Fear of Making Mistakes
Fear of making mistakes is rarely just about the mistake itself. It’s often about insecurity and the threat to your self-esteem that results with behaviors such as perfectionism, overthinking, checking, and procrastination.
Usually, the deeper fears are:
- “What if people think less of me, criticize or lose respect for me?”
- “What if I lose control or cause harm?”
- “What if this proves I’m incompetent, careless, inadequate, or flawed?”
Mistakes can attack your self-confidence:
- A typo can feel humiliating.
- A small error at work can spiral into panic.
- An awkward comment can replay in your mind for days.
- A missed detail can
It’s possible to learn to handle making mistakes. The goal is for you to build a healthier, more flexible relationship with mistakes and imperfection.
What Fear of Mistakes Can Look Like
People often assume fear of mistakes only looks like perfectionism, but it can show up in many different ways. Some examples include:
- Excessively checking emails, texts, or assignments
- Avoiding trying new things
- Taking an extremely long time making decisions
- Needing reassurance before acting
- Procrastinating because the pressure feels overwhelming
- Harsh self-criticism after small errors
You may appear highly successful externally while internally feeling chronically anxious and never “good enough” inside. Other times, the fear becomes so overwhelming that you may shut down, avoids risks, and stops pursuing meaningful goals altogether.
How Fear of Mistakes Is Maintained
You may use lots of strategies to avoid making mistakes. This creates a temporary feeling of relief and lowers anxiety. But there are long term costs because the underlying fear has not been addressed.
| Coping Strategy | Long-Term Cost |
|---|---|
| Overchecking | Reinforces belief that mistakes are dangerous |
| Avoidance | Increases fear and loss of confidence |
| Perfectionism | Leads to exhaustion and chronic pressure |
| Reassurance seeking | Prevents self-trust from developing |
| Self-criticism | Increases shame and anxiety |
| Procrastination | Creates more pressure and self-doubt later |
| Overpreparing | Strengthens dependence on control rituals |
A Case Example
Sarah* is a competent marketing manager who spends nearly an hour rereading emails before sending them because she is terrified of making mistakes and people seeing them. Even small feedback from her boss triggers intense anxiety and thoughts like, “What if I’m bad at my job?” or “I can’t afford to mess up.” Although she logically knows everyone makes mistakes, emotionally they feel threatening and deeply tied to her self-worth.
In therapy, we discovered that growing up, mistakes were often met with criticism or loss of approval, so perfection became linked to safety and acceptance. Using CBT, Sarah worked on reducing overchecking, reassurance seeking, and catastrophic thinking while learning to tolerate uncertainty and imperfection. Using Schema Therapy, we also explored deeper patterns like Unrelenting Standards, Defectiveness/Shame, and Punitiveness that kept her harsh inner critic going.
Over time, Sarah became more flexible and self-compassionate. She still cared about doing well at work, but mistakes no longer felt emotionally devastating. She spent less time overthinking, recovered more quickly from criticism, and no longer based so much of her worth on being perfect.
*Not her real name and not based on a specific person.
Changing Self Talk Patterns
You may recognize some of your current self-talk in the table below. The goal is to change your mindset by developing new beliefs. One way to do that is to review which old patterns apply to you and reflect on whether the old pattern is true and whether it serves you. Then find ways to build the new beliefs into your daily life by trying small things where you can be imperfect and see what happens.
| Old Pattern | New Beliefs |
|---|---|
| “I can’t make mistakes.” | “Mistakes are part of being human.” |
| “This proves I’m incompetent.” | “Mistakes do not define my abilities.” |
| “I need certainty before acting.” | “I can tolerate uncertainty and still move forward.” |
| “I should punish myself for this.” | “Self-compassion works better than self-criticism” |
| “People will reject me if I mess up.” | “Healthy relationships can tolerate imperfection.” |
| “I have to be perfect to feel okay.” | “My worth is not dependent on flawless performance.” |
| “If I relax, everything will fall apart.” | “Flexibility is healthier than constant overcontrol.” |
How CBT Helps Fear of Making Mistakes
Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) focuses on identifying and changing the thinking and behavioral patterns that maintain the fear. Here are a few ways to work on coping with mistakes using a CBT approach.
- Identifying your thoughts and behaviors when you get triggered
- Looking at your thinking traps (like catastrophizing or mindreading) and learning how to react differently
- Reducing safety behaviors that make things worse like reassurance seeking
- Exposure to making mistakes that help your nervous system learn that mistakes are not dangerous
- Setting up specific experiments where you make mistakes and see what actually happens to change your beliefs
How Schema Therapy Helps
Schema Therapy goes beyond symptom reduction and explores the emotional roots of your fear of making mistakes. Schemas are the patterns of your mind, your core beliefs and emotional experiences rooted in your early childhood years. Schema therapy includes:
- Tracking and becoming aware of your schemas
- Looking at patterns that happen when your schemas get triggered
- Providing compassion for your younger self
- Talking back to your inner critic that can be demanding or punitive
- Breaking old patterns like giving in, avoiding or overdoing it
Schema therapy includes cognitive, behavioral and emotion focused techniques. This deeper work often helps people understand why the fear of making mistakes feels so emotionally intense and automatic.
CBT vs. Schema Therapy for Fear of Making Mistakes
| Area | CBT Approach | Schema Therapy Approach |
|---|---|---|
| Main Focus | Current thoughts, behaviors, and anxiety patterns | Deeper emotional patterns and lifelong themes |
| Core Question | “What thoughts and behaviors are maintaining the fear?” | “Why do mistakes feel emotionally dangerous in the first place?” |
| View of the Problem | Fear is maintained by distorted thinking and avoidance behaviors | Fear is connected to unmet emotional needs, schemas, and coping modes |
| Typical Thoughts Explored | Catastrophizing, perfectionism, over responsibility | Shame, defectiveness, conditional worth, fear of criticism |
Frequently Asked Questions
Not exactly. Perfectionism is often one way the fear shows up, but underneath perfectionism is usually a deeper fear about what mistakes might mean. For some people, mistakes feel tied to shame, rejection, loss of control, criticism, or failure. Other people respond by avoiding risks altogether rather than trying to be perfect. Each person has unique reasons related to why they fear mistakes.
For many people, the emotional reaction is not really about the current mistake alone. The mind and body may be reacting to older experiences where mistakes led to criticism, humiliation, conflict, pressure, or feeling unsafe emotionally. That is why a relatively minor situation can trigger a much bigger emotional response than the situation objectively calls for.
Yes. Some people become overly apologetic, defensive, people-pleasing, or afraid to express opinions because they worry about saying or doing the “wrong” thing. Others may avoid vulnerability altogether because mistakes feel too exposing or emotionally risky.
Many people mentally replay situations where they think they made a mistake – or they made one – because they are trying to search for reassurance, certainty, or evidence that they did not make a mistake with negative consequences. Unfortunately, this usually keeps anxiety going instead of resolving it. The brain starts treating normal situations and interactions like threats that need constant review.
Absolutely. People often assume procrastination means laziness, but in many cases, it is driven by anxiety and pressure. When mistakes feel emotionally dangerous, starting a task can feel overwhelming because the person fears not doing it “right” or being judged negatively.
Yes. Healthy functioning is not about having no standards or accountability. It is about being able to learn from mistakes without spiraling into shame, panic, or relentless self-criticism. Most people function better when they are less consumed by fear and overcontrol.
Final Thoughts about Mistakes
Fear of making mistakes is rarely just about the mistake itself. More often, mistakes tap into deeper fears about rejection, failure, embarrassment, fear of judgment, shame, or not being “good enough.” Over time, many people become trapped in cycles of perfectionism, overthinking, avoidance, self-criticism, or constant checking—not because they are weak, but because their nervous system has learned to treat mistakes as threatening rather than simply human.
The good news is that these patterns are highly treatable. The goal is not to stop caring or become careless. It is to develop enough emotional flexibility and self-trust that mistakes no longer define your worth, control your decisions, or keep you stuck living in fear of getting something wrong.
How to Get Help for OCD or OCPD
Laura Johnson, LMFT, LPCC, provides evidence-based treatment for the anxiety that drives the fear of making mistakes. Laura is both an Advanced Certified Schema Therapist and a Certified Cognitive Behavior Therapist, a rare combination to find. Clients seek Laura out in San Jose and across California because she is one of a few therapists certified in this unique style of therapy.
