4 Steps to Overcome the Fear of Failure in your Teacher Business
It’s inevitable, at some point you will need to overcome the fear of failure if you want to succeed. If you decide to try your hand at making extra money as a teacher, you will fail. Every step of the way you’re faced with new obstacles to overcome and new questions that Google just can’t answer. What people get wrong is that they assume that their failures define their success. That what they did wrong will ultimately be their demise. If you mess up too bad here, you’ll never make it there.
Anybody feel that way? I know I sure did in the beginning, staying up late trying to make things perfect, or not ever being satisfied and allowing those thoughts to control my business.
Let me let you in on a little secret! The way you fail or how bad you fail has absolutely nothing to do with your success at all.
Isn’t that great news though? It doesn’t matter how bad you suck at making extra money online….it doesn’t matter how big your fear is….or how embarrassing a failure might become…all that matters is your mindset and your why!
I want to share with you a true story about failure that happened not so long ago. I want to share how I first perceived the moment and how I see it now. About 2 years ago I decided to start a high ticket mastermind. If you aren’t familiar with what that is, it’s an expensive way to get in with a group of like-minded people and share ideas, tips, and strategies. I’ve been in a lot of masterminds over the years that were ridiculously expensive so I decided that I wanted to have that for teachers too.
Only, I didn’t want it to be like the masterminds I was in. I was in these groups, I paid a lot of money and we shared wins each week. We weren’t taught anything, literally paid thousands of dollars to discuss strategies that were working. In my mastermind I wanted to group people together based on their ability, teach them a lot of content each week for 6 months and have them report on their homework each week.
What I didn’t realize was that not everyone wanted that. They didn’t want to work crazy hard for results. I admit that this new way of masterminding was going to be the wave of the future. We had 2 groups….one group went so well that the students were literally making so much progress each week, I was mind blown. The other group? It didn’t go as well and I really beat myself up about it. I really struggled with why. I felt like a failure and allowed a few of those people to take control of my life and make me feel like I was less than because they weren’t seeing success. You see, failure is subjective. I didn’t fail. I did the exact same strategy with 30 people. 25 or so succeeded and 5 didn’t.
I pretended that those 5 people were the reason why it wasn’t successful when in reality, for whatever reasons, it just didn’t work for them. I didn’t fail – nor did the program fail – but instead I began laying a foundation for a new level of life that I now love and enjoy. The tasks and templates and coaching I did in that mastermind helped me build and mold our new programs for The CEO Teacher®. I fell in love with coaching each week but I wanted to do it on a more basic level with our students inside of The CEO Teacher® School and The CEO Teacher® Academy.
The fear of failure was the catalyst for a new way of thinking
Reprogram your idea of failure
This was probably one of the hardest things for me to do. Remember this though, you are only the main character of your own story, not everyone else's. Chances are, not everyone saw you fail – and if they did, it wasn’t as big of a mess as you thought it was. We had this happen with a sales page. My integrator and I got a sales page back just in time for cart to open and it wasn’t what we were expecting. To us – it was a failure but we quickly rebounded. We grew a lot and learned a lot from that experience.
Fall in love with the process, rather than the product
This has been my anthem for the new year. I somehow fell into the deep overthinking side of TikTok land. While watching countless hours of stuff about time and present moment thinking I kept hearing and reiterating the idea that if we don’t fall in love with the present moment. The right here right now, we won’t be happy when we get there. Remember, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side! It’s green where you water it. I’ve taken that saying and this idea to an entirely new level and started applying it to every single aspect of my life.
I get frustrated way too easily with my kids and immediately rate the day as a failure if things don’t start off with a bang. Making it a priority to stop in those moments, take a few deep breaths and remember if I don’t fall in love with the process of raising my children (even when things seem like a failure). I won’t be happy when they are grown because I will have missed each and every moment complaining. So stay aware of your mental state and keep checking in with yourself about where you are so you can fall in love with the process, rather than the product.
Ask yourself this question: What’s the worst-case scenario?
My husband wins the award for conquering this mindset. When I was ready to leave the classroom I did a lively dance of hokey pokey every single day. I’d put my right foot in and take it right back out. I’d dream of leaving the classroom to pursue a life of selling my teaching resources full time but I’d metaphorically shake my body all about and be back to what feels safe. I realize now that my focus was on my failure instead of my success.
I was so afraid of “what could happen if I fail” that I didn’t even dream of “what could happen if I succeed?” In crazy life-altering moments, we don’t even go to “what could this look like if I succeed” it’s like our minds blackout. So here’s a tip I have for you, my husband would say “if you resign today, what’s the worst-case scenario?” If you left the classroom tomorrow, what’s the worst thing that could happen?
Me: “Well, I would fail.”
And he would say “Ok, then what?”
Me: “Then I would look like a failure to everyone else.”
Him: “And then what”
Me: “And I’d have to go back to teaching.”
He would then say, “But you love teaching, right?”
Me: “Yeah, but I don’t want that life anymore.”
Him: “Well even if you have to go back, the worst-case scenario really isn't all that bad.”
And when he put it that way, I finally had the wings to fly.
FIND YOUR REAL REASON WHY!
If the answer is to simply make money with no reason why that money will change your life, you may want to rethink the goal…
I put this tip here for you and for me. Busy is my favorite thing to be. I love love love having a full slammed schedule with every single moment mapped out. At the end of 2021, we planned our entire year as a team together, and let me just say, it was BUSY! As we moved into 2022 I had to keep asking myself, why? Why am I doing this? Why am I putting this pressure on myself, on my team members? What’s the point? If it’s for money, that’s a horrible reason.
How could you simplify your life and begin asking yourself real reasons why so you can eliminate the idea of having to do everything and at all times so you won’t fail. Our business is beyond the failing stage. We are in growth and scale moments, so if we don’t do a million things every waking moment, we won’t fail. Find your why, and enjoy the process.
And maybe after reading this post, you are saying to yourself, OK Kayse, I’m ready to jump. I want to take the next step and fly. I’m going to do it scared, messy, and brave, but I have no idea how to actually put it all into place.
Then you are in luck. I want to encourage you to use your gifts and talents to grow your ideas and dreams and begin the process of flying high. And like finding your enneagram, reading your horoscope, or understanding your strengths and weaknesses, you can find your CEO Teacher® Type and begin using your results to your advantage. Once you learn how your unique CEO Teacher® Type fits into the equation you can begin using your natural gifts to your advantage. Whether you are a helping hand, fun lovin' leader, sensible superstar, friend til the end, or purposeful perfectionist, your gifts and talents will help you learn how to overcome the fear of failure and get you started on the path to a life you love.
Overcome the Fear of Failure in Your Teacher Business
I am always looking for new ways to fix my mindset and work toward my goals and dreams. And if you are saying, yep Kayse that's me too, here are some actionable strategies for you:
5 Ways to Overcome Your Fear of Failure
How to Conquer Scarcity Mindset as a CEO Teacher®
[…] Often, the fear of failure is attached to the anxiety you may get when you receive negative feedback from customers. Overcome your fear of failure with these four steps! […]