How Far? How Fast? How’s Your Form?
These are the kinds of questions we tend to ask each other—sometimes out loud and sometimes without even realizing it.
If you’re a runner, people may want to know: How far do you run? How fast can you run a mile? And if they’re really interested, they may even want to know how your form looks.
But those questions aren’t just about running. In one way or another, we ask them about almost everything.
How far? How long have you been at your job? How old are you? How much have you accomplished?
How fast? How quickly did you get there? How much do you make? How busy are you? How much can you handle?
And then there’s form: How well are you actually doing what you’re doing? What does it look like? How are you doing it?
We can easily find a sense of personal glory in the first two questions:
How far? How long? How old?
How fast? How much? How strong? How busy?
We tend to measure ourselves—and sometimes one another—by our accomplishments, our productivity, our longevity, and our capacity...
No More Fear Paralysis
When was the last time you failed? Was it huge or a small mistake, a breakdown or a collapse – or have you intentionally suppressed memories of your failure?
Most of us hate failure. Failing makes us feel ashamed. It threatens our identity – as if our identity could be built on consistent, flawless performance.
We need to remember, however, that failure is a significant and important part of life. The only way a child will ever learn to walk is by failing thousands of times. People of great accomplishment have a long string of failures to which they can very easily point.
Winston Churchill, widely regarded as one of world’s great wartime heroes, defined success as “going from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”
The best way to deal with a fear of failure is to press ahead, try some new things and fail a few times. You will find that the fear of shame associated with the fear of failure is ten times worse than the actual failure. The paralyzing questions related to, “W...
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