How To Worry Less About Failure
(so we can get on with enjoying the good stuff instead)
Welcome to the third of my series on how to worry less about various things - here’s the first on everything & the second on ageing. Next week, climate change, and then we’ll take a break from worrying about worrying over the holidays. So let me tell you about my life…
I have failed at my life. Let me tell you how.
I earn half as much money as many of my peers. I weigh more than I should. I live in a community set-up that doesn’t quite suit me. I don’t do as much eco-activism as I want to or should do. I lean towards workaholism. I get horribly impatient with my reactive dog Ralph.
I could go on. These are some of my perennial failure worries - areas of my life where my expectations of myself are rarely or never met. I lumber around the track like an out of shape greyhound chasing the toy rabbit - the only constant my inability to catch up.
I wonder what failures worry at you, like fish nibbling at your ankles? Your complicated relationships? Unpopularity? A lack of money or other resources? I’ll be writing more specifically about some of these topics in the coming weeks, but today we will take FEAR-OF-FAILURE by the scruff of the neck and…
No - let me change my metaphor. We will coax fear-of-failure into a safe warm space by tempting it with tasty tidbits, and then we will offer it some help.
Why do we worry about failing?
Internal Family Systems tells us that all the activities that happen inside us happen for a reason. We harshly criticise ourselves to try and stop ourselves from messing up. We crave excess alcohol, shopping or gaming to distract us from our troubles or from troubling emotions. We feel angry to help us set necessary boundaries.
Worrying is no exception. The parts of us that worry about failure have a job to do, and they either do it gently, by tugging quietly at our skirts every so often, or anywhere along the scale to violently, by giving us panic attacks or sleepless nights or taking away every drop of pleasure from our days.
In my experience, the best way to ease the burdens of our over-worrying parts isn’t to handcuff them or shove them in a dark cupboard. This backfires in the long run as they spring back into action with even more suspicion of us than before. Instead we need to slowly and kindly befriend them, come to understand them, and offer them the help they need.
What does this actually look like in practice? An example.
Over the years I’ve noticed big changes in my ambitious parts, which worried endlessly about how successful I was or wasn’t.
At first I didn’t really know they were there - I was just desperate to achieve success (as a writer, as a Buddhist teacher, financial success…) and thought that this was perfectly normal1. Then I started to notice that not everyone was driven in the way I was, and tuned into the hunger and got curious about it.
I dipped in and out of therapy, had conversations with friends, read, reflected, did spiritual practice. Life was working away on me in the background as I continued to learn and grow and heal. There was a period of my ambition coming into sharper focus - when something inside us is changing, it can become very noticeable for the first time!
As I come through the ‘other side’ I notice that I’m happy when, for example, I get an email saying I’m going to be published in an important Buddhist magazine (this happened last night) but after a short burst of happiness it doesn’t really change my life, or how I feel about myself. My ambitious parts are no longer so necessary - their job of propping up my ego is fading away. This is because I generally feel pretty good about myself already.
So is there anything we can DO about our failure worries, or do we just need to wait for life to work on us?
What we can do? The four word summary: be kind to ourselves. Here’s a little more of what’s helped me.
⭐ Trust that there’s a good reason for the worry. Other parts of us know that there’s no need for us to worry about failing - that it’s silly or self-indulgent or just plain misguided. Those things may be true, and it is ALSO true that your worrying parts have good reasons for doing what they’re doing. They may be working from outdated information, but they will have excellent reasons for trying to protect you from something, and knowing this can help you to feel softer towards them.
⭐ Be realistic. We are all physically and psychologically limited in different ways from each other. Some of us (me) are terrible at cleaning or being at parties. It is also true that some of us are more prone to worry than others - because of our genes, because of our family history, because of our upbringing or our past experiences. We may never be a happy-go-lucky type. This may have silver linings, but regardless it may just BE that way. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t keep working towards healing whatever needs healing. Also, accepting some inevitability to our current limitations hopefully means we can relax a little and take steps to look after ourselves a little better.
⭐ Act according to reality. If doing presentations makes you horribly worried about what a failure you are, try to do less presentations - or do what you can to support yourself through them (using friends, props, recovery time afterwards etc.) Take the current reality into account, not the one you’d prefer, and be as kind to yourself as you possibly can.
⭐ Practice having faith. Offering kindness to our worrying parts isn’t the quick fix we may prefer. We might especially want a quick fix when we are in pain or at risk of being overwhelmed by difficult feelings or shame. We become, understandably, desperate for a solution NOW. Sometimes it is a great plan to get some specific help - therapy, reaching out to friends, seeking medical help etc. I also know that sometimes change takes a looooong time, and that we get an opportunity to practice patience! Remember that you’re doing your best, and that all the little drops of kindness you’re able to offer yourself are sinking in and doing their work underground. Who knows when something new and wonderful might suddenly blossom?
⭐ Take systemic issues into account. Our society sets us up (in all sorts of powerfully insidious ways) to expect more of ourselves than is realistic. The glossy airbrushed photos. The aspirational adverts. The conflating of value with financial worth. I could write a whole other piece (or a book!) about this, but for now I just want to remind you that you are not just a person who worries but also a very small part of a huge complicated and sometimes-poisonous set of systems that holds all kinds of influence over us all. So, give yourself a break!
⭐ Know that you’re not alone. We might not talk much about this stuff but (trust me, I’m a therapist 😉) everyone worries about being a failure sometimes. Just see how many ‘likes’ this piece gets if you don’t believe me.
I started this piece by saying that I was a failure at a long list of things. Sometimes I still feel that way - when Ralph aggressively snaps at another dog and shame whooshes through me, or when I melt down at my lovely spouse who was only trying to help me fix my computer.
Mostly, though, I know that I’m a messy old bundle of human in a flawed and beautiful world, doing my best. That actually, I’m really doing okay.
My best guess is that, under the circumstances, you’re doing okay too.
Go gently,
Satya <3
Tell me: What kinds of failure do you worry about? If it feels comfortable, do share these worries in the comments as it’ll help other people to feel less alone. What helps you to manage these worries? Do share your experience & any tips you have. How might you be a little bit kinder to yourself this week?
PS In this Friday’s piece (for paid subscribers2) I will tell you a story about my years of counting how many people were in the shrine room for Buddhist practice (and why I finally stopped). I’ll also give you a list of instructions so you can work directly with your worrying parts using Internal Family Systems. Join me? If you’d like to but you don’t have the money right now, just let me know and I’ll sort you out 🙏🏻
Capitalism!
Capitalism! 😂 (And, me valuing my writing, and you valuing yourself. Both can be true at the same time.)
My brother and I grew up worrying. Our home life was dysfunctional on steroids. What helped was Al-Anon. It helped us understand what you can and cannot control, and gave us tools to help keep our sanity. When I found Buddhism I found even greater help. Do I still worry about my husband’s cancer, getting older, extra weight, climate change, senseless violence, will SSI go bankrupt . . . yes I do. But I remember suffering with worry changes nothing - so I breath deep and do what I can to mitigate things at my level. Is this a benefit of old age, good friends, the love of a special dog, a 12 step program, and good Buddhist teachers all of whom remind me there is a resource greater than my self? Yes. And - I am so very grateful to all of them. 🙏❤️
I worry about losing control; about those days (or longer periods) when so much is happening that it feels overwhelming. But also I worry, if over a long period I am not busy enough ( I feel I could/should be doing more ). I have just finished a 16 month period of working back full time in Children's Social Care. When I committed to this I worried that at 68 years old I may simply not cope like I used to do. But I did and I could see that my regular meditation and other Buddhist practices have accumulatively over the years helped my resilience. I found I was able to give a lot, but without worrying as much as I used to do about failure. Currently, as my contract has ended, I have fallen off the cliff and am worrying about how to use all the time available. My zen training teaches me to be with what is present as that is sufficient and that helps (most of the time!)