Fear of Failure

Fear of failure is often expressed subconsciously. It takes the form of worries.

These worries distract us from our goals and are a root cause of procrastination.

Do you spend too much time worrying?

Do you sometimes feel you should be cleaning your house instead of writing?

You are not alone.

Sometimes when I am writing I am conscious of worries creeping into my mind. What am I neglecting? What have I forgotten? Is the house clean?

I know housework is not my priority but it nags at me sometimes.

I realize that I was brought up to think that way because I was surrounded by women who thought that way.

IS IT IN MY ATTITUDE?

I remember my mother returning to education as a mature student. She had two part-time jobs, went to college, had two kids and still had to clean three houses – our house, her sick mother’s house and her elderly auntie’s house.

That kind of workload went without question in those days and to be honest I have no idea how she did it.

The phrase at the time was ‘you just get on with it.’

Although attitudes towards gender roles have changed – I wonder just how much?

HOUSEWORK AND GENDER ROLES

Has my own attitude changed enough? Not if I still find myself with niggling little guilty feelings about housework?

Of course, now there is a whole industry growing up around the idea of keeping thing clean and simple and a whole heap of books and TV programs telling us how to do it.

But, I wonder if keeping things clean and simple is in itself another thing we feel we have ‘to do’ that keeps us away from our writing.

Before we write should we organise our writing room?

I wonder is it really about finding an excuse not to write.

Is it just another form of procrastination?

Writing is risking.

It is easier to go through life not taking any risk.

Not writing, and not putting our work ‘out there’ is one way to avoid criticism and failure.

FEAR OF FAILURE

Failure is a big word. I dread it a lot more than I dread housework.

So do most people I know.

So, maybe it’s the whole idea of failure that we need to address.

Why is it so scary? Our culture tends to attach shame to the concept, yet failure is really just a by-product of learning.

ELIMINATE YOUR FEAR OF FAILURE

In fact, failure is a crucial part of the learning process. Nobody likes it but we need to keep it in perspective.

Writers often call those unsold manuscripts they keep in the drawer failures, but really they are not. They are in fact practice.

Practising your art is what you are meant to do.

We don’t expect to be note-perfect when we learn to play the piano.

We expect it to take work. Work is what makes an artist.

If you accept this you will find it much easier to just let go of the fear of failure and focus in on developing your ideas and getting those stories written.

Oh and if it’s really about housework and then my suggestion is to schedule it and do it.

Learn an easy way to manage your time here.

So get it over with, don’t let your fear of failure allow cleaning, or thinking about cleaning chip away at your precious writing time. For inspiration read this article.

Keep your writing time sacred.

Best of luck with your writing.

Grace

ARE YOU STUCK?

Try some Practical Creative Writing Exercises

Many writers will say that the hardest thing to face is that blank page.

But not if the page isn’t blank!

Try these exercises and start writing now.

Never Be Stuck Again!

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