> my fear of failure – something I didn’t have a lot of experience with as a child – held me back from making the attempt.
It is the key to understand a mind of a wunderkind, I believe (at least in my own case it was so). It is the reason why parents should not praise their child on being smart. When you are praised on being smart at a child age, when your self-concept is being formed, then "to be smart" becomes a part of self-concept. To be not smart means to fail yourself. The worst part of it: it is a very short-sighted concept, it means that to fit into my self-concept I need not to really be smart, but to look smart.
It is like a mask I need to wear. The mask of a smart man. With a hidden fear of being not as smart as it looks from outside. Sometimes with a panic attacks when mask slips for a second (not the real panic attacks, but pretty close to it).
I remember that being at school I was reluctant to ask my father to help me with math homework. He could explain anything, but I never managed to understand his explanations, he was a terrible teacher. I knew that I couldn't understand him and I knew that he would ask "are you understand now" and I knew that I would be afraid to disappoint my father by my stupidity by admitting that I had understood nothing from his explanations. So I did math homework by myself, even if I struggled to understand how to do it. Even when my mother suggested me to ask my father about it.
That situation was projected to a future. It was hard to overcome fear of asking other (and to inform them that I'm "stupid"), it was hard (it is hard) to work hard when I'm suspecting that I'll fail with that. Even if I'm a little bit unsure about my coming success it would be hard.
I used to think that I just couldn't work hard, but then I realized, that I can work hard, just up to a point when I start to doubt my success.
It is the key to understand a mind of a wunderkind, I believe (at least in my own case it was so). It is the reason why parents should not praise their child on being smart. When you are praised on being smart at a child age, when your self-concept is being formed, then "to be smart" becomes a part of self-concept. To be not smart means to fail yourself. The worst part of it: it is a very short-sighted concept, it means that to fit into my self-concept I need not to really be smart, but to look smart.
It is like a mask I need to wear. The mask of a smart man. With a hidden fear of being not as smart as it looks from outside. Sometimes with a panic attacks when mask slips for a second (not the real panic attacks, but pretty close to it).
I remember that being at school I was reluctant to ask my father to help me with math homework. He could explain anything, but I never managed to understand his explanations, he was a terrible teacher. I knew that I couldn't understand him and I knew that he would ask "are you understand now" and I knew that I would be afraid to disappoint my father by my stupidity by admitting that I had understood nothing from his explanations. So I did math homework by myself, even if I struggled to understand how to do it. Even when my mother suggested me to ask my father about it.
That situation was projected to a future. It was hard to overcome fear of asking other (and to inform them that I'm "stupid"), it was hard (it is hard) to work hard when I'm suspecting that I'll fail with that. Even if I'm a little bit unsure about my coming success it would be hard.
I used to think that I just couldn't work hard, but then I realized, that I can work hard, just up to a point when I start to doubt my success.