Defeating the Fear of Failure
In this episode of the Infinite Gold Podcast, hosts Bree and Anthony Goldner explore the pervasive fear of failure and how it blocks personal and professional growth. They begin by reframing failure as a learning experience rather than a defeat, sharing Bree’s own journey from an esthetician venture to health‑fitness coaching and a real‑estate project, illustrating how each setback was a pivot rather than a loss. The conversation moves into mindset shifts, emphasizing the mantra “it happened for me, not to me,” and the importance of viewing challenges as purposeful lessons. They discuss concrete mental tools—daily positive affirmations, gratitude practices, and the Project 100 “I‑am” statements—to rebuild confidence after setbacks. A three‑step framework (prepare, plan, expect) is introduced, urging listeners to “expect to win” and avoid the self‑fulfilling prophecy of expecting failure. The hosts stress the necessity of taking calculated risks, citing growth‑mindset research (Carol Dweck) and examples from high‑profile entrepreneurs (Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk). Visualization and manifestation are presented as complementary practices that align vision with action. The episode concludes with three “golden nuggets”: act without over‑analyzing, adopt the “it happens for me” perspective, and accept that failure is inevitable but can be harnessed through affirmations and gratitude. Listeners are encouraged to subscribe, follow, and submit further questions.
Chapters
All right, everybody, welcome back to the Infinite Gold Podcast. It's your show hosts, Bree and Anthony Goldner. Babe, how we doing?
Great, great, great.
Yeah, great. Pretty great.
Pretty great.
All right. Today we're going to go deep dive into defeating the fear of failure. We get a lot of questions about that lately, um, about how to combat that and how to let go of the fear from holding you back and taking the next step.
Yeah, that's so good. And why not have the fear of failure on Friday? Fuel.
Yeah.
The 4 Fs, right? You got that? F, failure.
F, failure.
There it is. It's huge. It is literally the thing that's holding everybody back in anything that you're trying to do. And even if you're doing it, if you're not doing it at the level that you can be doing it, it might be that little nagging fear of failure in the back of your mind that's holding you back from that next level. I had an amazing conversation with my boy the other day And the biggest thing is not necessarily the fear of failure, cause that word didn't come forward, but it, in evident, it, it was the fear of failure. It was taking that next step to doing something that possibly doing something else. And if I do that, am I failing on what I'm doing right now? And then am I going to fail on what I'm going for?
No, cause you don't truly, you don't truly fail. You just figure out that it. Wasn't for you.
Oh, okay.
Like that, if, if you knew that you gave it your all in whatever it is that you are attempting, you didn't, you didn't fail. You gave, you gave it your all. You tried your best to have it work for you. And I think because we learned this, you and I had a conversation about it with some previous ventures that I had business-wise. So like when I got my esthetician license and I ventured off into starting that business because I think at the time, you know, I wanted to, I was like, well, I wanna make a business out of this and maybe someday I wanna open up my own salon. No, no. And I think for a while I mentally had thought that I failed at that venture when really I didn't fail. I gave it what I had and I didn't have much for it. I had some passion there and I enjoyed doing it, but it wasn't the driving energy and fuel that got me. Like personal growth and mindset does. So I didn't fail at that. I attempted it and I gave it what I had and what I had wasn't enough. So I didn't fail.
I love that. Another thing I love is you don't feel until you quit. Until you stop.
Yes, quitting. Quitting is the part that's the fa—
that's the failure.
Yeah.
And we don't quit. We don't stop. So it, it goes for you if you're listening to this, if you're working on something and that turns out to not be what, like Bri mentioned, it's not what fuels you. It's not what gives you that fire every single day. By you pivoting, that's another word that our community is really using this year is pivot. You just got to pivot from whatever it is you're working on now to something else. So that doesn't mean you failed on the other thing. That just means you've taken the experiences, you've learned from it. You learn that that's not what I want to do, or that's not what's working for me right now. And we're just going to pivot. To the next thing. And that's what you did with the esthetician. You pivoted.
Yeah.
And then what did you pivot from there?
From there, I want— I, again, I was getting into the coaching realm, and I thought it was health and fitness, which is something that I am very passionate about. However, it's still— I wasn't all the way there. I was getting closer. So we're like, okay, before I was like, okay, we're cold, now we're getting warmer, we're getting warmer. So getting past, getting past that, I'm like, I could still assist in You know, help little by little in that area. Mm-hmm. If someone came to me, cuz I have learned a lot over the years.
Oh yeah.
With my health and fitness, with my own health and fitness journey that I can help. And if it's a, a question that I can't answer, I know plenty of others that I can redirect you to. So that's like the wealth of having a connection and meeting other people and such. But from there, it's, it was going into helping women postpartum with their health and fitness. Oh yeah.
Mindset.
And then I was like, hey, we're getting warmer. Mm-hmm. And it wasn't all the way there. So I was like, well, why limit myself to just helping women when I can help men and women? I want to be able to help as many people as I can. I've always known in my heart that I wanted to help people. And for the longest time, I didn't know what that vehicle looked like until now.
So, so did you fail?
No, I didn't fail. It was, it was a lot of trial and error. And that's, that's part of it. You're not failing. You're just seeing what's working for you and what's not.
Yes.
And the other part is I, I hear a lot of people say, well, like, oh, I tried this for 3 months, 6 months. Oh, I tried it for a year or 3 years and it just didn't work for me. Okay.
Mm-hmm.
Did you want to, especially I'm hearing a lot with businesses and entrepreneurs, the first 5 to 10 years are the hardest fucking years.
Oh yeah.
They're not easy. Like we're still in the first year of our, our business. Mm-hmm. Like, We're just barely scratching the surface.
Oh yeah.
We've got a long ways to go, but it's a, it's a road that I'm still, I'm so excited for, but we're, you know, we're, we're not getting so caught up in what the future is going to look like that. Cause we're focusing on being present now and providing the value now that we have and just continue to grow from there. But when people are giving up on that stuff, they're like, oh, it didn't work for me. Okay. You didn't fail. You just, you worked out, you tried, but you realize that it wasn't for it, it really wasn't for you. It truly wasn't for you. Or maybe you didn't work hard enough for it.
That's, that's a good point right there is, cuz you touched on it where some people are like, oh, my business didn't take off like I thought it was going to in the first 30 days. Or like, I didn't lose the 30 pounds in 30 days like, like they said they were gonna happen. It's like, okay, well for starters, you're grasping too much that you can chew on right now because it's not gonna happen overnight. It's not gonna happen in 3 months, 6 months, a year. It's gonna happen when it's gonna happen. And then also how much work are you putting into it? Like if you're not going full boat, if you're not going the final percent in it, in everything that you're doing right now, well, you can't expect it to happen. So that's the, that's the thing is really you need to find out what it is. Is it the fear of failure? Is it the fear of not accomplishing it? Or is it the idea that you wanted it to happen in a day and it did not happen in a day? Like you really got to dive into what it is that's kind of going on with your mindset. In this given time.
The other thing that I just thought of too, is that I think there's people out there that aren't just fearing failure of whatever that thing is that they're trying, that if it doesn't work out and they're like, oh, well, I failed at this. No, I think on a deeper level is I'm afraid of what's next. Like if I don't know what the next step is, where do I go from here? If this fails, that is good. As if they're like, oh, this is why you need to have a plan B. Well, okay. Plan B is more of like a security blanket, if you will, to fall back on, but you don't want to have that to expect that you're going to fall back into it because then you're expecting to fail.
There it is.
You can't expect to fail because then it will happen.
100%. It's going to.
What you have to expect or what you can plan for is you can plan to win. You can plan to win. And then if you fall a little short of that, Well, at least you got closer to winning than you did to falling into failing.
In the final percent, we talk about prepare, plan, expect. Prepare by going the final percent. Prepare like you need to cross all your T's, dot all your I's, and you need to plan accordingly on what's going to happen. And if you're going to plan for multiple avenues, that's fine. You can plan for multiple avenues, but then you need to expect to win. Don't expect to fail A that you have to do B. Don't, don't. Expect that you're gonna fail A and B, so that's why you have C. No, you have those planned out in case those happen so you could pivot to them, but those aren't where your driving force is. Driving force is going to final proctology exam on whatever it is right this exact second that you're doing. And I love how you talked about the fear of failure on the aspect of it's in your mindset. We gotta get rid of that completely.
Yeah. Well, it's, you might not even be saying like, oh, I think I'm gonna fail at this. Yeah. But if you're thinking it, it initially is going to end up coming out, and then your actions are going to follow that, correct?
Yeah, that's so good.
So you have to start telling yourself, I'm gonna win. Yep, I'm gonna succeed. I'm a badass. There it is. Yep, I know I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna give it my all at every shot that I get. When opportunity comes, I'm gonna take it.
Yep, and we're gonna get there.
And you're gonna get there. Yeah, it might not look like sunshine and rainbows in the process. It might not look perfect, but at least you're on that track. Yes. And The, the journey to success isn't meant to look pretty. It's not meant to look perfect.
It's not going to.
It's not going to. And the thing is, people are like, well, I don't want to fail. I want to be able to succeed. Failure is part of the process. It is part of the equation. If you're not failing on your way to success, you're not truly successful.
Which kind of leads into that first question, right?
Yes.
So what was that first question?
First question, because we've been having— again, we've had people asking us questions and this revolved around failure and said, how do you turn your failure into success? Well, in success itself, there is failure. There's multiple failures.
There's more failures than successes.
There's more failures than successes on the way. It was like the concept that we talked about. You're gonna get more nos and more doors closed in your face than you will have yeses and open doors. But you gotta get those reps in of all the nos. And of all those doors in your face, face it, to get, you know, they get to the yes and you can't give up on it. Oh, I've gotten 100 nos. Well, what do you think is going to happen if maybe you get to 101? That's pro— it could be your yes. You never know. So you got to keep trying.
It's like that meme that has gone around and it goes in waves. You see it and then you don't, of the miner.
Yeah.
Where the top miner, stops halfway and the diamond, or not halfway, but the diamond is literally 2 more steps away. And then versus the other guy who just keeps going, like you need to keep going. You hit 1,000 failures, you hit 100, 1,000 nos, like you need to go that next step. Thomas Edison didn't create the light bulb with 1,000 failures. It was well over 10,000. But if he didn't, if he stopped, would we have light? Yeah, probably eventually, but not nearly as soon as We have it to today and you need to just push through no matter what. That's basically what it comes down to is you're going to fail. You're going to have these tribulations and it's those that get you to the next level. Hormozy talks about it as well, is fail now when the cost and the price is low.
Yes. Oh my gosh.
Like, so right now you're just starting that business. You're just starting that hobby. Think that, oh my gosh, I just lost $500. Well, think that. That's all you lost.
Yeah, you're like, that's all I lost.
That's all I lost.
You're like, it could, you know, hundreds of thousands, hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Like, let's say right now you're making those mistakes, you're, you're making those quote-unquote failures towards success, and that business deal that you thought you were going to get, the, um, distribution company that you thought you were going to partner with, and all of those, maybe you're losing $5,000, $10,000, $20,000 on these kind of like our masterminds. We've joined multiple masterminds to find the one that we need. Those are just thousands of dollars, but you make those thousands of dollars mistakes now before your business, before your life is worth millions of dollars. Now you could be making millions of dollars of mistakes. So use this to your benefit that, whoo, that was only $10,000 loss, could have been $10 million.
Project, our real estate project in Westlake, that, that was a big learning lesson. We're glad that we learned it now rather than waiting til later on.
Yeah. Until we're doing a 100 apartment complex where the stakes are much higher.
Yeah. We, again, it was, we chalked it up as a learning experience and we're like, okay, it kind of sucked to learn all of this at once, but we got it out of the way and now we know, you know, the laundry list of things, what not to do and what to do differently. So that I think, you know, that helps you like it when you, when you can learn all of the hard things in the beginning and get it out of the way, it makes things much easier later on.
So think about that.
Yeah, because then you know how to handle it when it does come your way and you're like, you don't look at it as an obstacle. You'd be like, I've done this. This is an opportunity for me to grow, an opportunity for me to learn something else that's going to help me do something differently or do something better.
So think about that. If the failure word or mindset creeps in your mind, think of it as more of a learning experience to get you to that next level, to get you to that future that you dream of. Don't think of it as a negativity. Think of it as more of a positive idea in your brain.
Yeah. And I actually have something I saw on social media just this past week that Jocko posted, and I loved this. He's like, life is like— they're like burpee. Life is like burpees. Life's like burpees. You fall down, you get back up. You fall down, you get back up. You fall down, you get back up again. That's all that it is. Doesn't matter how hard you fall, as long as you get back up.
Yep. He also has the great saying, it hurts, good. Yeah, it sucks, good. Good. Are you still alive? Yeah. You still chugging along? Yeah. All right, good. Keep moving, keep going forward. Beautiful.
He shares a lot of really good shit.
Yeah, follow him. There's a plug for you. All right, what do we got for number— question number 2?
Question number 2, um, was how do you build confidence after failing?
Oh, so this is so good.
That's a hard one. It's like you feel like you failed and you feel like you got a knife in your heart. How do you take it out?
So one of our core values, the We Are Gold core values, one of them is resilience. And that falls within that also is grit. It's not going to come overnight and it's not going to come with your first failure, your second, third. It's going to be hard. You need to just— one thing I think that's benefited me is positive affirmations and gratitude.
Yes.
Those two have been like probably the biggest tools for me. And a lot of when I do that is you need to find out what works for you, whether it's a morning routine, evening routine, and we've got blueprints for all of those. Definitely follow, stay tuned because all that free material will be coming out here very shortly. But put in positive affirmations and gratitude at some point throughout your day, and/or put it multiple times if you need it. For me, it's being grateful for what I have right now.
Mm-hmm.
So a lot of times is if I don't get what I want right away, like I don't get my six-pack abs in 30 days, I don't get the million dollars, uh, tomorrow if I don't have my ranch out in, uh, Tennessee or wherever it's gonna be, if I don't have my private jet, like these are all things I want. Like it's on our vision board behind us, our private jet, our ranch, our helicopter, our Ford Broncos, old school, not these new school crappy ones, the vintage ones. They're on our board. Do I want them? Do I want them tomorrow? Yeah, I do. Do I want them right now? Yes. So what do I got to do if I'm failing along the way to get there? Because it's going to happen. Is I practice positive affirmations that I can do this. I am strong. Actually, part of our Project 100 right now, which again, if you're not doing Project 100, you really need to do it. Check out thefinalpercent.com, join the app. It is free. Join Project 100. But what we're doing right now on our level 3 side of it is we are doing I am statements every single day. We're writing down every single one of them. So at the end, we're going to have 33 I am statements. These are what's going to get you past those failures. These are what's going to get you past those roadblocks, those obstacles. I am, like you say, I am a badass. I am a mom. I am strong. I am resilient. I am— I have grit. Any affirmation that you could think of that's going to help you get past that is going to prolong the effects of failed. Yes, it's going to suck at the beginning. You're going to feel that illness. And then gratitude, just being grateful for what you have right now. Yeah, you might have failed on that business deal, you might have failed on that house, but you still have a house over your head. You still have a beautiful family, beautiful wife, beautiful kids. It might be a pain in the butt sometimes because they're toddlers. Um, but we love them. They're healthy. So I'm grateful for them. Those are the two things that I do if I run into a failure, if I run into an obstacle, or if I don't get what I want right away, those are my two biggest takes on that.
Yeah. Now, and the other, the other switch I feel like you have to flip is with your mindset when you come across this said failure. Look at it as it happened for me, not to me.
That is so good.
It happened for me. No, there's some circumstances where, yeah, okay, it's shitty, but it happened for me to teach me some sort of a lesson.
Yes.
It might not hit you right then, but you'll realize later on down the road, you'll be like, I see why this happened. You're like, this, this really was meant to happen the way that it did, and this— but meant to happen for me. Not to me.
That is so good.
It's shifting that mindset and, and rewording and relook, you know, looking at things, having a different viewpoint. And again, I talk about this a lot, but it's opening up your perspective and widening your lens.
Oh, that's so good. Write that down if you didn't write that down. All right, I think we've got time for one more question.
Yeah, let's see. So the third one is How to stop being afraid of taking risks.
So for this one, how to stop being afraid to take risks basically comes down to being—
you just have to do it and being okay with failing. Yep.
That's literally what's going to come down to. If you can master those first two questions we talked about, master exactly what Bri just said, is it didn't happen to me, it happened for me, that'll enable your mind to be like, Cool. I can take a risk because it's not going to hurt me, right?
And that's growth mindset.
Oh, right there. Carol Dweck talks about in Mindset— great book, highly recommend you read it, download on Audible, whatever you want to do. And that's what she talks about, is having a fixed mindset versus a growth mindset. If you have a growth mindset and you're always trying to grow, you're always looking at, like Bree said, the perspective, having an open lens of everything that's going on and being open to new things, trying new things, and going and going and going, you're eventually going to get to where you want to be. And no business has been great or started without taking risks.
Yes, that is absolutely true. And you could talk to a number of the greats out there that will tell you, like Ed Mylett.
Yeah. And Andy Frisella. You could talk to Steve Jobs, Inside the Basement. You could talk to Bezos with Amazon. They didn't make any money for like 10 years. It was an Amazon bookstore, Tony Robbins, whether or not you like certain people, Elon Musk, like there's so many people that businesses did not make a dollar and were near bankruptcy for the longest time. And they just kept taking risks. You have to take risks to get to where you truly want to be for that vision board to get to those goals. They're not going to happen from us just being complacent and just being, you know, going with the program. So changing your mindset into understanding what it is you truly want. Actually, that goes into play where you've talked about with your vision, as in you seeing the vision and seeing the dream that you want. If you put that into your mind and you take mental notes daily of where you want to be and the vision that you truly have, that's going to help you take risks because you're going to know, well, I'm trying to get to there. I can't get to there what I'm doing right now. So I have to take that risk. I have to put my foot in the playing field and try it.
Yeah. No, you really have to go, you have to go there mentally. And it was something I practiced with my visualization and I'm struggling to figure out the other word that I was trying to use.
Manifesting.
Yes. That's the word. It started with an M. I knew it. Thanks, babe.
Great minds think alike. We've been together a little bit.
Yeah.
A few years.
He gets me. So yeah, with manifestation and visualization. I did a lot of practicing of that, and I think I was even talking about it on one of our last interviews, was, uh, when I started doing practicing visualization, I was mapping out everything I was wanting out of life and where we wanted to live, down to where we wanted to live, the things that we wanted to have, you know, animals, a ranch, all, all the fancy things, just because we're just like Why the hell not? We worked hard for it. We can treat ourselves to that. We deserve this.
Yes.
It's not, you know, like, you know me, I'm not a very materialistic person. I'm very simple, and the small things in life make me happy. Fucking flowers. Yeah, those things make me happy.
But whether they die in a couple days or not.
Yeah, exactly, exactly. But it was down to all of those things, and in The visualizations that I was having each time effortlessly without me even thinking about it, I started seeing myself speaking on a stage. And if you asked me a year, maybe two, no, not even a year.
I would say a year ago, maybe even 8 months ago.
Okay. A year, a year ago. We'll say that. Year ago, if you asked me or told me that I was going to someday start speaking on stages and be doing a podcast. I'd be like, what are you smoking? What are you smoking? I know marijuana's legal and all, but get back in, get back in the hole that you crawled out of. And yeah, no, you're smoking something.
But here I am, the Aaron Rodgers dark retreat.
God, that's a whole other topic. But it, it was, it just goes to show how when you start like putting things into practice and really diving into what it is that you're passionate about and what you what you find your true calling is in life. I think that was like a sign to me from God and the universe that this is how you're gonna help people. This is where you're meant to be. You have so much power within you and I need you to see it. This is where you, this is where you're going. And I brought that up and I was just like, okay. And I think I even said it during my tactical transformation with Greg. He was like, well, you're standing on a stage right now, aren't you? And right there I was just like, and blow them. And I'm like, okay, yeah, this is true. And before, like, I think I envisioned being on a stage in a different way because of my singing. And that was one of my other avenues that I was kind of after for a bit. And then I realized, oh, you know, it's more of a hobby for me and I really just enjoy doing it. Like, yeah, for a bit I was like, okay, well, what if I could be like the next Carrie Underwood? That'd be fucking awesome.
Yeah.
But I found that that's not where I was needed and necessary. I'm needed and necessary right here, right now, and helping people with their mindset and their personal growth.
Perfect. So, so long story short, stop fearing failure on this Friday Fuel.
But take the chance, take the risk, because sometimes when you take risks, you never know what's going to be on the other side.
Exactly. So babe, 3 golden nuggets from defeating the fear of failure from our podcast episode today.
One, I think, um, don't think too hard about Making the choice and worrying about, should I take this step and worry about the failure of it? Just do it. I know it's easier said than done, but I promise you, once you take that leap of faith, you take that risk, you'll be grateful when you get to the other side of it, because you'll see the possibilities and the opportunities that can come from it. So take, don't be afraid to take the risk because again, risk is part of success. The risk and failure is part of success. Take that into account.
Perfect. What's number 2? That saying you used, it was amazing.
Saying I used?
Yeah.
Which saying? I say a lot of sayings.
I know you do say a lot of sayings, that's for sure.
I got a lot of good sayings.
You do.
But it, you know, it's not all, it doesn't all come from me. I, I have a lot of great mentors and people that I look up to that have shared some knowledge with me.
So it doesn't happen.
Yeah, it doesn't happen overnight.
It doesn't happen to you. It happens for you. That's the other one.
Yeah. Okay, so two. Yeah, things don't happen to me, they happen for me.
Change that mindset in your, in your brain that things aren't happening to you, they're happening for you. And a lot of times, and we say it, and whether or not you're religious or not, God does not put things in your hands that you're not capable of handling. So he's going to put it in your hands, you're going to be capable of overcoming it, and you're going to be better at the end for it.
You want to hit us with the third?
The third one that I'm probably going to have to say is failure is going to happen. It's inevitable.
Not if, but when.
Yes. And it's going to happen when you least expect it and just don't fear it. Use the two tools that have benefited me the most: affirmations and gratitude.
Believe those affirmations too. That's one thing people will go after the affirmations and say all the 'I am this' or 'I am that.' That is so good. But actually believe in them. Yes, believe that. Turn— and then turn from your believing— turn your believing into knowing. Not 'I believe I'm a badass,' 'I know I'm a badass.' And feel it.
Yes, let your body encompass every being and every feeling of that affirmation statement that you use.
Yes.
And You've got a great quote right here that I can see out the corner of my eye. It goes towards— we're going to finalize with this, but prior to that, follow us, like us, subscribe, 5 stars, don't 5 stars, send it to all your friends, Instagram. What are we on here? YouTube, Instagram, all the Apple Podcasts, Spotify. Follow us. If you've got any more questions, we'd love to answer them for you. Any concerns, anything you'd like to bring up, DM us. It's us answering them. It's not somebody else. Um, we'd love to talk to you some more, but we're gonna end with this one quote.
Okay. If it scares you and excites you at the same time, that's your gut telling you to go for it.
Boom!
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