Impostor Syndrome

Impostor Syndrome is a topic that is receiving a lot of attention and press in recent years. But the syndrome itself is not new.  It has been around for – well, likely forever.  It just has a name now.

To be honest, the name it has, or that has become popularized may not be completely accurate. Calling it a syndrome implies some type of clinical acceptance of a disorder. What is most often called Impostor Syndrome is more accurately known as Impostor Phenomenon or IP. This term was coined in the late seventies. You can look at definitions of syndrome until your eyes glaze over and argue either for syndrome or against it, but I am going to call it Impostor Syndrome because it is acceptable, more familiar, easier to spell and much easier to say than phenomenon.

Do you suffer from Impostor Syndrome?

Do people who know you consider you confident and competent but deep down inside you don’t feel that way?

When you see people, you look up to and respect do you wonder how it is that they are so confident and accomplished?  Do you wish like you could be like them?

You may feel that way about your work, your parenting, your intelligence, your ability to speak to others, any number of areas of your life.

Do you have thoughts like, if they knew who I really am, and how I feel inside, they wouldn’t like me, respect me, or want to hang around with me?

Have you ever walked into a party, presentation or board room and felt a sense of intimidation or felt like you don’t belong there?  Can this happen even if you have never met the people or know what their qualifications and accomplishments are?

I ask that last question because people who suffer from impostor syndrome will feel like impostors even in groups where they know little or nothing about the group they are with. They may be in a room with people who have less intelligence or accomplishments, and they feel less than, before they even understand the make-up of the group. Just the venue, such as a board room or a party where people are dressed in expensive clothes or wearing expensive jewelry may be enough to bring up intense feelings of being out of place.

Let’s take a closer look at impostor syndrome, identifying it, its causes and how you can overcome it.

How Common is Impostor Syndrome

Interestingly, some research indicates that as much as 70% of the population feel like impostors, at least some of the time.  Surprisingly, the phenomenon occurs frequently in people who are high achievers. These people can feel like fakes despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Impostor Syndrome is more than just a garden variety insecurity and a tendency to dwell on the negative. Underpinning the insecurity and dwelling on the negative is a fear that somebody will find out they are impostors.

It can be difficult to identify impostor syndrome in another person. In my practice as a therapist, I will listen for the following clues.

Those who struggle with feeling like an impostor, typically have difficulty accepting compliments or praise even when they perform well or have significant accomplishments.

Instead of accepting praise or compliments with a simple, thank you, they will often deflect with self-deprecating humor, or pay the other person a compliment to divert attention from themselves. This practice can seem like sincere humility, but it is not. It moves attention from the self-identified impostor because they believe too much scrutiny will expose them for who they really are, or more accurately, who they think they are.

People who struggle with impostor syndrome will experience discomfort when being praised and have feelings of anxiety and find ways to escape the conversation or situation.

Even in the face of evidence and proof of their abilities, such as raises, promotions, awards, or affirmations, they will write it off to luck, charm, good timing, or other factors that have nothing to do with their ability.

There are some other outward signs of impostorism. When given a task some people will put in an extraordinary amount of effort completing the task and then convince themselves that they received the accolades only because of the unstainable level of effort they put in. The other side of the coin is the procrastinator who puts things off so they will have a built-in excuse if they either don’t complete the task or complete it haphazardly. Most procrastinators will then finish the project or task on time because they have the necessary ability but will then write it off to good fortune or some other factor outside of their control.

Although it is often difficult to identify in others, those who struggle with impostor syndrome, know all too well what it feels like and the sense of low self-worth that is its constant companion.

What people who have impostor syndrome don’t know is the impact it has on those who are closest to them.

Fear and self-doubt combined with the inability to enjoy achievements and accept compliments can lead to emotional and physical depletion. Sometimes to the point of depression. The effects can also be draining on partners, children, and friends. It can be frustrating to see an accomplished, successful, intelligent loved one have the inability to see in themselves, what others see in them. And the constant deflection of compliments, praise and support given by loved ones can create a sense of futility and cause them to give up their efforts to help.

Causes

Before I jump into the causes of Impostor Syndrome, I want to clarify the difference between it and an inferiority complex. The differences are subtle and there are many similarities. People who struggle with Impostor Syndrome feel like they are frauds or misrepresenting their capabilities or importance, and fear that will be discovered.

People with inferiority complex typically do not feel like they are posing as someone or something they aren’t. They just have an overarching feeling of not being as good as other people.

Both have low self-esteem but the person who feels like they are an impostor, is often accomplished, capable and articulate and appears to the outside world like they have it all together.

Often the seeds of impostorism are sown in childhood. The usual suspects are parents and other family members, or friends of the family. However, it can also include teachers, coaches, and religious institutions to name a few contributors.

Let’s look at how some of the underpinnings of Impostor Syndrome can start.  Imagine a child growing up in a family where both parents are highly accomplished and who have received awards in their fields for excellence. Mom and dad talk about how son or daughter will attend the same schools and follow in their footsteps. The parents work hard at ensuring the child is afforded every opportunity and there is a push for academic and/or sports excellence. Anything less than an A or A+ may not be outwardly criticized but the child knows when they have failed to live up to expectations. Perfection is the goal.

The strive for perfectionism is a prison because there is no such thing as perfection. The child goes on to be accomplished in their field, always striving to be the best – striving for perfection. Driven because of their parents. Knowing that anything less than perfection is failure, the praise, compliments, and awards seem like insincere flattery because deep down the adult child feels like the task or project, they have completed isn’t good enough – or more accurately, they aren’t good enough. They feel like a fake, a fraud, an impostor.

It is interesting to note that children that are raised in that type of competitive environment strive for perfection to avoid feelings of shame for not measuring up. Yet, having the underlying feeling of never achieving the goals either they or their parents have set for them, when receiving praise which should help them feel better about themselves and not feel shame, they still cannot shake the feeling of being an impostor.

These feelings can also arise when children are compared to their higher achieving siblings by parents, teachers, other       family members, friends of the family, or coaches.

Eleanor Roosevelt wrote: “Comparison is the thief of joy.” When children are compared unfavorably to their siblings, or other students, their self-esteem suffers, and they begin to judge themselves. Wherever there is comparison, there is judgement.

There is a vast difference between a child looking up to someone as a role model and something to aspire to and being told things like: “Why aren’t you as smart as your brother or sister.” “Or your mom or dad were great athletes, I guess you didn’t get their genes.”

Never in history has there been so many opportunities for comparison or self-judgement. We hear of the lifestyles of the rich and famous, see almost everyone posting the highlight reels of their lives on social media, and watch advertising that makes us feel like we are less than, if we don’t own “this” or look like “that.”

This can put a person in the position of having to pretend or wear masks so they will appear to fit the mold, never let them see you sweat, and be a good soldier, even if the person is dying inside, consumed with the fear of being found out to be an impostor.

Often religious institutions have high standards for their members’ behaviour and can even have unrealistic expectations of how people should behave both when at church and when going about their daily lives. When members fall short of the mark in their non-church life and then attend church pretending to be living as the church demands or expects, they often feel like fakes or impostors on Sunday morning.

Not to be overlooked as an incubator for impostor syndrome is the workplace. It is a place where long hours, perfectionism and drive are often rewarded. There is competition for promotions and better pay as well as performance bonuses or awards.

Expectations of high performance and excellence are enshrined in mission and vision statements. If someone is struggling to make the grade in these highly competitive environments it can be seen as a sign of weakness to ask for help or as a career limiting move. When someone who is struggling internally with their self-imposed performance goals, receives raises and awards, they feel like a fraud, feel they will be found out and push themselves harder to avoid what seems in their mind to be the inevitable moment they are exposed.

Overcoming Impostor Syndrome

How do we overcome impostor syndrome? I apologize but I am going to go on a bit of a rant here. I recently read an article that suggested a way to overcome impostor syndrome was to “wait it out.” I’m sorry but I find that advice to be shortsighted and irresponsible. The author was saying that as we age, we become more sure of who we are, our capabilities and less sensitive to negative emotions. I won’t even start on the fact that there are no negative emotions.

People who suffer from impostor syndrome most often have deep feelings of shame, not measuring up, or not being good enough. In many cases these feelings begin in childhood so have been carried for decades. Pressure cooker workplaces, religious institutions and societal and peer pressure keep reinforcing those feelings.

Feeling like an impostor impacts jobs, relationships, and self-esteem.  I don’t think waiting it out when there is so much on the line, including self-fulfillment and happiness, is a viable plan.

Here is an example. I have a highly successful client who is approaching sixty. He has felt like an impostor all his life. One would hope waiting it out would be complete by the time someone reaches that age. It isn’t. His impostorism dates back to his childhood and has never been addressed until he recently disclosed it to me. We are now working on reducing it because feelings of shame and not being good enough don’t miraculously go away if you wait long enough.

I will grant that in some people, impostor syndrome is first recognized in early adulthood and as people self-actualize the feelings may reduce or disappear. But why not go to work on them as soon as they are recognized so people don’t suffer with it longer than necessary?  Most headaches go away on their own too but when the pain is significant, we take a pain reliever rather than waiting it out. How long should a twenty-year-old with impostor syndrome wait? Until they are thirty, forty, fifty?

Strategies for overcoming impostor syndrome start with identifying the origins. What factors contributed to the feelings of being an impostor? Did they sprout in early childhood and who sowed the seeds? Was it parents, teachers, minsters coaches? If a person can identify where the beginning was, it is possible to then put them in context.

When we can establish the origins and context around them, (especially if they are in childhood) we will see that these feelings are based on the experience and reference points or lenses through which the other people see the world. These are constructs that belong to the people who dump them on us. A construct is a subjective idea or theory based on concepts and is not based on empirical evidence. For example, parents may say: “If you become a doctor, everyone will admire you, you will make lots of money and be happy.” This is not necessarily true.

Finding the origins will help us recognize we didn’t develop impostor syndrome on our own. It is a series of messages which we have received overtly or covertly from people, and other information we are exposed to.

Understanding the messages and beliefs were “put there” by other people based on their own beliefs and paradigms help us to first understand they are not our own and then determine if they are currently true or valid for us.

If the feelings of impostorism appear in later years, let’s say once a person is in a competitive work environment, consider that people with well-developed self-esteem and self-efficacy typically aren’t susceptible to impostor syndrome. Self-efficacy is defined as: an individual’s belief in his or her capacity to act in ways to achieve specific goals.  If an individual struggles with self-esteem or self-efficacy, the finger will point back to a breakdown in the nurturing and environmental factors necessary to build them. This can include families, schools, churches, sports teams, or other communities a child is raised in.

If impostor syndrome is first recognized in the workplace, it is usually the result of the factors previously mentioned.  An extremely competitive workplace can trigger these feelings which may not have been previously noticed.

To reduce the feelings of shame and inadequacy, whether they have been long held or recent, the process is similar.

A hallmark of impostor syndrome is the inability to accept praise, rewards, and awards without feeling like a fake, which leads to shame. One of the first and most important things to do is to practice simply saying thank-you when somebody praises or gives a compliment. Resisting the urge to deflect with humor, feigned humility or by immediately paying a compliment back, provides an opportunity to let the compliment sink in, allow that it is likely sincere, and that you have done something worthy of the praise. If you find it difficult to do this one simple thing, and you fight to keep yourself from basking in the moment by filling the silence with words, it is a strong indicator of the importance to practice it. Smile and say thank-you.

Also, accept that you have abilities in some areas which are superior to other people and other people will have abilities in areas you aren’t proficient in. This is a fact of life. Once you learn to accept your own gifts and capabilities you can accept your value and worth to an organization, situation, or relationship.

Evaluate what you have accomplished. Most people who suffer from impostor syndrome never look at their list of accomplishments because they discount everything.

Admit that you suffer from impostor syndrome to supportive people and talk about it. This reduces the hold it has on you and in particular the shame you feel. You will be surprised to find out how many people you know feel the same way. You will then feel less isolated and alone and have a group of people to help you recognize your value.

If work is the only or primary place you experience impostor syndrome, look at other areas of your life and acknowledge what you are doing well in them. This will strengthen your belief that you are a good person of value and worth.

Above all else, avoid comparison. Stay focused on evaluating your own achievements not those of others. Like perfectionists, people with impostor syndrome put pressure on themselves to perform every task flawlessly, fearing that any mistake will expose them.

People make mistakes. When we accept that, we can embrace them as an opportunity for growth and progress. And everybody is a beginner at the start and grow to competence and eventually becoming a master.

Takeaways

Here are three takeaways. If you struggle with impostor syndrome, look for its origins. Next, avoid comparing yourself to other people. And talk about it with supportive people because shame does not survive when it is exposed and talked about.