All too often, we make excuses for the things we do not achieve in our lives. We would all like to be rich, popular, happy, and have our egos stroked regularly. In fact, our primary "lack of achievement" can be blamed on our childhood influences. From the day we are brought into this world, we begin to create a road map, which, for the most part, will define a more significant part of our lives. This road map direction can never be changed, only rerouted based on the influences around us. Through early childhood, our parents and friends define the routing of our life's road map to a large degree. Our parents, whether they meant to or not, influenced us with their insecurities, prejudices, and, most importantly, their failures, but does this mean we are destined to be like our parents? Not exactly! As we age, we experience other powerful influences such as friends, teachers, mentors, and others who alter our preconceived habits passed on from our parents. This is not to say that our parents can't be a significant influence in our lives; it merely means that we tend to absorb the most considerable impact. An excellent example of this would be parents that become overly paranoid with the possibility of failure, perhaps because they started a family business and lost money. Growing up, watching the family business fail could create a negative influence, therefore, changing direction on your life's road map. Understanding the negative influences in our lives may be the master key to overcoming the fear of failure. In other words, our success becomes a by-product of our failures. As we experience failure, it gives us the knowledge, strength, and wisdom necessary to succeed. The problem with failure is that it is exasperated through our influences and becomes a negative force creating the "subconscious fear of failure." For example, if a child is taking an exam in school and gets a failing grade, the threat of punishment and lack of positive reinforcement can enhance this negative experience, causing the child to fear exams through adulthood. So how can a situation such as this be handled without allowing failure to be an acceptable alternative? Perhaps you need to go further back on the child's road map and identify the pattern of self-inflicted behavior. The child may be placing limitations on their potential through the perceived fears of failure brought on by negative influences from the past.