# Encore Anxiety

Source: https://www.workingtheorys.com/p/encore-anxiety
Kiwi News: https://news.kiwistand.com/stories/Encore-Anxiety?index=0x68c5d4499ce45da5cf609bc865ce1167904de9056150a6c347dd29ae3a80009b75cc21aa
Submitted by misha on 2025-09-13 UTC, 1 upvote, 1 comment

## Summary

Encore anxiety is the distress of knowing people expect you to be brilliant again after your work has been appreciated, often without being sure how you achieved it the first time. Because the concept requires admitting past success, which polite society tends to discourage, the idea is that people would be better off being honest about their wins, losses and goals. Unlike outright failure, it is described as the exquisite agony of being expected to repeat a success.

## Article

There’s a special kind of hell for anyone who has tasted appreciation for their work, especially in public. It’s not the obvious torment of abject failure. That’s too straightforward, too clean. Rather, it’s the exquisite agony of knowing people are waiting for you to be brilliant again and you’re not entirely sure how you pulled it off the first time. I’ve come to think of this, affectionately, as encore anxiety.

Note: One of the reasons I wanted to write this essay is that the very concept of encore anxiety requires you to acknowledge that you’ve done something interesting or successful or noteworthy already — something that deserves an encore. Polite society tends to push people to avoid this acknowledgement, but we’d all be better off being honest, about our losses and wins, and our goals.

## Comments

**misha**: > Part of creative growth is accepting that some people who loved your early work will hate what you become, and that's exactly as it should be. Disappoint people.