I’m part of a Mastermind group that hosts guest speakers. One of the speakers was Steven Bartlett. You probably know him as the host of *The Diary of the CEO*—the second-most-listened-to podcast in the world, with over a billion streams to date.
That’s huge, of course—I’m happy for his success. But what he said really struck a chord with me. And it immediately touched on something I practice myself, but which I often find lacking in the mainstream therapy world: the courage to experiment and the art of failure.
Just imagine: In his massive company with hundreds of employees, Bartlett has appointed someone to a unique position—the Head of Failure.
Let that sink in for a moment. A chapter titled “Failure.”
Watch the video:
That person’s entire job is to ensure that employees fail enough every day. Why? Because to learn to juggle, you first have to learn to throw instead of catch. When you’re learning to throw, you don’t catch. So that ball keeps falling to the ground—until your throw is good enough that you can start catching it. Only then can you really start juggling.
In businesses—like mine or those of many other entrepreneurs— experimenting is really just another word for failure. Most experiments simply don’t work out. But Bartlett shared a formula that immediately got me thinking:
Failure is feedback. Feedback is knowledge. And knowledge is power. So failure is power.
Look at giants like Amazon. They’re constantly experimenting. You never hear about the vast majority of those experiments again because they failed miserably. But one of those experiments was AWS (Amazon Web Services), now the world’s largest cloud service, which is making them a fortune. At the time, it was simply a bold experiment.
The fears that hold you back
The big question, of course, is: Are you doing that enough in your own life? Are you experimenting? Or are you mostly terrified of failing?
Research even shows that if you have a conscientious personality, this makes it easier to learn from failure—just like being an extrovert[1]. Now, I’m assuming that everyone wants to be conscientious about what they want to become good at. So in that case, failure is a great learning experience.
Most people are afraid of failure. They want to stay within the comfortable, safe boundaries at all costs. They no longer stretch their minds, take challenging courses that really push them out of their comfort zone, or try new physical sports.
That immediately reminded me of my own work in therapy. There are certain issues that I secretly really enjoy treating. That might sound a little strange coming from a therapist, but take hypochondria, for example .
If you’re not exactly sure what that is: it’s the extreme fear of getting sick, contracting a serious illness, and dying as a result. Many people suffer from this to a greater or lesser extent. They’d rather not shake your hand and rush to the doctor at the slightest ache or pain. During the COVID-19 pandemic, these people were completely at odds with themselves. They constantly thought it could all be over at any moment.
How do I go about something like that? I experiment with it. And very often, it’s over after just one session. How do I do that? I make it worse during the session.
The Art of Growing (and Laughing About It)
When someone comes in and mentions vague symptoms, I ask for more details. “Gee, what’s bothering you?” “Well, I have a little spot here on my elbow…” Then I say with complete conviction: “Oh yes, clearly elbow cancer.”
That word triggers their deepest, darkest fear. Of course, it’s terrible to go through—don’t get me wrong. But in their heads, they’re already making it at least as bad. What I do next is poke a little fun at it. I start rambling on about it, I mimic their attitude, and I exaggerate everything that could go wrong.
Clients often say, “Hey, this is exactly what I do in my own head all day long!”
And then something magical happens. Because I hold up a mirror to them and reenact it in an almost cabaret-like way, they become dissociated.
As long as that fear exists only in your own head, it drives you absolutely crazy. But when you see someone else act out that same ridiculous scenario, it suddenly becomes a kind of comedy. They burst out laughing.
As early as the 1970s, Richard Bandler (one of the founders of NLP) discovered that when people see themselves in a fearful situation and can simply laugh it off, the problem disappears like snow in the sun.
Now they see me mimicking their own behavior. They realize: “Wait a minute, is this what I do all day?” They burst out laughing, and boom: a home run. The old problem falls apart.
I’ll keep doing that until they simply can’t bring up that old feeling anymore. So that the next time they feel a twinge in their neck, they won’t panic, but will burst out laughing and think, “ Oh, here we go again.”
Because let’s be honest: if you pay very close attention to your own body, you’ll always feel some tension somewhere—a twinge in your shoulder or a creaking knee. If you start imagining the worst-case scenario, you simply won’t have a life anymore.
Research also shows that humor in therapy helps combat anxiety and depression[2].
From Experiment to Success (and the Scent of Progress)
That approach originated from an experiment. I thought: I’m going to take a more provocative approach with them; I’m going to see if I can make them laugh about that problem.
And please note: I never laugh at the person in front of me—I take them one hundred percent seriously.
But that problem? Sometimes it’s just laughable.
Of course, to get someone to that point, you can’t just jump right in from the very first minute. If you do, you’ll lose the connection (rapport), and the client will storm out the door in a huff. That connection is incredibly important for the success of therapy[3], especially when you use humor.
It’s a “handle with care” situation. You have to gradually heat up the water. You start off normally and, step by step, push the boundaries until the boiling point is reached and the client can laugh at the absurdity of the problem.
I apply this principle to everything we do. In our training programs, we analyze our work anew every day: what went well, what could be improved, and what experiment can we start today to help participants absorb the material even better?
For example, a year and a half ago, we experimented with adding scent to our training rooms. A bold move! Some participants didn’t like it at first (“What’s that smell?”), but statistically, we saw that the overall experience and satisfaction scores for the classes increased significantly on average.
Not every experiment succeeds, but if we hadn’t tried, we would never have known.
What are you going to mess up today?
So today’s question is for you, too: What new thing are you going to do today? And in what way are you going to dare to fail today?
Be sure to let me know in the comments—I’m incredibly curious. Because remember Stephen Bartlett’s formula:
- Failure = Feedback
- Feedback = Knowledge
- Knowledge = Power (control over yourself)
The more you fail and learn from those failures, the more control you gain over your own life.
Learning to Fail with Hypnosis
In our training program, we also practice a great deal—precisely because we realize that you learn the most from sessions that aren’t so straightforward. Would you like to learn more about hypnotherapy? Come join our free masterclass.
Or register for one of our events and trainings.
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