“Woah… I stopped hearing anything you said after that first sentence”, said my friend on Zoom.
I was sharing the outline of what might be my next book, about my crippling Imposter Syndrome and how I learned to get over it and love myself.
“Which one? That you can’t feel like a fake unless you’ve done something?”
“Yes. Holy crap, my life just shifted. You know those moments of insight when they describe that shift? It is literally a whole different and affirming way to look at my life. That sentence is a shift on a cellular level for me.”
I was taken aback by her reaction. And then I remembered, the things we find easiest, we don’t value. I was doing it right here. I was sharing my “cocktail napkin” notes… something I had written out in a minute or 2 shortly before our call and wanted to share it with someone. I had thought nothing of it, other than it was a start for my book idea.
I’ve learned enough to recognize this habit, and was able to stop my dismissal of my thoughts and circle back that I had actually come up with something valuable.
“Thank you for sharing your reaction with me. It was really valuable to reflect what I had”, I let her know.
My thinking behind that statement has come from the fact that I’ve only in very recent years begun to appreciate what all I have done and accomplished.
It has made it so crystal clear for me: You literally can’t feel like a fake unless you have had some kind of success or achievement. In a sense, the imposter feelings are evidence of the scope of your achievement. The bigger an imposter you feel like, the bigger your achievement.
I faked my foot through the door multiple times in my life, but once I was through that door, it was all on me. No amount of faking can create actual results. Only you delivering creates results.
I couldn’t fake my way to my CD series selling 10 times what the record label had projected.
I couldn’t fake my way to selling out events with everyone paying to come see me.
I might have gotten myself on TV to do a demo of stage hypnosis with no experience, but when I showed up I did an amazing bit on live TV that I used for the rest of my career and got me immediate bookings.
I thought I fooled the world creating software with no training or education, but I couldn’t fake that millions of people used it and got tremendous value from it.
I was caught up in my own head thinking that I was a fake when the evidence was always there of my success. I now see it and appreciate it for what it is.
People who do nothing and achieve nothing will never feel like a fake. Only those that actually have done something do. In my case, the crippling imposter syndrome I lived with for years was fed by the scope of my success. I did some awesome things. I can now appreciate them and know I did that.
If you’re dealing with feelings of being a fake in your own life, how does it change things for you to realize that you would never feel that way unless you had actually achieved something? Your evidence is sitting right there.
