Success Anxiety: Struggles Around Being Successful

What happens in your body when you read the word “success?”

Is it an automatic relaxation and easing in your chest and shoulders? Or is it more like a sinking feeling in your gut and a tightening of your jaw? 

Experience tells me there is one of two ways your body responds to this word: greater ease and comfort or more discomfort. 

Based on the fact that you are reading this blog post about success anxiety, yours may be more of the latter than the former. 

Not to worry—you're not alone. I have had my share of experiences with success anxiety, as have my clients and many other people I have never met. 

I was recently on a trip to one of my favorite lakes in North Carolina. As I rode around on the boat watching the kids bounce all over the place on a tube, I also saw some beautiful homes that left me imagining the day I could own one. 

Owning a home on a lake would be a huge success for me individually and for us as a family. Initially, it brought me psychological delight and inspiration. It was not long after that it brought up success anxiety. Will we be able to make enough money in the time I want to help my family accomplish this goal? I began to question and shame myself for not already having figured this out. 

Keep reading to learn how I navigated back out of my success anxiety. 

What Is Success Anxiety?

Success anxiety is an uncomfortable response to becoming successful, or even just imagining it. These uncomfortable responses can emerge in our thoughts, emotions, behaviors, our sense of self, and relationships. 

Success anxiety can circle around an extensive range of experiences including, work, school, homes, finances, athletics, arts, and more. Most people do not want the experience of anxiety in their life, even if it means being successful.  

Yet it is important to reframe our understanding of anxiety to effectively work with it. Anxiety is a messenger letting us know there is something to pay attention to. 

Understanding Big S vs. Little S Successes

When thinking about success anxiety, I like to borrow from the field of trauma therapy. I have found it helpful to think about trauma in two broad categories: big T trauma and little t trauma. Big T trauma is the type of traumas that make the nightly news or show up in our social media feeds. Little t traumas are the daily, weekly, and monthly experiences that may go unnoticed by many but you have felt their adverse effects. 

Inherent in the nature of success is a change in the way you live and experience life. These changes can be caused by a single big S success (becoming a doctor or retiring early) or by many little s successes (receiving an award at work or paying off one of your credit cards). While often seen socially as beneficial and good, these changes can leave some of us perplexed about how to live this new life and confused about why we are longing for our old lives before success. 

The Psychological Impact of Being Successful

When our success is inconsistent with our core identity, the psychological impact can be crippling or paralyzing. I watch this play out often in Therapy-Informed Financial Planning™ where clients navigate new levels of income or wealth but struggle to get it to all make sense. 

Many of us grow up with a conscious or unconscious belief that more money and status are supposed to make our lives better, not worse—even when we see and hear stories about “successful” people and their lives falling apart. 

Being successful is an invitation to deeper self-reflection on the meaning of life and success. Our psychology is made up of our unique patterns of thoughts, feelings, behaviors, bodily responses, senses of self, and relationship dynamics. Success can pull one or many of these aspects out of alignment. 

How Success Anxiety Affects Your Daily Life and Intimate Relationships

Success anxiety can lead you towards success obsessions, success avoidance, or some combination of the two. 

It also can lead you to choose relationships that are not fulfilling in the long run or helpful to your overall wellbeing. It may mean that you are compulsively checking on your spouse's success if you are counting on their success to support your family. Or their success can activate deep insecurities within you about the contributions you are making to your family. 

Success anxiety can lead you to compulsively work for fear of not becoming significant, or, on the other hand, to avoid all the trappings of success. 

Overcoming the Fear of Being Successful

The first step to overcoming the fear of being successful is recognizing that you are experiencing it. 

For many people, success anxiety comes masked as the fear of failure. These are actually two sides of the same coin. 

Embracing uncertainty is a large part of overcoming success anxiety. We can’t fully know how achieving our success will change our lives. It is important to imagine and be moved by the positives that can come from enjoying and experiencing success. 

But if becoming successful evokes the sense that you will be alone, less liked, or less acceptable in any way, you will need to work through these reactions and discover ways to help you discover that your worth and relational value are not up for grabs—no matter your level of success. 

Celebrating Small Wins: Little S Successes Matter

As for my trip to the lake with my family, the trip ended with some little S successes. I met some people who live and own the house next to the one we rented. 

I have a quiet story that plays in the back of my mind that successful people are rude, unhelpful, and greedy. I have been correcting this for years now, and I do that by looking for the exception to this “rule.” This is where Rob and Patti come into play. 

Patti was walking her dogs when we were checking into the lake house. She warmly welcomed my family to the lake and generously offered to help us if we needed anything while we were visiting. 

Later that evening as we were out kayaking, Rob called to me and said, “Hey, are you Ed.?” I said I was. Patti had already told her husband about us. They offered to take us out on their pontoon boat before they knew we had rented one. Their warmth and kindness reminded me that successful people can be very generous.

I have a fear that if I were to become more successful I would lose my own generosity and kindness. I count this experience with Rob and Patti as a small s success: having positive relational experiences that challenge my assumptions about what it means to be successful. 

The Pressure of Big S Successes: How to Manage It

What about you? What will be your big S successes? 

Can you allow yourself to acknowledge big S successes from your past?

Can you imagine the big S successes you want to have in the future? 

Rate your success anxiety on a scale of one to ten. 

Now ask yourself, “What will help me to take my success anxiety down one notch?” 

Most of us don’t wipe out our success anxiety in one shot. It is a theme that continues to emerge in our lives and with choice, intention, reflection, and relationship support, over time our relationship with success can change. 

If you struggle with success anxiety, let’s talk about how Therapy-Informed Financial Planning can help. Schedule your free 30-minute consultation here. 

Wishing You Healthy Love and Money,

Ed Coambs