Stop fear of success with hypnosis
The time of good intentions is upon us again. Everyone starts again with hope, and some people manage to achieve their resolutions. Success, it's something everyone seems to want, but sometimes there's just something inside you that makes you think it would be really scary if success were to happen. Do you often have your resolution within reach, but then do something that causes you to fail. Do you get anxiety the moment you think your resolution will succeed this year? Then you may suffer from fear of success.
In this blog, I address that fear and what you can do about it
What is fear of success?
So when you have a fear of success, you’re afraid of actually achieving your goals. What if you suddenly do get that promotion? What if you suddenly do have your dream body? What if you suddenly do win the lottery? What if there’s nothing left to strive for?
The most famous story of someone who had a fear of success is about Hannibal who invaded the Roman Empire in 218 BC. He had multiple opportunities to conquer even Rome, but never did[1]. Fear of success is something that can happen to the best of us.
So, when you have a fear of success, you become anxious about the consequences that success might bring. Those consequences are something you assess yourself. That’s why this fear depends on your beliefs about the consequences of success. Perhaps you’re afraid that if you earn more money, people will ask you for money, and you don’t really want to give it to them. Instead of being successful and having to say “no,” you’d rather sabotage that promotion so you don’t get it and can keep functioning at the same level.
How does fear of success arise?
Fear of success can come from many factors. For example, your parents have a big influence. The culture you live in and what gender you are then, your age and your beliefs about how the world works.
Fear of success and your parents
Fear of success can arise when you actually have an unhealthy relationship with your parents. As you grow up, you gain more and more independence. At some point, you can tie your own shoelaces, and before your parents know it, you’re earning your own living.
Some parents actually don't like this at all. They worry about their own success and that their child is surpassing this level.
Another reason parents sometimes cause anxiety about success is because they want their child to remain dependent on them so that they will continue to live close by.
In both cases, parents may react in very strange ways when their child achieves a small success, such as landing their first part-time job. This makes you, as it were, “punished” for your success, and because this happens while you’re growing up—during the period when you’re forming your beliefs—it can lead you to associate success with a negative consequence, such as your family no longer loving you.
Fear of success and your age
Research shows that fear of success does not really exist at a younger age, and if it does exist that boys and girls suffer from it equally on average[2]. It is more common to develop fear of success as you get older than to have it at a young age.
Part of the reason for this is the experiences you can have when you achieve success, such as the loss of friends and/or family who do not grant it to you. Another explanation is the culture you live in because it is also important to the beliefs you have about success and what it means to you.
Fear of success and your culture/sex
Women generally suffer more from fear of success than men. This is because in most cultures women are taught to be modest and not to brag about your accomplishments. You have a caring role and being a power bitch (the term alone says it all) is not something that is valued. The fear of success, as being called a bitch, is something that stops women from also achieving success at least on a business level.
This fear is not entirely unfounded, as research shows that women who do not behave according to their gender stereotype are less likely to receive a promotion or even a pay raise, in the process they are also less liked. So the fact that women should behave more like men for more pay does not help at all. In fact, showing and reminding people of their strengths does help for getting that pay raise or promotion.
What you personally consider acceptable behavior for a woman can cause you to develop a fear of success. For example, if you think your husband should earn more than you do. Or if you think it’s wrong to work full-time, even though that’s secretly something you want to do. In the Netherlands, the “schoolyard moms” can make you feel like you’re doing something wrong if, as a mother, you work full-time and therefore don’t have time to volunteer at your child’s elementary school.
Stop fear of success with hypnosis
Now you might be thinking, how can hypnosis help with these problems when they seem so big? Hypnosis is a technique that allows you to influence your subconscious mind. Your subconscious contains all the beliefs that block you from doing the things that lead to success. That’s where the beliefs that cause the fear of success reside. It doesn’t matter whether they originated from your parents, certain life experiences, or the culture in which you live.
Uncovering Unknown Cause
Have no idea why you're actually afraid of being successful? Then a hypnosis expert can help you through regression. With this technique, you go back to the moment when you subconsciously determined that success is something to be afraid of.
These are often moments from childhood, because this is when you form your beliefs about life. As a result, you can have very illogical beliefs. With your adult knowledge, you may view the situation that caused the fear very differently than you did as a child. Because of this, the fear can be overcome by regression alone.
Practice behaviors that make you successful
As mentioned, you don't have to act like a man as a woman, for example, to get success. Still, getting a promotion an sich can be something that makes you anxious when you could well use the extra money. So in that case, you need to remind your boss or manager about the good quality of your work and what you have accomplished. Doing this can be something very scary.
Hypnosis can help you get rid of anxiety by teaching you how to stay calm at such times. This is done with guided visualization.
During such a visualization, you imagine yourself doing what you need to do to achieve success. By imagining this, you are already experiencing anxiety, such as the tension in your body and speeding up your breathing.
As you go through the guided visualization, you’ll practice regaining control of your body and your fear so you can still achieve the success you’re so afraid of. By visualizing, with guidance, how you successfully accomplish something, you’re more likely to actually do it.
Hypnotic suggestions against fear of success
Hypnotic suggestions are also a popular technique for overcoming fears of success. Because beliefs have a lot of influence on this anxiety, hypnotic suggestions are used to dispel those unhealthy beliefs. Especially since you can also repeat or listen to these suggestions at home during self-hypnosis, this can be very effective. The suggestions you receive depend on the beliefs you have about the consequences of success. For example, you may be given the following suggestions:
"Your true friends grant you your success."
"Success says nothing about you as a woman/man."
"Success creates greater security."
"People get inspired by successful people."
These are just suggestions as examples. Depending on your beliefs about success and its consequences, a hypnosis expert may give you other suggestions.
So fear of success can have many causes, but overcoming it can be quite easy with hypnosis. Fears are sometimes overcome even in 1 hypnosis session and sometimes you need a little more. Those sessions include the use of the techniques mentioned above.
Would you like to learn more about how hypnosis can help you overcome fears? Then come to a hypnosis workshop or check out the courses offered by the Hypnosis Institute of the Netherlands.
[1] https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-45162-6_23
[2] https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01884/full