What's the key to success?

I was chatting with my therapist a few months ago, and I told her that I hate being terrible at things. I thought that this was such a “duh” statement; I mean, who likes being a total flop at something?

Then, the more I started to unpack it, I realized that not everyone feels the way I do, or at least they didn’t feel that way when they were younger. I’ve had this fear surrounding and obsession with perfectionism through adolescence and into adulthood.

Some people are totally fine with trying things and failing, even if these things are totally unfamiliar to them. I would be absolutely terrified to try surfing now. I’m (redacted) years old and have never attempted it. I cannot imagine taking a skiing lesson right now. (The true differentiation between me — lower-middle class upbringing — and the friends I’ve made now — upper-middle class upbringing — is the ability to ski lol.)

That said, a true way to improve oneself is to try new things, explore areas outside of her comfort zone and learn from this curiosity.

There are two main areas I’ve seen the fear of failing negatively affect my work and my studies.

1. A narrow scope: In the past, as I’ve looked for jobs, I’ve found that I only qualified for a small number of listings despite having people management skills, leadership experience and other soft skills that would easily translate across departments. In my past jobs, I did not always reach outside of my day-to-day to expand my quantitative skills.

2. A lack of innovation: Creativity and innovation come from failing forward. We have to try new things in order to brainstorm and expand our minds. I feel like my ideas could be grander and more fleshed out if I took the initiative to go out on a limb and try.

It took me an embarrassing amount of time to realize the value of failing. Of brainstorming, testing, iterating, tinkering and adjusting.

This abandonment of my fear that is so tied to my perfectionism can be achieved in both big and small ways. For instance, in my MBA program, I wish I would have taken some more random electives that had nothing to do with my major. I recently signed up for tennis lessons even though I know that I’ll suck. I’m working on a small personal project that scares me.

I hope that this newsletter could serve as a spark for you to try something new. It doesn’t need to be a huge life-changing choice, just something that’s out of your normal wheelhouse.

Let’s succeed by failing together. 🙂