How People Overcome Imposter Syndrome

I don’t like the phrase, Imposter Syndrome. It makes me feel ill. The use of language would have anyone believe that it’s a genuine diagnosable condition. When in reality, it’s just two words used to give meaning to feelings of unease. 

One day, me and my colleagues had been putting the business world to rights on a Microsoft Teams call, when a colleague requested my attention with a virtual hand. Having worked out how to unmute themselves prior to speaking, they eventually said, ‘Ian, you work harder than the majority of people I know.’ 

That statement made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. So chuffed with their comment I was, I failed to realise it was not just any old comment but the entrance to a line of questioning. They went on, eventually asking… 

‘Do you work so hard because you love what you do, or because you’re insecure and feel as though you must impress those around you?’

(Long pause from me)

I was slightly taken aback. My answer was so tangled in uncertainty I genuinely cannot recall my response.

However, I can break it down for you rather simply now. Do I love what I do? I’m not sure. What is love? I think I have weird attraction to hard work itself, rather than any given duty. I guess the status game attached to the grind is something my ego enjoys. Do I feel as though I must impress? Yes, always. Am I insecure? Absolutely. 

That day, that question sparked a call for action, a call for change. After hours, days, weeks of soul searching, I realised I was far removed from the person others thought I was. People think I am calm, rationale, focused, and evidently hardworking. Perhaps I am that, but I am I so much more, so much worse. I learned, amid an existential panic, that I had never truly felt any degree of adequacy, achievement or sense of pride in my career to-date, perhaps even in my life.

Whatever I do, I feel I should do more – and maybe I could. But if I do more of the things I could do more of, when would that hamster wheel stop spinning? Should it? Is it possible to be content whilst striving for more? Beats me. I have been intent on securing a purpose for my life since my memory remembers. And now here I am, 35 years old, writing to myself about a lack of it. 

Here’s the thing, I could be better. I could work longer hours. I could be fitter, stronger, leaner. My meals could be healthier, my sleep deeper, writing more thought provoking. My Ice baths could be colder, friendships friendlier and my sex life, sexier. 

I’m far from the most successful person, particularly when considering a more traditional definition. Still, I believe the person I could be has much greater potential than the person that I am.

I am interested to understand, being the psychological geek I am, that although I know how to stop – having embedded methods for overcoming feelings of nervousness and worry – I continue engaging with destructive thoughts about my feelings of inadequacy. 

You see, I’m not hopeless, quite the opposite. I can easily identify things that make me happy. I can tell you what I want from life, and possibly even how I could get it. And yet, I sway to apprehension rather than ease. Thus, I simply have no idea, no plan, at all, for how to achieve just a glimmer of prolonged gratification.

My mind follows a loop of uncertainty. Like a greyhound chasing the hare, it’s possibility that prolongs the game. Thoughts pinball, wondering what opportunity I’m sure to miss – dreaming of what could be achieved, if I was someone a little different, a little more capable.

It’s not all doom and gloom here. If you look at the trajectory of my life, it’s not to be sniffed at. Evidently, my systems and effort have an impact. Working with averages, I’m doing ok. Things are pretty good. That pleases me. But to go on like this, and die in dissatisfaction? Not on my watch!

My obsession with human behaviour currently has me wondering why things must always worsen before they get better. I mean, by the very definition, better can only evolve from worse, but I am keen to learn if success can be present in the absence of misery. And if each level of success must be defined by the level of misery preceding it. 

So far as I understand it, as humans, we partake in abusive, addictive and self-destructive behaviour – often to a point of pure self-disgust until we look to improve upon or accept a situation. And so, if my understanding is true, I am eager to ascertain why I genuinely believe I could live in serene joyfulness, before my arse bounces off a floor of pure discontent.

I am sure, for reasons presently unbeknown, that I could be somebody different to that I am, somebody better. I am certain, that it is humanly possible to wear a smile of authenticity, whilst remaining ferocious in the pursuit of betterment.

Why do I believe that? Well, reflecting on my life, and in particular the few years I basked in crippling anxiety, the best version of me can always be traced back to a place of stillness. When my mind is still, I am curious. When I am curious, I am joyful. I have new ideas, better ideas, different ideas. I am happy, at ease, confident, abundant. In stillness, I am the person I want to be rather than that I am.

I live in conflict, determined to remain calm. Yet, irritated, eager. Unwilling to dismiss the popular theory that the highest level of success I so crave will find its way to me via calculation of effort and unease, rather than calmness and rest.

Anyway, That’s enough about me and my conundrum. You want to know why you feel so inadequate, so here it is…

There’s a general idea that most people think they are better than others. But I don’t really buy that. People may have you believe they are confident and audacious, but rarely is that the truth on the inside. I think you’d only have to scratch just a little into the lives of others to find something tragic about themselves or a loved one, or at least some sense of inadequacy or non-belonging. 

Everyone has something wrong, something they are dealing with, something they would rather they didn’t have, given the choice. And if you don’t have that something yet, well, you will. 

I mean, really, who actually thinks they are doing everything they could be doing and can’t possibly improve?

There seems to me, to be a lingering sense that we all carry some sort of survivor’s guilt, just for being alive. Almost as though there is a debt we must pay for the privilege of life. The crime of living, I suppose. Perhaps, it’s because as humans, to survive, we know we have to offer something of value in order to be tolerated by others. 

And how do we determine our level of value? By benchmarking against others. The problem is, comparison is one of the great tried and tested methods for destroying your life. 

I believe a person’s greatest fear is that they waste their potential. People are terrified of not living life in the way they believe it could be lived - that’s the modern-day dilemma. And so naturally, we look for conformation that we are living well. But searching for conformation only exasperates the fear of wasted potential via comparing what you currently have with that which you could have. Or rather, comparison of who you are, with who you potentially could be. 

We all, from varying degrees, compare ourselves to the competition. Parents, colleagues, teachers. A portrait, image, or idea. However, I have come to learn that the story of inadequacy we create as a result of comparison, is not because we believe someone’s life, or aspect of it is more desirable than ours. No, the unhappiness stems from comparison with ourselves, and the panic that the life we envisage, may not turn out the way we believe it could. It’s where you are now, the present-day, in contrast to where you could be. It’s the fear of not reaching your potential, that could light the flame, but more often than not, truly stifles your progress.

There’s a multitude of reasons why someone would not reach their potential. But the reason for mass comparison and subsequent unhappiness, I believe, is because the most fundamental reason is not so obvious… 

Society will tell you that you’re not the best version of yourself because you’re not trying hard enough, you’re not putting the work in. You’re sitting on the sofa for the third night in a row eating ice cream when you should be studying. You’re snoozing the alarm instead of going for a run and only planning healthy meals rather than eating them. 

The world says, if you study, learn, create, get up when the alarm goes off and run. If you start treating your body with respect and fuelling it with nutritious foods rather than making it work to flush out your 19th slice of pizza, you will realise your potential.

Well, I have come to learn, you won’t. You will never reach your potential. Even if you do everything you think you should.

Great! So, why bother doing anything at all? Well, because you will get better.

You see, the reason people compare themselves with others is because they have seen what others are doing or have done, therefore it is proven to be possible. Therefore, it can potentially be done. Potentially. 

For all those you compare yourself to, you do so on a human level. That is to say, you believe that because you and your benchmark are both human, you should be able to achieve things in equal measure. But what are achievements anyway? And which is better? 

Those that achieve extraordinary things are fuelled – haunted – by a sense of not belonging, inadequacy. They feel they must do more than others just to be worthy of a place in this world.

What you don’t rarely acknowledge is that the fears of those perceived to be more successful are shared with those envious of the success. There is enough literature to support that. The reason dark thoughts and fears remain, regardless of how successful someone becomes or the accolades they collect is because, in the main, people became successful as a means of ending their suffering. And it didn’t work.

Seek, do better, accumulate more. That is the world’s answer to fulfilment. Thus, we run around trying to gather things we hope will keep us warm.

The way I see it, if you could sing like Amy Winehouse or act as well as Robin Williams, well… 

My view had been flawed all along. Comparison with others is not the big problem here. It’s the comparison with the human you are now and the human you could be that keeps you in a cycle of misery. Because even those who continue to get better each day, only raise the bar of the person they could become.

And that’s why, you wake, eat, work, play and sleep, feeling like you don’t belong, an imposter. It’s like you’re there but you shouldn’t be, the centrepiece of everybody’s joke. Which is great, because that is precisely where you need to be.

So, what’s so good about Imposter Syndrome?

Well, people who feel like they belong, are comfortable. Comfortable people stay where they are.

Here’s the thing, every time you make a status shift, you don’t know what you are doing. And why would you?

If you want to progress to the next stage, at some point, you must pretend as though you are capable of operating at that level, when you’ve only just got there.

It’s a necessary act. But just because you need to act, it doesn’t mean you are telling, nor living a lie. You can only become a lie if you genuinely believe you know more than you do, but not if you know you are the novice, bluffing your way through.

You see, when you step up to the next level, you are granted an element of forgiveness. Take It, nobody expects you to be the person you could be.

If you had any sanity, you would absolutely feel like an Imposter when you move in an upward trajectory. Everyone should feel that way. To not feel inadequate is to be narcissistic, and that’s a much greater problem to have, particularly for your mental health and all-round competence. 

If you are surrounded by competent people and you are willing to be open about your lack of competence, you will never be judged harshly for that. What you will be judged for is trying to make an impression you are not equipped to make in order to be accepted, which will likely only lead to a greater divide and further feelings of inadequacy. 

Many people are afraid to ask questions because society tells them that the person who asks the question is the idiot. And the belief is that it’s much better to sit in silence pretending to know what everybody else is talking about, rather than genuinely learn something from somebody more competent than they are.

The best thing about asking questions to reveal your inadequacy is that you only have to ask them once, and then you’re no longer stupid.

Be the idiot that you are. Intellectual humbleness is endearing. Those people more senior and competent would rather be asked a question than told an answer. People who have all the answers you wish you had, are people who once asked questions.

In psychology, the only proven way to reduce fear is to expose yourself to things you are afraid of, voluntarily, and you become braver as a consequence.

The brilliant thing about Imposter Syndrome is that it has nothing to do with your capacity as a human being. You need to feel inadequate; it means you’re on the right path. You don’t want the feeling to be permanent, but you do want it to reoccur, often. If you don’t feel like you don’t belong it means you are comfortable. And when did comfort ever make anybody stronger?