Imposter Who?

Audience: Anyone

Over the coming months I want to explore in more depth something that plays out for many of us, with a view to getting to the end of the year understanding what it is, why it happens, how to work with it rather than against it and by providing some tools to help your journey. Imposter Syndrome. I'll be deepening my understanding and looking to spend time with others who this resonates with to understand their experience and how they've managed it or if they have.

I wrote my first blog about imposter syndrome around 2 years ago, Imposter syndrome: control it, ignore it or use it? - Women in Defence Careers. I was open about what it meant for me and my experience of it. I wish I'd kept count over the last few years of how many times friends, colleagues or clients had made reference to it in a conversation because it has been a lot. A question I want to ask or do ask depending on the situation is whether they've defined what this means, either from a theoretical perspective or personally for them.

Sometimes I worry that the term is used freely without really understanding or without working through the impact of it on our everyday life. Do we label it and move on too quickly?

There are a number of signs that someone might have imposter syndrome and it might play out in certain situations or environments; some of these signs are listed below, click to drop down a brief description.

Self-Doubt

Doubting our own abilities and achievements. Feeling that we are not as capable as others perceive us to be.

Success linked to Luck

Believing that our success was down to luck, being in the right place at the right time or because someone else made it happen for us. We detach our success from our own doing.

Comparing Ourself to Others

Using others to compare ourselves to and believing that we can’t be or are not as good.

Avoiding Recognition

It’s much more comfortable to avoid situations of recognition or if we do find ourselves in these situations we’ll be telling ourselves in our heads that we don’t really deserve this and anyone could have done what we have done.

Pushing ourselves too Far

This really resonates with me as it drove me to burnout.  I worked excessive hours and extra hard to try to prove I was good enough.  Most of this time was spent procrastinating and thinking of ways to make people believe I could do what I was doing!

Seeking Perfection

Any misstep or mistake could call into question our ability, so we believe that we should always strive for 100% rather than getting a piece of work to good enough.  Our good enough is probably not good enough in our own minds and I found that I'd keep going and actually it didn't make much difference.

Do any of these sound familiar to you? Let me know what resonates with you in the poll below. If you take a look at my first blog Imposter syndrome: control it, ignore it or use it? - Women in Defence Careers on this topic you'll see how I recognised some of these in myself and how they impacted my thought processes.

We can feel that this way of being controls elements of our life. Sometimes it can feel overwhelming and in extreme circumstances it can have a negative impact on our well-being and mental health. Taking time to explore why we experience imposter syndrome and developing mechanisms to manage it can have a significantly positive impact. 

Any of the above resonate with you?

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• Self-doubt
• Success linked to luck
• Being found out
• Comparing ourselves to others

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Look out for the next edition of the blog coming in the next few weeks or if you want to find out how a coach can help you with this get in touch to arrange a complimentary discovery call. Info@reachpeakperformancecoaching.co.uk