Lower your sights to things you can probably succeed at.

For example, if you’re afraid to go into law because you think you might fail as a lawyer, maybe set a smaller goal to start with, like doing 20 pushups a day.

I started doing 5 minutes a day of meditation (my rule was no reddit until I’d done my 5 minutes). Now I’ve got a streak of 148 days, and I’m up to 9 minutes a day.

And that may not seem like much, but my life has improved radically since 148 days ago.

20 pushups a day could change your life. It could make you the kind of person who might be less likely to fail as a lawyer.

It’s stairs. If you think you can’t step up to the next step, well, make the steps smaller. That’s literally what stairs are: a way to get up over a wall that’s too big to step over, by breaking it down into smaller walls that you can step over.

Your goals should be something you know you can do, but only if you grow a little.

And they should be nearer-term than you’re probably thinking. Becoming a lawyer is, absolute minimum, a three-year process. Most likely it’s more than that, because you need to get other things accomplished first, like getting a stable job, or fixing your health, or going through undergrad, or saving up some money to have a buffer while you study.

So instead of trying to commit and act on a five-year plan, maybe make yourself a one-month plan.

1% improvement per day. Just strive to do something 1% better than yesterday. A little bit of pushing, just for today.

Afraid to commit to cleaning your apartment? Clean one windowsill.

Break it up into smaller pieces, and allot short time spans to them on a bit of a schedule so you already have time set aside to spend on them.

Accept that "sucking at something is the first step to mastery" and just get on with it. I recently took up drawing based on a few artists who I watch on Picarto. I haven't drawn since kindergarten and the results are laughably bad, but they are a START.

The only way to get better at something is to accept that you are NOT good to begin with. No one is born speaking their native language. It takes years to speak properly and yet it comes naturally with time.

Be willing to laugh at your mistakes and then be amazed as you see yourself getting better with time!

The concept of "fail" is odd

In weight lifting "going till failure" is how you produce gains.

In military strategy, probing your enemies strategic points with your offense is testing your strengths against their defense.

Artists can't see work as failures If taking risks has value

Just from my personal experience, trying and failing is much easier to deal with than regretting not trying at all. Took me a long time to realize that.

Accept that you’re going to fail many times regardless.

I deal with this daily as well , no matter how small the task I procrastinate. What’s helped me is just saying fuck it and doing it , Depression is in the past/anxiety in the future/ peace in the present . Stay in the present you got this

Redefine failure as a learning experience, a chance for you to grow and improve. Not saying thats an easy thing to do but if you practice youll get it

Make plan B. So if you fail, how will you handle it and move forward.

The best experiences in life are on the other side of fear. If you haven’t read “The Man in the Arena” quote by Teddy Roosevelt, you should. It is not the critic who counts….