There Is No Prerequisite for Success

Making big changes and starting something new can be petrifying. Especially as we get older, we lose that youthful naiveté and enthusiasm that made jumping into new experiences easier, even fun. But the need to try new things doesn’t fade over time. Life gets boring if you don’t switch it up every once in a while. And some of us find ourselves in a position of having to reinvent ourselves well into middle age or beyond. Maybe we’ve lost a job, or a relationship has ended. Maybe a pandemic hit and suddenly the world is different. Some change is forced upon us. But if you think about it, there’s probably something you really want to do, but haven’t been able to commit. I’m sure you have all kinds of reason why, but ultimately it’s probably because you fear failure. That sounds trite, I know. Let’s break it down.

Fear of failure is at its core a fear of not being good at something. But undergirding this is an even deeper fear we all have: we don’t want to make the wrong choices and mess up our one precious life. We are surrounded by messages about making the most of our time, being competent at everything, and living the right way. We tend to see success and failure as a binary, black-and-white prospect. You either succeed or fail. You’re either good at something, or you screw it up. And by a certain age, we’ve all had our share of major screw-ups, compounding our fear. I have failed badly at times - ironically, often it was at things I’m good at. And sure enough, these failures have taught me some important truths about success.

Being good at something doesn’t matter

You’ve probably heard that in order to succeed at something you need to master it, and to master it you need to put in the time – 10,000 hours of practice is the usual calculation. This is bullshit. It’s something gatekeepers like to say because it gives their position a more vaunted flair and obscures their own imposter syndrome. The truth is, lots of people find success with seemingly little effort. Some people succeed despite sucking at what they do. And some put in those 10,000 hours and never succeed – like me. I’m a good writer, always have been. My dream was always to be published in fiction. I’ve spent way over 10,000 hours practicing my craft, have written short stories and several novels. I’ve gotten interest in my work a few times, but no publications. This is the biggest failure of my life, and it has been super painful.

For a long time I didn’t know how to handle this. It was my dream, I’d put in the time and effort – how could I not succeed? It felt like a betrayal of the logic of success. Finally I realized that it doesn’t matter that I’m a good writer. It doesn’t even matter how hard I worked. For multiple other reasons, many outside of my control, I failed at this dream.

Eventually I moved on. I still write fiction, but I don’t seek the accolade of publication, and I’m happy with that. In fact, it was when I embraced not publishing that I finally felt I had eared the title of “writer.” A writer is someone who writes regardless of outcome.

There’s no such thing as a “right” decision

I can’t tell you how many times in life I’ve planned something so carefully it was destined to work out…and it didn’t. My PhD was like this. I did everything I could to make it the right decision. I wrote a manifesto about how I would meet the challenges of obtaining a doctorate and what I would do with it after. I researched everything I could think of about the process in depth. I was ready. You can guess what happened. I barely dragged myself across the finish line, and by the time that hell was over I no longer wanted what I used to. None of the carefully thought out justifications I’d made for getting it the first place were valid anymore.

When it didn’t go as planned, I felt like I’d failed even though I got the degree. Because I didn’t end up doing the things I’d expected to with it, I worried I’d wasted eight years of my life. I was tortured by the thought that it had been the wrong decision.

But getting a PhD wasn’t the wrong decision. It’s just that trying to control the process and outcome was the wrong way to go about making it. If I’d been more open to letting the experience be what it was instead of what I thought I needed it to be, things would have gone much better for me. I didn‘t need to justify my choice by planning out every contingency before I committed. A choice can only be right in retrospect, and it’s how you live it out that makes the difference.

There’s no excuse to not do what you want to do

If it doesn’t matter how good you are at something or whether a choice is “right,” how do you decide if you should make that big change, start that new thing? Here’s how: wanting to do something is enough of a reason to do it. All you need is that spark of interest and enthusiasm. If you feel that about something, do that thing. Work at it to get better. We’ve all heard that advice, fake it ‘til you make it. No. Let me assure you, by trying something and working at getting better, you are not faking anything. There’s no need to pretend you are better than you are. What you need is to believe that you are good enough right now, even if you aren’t that great and are still striving.

Keep your focus on the fact that this is something you want to do. Keep reminding yourself that wanting to do it is enough of a justification for your participation. Any true master will tell you there is no such thing as mastery, only practice. So go ahead and do what you want to do, start the new thing, and be open to letting it be what it will.