In this blog post, I will dive into how I overcome fear of failure, and how I turn it into motivation to keep going and achieve the different goals I’ve set for myself, how scary and uncomfortable they may be.

You’ve probably been in a situation like this before:

You’re about to work on a challenging, but an exciting project that’s a little outside of your comfort zone, but then, all these worst-case scenarios start popping up in your head.

“What if this goes wrong?”

“What if that doesn’t work out?”

“What if I make a total fool of myself?”

“What if I end up losing everything?”

The moment fear of failure kicks in, you find yourself paralyzed and unable to function properly.

Even though you know deep down that these scenarios are so unlikely to happen, the fear you feel can be very real and terrifying.

However, we shouldn’t let this fear prevent us from doing the things that we’re destined to do and miss out on so many amazing experiences and opportunities.

So, it’s important that we learn how to deal with this fear and go outside of our comfort zones anyway.

Related Reads:

• Why Your Childhood Traumas & Limiting Beliefs Are Holding You Back From Success
• How To Stop Self Sabotage For Once And For All
• Tapping Into Your Inner Child As A Solopreneur
• How To Practice More Self Love & Self Compassion As A Solopreneur

1. How I overcome the fear of failure by understanding how fear works

The first step that I took to overcome my fear of failure was understanding how fear “works”. Why do we get frightened and paralyzed only because we are thinking about a worst-case scenario?

What I learned was that your mind is very powerful. It is able to envision a situation in such a vivid and real way, that your body can’t tell the difference between you imagining the situation and actually living it.

So while you’re thinking about a worst-case scenario that could happen, your heart rate will raise, your hand palms will get sweaty, and you will probably get an adrenaline rush.

I realized this was important to me, so I could then calm myself down whenever something like this was happening.

I tell myself that this worst-case scenario that I’m envisioning isn’t real. It’s not actually happening right now. It’s just a thought I’m having. And okay, it might not go perfectly, but that doesn’t mean that the worst-case scenario is going to happen.

2. Know your why

Something else that helped me a lot to deal with this fear of failure, was getting crystal clear about my why.

Why is it that I really want to achieve this goal? In what way would this product I want to share with the world or the way that I want to show up in my business, and really help and impact people on a deep level?

Because if you have a strong reason why you want to achieve this objective, even though it may be really out of your comfort zone, you have a strong reason and motivation to do it anyway, despite the fear.

So, by having a strong why and really focusing on the impact I would make in the world, it made me realize that it’s just so much bigger than myself and some emotions I’m dealing with.

3. How I overcome fear of failure by starting a victory journal

The more self-confidence you have, the less fear of failure you will experience, right?

Because if you truly believe in yourself and your capabilities, then you will have trust that whatever challenging objective you have set for yourself or whatever uncomfortable obstacle you have to overcome, you will nail it anyway.

So, what I decided to try out during the last year or so, is starting a victory journal.

Whenever I feel I accomplished something or I am proud of myself, how big or small the win is, I will grab my victory journal and write about it.

I try to not only include business wins, but also more personal ones, such as having eaten healthy for the last week, not getting affected as much as I used to by a certain situation, or just having talked to a person about something uncomfortable, you name it.

And whenever I feel that this fear of failure and anxiety is coming up, I grab this journal and read through it. And honestly, it’s so powerful, because it genuinely gives you a reminder of how capable you are, how much you’re underestimating yourself, and that you’re so much more than your fears.

4. Fear Setting

When my mind starts to go loco and I’m getting exhausted of all these scary and unhelpful thoughts I’m having, I will do some fear setting as recommended by Tim Ferriss.

With fear setting, the objective is to get hyper-specific and actually write down the possible scenarios that could happen.

And you might think that this is the worst idea ever since you will be even more frightened.

But no, I don’t know what it is, but there is just something super therapeutic about this.

In your head, things always seem so much worse than they actually are… And by getting hyper-specific and writing those scenarios down, you can take back control and anticipate them.

What can you do to avoid this scenario? Is there an action that you can take to nullify this scenario? And what if this scenario actually happens, what are the consequences? And what actions could you take for some damage control?

5. There’s no failure, only feedback

Okay, maybe your product launch won’t go as great as you hoped for. Or maybe you won’t have as much profit as you initially thought you would.

But this doesn’t actually mean that you, as a human being, are a failure, it’s just feedback, right?

You might need to add a bonus or two that makes the offer just irresistible or tweak the messaging so it resonates more with your target audience.

And these are really great insights to improve your sales strategy with the next launch.

Being an entrepreneur means trying things out, seeing how your target audience reacts, and adjusting accordingly.

So change your perspective, and don’t see feedback as failure anymore.

Because we wouldn’t be able to grow without feedback. It’s an absolute necessity to build a successful business.

6. Don’t set your standards too high

Something else I tried to avoid in order to not put even more fuel to the fire, is setting totally unrealistic expectations.

As solopreneurs, we need to come out of our comfort zones and do things we never did before, almost on a daily basis, right?

First time recording a video

First time organizing a live webinar

First time creating a sales funnel

First time being a guest on someone’s podcast

And as these things are so visible to other people, we tend to put our standards extremely high. We expect that our first webinar will go flawless. We expect that our first sales funnel will convert above the benchmark.

And in this way, we give ourselves even more stress and fear of failure.

So, what I tried to do to avoid this from happening, is actually giving myself the permission to make mistakes and like that, being able to learn and grow.

I put my blinds on and solely try looking at my performance, taking into account that it’s the very first time I’m doing this.

Because when you start comparing your performance with someone’s that is doing the same thing every single week for the last 4 years, you will feel that you did a sh*tty job while that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Don’t compare your chapter 1 with somebody’s chapter 54.

Everyone is starting from zero at one point.

So don’t be too harsh on yourself and give yourself the time and space to grow, even though that means making a mistake or two.

Lastly, I just want to tell you that it won’t be always like this. Your comfort zone is like a muscle. The more you train it, the bigger it gets and the more your confidence will grow.

Hope that was helpful!

Related Reads:

• Why Your Childhood Traumas & Limiting Beliefs Are Holding You Back From Success
• How To Stop Self Sabotage For Once And For All
• Tapping Into Your Inner Child As A Solopreneur
• How To Practice More Self Love & Self Compassion As A Solopreneur

Let’s Chat!

Let me know in the comments down below if you’re experiencing and struggling with fear of failure.