Fear Of Failure – Why And How To Overcome It

My Fear of Failure Story

I have never been good at failing.  At primary school I was devastated when I failed my cycling proficiency test.  I was the only one to do so and was teased as a result, which made it even worse.  This may be where my fear of failure began.  Or perhaps when I failed Grade 1 piano – again, I seemed to be the only one who did!

After that, I didn’t fail that often.  Looking back though, I don’t think I put myself in a position to fail.  I played it safe and stuck to doing what I knew I could do without failing.  Until it came to my driving test.  It turns out four wheels is not better than two in my case, as I managed to fail that too!  And that failure left me inconsolable for days.

So why did I react so badly to failing?  And why do I need to change my reaction to failing?  Read on to find out the answers – and why you can learn a lot about failure from Worcestershire sauce!

Do you have a fear of failure?

Over the years, I have realised I have a real fear of failure and this has held me back.  It’s not always obvious though that what is holding you back is a fear of failure.  Symptoms include a reticence to try something new for fear of being rubbish at it and failing.  You’d much rather play it safe than try something new and set yourself up to fail. Especially if anyone else is watching!  You may lack self-confidence, particularly in new situations. And only start to feel your confidence grow when you become more familiar with the task at hand.

Procrastination is another classic sign.  You keep putting off doing something you are not sure how to do or worried about doing because you might fail.  And when you do pluck up the courage to do something new or different, you fall into the trap of perfectionism. You hover for what feels like hours over the “send” or “post” button.  And if something does happen to go wrong, you immediately jump to the conclusion it must be your fault. I do this a lot at work – I see an unexpected email from a client and straight away assume they have spotted a mistake I’ve made. Very rarely is that the case but my “go-to” thought stubbornly refuses to change.

Where did your fear of failure come from?

It often stems from your childhood experiences. You may not be able to pinpoint to such definite examples as I can with my lack of cycling and piano-playing prowess.  But a lot us had it drummed into us from an early age that it is bad to fail and were praised for getting something right the first time we tried it. 

Why is it good to fail?

You can’t let your failures define you. You have to let your failures teach you.

Barack Obama

All of the above “symptoms” may seem perfectly justifiable to you.  It’s a form of self-preservation.  Why should I risk embarrassing myself? Isn’t the survival of the human race based on relying on fear to avoid dangerous situations?

Whilst having a certain degree of fear around failure is a good thing when it comes to things keeping you alive, it needs to be a healthy level of fear.  Too much fear around failure stifles your creativity, prevents you from growing as a person and limits your experiences.

Failure promotes creativity

Being willing to fail allows you to be more creative.  Without a fear of failing you will let your creative mind flow wherever it wants to and run with it.  Run out of a key ingredient for a recipe? Don’t abandon all hope – try an alternative and it may turn out even better than the original.

Learning through failure

Failing is often the best way to learn.  Next time you try, you will know what not to do and that is one step closer to achieving your goal.  It can teach you about yourself, and others, and will build up your resilience to failure, allowing you to fully become the person you are capable of being.

Losing fear opens up opportunities

Letting go of a fear of failure opens up a world of possibilities and experiences you would have previously been too scared to even think about doing.  So you want to learn how to make Sushi but are too scared to go to a class to learn as you are sure you’ll be awful it.  Lose that fear and go to the class.  Who knows, you may be a natural? But even if you are not and your first attempts look like something your two year old would make, who cares? You’ll have fun trying and the more you practice the more you’ll learn what works and what doesn’t.

But how do I learn to fail without fear?

There are several strategies you can adopt to push past a fear of failure.

1. Recognise that a heightened fear of failure is usually something you have learnt, meaning it can be unlearnt.
2. If you are hesitating to do something, list out all the various outcomes and consider each one.  Are any of them really that bad? If there are any that you really couldn’t cope with, can you modify your actions to ensure those particular outcomes are avoided?  And then, when you have built up your confidence, go back and try it again without those modifications.
3. Take baby steps. If entering the Great British Bake Off is too scary, start with a local baking competition. (Top tip: judges at such events do not consider cooling rack marks to be decorative!)
4. Reframe your view on failure.  As Thomas Edison put it when failing yet another time when attempting to invent the light bulb, he hadn’t failed in his invention, he had discovered another way that won’t work.  You are not failing, you are on a voyage of discovery.
5. Don’t always aim for success – experiment.  Treating your attempts to succeed as experimenting takes the sting out of it when things don’t work out the first (or sixth) time.
6. Ask yourself, if you looked back in ten years’ time would failing the thing you are scared to do really matter?  Chances are it won’t.
7. Think positively.  Don’t always go to the worst-case scenario.
8. Ask yourself, “but what if?”  If you think that trying out that really complicated recipe for your in-laws visit is bound to be a disaster, ask yourself “but what if it turns out great?” Believe in yourself. And if it doesn’t work out as you hoped, see point six above.
9. Don’t think – just do it! I am a big fan of Mel Robbins’ Five Second Rule.  Feel yourself starting to question whether you should do something for fear of failing? Stop thinking, count down 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…. and go for it!

So, what does Worcestershire Sauce have to do with failure?

Cooking is one failure after another, and that’s how you finally learn

Julia Child

Well, apparently two Worcester-based chemists, Mr Lea and Mr Perrins, were visited in 1835 by Lord Sandys, the former Governor of Bengal.  The aristocrat was looking for someone to make up a recipe for a sauce he had brought from India.  The chemists obliged and kept a bottle to themselves but the sauce was not a success – the taste was far too strong for their local customers.  So they put it in their basement and forgot about it.  A year later they found the sauce and discovered what had once been a failure had developed into the flavourful sauce we know and love today.

The moral? Although something may feel like a failure at the time, revisiting it at a later date can bring a different perspective.  For Lea and Perrins, the process of fermentation turned their failure into a success.

And this is the inspiration for my Tomato Tarte Tatin recipe, along with a French favourite that was also born out of failure – the tarte tatin.  Although there are slightly conflicting versions of the origins of tarte tatin, the one I like is that it is a result of an apple pie gone wrong.  Stéphanie Tatin, a French hotel owner in the 1880s, was making an apple pie for her hotel guests in Paris when she forgot about the apples cooking in the butter and sugar.  Alerted by the smell of burning, she quickly put pastry on top of the apples and threw the whole thing in the oven in a bid to rescue it. 

Once turned out, the resulting “tarte tatin”, as it became known, was a big hit with customers.  Had Stéphanie let a fear a failure get the better of her and simply thrown the pan of apples in the bin, the tarte tatin would never have been born.

So please check out my Bloody Mary Tomato Tarte Tatin and, if even if you fear your tart will be a complete failure, just give it a go – what’s the worst that could happen?