Something I have learnt over and over in life is that success doesn’t start with effort or skill. It starts with belief. The hard-wired, confident belief that success is possible. 

Not everyone is wired that way, though, as I was reminded many years ago when our sustainability team thought it was not possible to develop a short course for small businesses because “it has never been done before”. It astounded me and was a reminder of how fear can limit success. 

As entrepreneurs, we push these types of boundaries every day and relish doing “what hasn’t been done before”.  After all, that’s how we get ahead, innovating and forging new realities. But even we can get stuck in limited thinking at times, especially when things are tough – when silently we fall into a fear-based mindset that ‘it can’t be done”.  

Often, the fear of failure goes hand in hand with the amount one has to lose…so taking risks in the startup phase is easy as there is ‘nothing to lose’, but this gets harder as the business grows, if we start feeling anxious about destroying what we have built! 

Imagine, for a moment, though, if you could lose all your fear of failure and step into pure possibility? Imagine how amazing your world would be. Imagine a country with such a confident mindset?  

The classic example of the effect of breaking a mental barrier was Roger Bannister, the first person to run a mile in under four minutes, clocking 3 minutes 59.4 seconds on May 6, 1954. Once the 4-minute mile was broken, dozens of athletes suddenly believed it to be possible, and many have passed that since. More recently Marathon Eliud Kipchoge broke the mental barrier of 2 hours for a marathon, running 1:59:40. This shattered the limiting belief that humans couldn’t do it, and since then, many elite marathoners have run much closer to 2 hours.  It’s also happening in tech, starting when DeepMind’s AlphaGo defeated a human world champion in the game of Go back in 2016, something thought impossible at the time. Since then, AI has rapidly accelerated breakthroughs in numerous fields, too many and too rapidly to list.  

None of this happened because someone simply waved a magic wand. It happened because they committed to doing the hard work to reach it. But first, they believed it was possible. 

Makes me wonder what subconscious limiting beliefs I have that are holding me back behind the line – in my personal, sporting and professional life? And what is holding you back? This short exercise is helping me; it might also help you to break through.  

Breakthrough Your Fear Barrier   

1. Name it  

Ask yourself: “If my business really took off, what scary or overwhelming thing do I imagine would happen?”  Write it down – For example, “I’ll burn out if I succeed.”, “People will expect too much from me.”, “I’ll lose friends or freedom if I make a lot of money.”  

2. Flip It  

Ask yourself: “If I succeed, what amazing opportunities or freedoms will open up instead?”  Write this new possibility next to your fear statement – for example, “When my business scales, I’ll hire a team and have more freedom.”, or “Success will let me support my family and invest in causes I care about.”  

3.  Action it

Take one small action today that moves you toward that success. For example, send a pitch email, post one piece of social media content, or ask one person for feedback and advice, and set a calendar meeting to discuss your plans. 

Finally, celebrate the feeling of success and retrain your subconscious to believe that success is possible and safe to achieve! 

It’s always easier to see how other people set mental limits to their success, so if you are really stuck in identifying yours, ask a friend or a mentor to spot yours, then ask them to help you lose your fear and reset your limits!