Fear of Success

What is Fear of Success?

- Worry that you will accomplish all that you set out to, but that that will have some kind of negative consequence.

- That you will then lose it all again

- That you won’t be able to cope with your new reality

- That you won’t be able to sustain the level of success you have achieved

- That you will become used to the new life and then it will be taken away from you again

- Fear that others, who are jealous, or more deserving, will take it away from you

- Worry about what will you do after you have achieved success

- That success is an end goal, so what do you do once you get there?

- Will you become de-motivated, bored?

- A belief that you don’t deserve this good fortune.

- That you will feel like a fraud receiving the benefits of success, because you are undeserving

- A fear that you will discover success, which is your dream, is not all you thought it would be, and you are disappointed and depressed with no where left to go.

When you have Fear of Success it can cause you to:

- put in less effort, because then you are not a failure … you know you didn’t really try!

- engage in self sabotage. As soon as you see yourself getting ahead, you do something to put yourself “back in your place.”

- an easy example of this to describe is someone on a weight loss program. If this person has fear of success as soon as they get close to their goal weight, they start to put on weight again. They are afraid to reach their goal incase they can’t maintain it.

- lose the motivation you had to succeed

- feeling guilty that you have achieved this success, so you slide back into your old ways, and lose some of the success. You go back to your comfort zone.

- draw back, feeling others will demand or expect more of you once you are a success, and you are not ready to give up leaning on the people you have always leant on, or receiving the sympathy and compassion of those who have always morally and emotionally supported you

- draw back, from fear that you will lose close friends, and family relationships if they view you as being out of their league

- make excuses to yourself as to why you are not doing what you know you can do to achieve your goal

- put yourself and your achievements down in front of others

What is your Fear of Success “Head Trash”? (what’s going on in your head)

- If I go farther than my friends and family, they will be jealous and not like/ love me any more.

- If I earn more money than my partner/ spouse s/he will be jealous and it will break up our relationship

- Will it really bring me happiness? I am scared it won’t, or that happiness will not be what I expect.

- If I get there and it doesn’t bring me happiness, where do I go from there?

- Who am I to succeed?

- If people know I’m trying, they will also know if I fail … then I’ll be a failure … safer never to try in the first place

- I have so much already. What right do I have to go for more?

Identify Fear of Success instantly. Steps to take to overcome Fear of Success

- Write down your goals, and each time you achieve on, mark it off, and date it.

- Look at your list regularly. You’ll be amazed at how much you accomplish.

- Make them small step goals, so you have things to make off regularly

- Also make large step goals so you can celebrate when your little steps combine to make a huge leap come true

- Appreciate the long hours, hard work and talent you have put into your achievement

- Take an objective look at what you’ve done.

- If it was someone else, how would you view what they’ve done … how far they’ve come from where they started?

- Visualize yourself in your new situation. Visualize it every day until it is so familiar you know you belong there.

- Any time you find yourself making excuses to not succeed, give yourself a shake, and restate your goal of achievement

- Take a good look at your goals regularly. Are they appropriate to get you where you want to go, to make you successful? If not, how do you need to change them to have that?

- Appreciate others contributions and help along the way

- Encourage others in their drive to success

- When someone compliments you on something you’ve done, learn to just say a simple “Thank you.” No excuses, no putting it down. Just “Thank you.”

Where is fear of success interfering with your life?

Think about all the areas of your life.

What are you trying to achieve? What would you try to achieve if you didn’t have the Fear of Success?

Look at all areas of your life: home, work, social life, volunteer work, personal development, education… every single area you can think of.

Then choose one. The one where you think fear of success is causing the most damage.

Choose the one where you would most like to move ahead more right now. Where would you like to succeed, that would be of most “achievement value” to you from where you are sitting now?

You can of course go for success in any and all areas of your life – and I hope you will. But for this exercise, just choose one to begin with and once you have the idea, you can follow through in other areas.

So thinking of the one area you have chosen, answer the following questions for yourself.

- What does success here look like? Paint a detailed description for yourself.

- Write it down.

- What is the fear of success you feel? What are you afraid of in this area? Consider all the items mentioned above, and any others you can think of.

- Imagine yourself successful – what is the discomfort you feel caused by?

- What are your main concerns, what is causing fear of success?

- Who do you think could succeed here, better and more deservingly than you?

- Why? What is it about them that makes this so?

- What is there to motivate you to this success?

- If you succeed here, how will it change your life in ways other than, as well as, financially?

- What would alleviate my fear of success the most right now?

Then look at:

- In what ways have you been underachieving in this area?

- What do you allow fear of success to cause you to self sabotage?

- What motivation did you have before that you don’t have now?

- Do you feel at all guilty about achieving this goal?

- Do you anticipate any negative reactions from people in your life if you succeed here?

- Do you have trouble accepting praise and appreciation in this area?

Write down your fears, as you have identified them above.

- Now either tear the paper into tiny pieces and throw it away, or burn it.

- Either way, you have got rid of your fears.

- They are yours no longer.

- Close your eyes and visualize this.

- Your fears are gone. You are now free to succeed.

If you have trouble believing this as you visualize it, just keep visualizing it regularly as your subconscious is programmed from repeated, vivid visualization. Your subconscious will start to believe it if you keep visualizing, and then your conscious mind will start to believe it too.

Now that the negatives are gone, it’s time to write down positives about your goals and how you will achieve them. Write out all the positives you can think of.

- What you have going for you that will help you achieve your goal.

- Who will help you. What it will look like and feel like to have achieved it.

- How you will deal with the success positively.

Again, visualize your new reality, your success. Each time you sit down to spend a few minutes visualizing, add some more detail. The more detailed the better.

Soon, it should become a familiar place to return to in your mind. It feels comfortable.

You are changing your comfort zone.

Your subconscious is beginning to accept the new reality, the successful you.

Keep visualizing.

The more you do it, the more you’ll accept it and once your subconscious (which guides your behavior) believes it fully it will do everything in its power to make that really happen .. so watch out!

You’re on your way to success!

Congratulations!

Some people find that the visual aspects of Treasure Mapping are of great assistance in learning to let go for their fear of achieving. More on Treasure Mapping.

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