Fear of Failure: When Anticipating Defeat Immobilizes Us

Imagining possible future failures sometimes makes us fall into a limiting mental trap.

No one doubts that life is full of setbacks and moments of discomfort or pain, but it is also true that a large part of our ills are manufactured by our own imagination. The fear of failure is a perfect example of this..

Although we tend to believe that we are fundamentally rational beings and that we act according to logic when we make transcendental decisions that will affect us greatly, the truth is that this is not the case; the simple fact of thinking too much about failure can act as a trap that limits our freedom. limits our freedom.

Fear of failure as a mental trap

Much of what we do stems from the fear of failure. Acting in a certain way and performing actions in a certain way is not the same as maintaining a proactive attitude; although it may sound strange, there are things we do precisely because they allow us to remain in a passive state, that is, within our comfort zone.

Thus, we will be able to draw up very complicated plans and go to great lengths simply to create a convincing excuse (in the eyes of others) that will allow us not to start that project we are excited about. that we are excited about.

The fear of failure is something that paralyzes us but, at the same time, makes us willing to spend time and effort not to leave our comfort zone and not have to face the risk of failure.

Analysis paralysis

The curious thing about the fear of failure is that it can be camouflaged in many different ways. For example, it can sometimes take the form of analysis paralysis. This is a concept used to refer to moments when having one or more decisions causes us to run out of choices with none of the options available.

Analysis paralysis can be understood as a failure to make decisions rationally when none of the options is good enough, but it can also be fear of failure disguised as rationality. Those moments of loop thinking where decisions are made sparingly and when they are made they disappear to bring us back to square one is one of the most frustrating experiences there is, but they also have another negative consequence: they keep us in place without being able to move, with all the consequences that entails.

Fighting the fear of failure

Theoretically, fear of failure is not bad in itself, because it is simply an unpleasant feeling based on rational ideas: what it would mean to fail in our objectives cannot be as positive as what it would mean to succeed, and if this were the case it would mean that the project or decision means little to us.

However, in practice, when we stop to think about the fear of failure it is usually because it has become a problem, an obstacle.

¿Y How can we prevent the fear of failure from harming us? To do so, you can follow these guidelines.

1. Write down a decision tree

Write down on a piece of paper the possibilities that lie before you, with their different ramifications in which the possible consequences of each one of them are represented. Next to each of the options, write down the probability that you think they are likely to occur assuming that you have made all previous decisions leading up to that point. To make this estimate as reasonable as possible, you can ask for a second opinion.

Then, next to each possible scenario, note the degree to which you would like or dislike that option. Combining these two types of information for each of the options, you can make another "decision tree" in which the branches are arranged in order of importance. in which the branches are ordered from left to right according to the likelihood of their occurrenceand you can color each one with a palette of colors ranging from red to green that express the degree to which you would like each thing to happen.

This colored decision tree can help you a lot in making rational decision making override the fear of failure.

2. Set short-term goals

Once you are clear about which option is rationally right for you and that anything that deviates you from it is simply fear of failure, setting short-term goals is the ideal way to commit to that decision. In addition, this will make it more difficult to fall into the "I'll do it tomorrow," which can be a form of fear of failure. a disguised form of fear of failure..

3. Commit to doing it in front of others

Another way to stop the fear of failure from paralyzing you is to commit to doing what you are afraid of in front of others. In this way, you can use the logic of fear of failure against yourself, as you begin to fear the possibility of not keeping your word.

Somehow, in order to combat this state of psychological paralysis it is good to find ways of self-compelling yourself to do the right thingand this option is effective (except in the case of pathological addictions, in which case it is essential to see a specialist).