I know the fear of failure well, because I intimately know failure, and its sinister psychological implications.
It was 2008, and I watched my first entrepreneurial project, which had started with such fanfare just two years earlier, die.
Technically it wasn’t exactly a failure. But, the voluntary liquidation of a company that had encountered a significant financial problem due to external causes. So I didn’t even have direct responsibility.
Despite this, I lived through it as the worst of failures, and the feelings from those years are still vivid in my memory.
The Impact of Social Background
In my view, the problem related to the fear of failure is first and foremost educational, cultural, and linked to the social context of origin. In Italy, if a company goes wrong, you’re branded for life. You’re not even worthy of having an ATM card for the ordinary management of your finances. In short, you’re finished, or that’s what they want you to believe.
Then there are the expectations of those around you, of those who believed you were infallible, of those who hoped you’d fail, those who don’t look at you with the same eyes as before.
All normal in a culture steeped in the foundations of Christianity, based on a perpetual sense of guilt and subservience to those above.
For a 27-year-old boy, born in Italy with humble origins, it was really tough and I carried the dictates of this suffocating climate with me for a long time.
If I had been born (or even just raised/lived) in the United States, it would have been much different, as their social and entrepreneurial context considers failure a fundamental prerequisite for success.
Across the ocean, failure is seen as a concrete learning opportunity and if you haven’t failed at least once, you can’t succeed.
Today, 15 years later, I can confirm all this: I manage 3 companies, I have plenty of free time, I can freely choose where to live, and above all, I have realized my dream. I have become a professional in this fabulous activity, Sports Trading, which represents my passion but also my freedom, in every way.
However, overcoming all this required distancing myself from where I grew up, from the scene of the (alleged) crime, focusing on personal growth, working on myself, and enriching my horizons with other worlds and other ways of thinking.
Failure as an Opportunity for Growth
Failure is part of the growth process, except in very rare cases, is inevitable for those who try not to settle, to grow beyond their comfort zone. And what you learn from reacting to such an experience can’t be found in any book.
Thomas Edison said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
And this quote speaks volumes about the difference between the American and European approaches.
In my opinion, the concept of failure touches a different, and even deeper lever than dealing with mistakes. A lever that I felt burning in the changed gazes of others or in the compassionate offers of support, accompanied by satisfaction at my financial downfall.
It concerns the relationship with yourself, and the definition of what you are.
Social labels and failure
We live in a world accustomed to affixing labels, from our own name and surname, to our profession and social roles.
I am Davide.
I am Renna.
I am an Entrepreneur.
I am a Son.
I am a Husband.
I am a Failure.
Simple labels. But I am none of these.
My name does not represent me, I didn’t choose it. It’s a nice name, but it’s common to many with whom I have nothing to do. It’s something I possess, not something I am.
My surname is even less so, because unlike the name, I like it even less. How much importance has been given in the past to the surname,? Overemphasised importance because history teaches us that blood ties mean little or nothing. Certainly, I have nothing in common with the other Rennas. Again, the surname is something I possess, not something I am.
Am I an Entrepreneur? So I can’t be a Trader? Or a Writer?
Not true.
Entrepreneurship is something I do, as are many other things, not something I am.
Am I a Son and Husband? Oh God, if my mother read these lines I would be directly responsible for her high blood pressure.
Sorry, but even in this case I refuse to be labeled. These are two roles that I love to play but that do not irrevocably represent what I am. Not by right of birth or because I decided to marry, but only by the pleasure I derive from having that particular role.
Failure and self-perception
And so we come to Failure and the fear of failure
How could I ever feel like a “failure”? When I don’t feel like a Davide, a Renna, an Entrepreneur, a Son, or a Husband?
Failure is an experience you go through, tough but precious, but it doesn’t define who you are. We are much more than crude social labels.
And even more so, we are not our past. The past doesn’t define us unless we allow it, we can change direction whenever and however we want. The future is determined by our desires, certainly not by what we have done (and what we are not).
This is the greatest lesson of these last 15 years, during which I’ve had to deal with one of the intense experiences of my life.
For this reason, today I approach any new activity with the calmness of someone who knows that failure is a possibility. Just like success. And if it happens, it will teach me how to do better next time.
In any case, it will not affect my self-perception and identity.
By the way, if I’m not all those labels, in the end who am I?
I will be what I will be, someone once said.
