The Fear of failing

Article written on 10/03/2007

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Does it excite you when you know that what you have achieved is better than any Afghan ever has? Or do you dream of such a position?

Before I begin, I would like to say that if you have achieved something so good then, you are not alone in feeling the pride, every Afghan is proud of you and if you are aiming to achieve such a position then we will be proud of when you get there and are proud of you now for trying.
Ok here we go:

When I was in my second year of University, we were required to apply for jobs as our part of our degree program. It wasn’t compulsory but it was recommended that we did so.

I was hesitant like many other students. If I went for an industrial work placement then that would mean I get a years worth of valuable experience. Which inevitably will stand me in good stead when I apply for permanent jobs.

However, if I didn’t go for the year placement then I would graduate a year early, which could also be a bonus.

Being confused, I still applied for jobs, just to fool myself that I tried and I didn’t get one. There was also a confidence issue, I thought no one would give me a job so I had admitted defeat before even trying.

I went for a couple of interviews but was unsuccessful as I alreadypredicted. Then I got a call from Intel Corporation for an interview. It was in the middle of my exams and as I was already disappointed by getting rejected by small companies and hereis a company that dominates the computer industry by an enormous share of 80% in the PC processors. I thought I didn’t stand a chance.
I then heard one of my Greek classmates who had already been accepted by them that there are no Afghans in the company. He also said it with sarcasm that he is not surprised, all Afghans know is how to blow themselves up, nothing more.

It may have been intended to be sarcasm by him but it hurt me like being hit by a bullet. I decided I was going to prove him wrong by not just going to the interview but getting the position as well.

It was that determination that helped me find time to prepare so well for the interview despite being in the middle of my exams that I got a job offer a day after the interview. It took nearly two months for the funny guy to hear back after his interview.

As you can guess, I was pretty excited to be starting a job at such a prestigious company but it didn’t last more than a week. I started to realise how low my aims were but that was not what bugged me. The fact that when I was scared of failing, I failed and as soon as soon as I overcome that fear, the failure just saw itself out of the door.

Fear of failing can be the biggest obstacle in the way of your success. Get over it and the rest will just follow. No failure is a failure, until you accept it. Every time you think you have failed has actually been a blessing with a wealth of life experience. It makes you see things you wouldn’t have even noticed had you passed the first time. Try again and again, until you achieve what you want to achieve and in the process you will learn so many more things and achieve so much more than you expected.

All of us use post it notes because they are so good, they stick but you can remove them easily and they don’t leave a mark. You can stick them on anything, paper, glass, plastic, wall, etc. A genius invention and you know where it came from.. you guessed it.. from a failure that was turned into success. The company was actually trying to create a super glue and got the weakest glue in return but they didn’t call it a failure. They turned the story around and made it a bigger success than that supper glue they were trying to make could ever take them.

So, if you want to do some thing, just do it. Don’t think about the consequences or the end result because what ever, it is going to be will be for the better. Just don’t do silly things like slapping a stranger because the consequences may not be in your favour :)

All the best!