Fear of Failure: The Thinking Trap That Keeps Us From Growing

Let's say you need to meet with a client and offer him your idea. This is exciting, because he can refuse you or express criticism straight to your face. It is much easier to get by with a phone call or even send an e-mail, because this way the risk of getting negative emotions is much less. You understand that it is easier to convince a person in a personal meeting, but you still succumb to the fear of failure.

How does it manifest

This cognitive bias drives risk avoidance. It manifests itself in the form of severe anxiety, negative thoughts, unwillingness to act. Potential failure seems too painful, and you fear it more than you need to.

The fear of failure even affects what goals you set for yourself, what strategies you use to achieve them.

Those who are more susceptible to this cognitive bias are primarily concerned with avoiding losses, not gaining benefits. For example, he stays late at work, just so as not to seem like a hack and not to lose his place. The thought of a possible dismissal is so frightening that a person is ready to stay up late just for appearance. Even when in reality there are no grounds for alarm.

What does it lead to

For fear of failure, you avoid situations in which you will somehow be judged and evaluated. Let's say a meeting with an important customer where you need to sell your product to him.

Sometimes people even deliberately create obstacles in their path, so that later they can blame the failure on them. For example, they call a customer at lunchtime when they are likely to be unavailable. In this case, the failure can be explained by the fact that the person could not be contacted.

In the long term, the fear of failure leads to physical and mental health problems. Those who are highly susceptible to this phenomenon often suffer from emotional exhaustion. They are slower to learn and remember information. They are more dissatisfied with their lives, constantly experiencing anxiety and hopelessness.

What explains this distortion

For most people, success and failure are directly related to self-esteem. “If I do not succeed, then I do not know how, I am worth nothing. I am not smart enough or talented enough to achieve my goal. They will consider me a loser, they will not want to work with me. I'll have to be ashamed of myself."

Such thoughts do not allow you to see anything but fear.

Social psychologists Timothy Wilson and Daniel Gilbert attribute this to focalism - the tendency to overestimate the impact of one possible event on our emotional state. When we think about the consequences of failure, we attach too much importance to the central event (failure). At the same time, we forget about the pleasure of the next project and the simple everyday things that bring us joy. The threat of failure completely absorbs our attention.

In doing so, we forget that we have a psychological immune system. Does it protect against mental health threats? - stress, depression, negative emotions. For fear of failure, we underestimate her and our resilience. We can't imagine rethinking failure and learning a useful lesson from it.

How not to fall into the trap

Consider it when making decisions. Do not rush into reckless adventures, but do not give up opportunities just out of fear.

Find a balance between risk and caution.

To bring it down, start doing what you want. While you are just thinking about it, you have a very active amygdala. This area of the brain is involved in the formation of emotions. But when you get down to business, the prefrontal cortex, the department responsible for decision making and other complex thought processes, is activated. At the same time, the activity of the amygdala decreases and the task no longer seems so daunting.

Develop new skills and learn to feel more confident in your abilities. Seek support and use other people's experiences. And do not forget that usually people do not regret what they started and failed, but what they did not even try to do.