How to avoid fear of failure: I Want to Start a Business.

So why haven't you already looked up the answers? Because looking can hurt. Russell Golman, David Hagmann and George Loewenstein of Carnegie Mellon reviewed the research on this in 2017, in the Journal of Economic Literature, and it shows that people often avoid information even when it is useful and free, because the information itself might make them feel bad. In one well-known study, Niklas Karlsson, Loewenstein and Duane Seppi found that investors logged in to check their accounts less often after the markets had fallen. They called it the ostrich effect. I am not judging you for doing the same thing, and I think most people do it. But you can't make a decision about a number you refuse to look at.

From chapter 3: Unknown is not unlikely

Then write two numbers, openings and closures in roughly the last three years, and divide the closures by the openings. Put your ratio at the top of your business plan, where you can't avoid it. I would count before I signed anything. Then decide.

From chapter 7: When the coward is right

That is how the book looks at “how to avoid fear of failure”: one idea at a time, with a step you can take right away. Of course, this is only one idea from the book. So, if this passage speaks to you, the full chapter goes further, and it ends with an exercise you can do the same evening.

In short, the book has 11 chapters, and each one ends with a practical exercise. Therefore, you can read it in order, or you can go straight to the part about “how to avoid fear of failure”.

1. The safer road
2. Afraid people see different odds
3. Unknown is not unlikely
4. Nobody checked your fear's record
5. The worst case is written in a law you have never read
6. What happened to the people it happened to
7. When the coward is right
8. Do not calm down
9. The price of the safe choice
10. Courage does not delete the fear
11. Beginning while afraid

Finally, you can get I Want to Start a Business: A Fear by Fear Check Before You Begin in the stores below. Because every title of this book shares the same text, you can simply pick the one you like best. Also, the book is available in 19 languages.

In addition, each title below highlights a different idea from the same book.

• I Want to Start a Business: Eleven Fears, Eleven Exercises, One Evening Each
• I'm a Coward: I Want to Start a Business, and Eleven Fears Say Don't
• I'm a Coward: Eleven Fears About Starting a Business, and the Evidence Behind Each One
• But I'm a Coward: I Want to Start a Business. Find Out Which Fears Are Telling the Truth.
• I'm a Coward: The Fear of Starting a Business, Checked One Study at a Time
• But I'm a Coward: Eleven Fears About Starting a Business, Checked Against the Evidence
• Am I a Coward?: Find Out Which Fears Are Telling the Truth
• Am I a Coward?: I Want to Start a Business, and Eleven Fears Are in the Way
• Which Fears Are Telling the Truth?: I Want to Start a Business but I'm a Coward
• Find Out Which Fears Are Telling the Truth: Eleven Fears About Starting a Business, Taken One at a Time

See all 45 titles. Go to the book page.