Allie Morgan – Writer & Cancer Survivor

My theme for November (chosen by you lovely lot) is something that holds a lot of us back – the fear of failure.

The fear of failure tends to creep up when you’ve just about built up the courage to do something you’ve always wanted to do, and that inner voice you carry around with you starts reeling off the ‘What if’s?’ and the judgements we anticipate from other people.

But is the fear of failure a good thing?

Look at it this way: it’s just a thing.

That fear that stops you from starting that new business or going for that job or asking that person out on a date? It can be good because it can motivate you to go for what you want. Or it can be bad because it can just stop you in your tracks. But mainly, just think of it as a thing.

Why?

Well, at the heart of it, all this fear stems from is your lovely brain trying to do its job and protect you. That’s it.

For instance, let’s imagine you asked someone out once and it didn’t go well. You got rejected and you felt shit about yourself for weeks or months afterwards. Every time you thought about them, you’d still get that sick feeling in your stomach and your palms would start sweating. Your brain knows that that’s no good for you. So it does its job and tries to protect you by reminding you of that pain (thanks brain!) when you go for it again.

It’s only a bad thing, if you let it be a bad thing.

Look, we’re all human. We all know how it feels to put ourselves out there and feel the pain of rejection, criticism or other people’s opinions. But the people who get what they want in life push through it all and don’t let the fear of failure hold them back.

Instead, they realise that those nerves are just their brain’s way of trying to say: ‘Babe, we’ve been here before and it wasn’t good.’ And they make their desire to go for their dreams bigger than that fear.

You stop fearing failure when you act.

You have it within you to push past the fear of failure. But you must act. You must take the first step to realise that whatever happens, you’re going to be okay.

Getting into a growth mindset is so important here. Without a growth mindset, we let ourselves be beaten down by the things that didn’t turn out as we planned and the opinions of others. We end up believing that we just don’t have it – that thing that all the other successful people do.

Truth is, we all have it inside us. That spark, that drive, those dreams we carry around with us. You still have it in you to get where you want to be and be who you want to be.

Allie x