The Art of Avoidance
Overcoming Fear of Failure and the Hidden Costs of Indecision
Do you ever think about the things you’ve subconsciously mastered? The saying it takes ‘10,000 hours of practice to master something’ becomes a little alarming when you realize how much practice you’ve had at things you might not want to be good at.
Avoidance is an art form many of us have mastered - a set of skills honed over hours of subconscious practice.
Our brains love to categorize and create shortcuts to conclusions. It hums along silently creating thinking habits in the name of efficiency and not bothering to discriminate between what is positively or negatively impacting our experiences.
What are we avoiding and why?
There is a lot we could unpack here, avoiding tasks and realities based on fatigue, discipline, and overwhelm. But in my project and program management career and my coaching practice it’s avoidance rooted in fear that has mattered most.
Fear of what exactly?
Avoidance shields us from the negative outcomes our brains have mastered predicting.
We play out negative scenarios in our minds as if they are real, and our bodies struggle to differentiate between what is a real vs. imagined threat. Over time, like the rings of a tree, we grow layers of protection and reinforce fears whether we actually experience negative outcomes or not. It’s like hurting yourself before you can get hurt.
There are two fear-driven avoidance scenarios I coach most commonly.
Fear of Failure
Why do so many perfectionists and high-achievers suffer from avoidance and procrastination? Because avoidance can be a mutated form of control. A shield against unknown outcomes. You can’t fail at a task you haven’t tried. Over and over, we choose the comfort of familiarity over the unknown, even when what’s familiar doesn’t really feel good. Have you heard the saying, “If you wait until you’re ready, you’ll be waiting for the rest of your life”? A friend recently described this as not wanting to go to the gym until you are already in shape.
This self-protection acts like padding, keeping us safe but unable to change shape.
Fear of Making the Wrong Decision
We put an unreasonable amount of pressure on our decisions. But a single decision can change your life, Kerrie! Yes and no. Let’s demystify that a bit. Is it the decision itself or the actions you take after you’ve made it that matter most?
Why does that distinction matter? A decision is like a seed being planted (initiation). It requires water to be transformative (action). And once it’s grown into a plant, you have to tend to the weeds around it - it may even outgrow where you planted it and have to be moved (adaptation). Decisions initiate, actions create, and adaptations maintain momentum.
Exhausting yourself over which option to choose leaves you with no energy to focus on the most labor-intensive and impactful part of the process - the actions to take, and adaptations to make.
Things to Consider in the Journey to Overcome:
Fear of Failure
Is the comfort of staying the same worth the price of not growing?
How is fear of trying something handicapping the full power of your abilities? What about the full power of how you show up in your relationships?
The desire to control can be an expression of trying to ‘protect’ or shield ourselves. What are you protecting yourself from? How could you provide yourself with a consistent sense of safety and love instead?
Does unhappiness come from a situation or event? Or does it come from the thoughts we engage in around the situation or event? If we are the ones determining how an outcome feels, what is there to fear in the outcome itself?
Fear of Making the Wrong Decision
We weigh the costs of making a ‘wrong’ decision, but what is indecision costing you? In time? In missed opportunities?
You’ll never control the outcome. But you control the choices you make and the actions you take. They either put you closer to where you want to be or further away.
Annie Duke’s book Thinking in Bets has some great distinctions about decision-making:
The results of our decisions aren’t necessarily a reflection of the quality of the decision - we can’t control outcomes. A well-informed ‘good’ decision can still have an unexpected or ‘bad’ outcome. And a bad decision can have an unexpected ‘good’ outcome.
It’s good to think through the possible negative outcomes of your goals, but focus on how to improve your overall likelihood of success. Imagine that you failed to reach your goals, and then why - it allows anticipation and accounting for potential obstacles so you can make relevant/actionable plans to address them proactively.
Hold Eye Contact with Your Life
What we are avoiding is exactly what we need to be facing if we want to overcome obstacles on the road to our deepest goals. Fear is like an empowerment leak detection system. Fear is behind everything that disempowers us. I’d challenge you to think of fear less as an opposing force you have to fight, and more as a guide showing you where there is work to be done. Fear is just a feeling, a response. It doesn’t define who you are, and it doesn’t have to dictate your decisions - it shows you where you have one you need to make.
Want to go deeper? Learn about ways to work with me.
Takeaways + Tools + Prompts
Tools for making better decisions, faster:
Work backward from a clear end goal. Then you can frame each choice in terms of whether it moves you closer or further away from that vision.
Limit your options. Endlessly seeking additional information is a CLASSIC avoidance trap that you could spend the rest of your life in.
Seek input only from those who can provide you actual value with their feedback, and don’t wait for them to all agree.
Own the decisions you make - especially if you are a leader. People’s trust in your decision-making has more to do with ownership than with you being right.
Consider both the long and short-term impacts, but accept that you can’t anticipate everything.
Give yourself the advice you would give a friend.
Let the level of risk involved be your guide for how conservative you need to be in the speed of your decision-making.
The real value of decision-making and planning is to create momentum and to think strategically. The plan itself matters less than the process of planning. The goal of planning isn’t to make a perfect plan that never changes. It’s to define clearly what you want so you make informed decisions along the way about what will move you closer - or further away - from what you want. It doesn’t create perfection - it creates the preparation needed to handle the inevitable obstacles that will pop up along the way.
Demystify the power of a decision. It is a step in a larger process. Not THE process. Seed, water, weed - initiation, action, adaptation. Make a decision. Make a plan to make it a reality. Then don’t be afraid to adjust it.
Closing your eyes and hoping things will work themselves out is a great recipe for waking up in 5 years, wondering why you feel so frustrated and powerless to change things.
The saying “hell is a hallway” refers to the idea that the hardest place to be is the space where you know life has fundamentally changed, but you don’t know yet where you’re going next. Which door you choose matters less than going through one to get to a place where you can start taking action and adapting as needed. Start opening doors.
Creative Project Prompt
Create a Transformation Timeline of your personal growth and major milestones (this could be written, typed, drawn, painted, collaged, or made of objects). Highlight key moments that led to significant changes in your life. Consider the decisions you made, actions you took, and adaptations you made along the way.
Meditative Prompt
Dedicate a space in or near your home for meditation activities and/or relaxation. Share before and after photos and explain how this space contributes to your well-being.
Gratitude Prompt
Consider writing these out for yourself and saying them out loud.
I am grateful to have this existence even when I am unsure of what to do with it.
I am grateful for the opportunities to face my fears and ask for guidance in kindness to myself in the process.
I am grateful that I own my happiness through how I respond rather than my circumstances.
I am grateful to be open to what I need to hear and understand.
I am grateful for every clear urge I get from the universe and the strength to follow them.
“The goal of planning isn’t to make a perfect plan that never changes. It’s to define clearly what you want so you make informed decisions along the way about what will move you closer - or further away - from what you want. It doesn’t create perfection, it creates the preparation needed to handle the inevitable obstacles that will pop up along the way.”
^Really needed to hear this part today!