I was watching an episode of “Say Yes to the Dress” on TLC and was saddened to see a beautiful girl go home without a dress because she did not feel like she looked “good enough” in any of the wedding dresses she tried on.

“Have you ever been in one of those moods where you don’t really know what’s wrong, but you feel really irritated with everyone and everything?” (unknown)

Did you know that Walt Disney was told by his former newspaper editor that he ‘lacked in imagination and had no good ideas’, that Oprah Winfrey was fired from her first TV job as an anchor in Baltimore, Sir James Dyson had 5,126 failed prototypes over the course of 15 years before creating a bagless vacuum cleaner worth $4.5 billion and that Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team? These are just a few highly successful people who failed their way to success (Sebastian Kipman, 15 Highly Successful People Who Failed Their Way To Success). Surprising or not each of these successful people did not let their failures get in the way of pursuing their dreams. What about you? Do you let your fear of failure get in the way of personal or professional opportunities in your life? If you do, you may have atychipophobia. Atychiphobia is the irrational and persistent fear of failing. Like other phobias, it varies in severity and can cause stress and anxiety. Whether you are looking to try new things or go after a goal, here are some tips to overcome your fear of failure.