How To Overcome Your Fear Of Making Mistakes: 14 Tips That Work

No One Wants To Look Like A Fool

A worried woman sits at a table with her hands on her forehead, looking at a laptop screen. A notebook and pen are on the table beside her. The background features a modern wood-paneled wall.

No one enjoys being teased.

It’s only natural that you’d avoid certain situations out of fear of making a mistake and being laughed at. After all, you are not a clown or comedian. However, lately, this insidious fear of making mistakes has really started to impact your life and hold you back from new opportunities and experiences.

Before, this fear was a minor inconvenience. One that you usually agreed with. Now though, it’s keeping you frozen in indecision or pushing you to procrastinate or shrink away from added responsibilities.

So how do you overcome it? Start by working through these 14 steps.

1. Acknowledge that the fear of making mistakes (or looking foolish) is real.

A man with short brown hair, wearing a checkered shirt and a dark apron, stands thoughtfully by a window with his hand on his chin. He appears to be deep in thought, gazing outside as sunlight streams in through the window.

Ignoring a problem never makes it go away. Burying your head in the sand doesn’t make danger disappear. In fact, the longer you ignore a problem, the worse it gets.

Pretending you don’t have a problem with being perfect and ignoring the fact that you are terrified of making mistakes won’t help you get better.

Rather, turning a blind eye to your perfectionist tendencies and your fear of making mistakes will keep you locked away in your safety net, at best. At worst, it will drive away your partner and your children because as much as you hate imperfection in your life, you despise it in them as well.

Everyone’s got something they’re working through. You’re no different. There’s no reason to be ashamed of being a mere mortal and imperfect.

No one expects you to be perfect. All anyone really wants is for the people in their lives to try their best and continuously work on improving themselves.

We all make mistakes. It’s part of the learning and growing process of life. Mistakes make you more relatable, and more human.

Acknowledge your fear and accept that you are fallible just like the rest of us. Then you can learn new coping skills to deal with it.

You can’t fix what you don’t address.

Address your fears.

2. Don’t fear your fear (or be ashamed of it).

A woman with long, light brown hair is standing indoors. She is wearing a white blouse and holding a black folder and eyeglasses in her left hand. She is gazing off to the side. Green-framed windows can be seen in the background.

As stated above, everyone has something they’re dealing with. For some people, their demons or challenges are obvious for everyone to see. Other people are battling private issues, ones not easily seen by others.

All we can do is strive to be better and do better, whatever challenge comes our way.

Don’t be afraid to admit that you have a problem or are ashamed to ask for help.

Shame will only push you to hide your problems. It will force you to deny your issues. Shame will never encourage you to confront it or seek help.

It might surprise you how understanding people can be when you open up and give them a glimpse of the real you to them.

3. Identify the thing that underpins your fear.

A woman with long dark hair sits on a gray couch, hugging a dark gray pillow. She appears thoughtful and is gazing off to the side. The background features a white brick wall and partially visible green plant.

Why do you fear making mistakes? What are you afraid might happen if you get something wrong or make a bad decision?

By seeking to answer those questions, you can develop a greater understanding of your fear which will put you in a better position to tackle it.

Is it that making a mess of something leads you to feel that you’re “not good enough” in a wider sense?

Do you not want to disappoint or upset others by getting something wrong because their opinion of you matters a lot to you?

Do you seek to avoid mistakes at all costs because a mistake is proof that you are far from perfect when you want to see yourself as perfect?

Are you worried that making a mistake will get you in trouble? Or that a bad decision or wrong choice will have negative consequences in the long term?

Or does criticism feel so hurtful to you (even if it’s delivered constructively) that you seek to avoid making mistakes so that no criticism is ever forthcoming?

4. Identify your triggers.

A man with a beard and short hair is gazing out of a window with a thoughtful expression. He is wearing a dark shirt, and the background shows a blurred indoor setting with natural light coming through the windows.

What sends you down the spiral of perfection? What situations cause you to check, recheck, and triple-check your work, certain there is a mistake you’re overlooking? Is it a particular person’s backhanded comments or comparisons?

Are you in an environment that treats mistakes harshly? Have you surrounded yourself with a hypercritical “support” group? Were you raised in a household where your parents or caregivers punished anything less than perfect?

Identify what triggers your fear. When you’re able to do that, then figure out how to deal with the triggers when they show up.

For example, perhaps in your childhood no one celebrated effort and anything less than an “A” was not good enough. If you can’t see the impact of your upbringing and how it has triggered your ongoing fear of messing up, you are likely going to pass on such lessons to your children.

However, if you can view your upbringing (and possibly your ongoing relationship with your parents) as your trigger, you will be able to start working on learning how to override the negative lessons you picked up so your children don’t suffer as you did.

5. Develop emotional agility skills.

A young woman with long brown hair is resting her chin on her hand, appearing contemplative or uncertain. She is wearing a light green short-sleeved top and gazing slightly to the side. The background is out of focus.

Emotional agility refers to your ability to be aware and in tune with your emotions. According to Psychologist Susan David, PhD, a lecturer at Harvard Medical School, during her interview with Knowledge at Wharton, emotional agility is the ability to be with your thoughts, emotions, and stories. You are not trying to suppress or control them.

Rather, you’re working with your thoughts, emotions, and feelings. You don’t see your emotions as either good (happiness, love, joy, peace) or bad (angry, sad, ashamed). With emotional agility, you embrace all your emotions and view them as important sources of information to learn about your internal processes and patterns without being overpowered by them.

Regarding the fear of making mistakes, when you employ emotional agility with the challenge you’re afraid of, instead of being paralyzed or overcome by the fear, you are evaluating and learning from your internal processes and patterns to understand what you’re afraid of and why. You’re not trying to change it or control it.

Emotional agility helps you to be more decisive. Instead of being stuck in your fear, and unable to move forward, you apply the skills of emotional agility. You note your emotions, label your thoughts and feelings, and learn about yourself from them.

For example, let’s say you’re in a situation where you are feeling agitated and not acting like your usual self. You note and label your feelings, perhaps it’s anxiety. Next, you accept your feelings and say what you’re feeling out loud.

This will help you to diffuse your tumultuous emotions. Remember, you’re not trying to ignore or control or stop your emotions. You’re not trying to make yourself feel better. You are accepting the way you feel without judgment and feeling those emotions.

Then you look at your internal processes and patterns to figure out why you’re feeling that way and how to respond in a way that is consistent with your long-term values and intentions.

6. Work on your processes.

Three students sit at tables, each with a paper cup beside them, looking attentive and engaged. The setting appears to be a modern classroom or study area with additional people in the background. The walls and furniture are contemporary in style.

In any given situation, the only thing you can control is your systems and processes. The outcome is out of your control. You can ensure that you study for your exam, but you can’t guarantee that you’ll pass the test.

You can follow all the steps to make the right decision, but you can’t be certain the decision you make will succeed. Some things are just outside of your control. The result of a decision is one of those things that we cannot guarantee, no matter how hard we try.

So, focus on the areas that are within your power to manipulate, change, or control. Focus on your processes.

For example, you can make sure you have all the knowledge and information necessary to be the best parent you can be. You can spend time with your kids and teach them right from wrong. You may do everything right when it comes to being a parent.

Ultimately, whether your children turn out okay, is up to them. It’s outside of your control. Focus on being a great parent.

7. Reduce the focus of your thoughts.

A woman in a black and white checkered dress leans against a railing on a bridge, gazing out over a river with large buildings in the background. She appears relaxed and content, enjoying the urban scenery on a sunny day.

When we worry about a challenge, our thoughts get hyper-focused on the issue. Our thinking becomes narrow, as we ruminate on all the ways things can go wrong. In a frenzy, we get wrapped up in dreaming up worse-case scenarios, which are most likely blown completely out of proportion. Never stopping to consider possible solutions.

On the other hand, we could be thinking of possible solutions, but because we’re so afraid of making a mistake, we miss glaring ones.

When faced with a situation where you are afraid you are going to make a mistake, you need to separate your emotions from the problem at hand. You need to put your fear aside because it will not help you think clearly or see properly.

Emotionally distance yourself from the challenge so you can broaden your thinking. Like a camera lens that is zoomed in to focus on a tiny object somewhere in the distance, zoom out so you can see what else is happening around the object and even in the background.

You could ask for other people’s input on the situation or read articles or books that address the challenge you are facing. Broadening your thinking might require you to take a step back from the situation for a better view.

8. Pursue leisure and rest.

When we’re worried about making a mistake in a particular situation that we cannot avoid, we are more than likely to obsess over it. We brood over all the possible things that could go wrong, dream about possible catastrophic outcomes, and work ourselves to the bone to mitigate any potential negative outcome.

This can only lead to exhaustion and burnout. Not to mention that by being hyper-focused on the problem, we are more inclined to miss obvious solutions or make glaring mistakes.

This is when leisure and rest are especially important.

Leisure is a valuable tool for helping people create distance when they are too emotionally vested in a situation. With leisure and proper rest, we can calm down and see things through a clearer lens. Our brains can take a break and better process information when we spend time in recreation and sleeping. This helps us subconsciously organize our thoughts, see blind spots, and think more clearly and creatively.

Have you ever been out on a run (or doing some sort of exercise) not even thinking about a problem at work, only to come up with the solution out of the blue? Or maybe while you’re brushing your teeth, after a good night’s rest, you finally come up with a great idea for the challenge you’re facing?

The problem or issue most likely was not on your mind at all. But in your subconscious, your brain kept working on it. Seemingly out of thin air, boom! A solution falls into your lap. One so simple that you wonder why you didn’t think about it before.

That’s the benefit of leisure and adequate rest.

Leisure helps you to take a step back from the problem. This, in turn, helps you to broaden your thinking and allows you to see your blind spots or consider aspects you weren’t thinking about before.

If you have been obsessing about a potential problem, take time off for leisure and rest. Then look at the challenge again with fresh and well-rested eyes.

9. Stop overanalyzing the situation.

A young woman with curly red hair sits on a couch, hugging a fluffy pillow and looking pensive. She is surrounded by a cozy living room with bookshelves and warm lighting in the background, creating a comfortable and contemplative atmosphere.

Extreme emotions make us act in ways we normally wouldn’t. When we’re furious, we may lash out and say things we don’t mean or wouldn’t normally say. If we’re head over heels in love with someone, we might behave in romantic ways we wouldn’t have thought we could.

When we’re afraid of making a mistake, we panic, become agitated, and start behaving in frenetic or even offensive ways.

A particular behavior we may exhibit when afraid of making mistakes is getting stuck in information overload. We read all the available books and blog posts regarding what we are concerned about. We might check and double-check our work, scouring it for mistakes, picking apart anything that doesn’t meet our high standard of perfection. There’s a chance we’d comb obsessively through social media looking for information on what we’re fixated on.

All of these activities only serve to cloud our judgment and fill us with even more fear. When there is too much information or input from different sources, our minds become clouded. This keeps us from being able to make the right decision or even any decision at all. The enormous amount of information keeps us trapped in analysis paralysis.

Our flawed methods of coping with the fear of making mistakes make us more prone to making the mistakes that we fear.

What you really need to do is stop.

Detach from the noise (or information) that you’re filling your mind up with concerning the challenge before you. You have enough information to decide or take a step out of your comfort zone. That book will not teach anything you don’t already know.

Stop over-monitoring, micromanaging, and over-checking. Let your brain rest from the information overload.

10. Change your mindset about making a mistake.

A person with shoulder-length blonde hair, wearing a brown sweater, sits at a desk in front of a computer. They are resting their head on their clasped hands, appearing deep in thought. There is a potted cactus and a desk lamp on the desk nearby.

The only way you can truly learn is by making a mistake (or a bunch of them). Our educational system is supposed to be about providing a safe and conducive environment for people to make mistakes while they are learning new concepts.

For example, after learning how to do long division in class, the student shows his/her understanding of the lesson by completing the homework assignment. When the student submits the assignment, the teacher reviews it to confirm that the student truly grasped the concepts that were taught.

If not, perhaps the teacher gives additional assignments or spends more time teaching the topic. If the student immediately grasps the concept and does not make any mistakes, the material may be too easy for him/her. Maybe the teacher will consider giving the student more challenging work.

But if the student makes some mistakes, when he goes over the assignment, he can see where he went wrong and learn a better way of resolving the problem. Learning from your mistake is a life skill that everyone should try to develop.

Unfortunately, many children were punished for making mistakes and were taught to fear the possibility of being wrong.

If you want to learn something, embrace making mistakes. That’s how you’ll learn better ways of doing things.

An added benefit of embracing a positive mindset toward making mistakes is that it makes you a more compassionate person. If you struggle with reading, for example, but have been able to learn from your mistakes and overcome this challenge, when you see someone struggling with it, you are more patient and understanding, and perhaps even willing to teach them how to overcome it as well.

11. Find a better support system.

Three people are gathered around a foosball table in an office setting. One person is wearing glasses, leaning forward and smiling, while the other, in a red jacket, is standing and concentrating on the game. The office has white desks and computers in the background.

Making friends as adults is pretty challenging for most people. Don’t worry, the problem isn’t with you. The issue is that as we grow older and gain more responsibilities, scheduling time to socialize gets put on the back burner. So we keep the friends we’ve had for years.

Often, these relationships do not support our current mindset, lifestyle, or general well-being. But we keep these people around because…making friends is really hard.

Your family could even be the reason you continue to wallow in fear. Do they constantly bring up your past mistakes? Or perhaps if you discuss a decision you are considering with them, they tell you all the ways it could go wrong?

Find a support group that stretches you or encourages you to step out of your comfort zone. Look for people who are striving to make a difference in an area you are interested in. If you’re considering starting your own business, find a group of other business owners. Being around them and interacting with them will give you the motivation and encouragement you need to do what you fear.

Everyone needs a support system. Find one that supports you where you’re at and encourages you to be better.

12. Give yourself an “A” for effort.

A young woman with dark hair tied back is sitting on the grass near a body of water. She is wearing a teal sports bra and gray leggings. Her gaze is directed slightly to the side, and she appears calm and relaxed. The background includes a swan in the water.

Even if you made a mistake and everything got screwed up, you still learned something. You took a chance. Unfortunately, it didn’t pan out the way you would have liked. But you tried.

Give yourself an “A” for effort.

Celebrate the fact that you did something instead of shirking away or being stuck in uncertainty. Pat yourself on the back for learning a new way of not doing something. At least now, you know what you should avoid. If you’re going to do this again, you know what not to do.

You’ve become experienced. That’s more than what others who haven’t done it before know.

If you try running for the first time and feel self-conscious because you’re moving so slowly, remember that you’re still moving faster than the person who hasn’t gotten off their couch.

Give yourself an “A” for improving.

13. Remember: you’ve done it before and you can do it again.

A woman with curly hair sits in a cozy cafe, holding a cup and gazing out the window. She wears a black T-shirt and jeans, relaxed against a brown cushioned bench. The brick wall and wooden table add to the warm ambiance.

When you start to spiral into the vortex of fear, remind yourself of your past accomplishments. Remind yourself of past challenges you’ve faced and overcome. Remember the times when you made a decision, and you weren’t wrong.

If the “best predictor of future performance is past behavior,” then you are likely to repeat a past victory.

You can even start a file that has all your past achievements in it for the times when you’re paralyzed with fear and unable to move forward. Put in that file every positive email you’ve ever received, including the glowing feedback your boss gave you when you completed a project or even a note your high school teacher gave you when you worked really hard on an assignment and got an A.

Anything that makes you feel proud and good about yourself goes into the file to serve as a reminder that you have what it takes to repeat that success.

14. Face fear head-on.

A man in a blue suit sits with his hands clasped together on one of five white chairs against a white wall. He looks slightly upward, appearing anxious or hopeful. The other four chairs are empty, and the floor is a shiny, polished surface.

Sometimes, when all else fails, you’ve just got to face your fears head-on. You’ve got to do it while scared and unsure of yourself. As Franklin D. Roosevelt once said, “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the assessment that something else is more important than fear.”

If your goal is more important than your fear, then you have to grit your teeth and take the leap even though you are terrified and trust that everything will turn out all right. There’s just no way around it.

Even though your knees are knocking, you’re sweating buckets, and your heart is racing, resolve to not let fear win out.

The battle is ongoing…

A man in a black hoodie and gray shorts is leaning on a metal railing outdoors, holding a basketball under his arm. He is gazing into the distance with a thoughtful expression. The background shows a modern building with reflective windows and an urban setting.

One thing we need to keep in the back of our minds is that overcoming the fear of making mistakes is an ongoing battle. It’s not a fight that you win once and for all. It’s one that you will continue to fight every day. However, your capacity will grow and expand as you strive to win and progress against that fear.