87 Quotes on the Fear of Failure & Overcoming It

Fear can lead to failure, and failure can lead to depression, loss of confidence and real life impact in a negative way. Overcome your fears, become comfortable with failure and learn from it with these empowering quotes about failure.

Failure Quotes

“There is no doubt in my mind that there are many ways to be a winner, but there is really only one way to be a loser and that is to fail and not look beyond the failure.” – Kyle Rote Jr

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

“Failure is nature’s plan to prepare you for great responsibilities.” – Napoleon Hill

“If you fell down yesterday, stand up today.” – H.G. Wells

“The truth is that our mind needs failure! No great inventions would have come into existence without failure.” – Thibaut Meurisse

“You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don’t try.” – Beverly Sills

“Failure is another stepping stone to greatness.” – Oprah Winfrey

“Everybody, at some point in their life, has fallen down and not felt like getting back up, but you have to, no matter how difficult it is.” – Charlie Hunnam

“If you set your goals ridiculously high and it’s a failure, you will fail above everyone else’s success.” – James Cameron

“Failure is success in progress.” – Albert Einstein

“Don’t bury your failures, let them inspire you.” – Robert Kiyosaki

“One who fears failure limits his activities.” – Henry Ford

“Failure is when you talk yourself out of becoming something amazing.” – Rudy Francisco

“If you didn’t succeed, it’s just as important to keep in mind that there has never been a success story without failure and lessons along the way.” – Eric Christian

“It’s not how far you fall, but how high you bounce that counts.” – Zig Ziglar

“Remember that failure is an event, not a person.” – Zig Ziglar

“For every failure, there’s an alternative course of action. You just have to find it. When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.” – Mary Kay Ash

“It’s only when you risk failure that you discover things. When you play it safe, you’re not expressing the utmost of your human experience.” – Lupita Nyong’o

“There is no thing as failure, only learning experiences.” – Anonymous

“Fear regret more than failure.” – Taryn Rose

“My grandmother once told me, ‘Don’t let failure go to your heart and don’t let success go to your head.’” – Will Smith

“Failure? I never encountered it. All I ever met were temporary setbacks.” – Dottie Walters

“Try a thing you haven’t done three times. Once, to get over the fear of doing it. Twice, to learn how to do it. And a third time to figure out whether you like it or not.” – Virgil Thomson

“Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” – Richard Branson

“It is no fun to fail, but you must pick yourself up and get back in the race. The only way you can grow is to challenge yourself beyond your present circumstances.” – Les Brown

“There are many victories worse than a defeat.” – George Eliot

“An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.” – Edwin Land

“Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure.” – George Edward Woodberry

“Sometimes by losing a battle you find a new way to win the war.” – Donald Trump

“If you learn from defeat, you haven’t really lost.” – Zig Ziglar

“Honesty is the fastest way to prevent a mistake from turning into a failure.” – James Altucher

“There’s no reason to fear (temporary) failure. What others may call a failure is only a temporary setback if you really believe in your dreams.” – Kory Livingstone

“You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over.” – Richard Branson

“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” – Albert Einstein

“You are right, I do fall down a lot. But that wouldn’t be true if I never stood back up.” – Richelle E. Goodrich

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas A. Edison

“Sometimes failure is the beginning of success.” – Astrid Scholte

“Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.” – Og Mandino

“The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” – Henry Ford

“So start to change your mind, that a failure can be kind, If we allow ourselves to learn from it.” – Julie Hebert

“I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.” – Michael Jordan

“Fear kills more dreams than failure ever will.” – Suzy Kassem

“There is no innovation and creativity without failure. Period.” – Brene Brown

“Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.” – Napoleon Hill

“When we give ourselves permission to fail, we, at the same time, give ourselves permission to excel.” – Eloise Ristad

“We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes.” – Arianna Huffington

“A man may fail many times but he isn’t a failure until he begins to blame somebody else.” – John Burroughs

“It’s failure that gives you the proper perspective on success.” – Ellen DeGeneres

“Failure is enriching. It’s also important to accept that you’ll make mistakes—it’s how you build your expertise. The trick is to learn a positive lesson from all of life’s negative moments.” – Alain Ducasse

“A little more persistence, a little more effort, and what seemed hopeless failure may turn to glorious success.” – Elbert Hubbard

“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default.” – J. K. Rowling

“The successful person makes a habit of doing what the failing person doesn’t like to do.” – Thomas Edison

“I never fail. It’s just that the people around me succeed more than I.” – Carroll Bryant

“I’ve failed over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.” – Michael Jordan

“Trust is the angels smiling when I’m crying because they see the other side of the world I haven’t come around to yet.” – Helen Edwards

“There is something good in all seeming failures. You are not to see that now. Time will reveal it. Be patient.” – Swami Sivananda

“The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising every time we fail.” – Confucius

“Failures are made only by those who fail to dare, not by those who dare to fail.” – Lester B. Pearson

“Success comes when people act together; failure tends to happen alone.” – Deepak Chopra

“Failure to prepare is preparing to fail.” – Mike Murdock

“You always pass failure on your way to success.” – Mickey Rooney

“Our best successes often come after our greatest disappointments.” – Henry Ward Beecher

“Do not judge me by my successes, judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.” – Nelson Mandela

“Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” – Jack Canfield

“No matter how dysfunctional your background, how broke or broken you are, where you are today, or what anyone else says, YOU MATTER, and your life matters!” – Germany Kent

“There is no failure except in no longer trying.” – Chris Bradford

“If I fail, I try again, and again, and again. If YOU fail, are you going to try again? The human spirit can handle much worse than we realize. It matters HOW you are going to FINISH. Are you going to finish strong?” – Nick Vujicic

“Failure doesn’t mean you are a failure it just means you haven’t succeeded yet.” – Robert H. Schuller

“You can’t let your failures define you. You have to let your failures teach you.” – Barack Obama

“Do not fear mistakes.” – Benjamin Franklin

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas A. Edison

“It is not failure to fail.” – Roshani Chokshi

“When setbacks arise – and they will from time to time – regroup, recharge, refocus and refine.” – Rasheed Ogunlaru

“Failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success.” – Anonymous

“Failure is so important. We speak about success all the time. It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success. I’ve met people who don’t want to try for fear of failing.” – J.K. Rowling

“Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.” – John F. Kennedy

“Success isn’t permanent and failure isn’t fatal.” – Mike Ditka

“Failure after long perseverance is much grander than never having a striving good enough to be called a failure.” – George Eliot

“Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” – Coco Chanel

“Remember the two benefits of failure. First, if you do fail, you learn what doesn’t work; and second, the failure gives you the opportunity to try a new approach.” – Roger ven Oech

“I can’t give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.” – Herbert Bayard Swope

“There is no such thing as failure. Failure is just life trying to move us in another direction.” – Oprah

“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” – Maya Angelou