Author Christina Sponias Ian Hanson Ira Robinson JF Danskin Patrick OConnell Mary V Elvie Lins❤️ Carmellita Roopleen Esther Friolo- Guirao Gauri Sirur Kristie Leong M.D. IJaveria Ansari Asim Nori