Beyond failures was a talk delivered by speaker Isha Sawant who is a psychotherapist and life
coach at the Institute of Clinical Hypnosis and Related Sciences. The talk was delivered on 12th
April 2019 at our ICHARS centre.

Objectives
Fear of failure is something that keeps most of us away from living the best of our lives and
achieving our life goals. This makes dealing with this fear extremely important otherwise most
of our important goals might be at stake. This 2-hour talk highlighted certain strategies to deal
with this anxiety-provoking fear of failure.

The objectives of this talk included the following:
 Introducing participants to certain strategies that would help them to overcome the fear of
failure
 Helping them to unlock their hidden potential once they have dealt successfully with the fear
 Overcoming reluctance to try new things
 Overcoming low self-esteem and low confidence
 Learning how to effectively reach goals
 Learning how to effectively deal with future obstacles

Target audience
Participants consisted of adults and young adults with a non-psychology background.

Outcome
Most of the times people stop themselves from taking steps towards their goals because of the
fear of failing in their initiatives. It is as if this fear has paralysed them. This way, fear of failure
becomes a significant obstacle that stands between them and their goals.
The outcomes that participants gained from the talk were as follows:
 Developing the ability to view failures as learning lessons
 Breaking down fear-inducing goals into smaller, less intimidating ones.
 Depersonalise their failures
 Developing solution focused coping mechanism

 Managing fear producing thoughts will be easier since they will be taught a technique to do the same

Description
The talk began by introducing participants to the definition of fear of failure. Participants were also told
a story by Sadhguru which revolved around choices. The story aimed to provide participants the
understanding that even after a failure, the choice of whether to sit with the fear of failing again or to
learn something from it and move ahead lies on us. We can always choose the decision of learning and
moving ahead of failures.
Participants were also made to realise that while dealing with the fear of failing is important, this fear is
completely natural and can affect anyone. To do this the speaker introduced participants to certain
causes of this fear like having critical parents, desire to be perfect, past failures etc.
Then they were introduced to certain tips to overcome this fear of failing.
They were informed of the negative effects of social comparison. They were told why it is important to
focus on self-development instead of constantly comparing oneself to others.
Participants were made aware of the difference between emotion-focused coping mechanism,
avoidance focused coping mechanism and solution-focused coping mechanism. They were introduced to
the benefits of developing solution-focused coping mechanism.
They were also taught a really effective technique known as “if..then..” which focuses on changing
thoughts that trigger problematic behaviours. In this case they were taught this technique with the aim of helping them manage their fear producing thoughts. They were informed that they can use this
technique for other issues as well.
All this was followed by an activity taken from expressive art therapy known as a monster activity. In this
activity participants were told to draw a monster first. This monster was referred to as trouble causing
monster who currently is the cause of fear in participants’ life. Then they were told to vent out their
feelings about/on the monster. To do this, they were told to hold the paper in front and say whatever
comes to their mind to the monster. They were told to vent out all their negative thoughts about this
fear producing monster on the paper (the same paper on which they had drawn the most). After this,
they had to tear that paper and throw it. Later, they were given another paper on which they were told
to draw an angel and write positive messages on it. They were then told to take this angel with them.
The angel signified positive energy that would help them to get over the fear now and in the future.

Closure
The talk ended by solving all the queries that they had about the techniques or concepts covered during
the talk. Feedback about the talk was also taken from the participants.