I’ve been thinking about how much stress we create just by imagining the worst. I used to think I was scared of failure… exams, career stuff, disappointing people. But when failure actually happened, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I had imagined. The moment came and went, and I handled it. That’s when I realized most of the fear wasn’t about failure itself. It was about the anticipation of it. The what ifs, the imagined shame, the pressure I thought others would put on me. It made me curious, how do you guys deal with that kind of fear? The kind that hits before anything even happens. Do you have ways to shut down those thoughts, or do you just power through?
Men, how do you deal with the fear of failure — especially when it feels worse before it even happens?
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I’ve been thinking about how much stress we create just by imagining the worst. I used to think I was scared of failure… exams, career stuff, disappointing people. But when failure actually happened, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I had imagined. The moment came and went, and I handled it. That’s when I realized most of the fear wasn’t about failure itself. It was about the anticipation of it. The what ifs, the imagined shame, the pressure I thought others would put on me. It made me curious, how do you guys deal with that kind of fear? The kind that hits before anything even happens. Do you have ways to shut down those thoughts, or do you just power through?
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I think that’s what makes fear so unhelpful. We all experience that on some level. The key is to keep going and do what you need to do. Overtime you’ll have so much experience that you’ll stop worrying about the outcome.
Anxiety can be helpful if you use that to apply yourself and improve your situation, but if you can’t do anything about it, anxiety just makes you feel crumby.
Failure is education. It’s scary until you’ve done it enough. I’ve performed and killed it in front of hundreds of people. I’ve also literately been heckled offstage by a crowd chanting “we want [the host]!”
It hurts every time, but you take the damage and move on. You can’t do it right until you’ve done it wrong.
I just say f it and do it the best i can, works most of the time
Only one way my friend. Some say get back on the horse – others say if at first you don’t succeed, then pick yourself up and try again, try again – another is fall down 7, get up 8.
Whichever way you want to spin it or phrase it, facing it and going back at it until you aren’t anymore is the way. Such is life, my friend. Godspeed.
It is what it is. I just ask myself everytime – what’s the worst thing that could happen? Most of the time it’s not that bad. Then I move on.
Just go with the flow and whatever happens happens.
Weed, got any?
I have dealt with anxiety problems for a long time and have seen some (and caused) doozies in my time (20+ years in IT) and if you’re in a healthy workplace, or team, family/whatever, then the anticipation is far less of a problem. For me it has always been dependent on the style/culture of the group the failure happens in as it will dictate the outcome of the problem and repercussions.
It is unfortunately very easy to develop oversensitivity to this fear, particularly when the culture is toxic and blame is the goal of the group when failures occur over solutions and support. Getting control over this fear is important because it can interfere with your ability to do things, which can then restrict your ability to perform.
For me personally, I invest that fear into planning. Use it as energy to develop plans and alternatives to resolve potential outcomes. That in itself can become a form of risk aversion, so I have to be careful not to create procrastination writing plans and figuring out alternatives, so like most things, it’s about balance.
Provided you are not being physically beaten to a pulp, you can always get back up, dust yourself off, and try again.
Also, it may be a cliche term, but fail forward. Roll with the punches. Develop a high level of tenacity.
I let the thoughts happen and when they’re done I tell myself “alright, now that we’re done imagining the worst possible outcome that has next to 0% chance of happening, what can I do to make this the best?”
Helps me to realize that my brain is doing its anxiety thing and focus on the positives.
I am my own worse enemy. My stress makes me physically ill on a regular basis. And more often than not, I didreach the point of actual failure, because I just stopped trying to succeed. Social anxiety and the fear of disappointing my parents, my employer, my few friends all continue to leave my stomach in knots.
But after enough reassurance from those that care about me, I learnt that I just need to stop worrying about it. My parents will always love me. My closest friends will stand by me. And no matter how bad I feel I am doing at my job, I still get glowing reviews. Does this mean the stress and fears are gone? Some yes, but not all of it and what’s left is more manageable.
I still can make myself physically ill running what ifs in my head, especially when looking at infrequent or new life events, but better able to catch myself and manage. Be that by cancelling plans to go out with friends, skipping family events all together, or just doing work tasks in the way that best suits my skills and needs instead of the expected method, changing things to put my emotional needs ahead of people pleasing just makes life easier.
Just embrace it. Sometimes things don’t work.
“You’ll get through it. Just like you always do.”
That’s all there is to it. You made it this far. You’ll figure it out as you go.
I try to mitigate what causes me stress tbh. Like work can be stressful the last thing I want is to come home and have home stress, or carrying work stress, or life stress. So I try to balance what brings me stress and what brings me joy and happiness. It’s not easy cuz life can kick you in the balls, but you shouldn’t repress feelings of stress or joy. Acknowledgement of what brings you actual stress vs anxiety vs joy.
I think of it like a baseball schedule. You have wins, you have losses, sometimes you have losing seasons, sometimes you win it all. Sometimes it’s not worth burning your bullpen for a game you’ll lose anyway. Sometimes you have losses that capsize your season.
As a man, you have to compartamentalize your feelings. Even if you do well, you can’t win them all.
I get stuck in this negative cycle as well. I’m having issues with my marriage and find myself self sabotaging out of fear and unable to be in the moment
Fear is the anticipation of pain.
How bad can it really hurt?
The only men who fear failure are men who have never failed badly enough.
So to all young men, I pray that your parents give you an environment where you can fail early and often.
So to all fathers, it is your duty to let your children fail when it is appropriate, endeavor to teach them why they failed, but do not catch the boy who has not yet felt the sting of gravity, else he launch himself from too high a rock while your back is turned.
Bro, suck it up, fuck it up, pick up the pieces, study the fall, and try it the fuck again.
You can’t fail if failure is part of the plan.
I skateboarded growing up. No better way to show you that failure is just part of the process.
Fear of Failure is intensely motivating. I deal with it by working hard and doing everything I can to make sure it doesn’t happen.
The greatest teacher, failure is. In my life, I’ve failed as much as I’ve succeeded. Only the failures taught me the lessons I needed to fail less. Take the hit, feel the pain, and embrace the lessons.
I learned to stop trying to control outcomes.
You can give it a try or not. If you choose not to try, it’s a guarantee you’re not going to achieve what you wanted. If you give it a go, there are two possible outcomes. As Wayne Gretzky once said, ‘you will miss on 100% of the shots that you don’t take.’
Failure presents growth experience and valuable lessons.
Failure is part of the journey, not a destination.
F.E.A.R. = False Expectations Appearing Real
Avoidance from fear comes from the percieved difficulty of doing the thing versus your perception of how capable you are of doing the thing. You could be overthinking or overestimating its difficulty or underestimating your ability to do it or haven’t planned you approach to simplify or peace up the task.
Start by lowering the bar to ensure completion. Maybe you are a completionist or perfectionist and you’ve set your bar so high that you might not even want to do it or avoid it because you cant see yourself completing the ideal you’ve set. Lower the bar to ensure you will complete it, baby steps first and then increase the load as you establish consistency in your completion.
I’m trying to exercise daily and always have excuses on hand to procrastinate and not do it but if I can’t get to the gym then I prepare to do something at home. If I can’t get a good session at home then I lower the bar to a few reps, if I can’t get a few reps then I choose one exercise and do it quickly for a minute or 2. Lower the bar until you do it.
Failure is a part of growth, and often blessings come disguised as failure. You are alive with that much more wisdom, knowledge, and resilience. Get back up, learn from past events, do better. I failed out of college, and I now work an amazing job/career that I never would’ve started if I finished school. Every failed relationship was a learning lesson to be the best version of myself i can be for my current partner. Every low point in my life ultimately became motivation to reach new heights. Failure is a part of the human experience, if you don’t experience failure I’m not sure you can say you’re fully living