Have you ever thought of being successful and then got scared of it all at once? Does the prospect of success fill you with both excitement and dread? Do you look at other successful women wondering what it would feel like to reach your dreams but not quite daring to dream that big?
If you’ve nodded while reading any of the above questions, you’re not alone. As a matter of fact, you’re probably joining the ranks of a majority of brilliant, competent, working women who work hard to make it, yet are well…terrified of succeeding. Counter-intuitive much?
In her famous doctoral studies, Dr. Matina Horner showed the astounding impact of the fear of success on women’s careers (Horner, 1972). Horner describes the motive to avoid success for women within the expectancy-value theory of motivation, as the social stereotype according to which independence, competence, intellectual achievement and competence are viewed as positively related to masculinity and not femininity. As such, there is an expectancy that achievement-related success will arouse negative outcomes for women.
Fear of success is one of the psychological factors that most affects women’s career development (Komalasari, Supartha, Rahyuda, & Dewi, 2017), and discourages them from going after achievements and opportunities. This fear of success in women has been demonstrated in numerous studies (Hoffman, 1974), showing how the threat of affiliative loss affects women’s motivation and attainment of goals. This fear of success is even more acute in non-gender appropriate conditions, such as in professions typically reserved for men (Cherry & Deaux, 1978).
For so many women, success is appealing, yet terrifying. It simultaneously crowns their efforts with both the recognition finally deserved, and the negative perceptions, often leading to rejection and communal disempowerment so feared by women, precisely because of their nurturing and community-oriented nature. This fear manifests itself in commonly known yet not as often suspected forms such as procrastination or self-sabotage.
So how do you fight this so often inherent fear of success as a working woman? Frankly speaking, it’s easier said than done. The fear of success is often ingrained in women as early as in their childhood, along with societal and communal expectations of who and what a woman should be and do. Pushing past these expectations and the related mindsets and self-destructing behaviors requires an intentional decision and journey into understanding oneself, and making peace with one’s purpose and personal path.
If this is a journey you’ve been thinking about, or are currently on, here are a few tips to get you started or to continue on your way to ridding yourself of the fear of being successful:
- Change your mind!
Literally! After years of social conditioning and messages all around us about the place and role of women, we seldom realize how much we tend to work against ourselves. Changing your mind to embrace your true desires has to become a constant process of identifying your own negative and self-defeating patterns, and replace them with positive ones.
- Normalize defining success on your own terms
What is success, really? My favorite quote about success is from Dr. Maya Angelou: “Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.” After years of subscribing to other well-intentioned people’s definition of success, it took me a long while to discover what success truly meant for me. Once I did, I was no longer afraid of someone else’s ethereal, impersonal definition of success. Rather, I started feeling emboldened to bring my own vision of success to life.
- Practice being unapologetic about what you want
I used to want to apologize for literally taking space, as if my achieving anything made me indebted to others. With the guilt of achievement, often comes the urge to apologize for simply being there. It takes the conscious realization of this, as well as the intentional decision to refrain from being apologetic about what you want.
- Grieve the loss of prior expectations
However, with normalizing success as a working woman, also comes the death of prior expectations from society. These are usually communal expectations of what a “feminine” woman looks like, that have been deeply embedded in the collective psyche over time, such as “girls should be seen and not heard”, or that female success equates the loss of all femininity and societal acceptance. These are also expectations that at some point or another, you may have carried with you, and that you must now allow yourself to grieve.
- Commit to your own personal journey of growth
Last but not least, fighting the fear of success and building confidence as a working woman is not an overnight affair. It’s the journey of a lifetime, one that requires commitment, devotion and most importantly, the blood and sweat of your legacy.
Are you afraid of achieving success as a working woman?
The Corporate Sister.
