How To Overcome The Fear Of Failure

Fear in psychology is a basic emotion of human beings. It is a mechanism whose function is adaptation to the environment and its dangers, with the aim of promoting the preservation and conservation of the species. However, fear can cease to be adaptive and become dysfunctional, being an obstacle and limiting our normal functioning. Within the different maladaptive fears we find the fear to fail. This fear of failing is a irrational fear that appears when we have to face new challenges and decisions in life, but we are distressed by the possibility of obtaining negative consequences or that our performance is not as correct as we wish.

Causes of fear of failure

Why am I afraid of failing? Fear of failure can be caused by:

• Interpretation that is realized from the situation, so it is valued in an exaggerated and unrealistic way. This inadequacy in reading the situation can lead to avoidance of it, because it is considered to be a risky situation and we lack the capabilities to confront it.
• The anticipation of consequences, consists of an anticipation of results from a negative and catastrophic point of view. This negative anticipation limits and slows down the ability to act.
• Self-assessment derived from results, so self-esteem depends on whether success or failure is achieved. You can avoid a situation as a way of protecting your own self-esteem if you believe that you are going to make mistakes.
• The concept of failure the subjective conceptualization of failure is erroneous and exaggerated, so the slightest error can be valued as failure by a person.
• Exaggerated expectations are unrealizable goals and objectives that cause anxiety in the person due to the fear of not being able to achieve them.
• Assessment of the whole and not of the parts, the performance and the process are not valued in parts or in a segmented way, but only the final result. Complete and exclusive focus on the result.
• Dichotomous thinking refers to thinking in black or white terms, so the person’s performance is only labeled as success or failure in absolute terms, there is no room for errors or partial successes.

Types of fear of failure

The fear of failure can be found in different areas of life. Among the most common fears of failure we find the following:

• Fear of success: It refers to the fear that a person experiences when faced with the possibility of achieving success in a certain area of ​​their life. Faced with this fear, self-sabotage arises, through which consciously or unconsciously efforts are made to hinder this possibility of achieving the goal. This fear of success is related to low self-esteem and appreciation of the lack of one’s own abilities, the fear of not being able to maintain the situation of success, the fear of suffering rejection from other people and considering that success is not deserved. due to feelings of inferiority.
• Fear of job failure: It consists of the fear of not obtaining the expected performance in the professional and work environment. It is usually caused by an environment and culture of pressure and demand at work, through which fear of making wrong decisions and receiving reproaches from responsible people at work develops.
• Fear of love failure: fear that romantic and sexual relationships will be disappointing or that the person themselves will not be up to the task. The most frequent causes are previous and repeated negative experiences within the couple, as well as low self-esteem due to which fear of rejection develops.
• Fear of school failure: fear that takes place in childhood and refers to the fear of performance in the academic field and studies. It arises in environments of excessive pressure for academic results; this pressure can be cultural, family and/or school. As a consequence, people may not develop their full potential and lose motivation to study, leading to dropping out of school.

The fear of failure can appear at different times in our lives and in a moderate way it can help us put more attention and effort into the tasks we perform. However, when this fear becomes irrational and appears recurrently, persistently and too intensely, it is considered phobia of failure or atychiphobia.

Atychyphobia

This fear of failure It is paralyzing for the person who suffers from it, so you avoid doing the activities you fear. In this phobia, in addition to avoidant behaviors, unconscious self-sabotaging behaviors are quite common.

Symptoms of atychiphobia

The symptoms that atychiphobia includes when performing a new task in which there is the possibility of failing are:

• The physical symptoms which include muscle tension, palpitations, tachycardia, stomach pains and headaches, nausea, temporary memory loss and panic attacks.
• Between the psychological symptoms There is a high level of self-demand and rigidity, excessive perfectionism, self-esteem problems, as well as anxiety and negative anticipatory thoughts.

Causes of atychiphobia

But why am I afraid of failing? Regarding the causes of atychiphobia, they are identified high levels of demand since childhood, having previously experienced a failure for which one felt shame or suffered humiliation, developing trauma conditioning, personality characteristics such as perfectionism and low self-esteem, as well as pressure from the prevailing culture to achieve. perfection and success in the different areas of our lives.

Below we list a series of keys that you can use to not be afraid of failure:

1. Realistically assess the risks: To more objectively evaluate the risks and avoid falling into catastrophic thinking, analyze the risk based on the probability of its occurrence (high, medium or low) and the severity of the consequences (little harmful, harmful or very harmful). The questions “what would be the worst that could happen” can help you. and “what is the probability of this happening?” In this way, a more rational analysis of the consequences is achieved and not based on the emotion of fear.
2. Set realistic goals: It refers to the setting of achievable objectives based on the availability of our own resources. In this way, we will begin to see positive results soon and confidence in our own abilities will increase. To make this task easier, it can be helpful to set a timeline and simplify the goal by determining general and specific objectives.
3. Recognize the emotion of fear: The recognition and acceptance of this emotion as normal and typical of people is the first step to start working on it. For there to be a change, we first have to accept the situation from which we started.
4. Identify the focus of your fear: Knowing exactly what specific part of the process is causing us fear can help improve our coping with the situation. It is necessary to carry out an exercise of introspection and explore our own fears.
5. Plan and anticipate situations: This contributes to reducing the levels of uncertainty that we have to face and generates fear in us. It is useful to know and analyze the situation beforehand and if you need to, you can practice the skill that you are afraid of not knowing how to perform to obtain greater security and confidence.
6. Use errors as a source of learning: Try to change your conception of failure and start considering that a mistake is not a failure. Mistakes are made daily by all people, the important thing is the ability to extract learning from them and be able to evolve and improve in the process. Reflect on what you have or could have learned from the mistakes you have made throughout your life, instead of considering them a failure.
7. Dare to fail: One of the most effective ways to lose fear is to expose yourself to what you fear, to make mistakes. Do not avoid making mistakes, look for small mistakes to verify that the catastrophic consequences that you expect to occur do not happen.
8. Lower your demands: Don’t demand a perfect result from yourself and pay more attention to the different parts of the process and less to the final result. Divide the task or process to be carried out into portions and evaluate each of these parts separately to obtain a partial and not global analysis.
9. Make a plan B: Creating an alternative plan in case things don’t go the way we want or imagine can help reduce our discomfort and insecurity about the possibility of making a mistake. It also increases the chances that we will face the feared situation.
10. Do visualization exercises: To achieve a goal, it is very helpful to apply the visualization technique, that is, visualizing the entire process and the steps that are necessary to achieve it, including the obstacles that may arise along the way and how you overcome them. Breathing and relaxation exercises can be done to improve the result of the exercise while you do it.

This article is merely informative, at PsychologyFor we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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