How Fear of Success Works

By Laurie Pawlik-Kienlen

Fear of success can be just as paralyzing as fear of failure. Many people fear success because it tests their limits and makes them vulnerable to new situations. Even worse, success can expose weaknesses and force people to deal with their flaws.

Success is scary because it involves change. Success can be intimidating and hard to handle. With success comes more challenges and responsibilities – and that can be threatening.

Sometimes people fear success because they don’t know if they can live up to their achievements. They don’t think they’re good enough or smart enough. They're afraid they don't have what it takes to rise to the challenge, and they don't know if they can sustain their success.

And that’s where self-sabotaging behavior comes in.

Signs of Fear of Success and Self-Sabotage

How do you know if you’re afraid of success? Some possible signs of self-sabotage are:

1. “Partying” the night before the big presentation. This can be literal partying (drinking too much, experimenting with drugs, staying out until the wee hours) or metaphorical partying (cleaning your house until 3 a.m., drinking too much coffee or soda pop so you can’t sleep). You may be flirting with self-sabotage if you somehow always ruin a good night’s rest before a big presentation, exam, or job interview.

2. Procrastination. Putting projects, assignments, or duties off while you take care of non-essential fluff or "make-work" chores can be a sign of fear of success. If you putter around instead of taking care of business, you may be subconsciously sabotaging yourself.

3. All talk, no action. Sometimes certain behaviors look like laziness, but they reveal a fear of success. For instance, you may talk about your life dreams and goals all the time, but you watch TV every night and surf the Internet for hours every day. You never actually take practical steps or exert self-discipline to move in the direction of your goals.

4. Negative, pessimistic thoughts and behaviors. Fear of success can involve an extremely negative perspective of life. “What’s the point of dressing up for the job interview? I probably won’t get it anyway.” Not trying – and focusing on all the things that can go wrong – is self-sabotaging behavior.

What’s the benefit of these self-sabotaging behaviors? They provide an escape hatch. That is, if you party the night before or put your project off to the last minute, you can then shrug off your performance. You have an excuse for not doing well. Instead of facing the fear that you're not good or smart enough, you chalk it up to too many beers.

New Research on Self-Sabotage

Dr. Jason Plaks is a social psychologist at the University of Toronto. He researched self-sabotage and why some people can’t handle success with Kristin Stecher, a research scientist at the University of Washington. They found that if people think their professional skills and abilities are fixed, they’ll become anxious if they’re successful.

These researchers found that people with a fixed view of their abilities get disoriented when they succeed, and their performance then spirals downward.

To apply this to real life: if you see your abilities as changeable (or not set in stone), you may be more likely to succeed. This could be one step in the direction of overcoming fear of success: see your skills and talents as variable. They grow with practice, and get rusty with disuse.

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