What is Imposter Syndrome?
Imposter syndrome is an experience of feeling like you are a fraud and that you have not really earned or are deserving of your achievements. Anyone can experience imposter syndrome and it can contribute to people's fear of taking career risks. This experience is especially common in BIPOC populations in the workplace or in universities that are predominantly white. The same is true with women in environments that have a male majority.
People who experience imposter syndrome can have anxiety and may even become depressed. People can feel isolated, may impact a person's self-esteem, and can have a negative impact on one's performance. Let's discuss some strategies for overcoming imposter feelings.
What are the Strategies that Can Help?
1. Learn the Facts : You may be feeling undeserving of your accomplishments and you may doubt your intelligence or skills; however, these negative thoughts about yourself are likely to be distorted. Take a moment to look at the bigger picture of your professional trajectory and look at the facts that support that you deserve to be in your role. Write them out and look at them regularly. Try to add to the list periodically. During this process of looking at the facts you may notice negative thoughts emerging that try to challenge the facts. During these moments, try to talk back to these negative thoughts in the same manner you would talk to a friend if they were speaking about themselves in this negative way.
2. Share your Feelings : Talking about our feelings is something that is helpful for most difficult situations. Sharing your feelings can help you feel less isolated and alone. Also, just as you are likely to support a friend who is feeling like a fraud, a friend is likely to support you and help you add to your list of facts. Be strategic about who you share your feelings with. Do not share with colleagues or people who you are likely to compare yourself with. Try speaking to someone who does not work in the same environment with you but who is a person whose opinions you respect.
3. Celebrate Your Successes : Typically people with imposter syndrome are quick to grab onto thoughts about what they did not do enough of, or could have done better, and tend to avoid giving their successes equal attention. Do not quickly dismiss compliments. Make space in your day to reflect on the compliments you receive. Take time to applaud yourself when you have contributed to your profession is some way or added to your resume. Do not move on before you have sufficiently congratulated yourself. Save emails with positive feedback or even print them out and post them somewhere that allows you to take a quick look when your are feeling down. Little accomplishments count too. When you add them up they amount to a large achievement!
4. Let Go of Perfectionism: Lower your standards for what it means to be successful. That does not mean you stop caring about the quality of your work but rather you recognize that perfection is an impossible standard. If you hold on to perfection as a measure of success then you are setting yourself up to feel like a fraud. Again, look at the bigger picture of what you have brought to your professional life...can it be good enough or maybe great, even if not perfect?
5. Cultivate Self-Compassion!: Think about yourself in a loving way as you would a person you care about. If you find yourself getting stuck on events that you feel negatively about, try and reflect on why that particular task or event was hard for you, and find compassion for yourself. Then try to shift your focus to something that you feel good about and maybe even return to your achievement facts list (from step 1).
6. Share Your Failures: Sharing your struggles and failures in a group will help you see that others also have struggles and failures. When you share a struggle, another person is also likely to share. This can leave you feeling less isolated and it also normalizes the reality that we do not always succeed. It also creates a more realistic picture of what success...success is not perfection but rather a mix of failed efforts and accomplishments that amount to something meaningful.
7. Accept It: Nobody is always going to be at the top of their game. There will be times when you are and other times when you will not be. We must accept that in order to enjoy the moments when we feel we are really making achievements.
If you find that these strategies have not been helpful or that you are struggling to come out of anxiety or depression, please reach out for help from a mental health professional.
***Seven Strategies Adapted from APA Monitor on Psychology, June 2021, Vol 52 (4).