Because you confuse failure with identity. You are not afraid of making mistakes — you are afraid that making mistakes proves you are not good enough. But failure does not define who you are; it defines what you tried. The fear of failure is the fear of judgment — yours and others'. And that anxiety keeps you in a limbo worse than failure itself: the limbo of those who never try, and therefore never fail, and therefore never grow.
What the letters say
From Letter 01 — Here we go again
And it's not anxiety or fear. It's that silent certainty of not being in the right place wherever you are. That whatever you've done, it's not enough. That there exists a version of you that you haven't reached yet, and maybe never will.
From Letter 02 — Choosing who to be
Failures don't disappear when you stop talking about them. They're carved into the psyche. You feel them every time you look in the mirror and know that the version you show the world never matches the one you live with inside.
And there's no greater failure than the one you feel toward yourself. In your own self, in your own mind, in your own silence.
From Letter 03 — The price no one wants to pay
Not because fear is a good indicator. But because fear tells you where your comfort zone is located. And your comfort zone is the exact place you need to exit from.
The brain will tell you it's madness. That it's too risky. That you can wait a little longer.