Failure Friendly: Using fear to unlock your creative potential

By Buzzy Lewis

What was the point of living if I couldn't do the one thing I wanted to do: make the big ideas that I saw in my head a reality? It seemed like no matter what, my lack of confidence always got in my way. I was a prisoner of my own mind and a spectator to my own life. <

• Language: English
• Publisher: Buzzy Bee Books
• Release date: Jul 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9780645251920

Book preview

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Is something keeping you from your creative dreams?

Wake up to the way your fear is holding back your creative potential.

Shake up your limiting beliefs with a new way of thinking about failure.

Make up with yourself by softening toward your creative anxiety. And GO!

Copyright © 2023, Bethany (Buzzy) Lewis

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from the author.

Written on Gunditjmara land

Published 2023

Cover and book design by Buzzy Lewis

Printed in Australia by IngramSpark

Page layout design by Dawn Black

Edited by Kevin Miller (www.kevinmillerxi.com)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available from the National Library of Australia

Printed book: ISBN 978-0-6452519-1-3

E-book: ISBN 978-0-6452519-2-0

Author: Bethany (Buzzy) Lewis

Title: Failure Friendly

Failurefriendly.com

@failure_friendly

All Inquiries: Buzzy Lewis, [e-mail]

Disclaimer: The content in this book is to serve as a general overview and does not constitute mental health advice. This book is an expression of one person’s ideas. You should carry out your own research and seek out professional advice when dealing with mental illness. The author will not be liable for any loss or damage that may arise out of your improper use of, or reliance on, the content of this book.

Table of Contents

1 Wake Up 10

How Did I Get Here? 11

To Fly You Have to Trust Your Wings 14

Say Hello to Fear 15

Fear Is Contagious 15

Anxiety Is Part of Any Creative Process 16

Failing Safely 17

Why Is It So Easy to Feel Like a Failure? 17

Failure Friendly 19

Fearless or Fear-less 19

Fear Can Work for You 20

Fear-Less to Faith-Full 22

Unlearning Fear 23

The Growth Mindset 23

When You Change the Way You Look at Things,

the Things You Look at Change 25

A Side Note on Diet 28

This a Journey; Get a Journal 29

2 Shake Up 30

The Failure Friendly Mindset 31

Guiding Principles 33

BELIEFS 33

VALUES 34

RULES 36

The Creative Journey 38

Discoveries 38

A Calm Sea Never Made a Skilled Sailor 40

The ‘How’ Is ‘What You Get 43

Take a Walk on the Wild Side 46

3 Make Up 50

Self-Compassion 51

Detachment 54

Other People 54

The Ego 57

Masculinity 60

Higher Power 64

Divine Inspiration 66

Sacred Rituals 68

Go! 72

Feel Fear and Do It Anyway 73

Freeze & Flight – Breaking the Pattern 75

Be Curious 78

A Journey of a Thousand Miles Starts with One Single Step. 80

Check Your Checklists 84

Fight – What Did You Just Say? 87

WATCH YOUR LANGUAGE 95

Friend – Love Your Fear 97

Name and Tame It 99

Lead 102

Over to You 107

About the Author 109

I dedicate this book

To all the failures that have gotten me to where I am today.

Being Failure Friendly is accepting that fear is a part of life and an important part of the creative process. It is not something you need to stop or reject, just something you need to understand. It has a very important role in letting you know when you are trying something new and entering uncertain terrain. But fear does not get to make the decisions. Fear’s decision will always be ‘no’ or ‘stop’. When it comes to your creative pursuits, the stakes are rarely life or death, the answer should always be ‘yes’ and ‘go’.

Perception refers to how we interpret and understand things based on the information gathered by our senses. It is possible to alter our perceptions. Instead of perceiving only hopelessness and setbacks, you can seek a new way of looking at your situation. In the spiritual text A Course of Miracles, this shift of perception is referred to as a ‘miracle’.

Mindset encompasses a set of established attitudes held by an individual. Our mindset shapes and influences our perceptions and therefore our reality, and choices.

For instance, imagine two people with different mindsets, waiting at the airport to board the same plane, both eager to return home. Unexpectedly, their flight gets canceled. The first person holds a mindset fixated on control, becomes angry, and feels helpless. He has no choice but to wait hours for the next flight. The second man has a growth mindset. Sure, the cancellation is frustrating for him too but instead of feeling helpless he feels inspired and begins looking for a way to solve his problem. He starts talking to people. He hires a plane, a pilot and a blackboard. He advertises the replacement flight on the blackboard to his fellow passengers whose flight has been cancelled, sells tickets to cover the hire fees and flies home. He is Richard Brandon, and this is how Virgin Airlines was born.

Choice. Ultimately, it comes down to choice. This book isn’t about controlling your life, thoughts, or fears. We have less control over these things than we would like to admit. Instead, we have agency over the meaning and power we give to events or fearful thoughts. This agency lets us change our perspective, our mindset and our reality.

Transcending implies going beyond your perceived limits. This book is not about destroying fear but gently moving beyond fear and not allowing it to hold us back.

Creative Anxiety is a psychological obstacle to creativity — a paralyzing feeling of unease, worry or nervousness while engaging in the creative process. The symptoms it causes can be physical, such as shakiness and a racing heart, and at its worst, it can take away our ability to create.

Warning:

You’ve picked this book because you want to reach your creative potential. Whether you want to work in a creative industry or create your own job, you wish to lead a fulfilling and vibrantly creative life. There’s a ‘but’ coming. But you’re frustrated with that invisible barrier that has been holding you back, and everything that you have tried so far hasn’t worked.

This book asks you to suspend the beliefs that have not been serving you and to try on new ways of thinking. Many of the lessons in this book can feel counterintuitive, asking you to embrace paradoxes that seem contradictory. Some will be easy to adopt while others may challenge your core beliefs. Like a child wrapped tightly around their parent’s leg, you may find yourself resistant to change.

Trying on new ideas doesn’t mean you have to buy into them. If they don’t fit, you can always go back to your old ones. If you’re feeling stressed, hopeless or out of control at the moment, then your current strategy is not working. So, why not give this one a try? The worst case is that you will know that this isn’t for you. The best case is freedom. A transformed mindset that is robust, courageous, productive and unapologetically you!

It’s worth it.

How Did I Get Here?

In this book are the things I wish I could have told my younger self. All I wanted to do was bring