Here’s a question: “What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?”

If you really ask yourself this question, you can’t help but feel uncomfortable. The question tends to make us aware that fear of failure keeps us from attempting great things, and life gets dull. Amazing things stop happening. But if you can get past that fear, impossible things suddenly become possible.

So by asking “What if I could not fail?”, we create a mental landscape in which the constraint of failure is removed. It’s actually quite common, and effective, to use “What if” questions to remove various kinds of mental constraints to allow for thinking freely, without some of the mental baggage that can weigh down the imagination.

Another powerful question is: “What if I fail, how will I recover?”

Failure in any endeavor is rarely absolute. There is a way back from almost anything, and once you acknowledge that, you can proceed with more confidence.

“If the worst happens, how could I cope?” 

Because people’s anxiety goes down once they realize they will live through their worst fear, and that they have internal and external resources that will help them get through it.

Another important question we should ask ourself: “What if I do nothing?”

The point being, when we take on a major challenge it’s often because we really need to change, and if we don’t go ahead with it, we’re likely to be unhappy staying put. Whatever problem or restlessness already exists may, in fact, get worse. There is no sideways, if you’re not moving forward, you’re moving back.

Lastly ask yourself: “What if I succeed?”

That’s important because the way our brains are wired, we tend to automatically go toward the negative scenario. So in order to give your mind a chance to latch on to something positive, something that will actually fuel action rather than paralysis, it’s helpful to create some level of clarity around what success in this endeavor would look like. In other words, give yourself a strong incentive to want to risk failure.

Of course, if the failure does become a reality, as it often does when taking on worthwhile challenges, a whole new set of questions become important, the kind that can help you analyze the failure, learn from it, and figure out how to use it to keep moving forward on the challenge. There are many such questions, but here’s one, in particular, to keep in your back pocket and use when needed: 

“In this failure, what went right?”

It’s a question people rarely ask about failure because they’re completely focused on what went wrong. But by paying attention to the small successes within a failure, we’re reminded that failure often is not absolute, nor is it an endgame. It is an instructive stage, and one step on a longer journey.