Some time ago, I helped Marcel during a live session on Instagram. He was suffering from fear of failure on a daily basis. He was comfortable in his comfort zone, had thoughts that there is more to get out of life, but taking that step was not going to happen.
He also suffered from fear of failure when working out. He had been doing crossfit for eight years and then doing that extra rep was still very scary, because he had a fear of injury.
So both in work-related matters and in sports, fear of failure was in it.
Fear of failure and comparing yourself
Coincidentally, I also do crossfit and there I heard the following about aging and crossfit. Because at some point age does start to count. He was dissatisfied with his progress with crossfit, but then again, he was 43 years old.
When I asked him how he was doing compared to eight years ago, he indicated that he was still fit, but he didn't think he had progressed enough.
About this, I gave him the following suggestion:
"I once heard from someone, coincidentally in the CrossFit Box, who said to me, "Ed, for example, if you lifted 100 pounds on the deadlift when you started, and now you lift 105 pounds, that's a serious weight, not everyone can lift that." But you're 43 and can still lift 150 pounds, and when you're 44, you can still lift 150 pounds. Have you progressed? Imagine if you can hold this weight for another 40 years, then at your age you will be one of the strongest 80-year-olds in the world, actually. That's a good mindset for our age, don't you think? See, that's just an example. If you keep going and don't give up, it seems like there are no limits. You keep growing and comparing yourself to other 43-year-olds."
After this, it was also revealed that Marcel has children in elementary school and if you wait in the schoolyard and look around, you will see what the average person looks like.
It is also often a question of who you compare yourself to. This could be what you look like, or what's inside you. What you say to yourself.
Still, the question is often: What do you want?
In work, he also wanted more success, but not necessarily with his job, but he wanted to invest in real estate. He currently works for himself as an asbestos surveyor. He inventories sites where something needs to be done about asbestos.
Improve Seriousness
Investing in real estate seemed fun and a safe investment to him. He was already into it, but not seriously. And you see this more with people with fear of failure. No real start is made yet, because the fear of not succeeding nips motivation in the bud(1).
This is then often mostly a matter of getting serious about it anyway. So I gave him the suggestion.
"Yes, you seriously need to do that. Because now you're in that place anyway, that's always the first step, and you want this badly. Okay, then you just have to do it. And do doesn't mean buy a property right away, no, just take a good look first, right? Because that's always funny, it's like when you decide you want a blue car and you suddenly see blue cars everywhere. It's really amazing how our attention focuses on what we care about.
Anyway, so you're considering investing in real estate, and that sounds like an interesting opportunity. Maybe you could fix up some houses and put them back on the market for a better price. And you know people in the construction industry who can help you with the foundation and other jobs, which is handy! And on top of that, your current job also allows you to scout for properties while working.
You have a good place to start, especially with homes that have some issues, because they can't be sold without those issues being resolved. So that presents opportunities for investment."
Going for it despite fear of failure
All in all, this still wasn't really enough to get over the fear of failure. And overcoming fear of failure is often also a matter of confronting the fear of failure. So doing something despite having fear of failure.
"Look, of course we can all say, "Yeah, but I have a problem and that's why I'm not succeeding." But we can also think, "Okay, even though I have fear of failure, I'm going to buy those five properties." No way, no, not with five properties, but if I have five properties and I generate 6,000 euros a month net, then I'll be okay. Yes, I still suffer from fear of failure, but I feel good actually like this. Get it? So it is possible. Of course you can solve practical problems spiritually, but it can also just be practical."
What do you do after you achieve your goal
Another problem with fear of failure can be that you don't actually know what you are going to do when you have achieved your goal. You're not really afraid of the success or that you won't make it, but more of what comes next. Because that's the great unknown.
So I asked Marcel what he would do when his goal was achieved. He actually hadn't thought about that very much.
So I gave him a suggestion of what to do after success:
"I know a lot of people who get a huge amount of money in an account, for example, because they sold a business. Wow, you know? They've been building and investing and now they have pocket money for life. The worst part is not being able to share it with anyone, because when you say, "I have 500 million now," almost no one says, "Oh, how bad. ' It's because they were just thinking about achieving that goal and then they thought I'll see it from there. But that's pretty tricky.
I see the same thing with soccer players quitting. Zlatan, for example, continued until he was 41, even though he was completely kicked out. But he tries to keep going anyway, because what else is he supposed to do for the rest of his life? If you quit at 41, you might still have 40 years to go, and he never thought about anything else, because this is what he did everything for. So it's helpful to think, "Okay, then what might I want?" after achieving that big goal.
As long as you have a direction, it doesn't have to be very exact. As long as you have an idea. For example, I could crossfit every day to make myself better and better. Oh, I have another hobby, then it's actually kind of already filled in. I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to do with work; it could just be writing, or putting together outfits, or making music. As long as you have an idea, something you take pleasure in."
The cause of fear of failure
Again, this didn't really help eliminate the fear of failure. So then it was time to go to the cause of the fear of failure. He had first suffered from this feeling when he had to get his driver's license, which had taken him five times, but he had succeeded. This did give a good entry point to make fun of the fear of failure a bit, because if you can laugh at the problem, it is no longer a problem. Here I also kept in mind that many people with fear of failure often get it because of how parents and possible teachers react to failure. That they then get a slap on the wrist, for example (2).
I said the following about that.
"A friend of mine took up to eight times to get his driver's license and he was a bad driver after that, but he is now a cab driver in Amsterdam and can drive like the best. You wouldn't say now that it took him 8 times. My colleague used to say "no one sees how long you worked on something, but they see how beautiful it is. The pace doesn't matter if you make mistakes, as long as it looks handsome afterwards."
No one will think "Oh he took five times, but that feeling may still be there with you. Now imagine having to do something five times before it succeeds, is that terrible?"
Marcel: "Yeah, I wouldn't do that again."
Edwin: "And how did the crossfit go?"
Marcel: "Yes that did take a while. More than five times, too."
Edwin: "So then you do it, so there you have no fear of failure. You do it for eight years now, it's not like after five times you couldn't do an exercise that you had to leave. With the driver's license, it's different. There's a lot more in return if you don't succeed. That's the difference. So it's not about trying, it's about the reckoning by someone else. Like the CBR, or a test at school on the exam. But in the cross-fit box, you don't suffer from this at all."
Recognizing that feeling, he also mentioned that he also really enjoys cross-fit. Pretty fascinating, that despite not succeeding, he still enjoys doing it. If you start thinking, how many times in the last eight years have you failed in that box? I fail in that box every time, too. But then my life is not in ruins, then I don't have to cry out to my wife.
Research also shows that fear of failure can be overcome by recognizing what it is like to fail and by looking at goals differently(3).
So the fear of failure is also context-dependent.
And there is also no one sitting next to you saying "Yeah, those five pledges, if you don't make it, there will be a penalty." Really no one else will say anything about it. Nobody, nobody, nobody. Maybe in you. But you can think of your real estate project as the crossfit box.
Visualize taking the plunge
Sometimes the project is also quite large in your mind, and then it can be helpful to go through the steps of the project about which there is fear of failure
"You already start with a head start because you start in construction and see things that other people don't see. So just like the crossfit box. You already know some of it but not all of it yet. So you start learning that you start reading a book, you go to a real estate event, then you talk to somebody, then you get recognition. I started that way, who knows, maybe it's something for you, then you talk to five people. Then there's 1 person you then think, "Gee, not thought about it at all," that's why you go there because you don't know everything. If you're working on it every day for a few years, then you're really very good at it. Better than many other Dutch people who are less involved in it."
Making the steps smaller
I asked him how it felt now when he thought about it that way. For him, it was liberating, but impeding thoughts also came to mind, such as that making a mistake in crossfit is not so bad, but in real estate it can cost you quite a bit of money.
Only, a mistake in crossfit can also get you a double hernia. So I had the following suggestion about this:
"Yes, you're going to make mistakes. And that might cost you money, too. Things can happen, you don't know how life is going to go. That's why it's helpful not to start deadlifting cold 150 pounds right away. Then you can end up in the hospital. You don't want to know what accidents can happen. But you start light. You're not going to immediately buy 10 properties and put all your money into them. That's not smart. You can get lucky, but it's better to look at what you have now and see if you can invest in another real estate project so you're already doing something. Then you get used to the whole idea of investing with money. That suppose you lose that money, that's annoying, but not life-threatening. So starting small is a solution."
This helped a lot in removing impeding thoughts. Making the steps to take smaller helped a lot.
"You know, maybe you should consider starting to discuss garage boxes. You might think, 'Oh, I can buy that,' and if it goes all wrong, yeah, well, too bad, you know? Just mentioning. There are garage boxes, and that might be something for you. But then you've started, then you're in that game. That's what it's about, that's what it's about how you get into the game with as little risk as possible. And when you're all the way in the game, when you're on that board and you're playing the game, yeah, it gets easier. You have to walk into that box, the crossfit, you have to go to the gym. That's the all the hardest part. But once you get there, you easily walk up to a piece of equipment to do what you need to do. What is the smallest ticket, risk or investment you can take to get into the game? Even if it's just going to such an event."
"If you get into the game at 43 already, well, no idea, I don't know what's in front of it, no idea. But imagine in 10 years you have 10 properties. That's fine, right? Are you 53, I'm just mentioning, right. And maybe it takes a lot longer for you, I don't know at all, but with me so, nail it and then you think, "Yeah, 53, 10 properties, then you can stop working." For example, you know? I know not even a very bad prospect, although it seems like a long time, but fine. And maybe it's faster, and maybe you have 20 properties by then. Or maybe you figured out along the way, "Yeah, stupid, nothing for me." Could also be, you don't know it all, but yes, you have to start anyway."
Moving through the tension
When I asked him afterwards how he was feeling he indicated that he would at least look into going to one of those real estate events anyway, but even that felt a bit exciting.
To this, I gave the following suggestion.
"Look, that tension is a little look of: Okay, are you going to go through or not, despite that tension? And are you going for your life anyway, despite that resistance. So then you go ahead anyway. Or let you say of: "Hey, let me have that resistance, that wind, from me." And it's all fine too. I just keep sitting on the couch, I just keep doing what I'm doing now, and um yeah, dream that I have, well, never mind, because I don't feel like fighting that resistance. Or I just go that resistance, I, I do it. I go there, I walk into that tent, I think, "Jesus, all these people, better than me, so they're much more knowledgeable." Then you talk to somebody and suddenly you think, "Oh, that's a nice person after all." These are also just normal people, because everyone is just basically the same. Only some possess different skills, but that's it. Human beings themselves are the same."
"But I just think it's going to be fine, because you're already in that little not world too so I don't think that's very difficult"
I asked him what happened after hearing this from me. He felt a lot positive and felt like he could grow. Thinking about the fear of failure, he indicated that those impeding thoughts go away when you make the steps smaller, so you can step over them more easily.
Finally, I always check if the feeling he had at the beginning of the session about fear of failure was still recallable. But you'll see, the harder you try at the end to feel it, the more it fails.
He also had this experience and liked the feeling.
Treating fear of failure with hypnosis
As you can see, a session can be quite long and does not always require regression. Giving insights, imagining how something might go and making problems or steps smaller can also do a lot to overcome fear of failure.
Watch the entire session here:
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