Ep 150: From Self-Doubt to Self-Assured: Tackling Impostor Syndrome Head-On

It's about having the clarity , self-confidence and unstoppable belief to go after and get everything you want . If you'll come with me , I'll show you how . Today we're going to talk about imposter syndrome . I think it's a really important topic because it has had such an impact on my own life .

I didn't even really know what it was until I guess it was 2015 , 2016 . I was at a Writers' Convention , a convention of authors in San Diego , and when you're at one of those things , there are thousands of authors there and I love being around creative people . They're fascinating , and this in particular . I think I've told you guys before on the podcast .

I have published a couple of novels so not in the self-improvement space . They were actually romantic comedies , nothing racy , just super funny , like something you'd see on Netflix or go see at the movies , like just intended to make you laugh and smile , and they were actually fairly successful .

But if there's ever a hallmark of imposter syndrome , I published them under a pen name .

So there you go , like , if you need any proof that I've got it , there it is , and actually it's funny because , as I've worked my own way through imposter syndrome we'll talk a little bit about that on this episode I've decided that I'm going to do kind of a re-edit , reboot of these and republish in my own name and retire my pen name .

That is a huge deal , you know , and I think an important thing , like when you write a book . I think people don't really appreciate this .

It takes a long time to write a book and authors , unless you're a bestseller , don't really make that much money off the book , and so it's a labor of love and you put it out into the world and people some trolls are mean , but most people are nice and gracious and stuff like that . Anyway , it's an important part of my life .

I love to write and haven't done much of it over the past five years , so I'm getting back into it . But anyway , I was at this convention and when you're there , like I said , there's thousands of authors there and I didn't know any of them because I was writing in a genre that I don't read .

I read action , spy thrillers , so very different than romantic comedies . So you know , I attended things and I studied the craft and I belong to a couple of writers groups and things like that , just because it's a fun hobby for me , and so I was .

You know , when you have those kinds of events you have usually a catered lunch and you know you go into this large room and there's thousands of people in there and you're sitting at these big rounds Tables of 10 or 12 people and you know , when I'm in a situation like that , I don't know anyone . I get very chatty .

So I'm talking to all these people next to me and you know I don't always pay attention to the keynotes . Here I'll just say that . And so Dr Valerie Young is kind of a pioneer in the field of psychology and specifically has done a lot of study on imposter syndrome and she wrote a book on it . That's kind of the Bible .

You can find it on the Amazon and she was there . Now , writers and I think anyone creative artists , probably to like anyone who's creating something from scratch , I would say a lot of coaches , right , creating content and thought leadership and stuff like that .

You know , when you're putting your stuff , your thoughts , out into the world , it's really to tell yourself all kinds of negative things about that . And so this woman was introduced .

She walks out onto the stage the perfect topic for a bunch of authors who don't think they're great and so are not always doing the best work they could or whatever they're telling themselves .

So I'm chatting with one part of my brain and sort of aware this low hum of like this lady starts talking and enough of what she was saying seeped into my consciousness that my chatting , like I , stopped talking and interacting .

I remember turning my chair and I was just like fixated like a laser beam on this stage and from the time that happened to the time she walked off the stage I think I was sitting at the time my mouth open like I was just like what is happening , like it was just like holy crap , like this lady in everywhere that came out of her mouth was like everything

that I was experiencing in my life . It was like seeing a 100% accurate diagnosis of yourself from a person you've never met . It was insane .

So I , of course , immediately bought her book and I have spent the years since really working on undoing it Because , in a nutshell , imposter syndrome will steal the joy from everything that you do in life , every success , everything you want to do . It is a boat anchor and it's ripple effects impact every part of your life . So it's a very important topic .

I actually thought initially I would focus my business there , but instead what I've done is I've decided to go deeper and my business is really fixated on helping people build the strongest self image of themselves , one that is aligned with where they're going not only with where they're at , but with where they're going .

Because one of the things that you know if we fast forward to like what's the fix to imposter syndrome ? It is having a self image that is aligned with not only where you are , but with where you're going .

And the problem with imposter syndrome is that there is a cognitive dissonance , like going on in your life , like there's one part of you that's very confident and because it disproportionately impacts achievers right , high achievers , so some things driving you forward .

So you've got the confidence to know that you want this big thing and it's really far from where you are and you're confident enough to go after it .

But it's like , as you start to do that , there's another part of yourself and it's your old self image and all of those old ways of being and old ways of thinking about yourself that are running on repeat in your mind and they tell you really nasty , horrible things and we'll unpack it here in a minute .

But it holds you back , it steals your joy , it keeps you from doing probably some of the bigger things you want to do . It's you say no to things you should say yes to like or you want to say yes to whatever . It's a . It is a very real thing and , I would say , disproportionately affects women .

They say you know , something like 80 or 90% of women have say that they have it .

I remember I was visiting home recently and my cousin one of my cousins is a very successful businesswoman and we were chatting about the business and stuff and she was talking about she goes yeah , almost every woman I work with says that they have imposter syndrome and I get it like I did too .

I can't tell you how many speaking engagements I've talked about this before . You can go back if you're interested in listening to how it . One of the ways it showed up for me to the confidence switch . That episode is one of the first few episodes I did . I think it's episode four or five and I talk about really my deep , deep fear of public speaking .

Right , I would just say no , this is not happening . And there was a situation that I share on that episode where my boss at the time this was about 16 years ago was like you're doing it right and he was right , I needed to do that at that particular time , but it was the amount of anxiety was off the charts for me and there was no way out .

Like he was having none of it , like I had to had to do this . So I want to talk about the ways that it shows up , because it isn't just women . In my private coaching practice I have some men to . It's probably evenly split between men and women , and my private coaching clients tend to be people like I specialize in mid career .

A lot of my private clients are people who are either entrepreneurs , so growing their business , or our upper level executives in sort of large and small organizations , and so there are a few men in there that have probably not full scale but like there are moments where they are struggling with aspects of imposter syndrome . So it's not just women .

It's just that most women , most high achieving women , struggle with it to some degree and for me , if you had a spectrum of zero to 100 , I was probably a 90 . And it got . I would say at the beginning of my career I might have been like more of a 20 or 30 .

And as I climbed the ladder , ironically , and got more and more successful , it just got worse . It was insane .

So I want to talk a little bit about what it is Like when you say imposter syndrome , like how does it show up ? And , in a nutshell , the truth is that if this is something that you have or are struggling with , no matter what you manage to accomplish , you are not able to enjoy your success . You don't own your success .

Like , on one level , you know that it was your hard work , but on another level , because your self-image has not kept pace with your accomplishments and your climb up the ladder this was the case for me . You see yourself as more and more of an imposter .

It feels fake , like you're working your butt off to do it , but then when you get the success , it's like , well , that's not really who I am and they're just going to find out like I'm going to do something wrong or I'm going to make a mistake or I'm going to somehow reveal myself and then they'll see the real me and the fact that I don't really know

what I'm doing and that this is all just a facade , and it feels like the more and more you achieve . I think like for me , why it got so exacerbated is , I felt , more and more exposed . On the one hand , it was super important for me I do feel like I'm good at my job so I craved those leadership moments .

I mean , I was managing , in some cases , budgets large as like $250 million , and when you're managing that and you've got a team of people that are like 26 people , like the whole organization is depending on you to get this thing right , because that's the gas in the tank right , that's what gets the business going .

And so I had zero questions about my ability to make the right decisions and to do it and to lead the team .

There was just something weird about what I was telling myself and there were triggers that I had that I'll talk about in a minute that sometimes it would quiet down a little bit and then I would have an event happen and we'll talk about that in a minute , because there are things that trigger the imposter syndrome . I think that's important to talk about .

But you tell yourself that you're a fake , you're a phony that people are going to find out . You'll tell people things like you'll dismiss their praise . Like for me , I wouldn't speak because I thought what do I have to say ? Like I'm not going to stand up in front of thousands of marketing experts and talk about the successes that I've had .

They've all done more important things , like that's what I was telling myself . I thought what am I going to do ? Like how is that going to be helpful to anybody to have me talk for 20 minutes ? And that was just my inner narrative . There were yes , were those people in the audience accomplished ?

Yes , and do they know a lot of things , many of which maybe I don't know ? Yes , but did I have things to share that might have helped them ? Yes , but I didn't believe that . So there was no way . It was just a hard . No , I'm not doing it . And it was bad Like some of the things .

Like sometimes I would sort of say yes , if I really liked , the person thought , oh gosh , you know I should do this . I should , I do have something to say , and then I would back out . Just bad too , like I was petrified of doing it . So you think , well , naturally I'd start at this podcast , right ?

So I will say that took a while and I just decided to start the podcast on a Saturday , like during the pandemic , and I thought I'm just doing it . If I don't , I never will . And so it was a journey for me to get here and it's become something that I really enjoy and I like doing it on the topics that I do .

I like helping people and especially sharing things that I've been through . So , you know , you find that you don't take ownership of your achievements and you have a ton of self doubt and self denigration and nothing is ever good enough . And I didn't really do that and it was all luck . And you know , blah , blah , blah . That is what we do .

That's how imposter syndrome shows up . And so you might say , well , like , where does that come from ? Because , like , if you are , if you think about it for a minute , you're a high achiever . So you're out there in the world pushing yourself , next , leveling . You keep wanting more , keep wanting to express yourself in new ways .

So there's one part of you that's confident enough to see that opportunity and to go after it and to believe , on one level , that you can do it , but you've got this old inner narrative that's holding you back . So where does that old inner narrative come from ?

According to Dr Valerie Young and other books that I've read from PhDs and experts on it , it comes from , they think , some areas all related to early childhood . So gender stereotypes , right ? So disproportionately impacts women . Think about that for a minute .

It's rather new to several decades that women have actually put themselves out into the workforce in the ways that we're doing now . So for those of us on the older end of Gen X , like I am , you know there weren't a lot of path pavers ahead of us . Like many of us still not all , but many of us still had a mother that didn't work outside the home .

So there was no like even in my family , like I think I've talked about , like there was no expectation necessarily . They all knew I was smart , I always got good grades , like you know , whatever . But you know that having the big career was not anything that my parents pushed me to do . It came from me , you know .

And so when you don't have anyone to look at , who's driving you forward in that way , it's kind of a crazy thing , right . So it comes from , you know , gender stereotypes , what's expected of us as women .

I think this is less and less now , I hope , because I think the younger ones coming up probably had mothers , or maybe even grandmothers who , or in the workforce but you know , I did not have that and early family dynamics . So I think I do think there's a thing about birth order . I really do .

Earth's the story I'm telling myself anyway , like in my family . I'm 34 , right . So I have an older sister is five , six years older than me . I've got brother . He's the only boy in the family , so he's two and a half years older than me . Then there's me and I've got a younger sister is about three years younger than me .

So you know , my older sister got to be the first kid , she's also a girl . My brother's the only boy , he's the second . And then there's me . I'm the third girl , third kid , you know , and so , and then my younger sister gets to be the baby . So when you're the middle child , I think I was the only girl .

It probably would have been a different experience , but because I was the second , you know , the second girl , two of three , and I think for most of my life , you know you can go one of two ways .

When you're that in that situation , I think you know some people become narrative wells , you know the black sheep not always that they're doing stuff to get noticed I became an achiever and it just was in me , right , and I do think it was programmed in . You know , I wanted to achieve .

I wanted , I guess , a need to stand out , but I do think for me the birth order thing was a huge part of it . Culture , you know ethnic origins can be part of it , but there's other things too . They say family dynamics .

You know , having parents who had , you know , incredibly high standards , having parents who are very , very protective , you know didn't really let you put yourself out there . Graduate level coursework , you know maybe where you find yourself . You know , with a lot of other academia people and you're feeling a little triggered by that .

Racial identities , you know all of that . So that is kind of , they think , where it comes from . So it's basically hardwired in and it becomes this way you have of looking at yourself , whether it's through the lens of what it means to be a woman , or what it means to be your ethnic origin , or what it means to be , in my case , third or four kids .

You know , whatever it is , there's something in there and the way you see yourself .

And so , on the one hand , even though you might be very confident and may know you're very capable , like intellectually , of doing the things that you want to go after , you have this thing , this recurring pattern of thought , this recurring way of being that's holding you back , stealing your joy , keeping you from really going for it .

And some of the symptoms , according to Dr Valerie Young , is if you're a failure . So if you are somebody that aren't sure if you have this or not , how often do you find yourself afraid to put yourself out there or not doing something because you're afraid you might fail ? That is a symptom , right .

Denial of your ability to people praise you and you say , oh , it was nothing , just I used to do that , oh , it's just luck , nope , I was just at the right place at the right time . And you know , forget about , you know , all the study , all the , all the work , all the long hours , like , forget all that , it's just luck , you know .

You know discounting of praise , right . Fear or guilt about success , right . So the more you achieve , the more you want to achieve , but the more you feel weird about the achievement , right , because it's not . Your self image has not kept pace with your upward climb .

That was me in spades , like I did not , did not , did not keep pace , my self image did not keep pace with the things that I achieved . So I got triggered a lot and let's talk about those triggers . So what we're going to talk about is the process that happens in our mind .

So when I talk about triggers , I'm not saying that these things cause the imposter syndrome . The imposter syndrome is caused by the things that you think , and we're going to talk about some of the symptoms of how we think because I think you might recognize it , that's what Dr Valerie Young was talking about on that stage .

She was talking about the things we tell ourselves and I was like holy crap , like that is my whole inner thought life you're talking about there , you know , but some of the things that trigger those thoughts , if we find ourselves in new professional settings you know , the big job , the big promotion , right ?

A new academic setting , so graduate school , law school , you know , md , doctor , you know , becoming a physician , like those sorts of environments are full of people that are struggling on some level with imposter syndrome because they're around other high achievers .

Right , the workplace there can be things about your workplace or the dynamics between you and your boss , or you and some of your peers that can trigger imposter syndrome , afraid that you're not good enough , right , but driving yourself to ever higher levels . There is a noise that happens there , a disconnect that can really take the joy out of your daily life .

Social interactions you know some people feel it flare up If they are in a large group setting . You know they can feel overwhelmed or not good enough or not confident enough to kind of work the room in that sort of environment . For me , you know , if I was invited to speak , there was just no way for many years that was ever going to happen .

Ever , ever , ever . Right . And relationships there's certain types of either friendships or romantic relationships that can trigger feelings of imposter syndrome , right , and so let's talk about like when that one of those triggers happens . Like what causes imposter syndrome ?

Because a lot of people would think like me , I thought , oh well , if I just don't ever accept a speaking engagement , imposter syndrome's gone , right . No , like these triggers are not the problem . The problem is what's going on in your brain , right , and so some of the things that we tell ourselves are I'm a fraud .

They're going to find out that I don't really know what I'm doing . Everyone else knows what they're doing but me . I'm not qualified , I didn't deserve this promotion . I don't deserve all of these accolades . I can't do it . I'm not good enough , I don't have anything smart to say , so I'm not going to speak up in the meeting , right , I'm going to be .

They're going to find out that I'm really a fraud , that I don't belong there , that I'm not as good as they are . Right , that you know , really , it's all about likeability and that's how I got where I am . My charm or whatever , or my external connections or so and so helped open the door for me . I didn't really earn this promotion , right ?

Those are the things that we say to ourselves , and when we say things like that , the reason Impostor Syndrome feels so crappy is because it causes us to either feel like there's a spectrum of emotion here . We can either feel like depression or sadness .

That was not a thing for me , but anxiety was huge , panic , like I would start sweating if someone even sent me an email on invitation , an invitation to speak . Like no , it's a hard , no right . A lack of confidence , like not .

It makes you feel like fearful of doing it , and yet you have something in you that's compelling you to put yourself out there and do it . So you're living in this constant state of driving yourself forward and being just panicked about that being exposed , stressed out , overthinking everything that you say , everything that you do . You worry .

How do other people look at you ? That wasn't a big thing for me . My whole thing was more about anxiety and panic , right , but some people ruminate , right , and they just constantly spin on the events of the day . Right , what happened ? What did people think about that ? I rarely think about that . I really .

Mine is more about self-doubt about whether I actually have anything smart to share . You know that people don't already know .

I kind of had this narrative in my mind and I remember an early boss saying well , that's not true .

And I was pretty early on , it was back in my days at Sprint , it was like the late 90s , and I remember we were talking about something and I remember telling her you know , because I've always said this thing with impatience and I've realized it's the things that I was telling myself and I started to realize it back then and I told her .

I said I just feel like you know , if I get something , you know the minute I get it , I feel like everyone else gets it too . You know , like it's so obvious that if I got it , everyone instantly also got it .

So when people like , if I'm trying to sell in a complex brand ID or whatever , in my earlier days I told her , I said I feel like I get upset when people don't get on the train , you know , and she's like sometimes like you are getting there first . That's why you're a leader , right , and she said so your job is to help other people get on the train .

And I thought that actually really helped me . I was like , oh , like cuz , I truly thought , well , if I get it , then everyone gets it and let's just get on the train and go .

You know , and it she helped me to realize like , no , like your job as a leader is to get everyone on the train , to help them understand the value of being on the train and where the trains going .

And I was like , oh , I had no idea because I just assumed that you know there was no way that I could possibly connect dots before anyone else did so that I was glad that we had that conversation earlier my career , because that helped me , I think , be a better leader to others .

Because I realize now , oh , you can't assume that everyone's I even knows there is a train like you've got a kind of in some areas where , like I'm an expert , like on brand , you got to help people understand , like what you're even talking about first , and Then see the value of that and then invite them on to the train .

You don't have to get Impatient with them because they're not connecting all the dots as fast as you did , right .

So it just shows up in so Many ways , right , and when you're feeling all of these feelings of fear , anxiety , panic , stress , overthinking , really the big way that it shows up , well , there's a couple like one is , I think you can say no to opportunity . Now , I Did not say no opportunity , I just kept pushing through it , right and and that's why .

But I never really changed or shifted those ways of thinking about myself and those ways of being . And so the higher I climbed , the more anxiety I had , and the the more anxiety I had , the more it showed up in other areas of my life .

I would , I wouldn't take Vacations , I wouldn't , like I told you on I think it was last episode or the episode before like I didn't have any balance , sometimes , like I would work all the time , like even when , you know , I was walking through animal kingdom at Disney World , right , I had conference call after conference call , like because , you know , I just

didn't ever want to stop working , because I wanted to make sure that I was , you know , maintained that level of achievement and Contribution . So it takes a toll on your life and you know I would isolate too , I wouldn't stay current with friends on , you know , calling them back , or you know I would cancel vacations . You know just all kinds of ways .

Some people overeat , some people over drinks , some people over all the over . Consumption behaviors that you have in your personal life , I think many times come from Impostor syndrome , not always , but they come from some form of anxiety , right , sadness , anxiety , panic , self-doubt , fear .

And instead of allowing ourselves to feel those things , let those emotions kind of be experienced and processed through and Just deciding to think something different so you can feel something more positive . Instead of that , which takes effort and awareness and discipline , we will just default into Patterns of behavior that sue this .

So consumption behaviors some people call it buffering , whatever anything that you're Over-consuming , overspending over anything Doesn't serve you and it causes all kinds of other problems .

Overspending causes , you know , financial issues , over eating causes , weight issues , over drinking causes , you know , health issues like it's a , it's a thing , and so it's super important to admit , when you're feeling , a good way to diagnose yourself if you're not in touch with what you're telling yourself .

A good way to diagnose this is to say on a daily basis , like how am I feeling , especially if you're getting ready to be in or have just been in a situation when your profile is raised right , where you're asked to speak , or where you're just promoted or where you're leading a discussion with some senior level .

So , whatever it is for you , if you're just starting a new job or going back to grad school or whatever it is , in some way Some things change , some things different your . If it's like you've got a little spotlight shining down from above on you , how does that make you feel ?

If that makes you feel fearful , self-doubt , anxiety , panic , I think you need to take a longer look at posture syndrome . May not be that , could be other things , but my guess is you're telling yourself some version of I'm not good enough , or everything I've ever achieved is really just luck , or Like I'm not really that good .

They just think I am and I've somehow tricked them into believing that I'm actually good at this thing . And so what you want to do is you want to see the patterns of thought that are going on in you and what's causing that . Like what , what are you reacting to ?

So , like I said , the triggers that we talked about like new job , new academic situation , whatever those aren't the cause of the imposter syndrome . They are the triggering event that's causing you to think , the things that are the hallmarks of imposter syndrome , and that's where it all starts , and that is your Point of power .

But I would say and this is the thing I want to leave you with for this episode , because in the next episode we're going to talk about the five types and we're going to talk about the cycle that you go through I want to leave you with this thought a lot of people I've seen online , like they're talking about , interrupt your pattern of thought and decide to

think a new thought , and that is one of the things you can do . But I believe that when we have these fear-based emotions or Anxiety based emotions , I think on this type of thing , it's really important to say but what's really going on ?

Yeah , it's not great to have a thought like I'm a fake or I'm a phony , or they're about to find out or you know , if I try this , I'm gonna fail . That that's not a great thought and yeah , it'd be nice to pick a more positive thought . You need to do that and Catch those moments where you're . You have that .

But I think when those things are recurring patterns of thought , I think you have to go deeper and I believe those recurring patterns of thought come from a Self-image based origin . There's something about the way that you're looking at yourself and About who you really are that is not aligned With either where you are at or where you want to go .

And it's that Delta when imposter syndrome lives right . It's hardwired in because of our early childhood programming and yet we have something in us that wants to drive forward .

And if you're like me and you're just gritting it out like driving yourself forward with Incredible tenacity , it just gets worse and worse and worse because that Delta gets worse and worse and worse .

The way you saw yourself when you were young and the way you learned to view the world and yourself in the world no longer matches up with all of the things that you've done to move yourself Forward .

So it's almost like there's a duality there's enough confidence and desire and belief in you to drive you forward , but you haven't done the work to shift who you believe that you are . And that is self-image , self concept work .

And that Is why I decided not to focus my entire business on imposter syndrome , but instead to focus it on the root , because a self-image not only can show up as a posture syndrome . It can . It can show up in so many other Areas of your life and in so many other ways .

So imposter syndrome is just one way , but it's an important way and I think it impacts so many of us .

So that is what I wanted to share today a little bit about what it is , how it's impacted me and the triggering events , the thoughts that we have , the things that makes us feel , and then the results that we get in our life , ways that can hold us back , and all of that . So that's what I wanted to share with you today .

Next week we're gonna talk about the five types , because there are five different ways that it shows up , and I think that might be really helpful to you , and we're gonna talk a little bit about the cycle and then we'll close .

Last thing I wanted to share is in mid-March I'm gonna be doing a masterclass , a webinar , on Imposter syndrome and we're gonna be going just a little bit deeper and I thought that might be helpful for you .

So if you're interested , stay tuned to next week and I'll , by next week , I'll have a sign up for the masterclass and and then we'll be holding it the week following , so the middle part of March . So if you found this at all interesting , I hope I see you there and Until next time ,

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