growth on Fear of Failure

In an essay on friendship, the renowned poet Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “My entire success, such as it is, is composed of particular failures.” There’s a deep truth in that line—one many of us need to...

Fear and growth go together like macaroni and cheese. It’s a package deal. The decision to grow always involves a choice between risk and comfort. This means that to be a follower of Jesus you must re...

In any given moment, we have two options: to step forward into growth, or to step back into safety. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again.

One saint used to say that she was the type of woman who advances more rapidly when she is drawn by love than when driven by fear. She was perceptive enough to know that we are all that type of person...

Brother Lawrence, a 16th-century Carmelite monk, spent his days scrubbing pots and mending shoes. Largely uneducated, he filled his free time writing letters and notes that, after his death, friends g...

The truth is, that more spiritual progress is made through failure and tears than success and laughter.

G. K. Chesterton said, “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.” Chesterton wasn’t encouraging mediocrity; he was alerting his audience to an important truth: if you wait to do something until you ...

There is no growth without change, no change without fear or loss and no loss without pain.

A Story from the Philokalia A story is told in  The Philokalia  about a young monk who went to an older monk to confess a struggle. The older monk was appalled, telling the young monk that his strugg...

Too often we fail to appreciate that (the) apprehension of God is not only the test of our worship, but also the test of our spiritual growth. A Christian's real development in spiritual life will...

Lord, forgive us for the times when we have chosen safety and comfort over fidelity to you. For the times when following you requires us to stretch, grow, and be challenged, give us courage. Renew our...

Churches, seminaries, and nonprofit organizations are notorious for saying they need change and then resisting the very leader they called to bring it. One of my consulting clients told me that he cal...

Churches, seminaries, and nonprofit organizations are notorious for saying they need change and then resisting the very leader they called to bring it. One of my consulting clients told me that he cal...

The fatal metaphor of progress, which means leaving things behind us, has utterly obscured the real idea of growth, which means leaving things inside us.

Some people find themselves stuck in a rut. Without challenge or new opportunities, they begin to sound like Snoopy from the Peanuts cartoons: “Yesterday I was a dog. Today I’m a dog. Tomorrow I’ll p...

We should not judge people by their peak of excellence; but by the distance they have traveled from the point where they started.

Individual disasters, too, very largely follow upon human choices, our own or those of others. And whether or not they do in a particular case, the situations in which we find ourselves are never as i...

If the amount of energy lost in trying to grow were spent in fulfilling rather the conditions of growth, we should have many more cubits to show for our stature.

Once when my daughter was six and my son was two, my mother-in-law noticed my daughter holding a favorite toy just out of my son’s standing reach, and she gently scolded her for teasing him that way. ...

We're not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.

Faith does not grow in spite of suffering, but through suffering, when hope learns to contradict reality.

The following illustration, taken from Ronald Rolheiser book, The Holy Longing, can be applied to the idea of bad habits, that they often have a way of returning, no matter how hard we try to kill t...

A major problem with a preoccupation with my individual development is that it provides no intrinsic value ‘for you,’ except as an environment for my growth,”

I lust after recognition, I am desperate to win all the little merit badges and trinkets of my profession, and I am of less real use in this world than any good cleaning lady.

One common mistake is assuming that everyone else finds faith easy, while we alone struggle. Yet there is comfort in recognizing that we are not alone in our pursuit of Christ in the midst of a broken...

Too many people hear the word capacity and assume it’s a limitation. They assume their capacity is set—especially if they’re beyond a certain age. People give up on the idea that their capacity or the...

Our problem with following Jesus is we’re trying to be a better version of us, rather than a more accurate reflection of Him.

The mind is seldom quickened to very vigorous operations but by pain, or the dread of pain. We do not disturb ourselves with the detection of fallacies which do us no harm.

Experienced mountaineers have a quiet, regular, short step—on the level it looks petty; but then this step they keep up, on and on as they ascend, whilst the inexperienced townsman hurries along, and ...

He who cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself.