The Empowered Entrepreneur — by Zach Marañon
November 22, 2023

Read Time: 6 minutes

Hey bud,

Last week I talked about how to overcome the FEAR of success.

This is something I’ve struggled with a LOT.

Why?

I used to be so afraid to be judged by others.

I used to be so resistant to responsibilities.

I used to feel so inadequate…

But now, I have NONE of that!

Just kidding, I still struggle with it until now hehe.

But through my own journey of personal development, I’ve been able to lessen those blocks at least to the point where I can start taking action and slowly move towards the life that I want.

In this issue of the Empowered Entrepreneur, I wanted to share how I was personally able to lessen the effect of these blocks in my life.

My hopes in sharing this is to help you overcome these fears even if just a little bit, so that you can also move faster towards the life you want.

Let’s get into it.

How to Overcome Fear of Success

To recap here are the 3 steps I mentioned in last week’s letter on how to overcome these fears:

Step 1 is to identify the true fear behind fear of success (because we established that there is no such thing as fear of success)

Step 2 is all about focusing on overcoming that true fear that you’ve identified with fear of success.

Step 3 is to start to take small steps in the direction of the success you desire.

Now, I know this is quite the general solution to this very specific problem that many people face.

So I’ll share my own journey of applying this general solution to give you a better idea of how it can look like.

How I’m Overcoming Fear of Success

Personally, the true fear behind my fear of success that I struggled with is the fear of responsibility (Step 1).

Growing up, I was never really the responsible type.

I just wanted to live and enjoy the moment without having to worry about the future.

Behind that fear of responsibility was the resistance to hard work and effort.

So, success seemed like a hassle for me which led to me not applying myself.

Of course, this further led to a lot of unwanted experiences:

• Unhealthy weight gain and lethargy

• Bad grades in school

• Disappointment from my parents

• Uncertainty about where my life will go

• Running away from the heavy emotions it brought with video games, overeating, and alcohol.

But these unwanted experiences gave me clarity of what I DID want (the opposite).

And so, I decided to work on overcoming this fear of responsibility (Step 2).

To overcome it, I had to stop avoiding it and face things head on.

I started to think, what would be the benefits of becoming a responsible person?

How would life look like for me once I overcame this fear of responsibility?

How would I feel if being responsible became normal for me?

I became clear on the answers to those questions until being a responsible person turned into a desire and a goal for me.

Once I found clarity, I realized that success isn’t something I’ll get from hard work.

Success is something that will be a byproduct of becoming a responsible person.

My fears lessened and I started to look forward to making a positive change in my life.

After that, all that was left was to build myself up into becoming a responsible person through actions, and through results.

I started taking small steps in that direction (Step 3).

Most days, it was just about me asking myself:
“What small responsible action can I take today?”

I started with small things like making my bed when I wake up, washing my used dishes, and going for a walk or a short jog.

Those small things compounded over time.

As I slowly built myself up to be a responsible person, I started believing in myself and my capabilities more — and my fear of success decreased.

As a result, I was able to hit top performer status in the life insurance sales industry for 4 years out of the 6 year run I had in that role.

I was able to create the income I wanted for myself.

And I’m able to set bigger and bigger goals from there.

I later realized that what once took a lot of effort became effortless once those regular actions became a habit.

An analogy I can relate this to is running a 10km race.

If you don’t run, and you consider running a 10k it will seem like hard work.

But for a marathoner who built up their endurance through months or even years of training, a 10k run will seem like no big deal.

In fact, that’s just one of their easy daily runs.

And so I was holding a misconception that to create the success I wanted for myself, I had to keep ramping up my effort levels.

Reality is, what once felt like an effort level of 6/10, over time will feel like a 2/10 effort level once the habit has been built.

In Conclusion

There you have it, one of the ways I’ve lessened the blocks I used to have around success.

So with whatever true fear you’re struggling with behind the fear of success, I hope these insights from my own experience will be able to help you even just a little bit.

I’ve somewhat overcome the fear of responsibility (of course there’s still some of it there — it doesn’t really fully go away).

Right now, what I’m working on in relation to fear of success is the fear of being judged.

With the whole building a personal brand online, I’m in essence opening myself up to be judged by others, and I’m on the journey to being okay with that.

One step at a time.

At the end of the day, success is just about repeating small steps that move you forward compounded over a long enough time horizon.

If you want to learn more on how to overcome the fear of success, you can read the letter I posted last Saturday here (in case you haven’t opened it yet).

All the love,
All the power,

— Zach Marañon

P.S. Whenever you are ready, there are 3 ways that I can be of help to you:

1. Follow me on Instagram here if you want a source of bite-sized ideas and content that can help you reach your next level in life.

2. Book a free kick-off conversation for one-on-one coaching here if you are an entrepreneur or sales professional currently looking to create solutions to a problem or challenge in your life but you seem to be stuck.

3. Download my goal setting guide here if you are wanting to create clarity on your desired outcomes (Free until 100 downloads — and then I convert it to a paid resource).

P.P.S. If you are from the Philippines and are looking for a personal mastery workshop to help you experience growth and transformation, check out Discovery by I Am Plus Coaching and Training Systems. It’s where my journey of self evolution personally got fast-tracked.