The Truth About Imposter Syndrome Nobody Tells You

Episode 39: Have you ever worried that you're not as good as everyone else? That maybe you don't belong in your job? Do you feel like a fraud? Do you worry that people will find out that you don't really know what you are doing?

If so, you've experienced Imposter Syndrome. In this episode, Career Change Coach Dana Stevens encourages you to think differently about Imposter Syndrome. She unpacks why acceptance of Imposter Syndrome actually creates a resignation that stops people asking the most important questions.

In this episode you will learn:

• What imposter syndrome is really a symptom of, and why naming that changes everything
• The real cost of accepting the imposter syndrome identity rather than seeing it as a signal
• The importance of learning how to take control of your confidence and how it can be built deliberately over time

Book a free Coaching Consultation:

https://calendly.com/danastevens/initial-coaching-chat

Connect with Dana:

Website: https://www.danastevens.com/workwithme
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dana_stevens_coach/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danastevens1/

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And if you’re ready to design a working life that truly fits your needs and lifestyle, book a free consultation call at https://calendly.com/danastevens/initial-coaching-chat

Special thanks to @Lou_Greenaway_Music for the piano composition and performance.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:51

Today I want to talk to you about imposter syndrome. Have you ever felt it? Have you ever told people you've got it? It's that feeling you get at work sometimes when you think, maybe I don't really belong here. Maybe I don't deserve to be here. Maybe you're thinking everyone else seems to know what they're doing way more than me. Maybe someone's going to find me out. Maybe someone's going to notice that I'm a fraud and I don't have it altogether. That might show up for you like staying quiet in a meeting when someone asks your opinion. And even though you have a thought, even though you have something there that's genuinely useful, you stay quiet. Maybe you're worried that what you have to say isn't actually as good as what someone else might say. Or what if you're wrong, or don't really know what you're talking about? Or maybe you do something well. You get given a compliment, a good result, a piece of recognition, and your first thought isn't pride. It's actually to deflect it. Your instinct is to push it away. You might even say, well, actually it was just the team, or everyone else worked so hard on it. You don't see the value of what you personally added. And the more you tell yourself it wasn't really about your individual contribution, or you don't see the value of what you gave, the more you worry that people will see through you. Or maybe you start looking at potential new jobs. You might even get excited about one, but instead of applying, you spend 20 minutes reading the job description and compiling a list of all the ways you don't quite measure up. If any of that sounds familiar, you're probably experiencing imposter syndrome. And today I really want to talk to you about why I think that label of imposter syndrome might actually be getting in your way and how to think about it differently instead. So chances are you do know what imposter syndrome means already, but if not, or if you just want a refresher about the actual definition, the Oxford Dictionary describes it as the persistent inability to believe that one's own success is deserved or has been legitimately achieved as a result of one's own efforts or skills. And personally, I think that imposter syndrome has been talked about so much, especially for women amongst women, that it's almost become this kind of standard part of how many women define themselves at work. And I hear it said by lots of people almost casually, like, oh yeah, I've always had imposter syndrome, or that's just me. I've got terrible imposter syndrome. People say that to me all the time. And there's nothing wrong with saying that. But what's really interesting is that people say it like it's a fact, like it's simply part of who they are. A fixed feature that arrived at some point and is just there now, permanently part of you. And I really want you to think about this word syndrome because I think it's problematic, because syndrome sounds medical. It sounds like something you're diagnosed with, something you get, and then simply have to manage and live alongside, like a chronic condition that you work around but can't actually fix. And that framing, I believe, is keeping a lot of women stuck. Maybe it's keeping you stuck. Because when you accept imposter syndrome as just part of who you are, you stop asking the most important question, which is what is really going on underneath this? What is this a symptom of? And crucially, what can I do about it? Because do you know that the word syndrome, because do you know what the word syndrome actually means? It means a group of recognizable symptoms that tend to cluster together. Symptoms. Which means that when we say I have imposter syndrome, what we're actually saying is I have these particular symptoms. And then far too often we stop there and we skip that next crucial step. We forget to ask, what is causing these symptoms and how do I address them? You wouldn't do that with a physical symptom. You would want to know what is causing it and what you can do about it, and that exact same logic applies here. So it can be helpful to really think about what is imposter syndrome a symptom of. At its root, it's the symptom of self-doubt and low confidence. And that's what actually is going on, right? The feeling you don't belong, the fear of being found out, the tendency to attribute your success to luck rather than your own skills and abilities. These are all expressions of an underlying lack of confidence in yourself and your right to be where you are. Now, I really want to be clear about this. This isn't a personal failing, it's not something that's wrong with you. It's incredibly common. And for women in particular, there are actually real cultural reasons why it shows up so frequently. Women are often socialized from a really young age to be modest about their achievements, to not claim their success in case they get too big for their boots or above their station, or to attribute success to luck or other people or good timing, we're sort of taught to do that. And often we kind of end up framing failures as evidence of who you are, who we are, rather than just the things that happened. And that pattern, repeated over years or decades, creates the conditions for imposter syndrome to thrive. So if you experience it or you are experiencing it, nothing has gone wrong with you. You're not like broken or a lost cause. You're just a person who has absorbed some very common and very limiting beliefs about yourself and your own capabilities. And those ideas, because they're thoughts rather than facts, can be changed. That's the really important thing I want you to hear and take away from this episode, that they can be changed. Imposter syndrome is not a permanent condition. It's the main thing I want you to take away from today, and I really want to pass on to so many women. It's not a permanent condition. It's a temporary collection of symptoms pointing to something specific that needs attention. And when you attend to that something, then the symptoms change as well. Right? It's really important that you understand that it is temporary. It can be temporary, it does not need to define you. And I want you to think about what it's actually costing you to just accept that label and live with it. Because we can sometimes underestimate that. When imposter syndrome becomes part of your identity, something shifts in how you move through your working life. The opportunities you go for become smaller, the ideas you share become fewer, the risks you take become less, they become safer. This doesn't happen like dramatically necessarily, not all at once, but gradually over time. And maybe your professional world starts to contract to fit the size of what you believe you deserve. Right? Maybe you don't apply for that job. Maybe you don't put your name forward for that project, or you don't speak up in the meeting. You don't charge what your work is worth. You don't push for that promotion. Not because you're incapable of these things, but because the imposter syndrome voice gets there first and it talks you out of it before you've had a chance to really consider whether it might actually be possible for you. And when it comes to career change, the things that I work with my clients with all the time, this becomes so significant because making a career change, a meaningful change, does require you to believe, at least in some small part, that something new is possible for you, that you could do something different, that you have value to offer in a new context. Now you might not believe that at the beginning, and that's fine, and that's something I work with clients on, but it really helps if you can do some work to really understand that you're worth investing in and supporting. And if you have imposter syndrome sitting at the foundation of all of that, telling you that you've been getting away with it or you've just been lucky, then of course imagining a new career feels impossible. You're trying to build this new start on really shaky ground. So accepting this label of imposter syndrome, it's not neutral, right? It has a cost. And hopefully, by seeing that, you can also see that you don't need to live with it. So I want to tell you about a time that I felt imposter syndrome. There's been many, many I could pick from. I think it's important to know that it's not just something that only you have and that other people don't ever have it, or it's something that only affects people who are not very capable or not very sure of themselves. It shows up for almost everyone at certain moments, at certain points, usually because we're pushing ourselves out of our comfort zone or doing something new, and that's a good thing, right? That in itself, the fact that imposter syndrome shows up, in itself is not the issue. It's what you do with it that's so important. So when I moved out of my very first career, which was radio producing at the BBC, into this new world of online content and social media, I then moved into strategy at a London ad agency. And I found myself suddenly surrounded by all these people who'd been working in marketing and advertising for their entire careers. People who'd done marketing degrees, who'd grown up in the industry, some of whom whose parents had even worked in the industry who really knew it inside out, people who knew all the acronyms. It sounded like a foreign language when I first started, right? And in strategy specifically, the area that I worked in, there were all these people who had all these seemingly academic frameworks and ways of talking about strategy that I simply hadn't encountered before. And I felt it immediately and quite hard at the beginning. And I kept asking myself, do I actually belong here? Do I know as much as these other people? Am I as useful as them? Am I gonna say something that reveals that I'm not really one of them? Someone at some point is gonna figure out that I came from radio and media and social media and work out that I'm not a real strategist, real in inverted comments, right? Now, what happened next was important because I could have let that consume me. I could have decided, yes, this is who I am. Imposter syndrome is just part of me being in this environment, and I could have settled into this like quiet, slightly anxious version of myself that never quite stepped up. But I made a different choice. I decided to see the feeling not as a verdict on my ability, but as a signal. A signal that my thinking about myself, my identity, needed some work. And so I started doing that work, some thought work. What I realized when I actually examined the thought I don't belong here was that it wasn't accurate. I could question it. It was just unfamiliar. I was in new territory, I was new to this whole world of marketing. And unfamiliarity often feels like inadequacy, but it's not the same thing. And when I looked really properly at what I did bring, something interesting happened. I'd spent years as a radio producer understanding audiences, understanding people, how to reach people, what they want to hear, how they want to hear it, how to tell a story in a way that lands, how to get attention, how to understand what moves people and what doesn't. And I realized that it's actually a really useful perspective and strategy, and it's one that many of the people around me, with all their marketing degrees and years in the industry, they didn't have in quite the same way that I did. This gave me some uniqueness, some unique perspective. I was also spending loads of time on social media platforms and understanding what people reacted to and how they behaved. I was curious about so many different areas of culture, not just marketing culture. So even though I was not a conventional strategist, I definitely wasn't classically trained. But I chose to see that as my strength rather than my weakness. A different background, an outside perspective, seeing the way I thought about audiences as useful because it wasn't the standard industry view. And once I was genuinely sold on that myself, that view, that perspective, it became so much easier to help other people see it too, but it had to start with me, right? And I also really did work to identify where the gaps were, where were the things that I actually did need to learn, things it would be useful to understand better, and I got to work on those things, not out of fear of being found out, but out of genuine curiosity and desire to keep growing. But the really crucial part of this story, and the reason I'm telling you it, is because I did not let the imposter syndrome define me. I didn't let it become a permanent part of my identity. I treated it as a symptom, a signal, a sign that some work, some thought work was needed. I didn't call it thought work back then. I wasn't a coach, I didn't really even understand what I was mentally doing, but it was thought work, right? And I went and did that work. I spent that time figuring out what it was that I brought instead of focusing on where I might be different or wrong for being different or lacking in some way. So, what does it actually look like to do something about this? Because I don't want you to just come away from this episode and just think, oh, well, okay, imposter syndrome is a symptom. I want to give you something practical to do with that. The first thing is to stop treating imposter syndrome thoughts as facts and start treating them as thoughts. Some of the first thoughts your brain offers you, some of the persistent thoughts your brain offers you. But just because your brain offers them to you regularly doesn't make them true or accurate. Thought is something your brain is generating, maybe automatically, or maybe based on old patterns and limiting beliefs or the context that you're in, rather than it being accurate evidence. I don't belong here is a thought. I'm gonna get found out is a thought. My success has been luck rather than ability is a thought. None of these are facts. They're sentences your brain is producing, and once you can see them as sentences rather than truths, you've got somewhere to work from. So a great question to ask yourself is is that thought really accurate? Is it accurate a hundred percent? Are there holes in it? Can I throw doubt in it? If it isn't accurate and true, what evidence is there for a different, more helpful thought? This is where thought work gets specific and practical. What do you actually know? What have you actually done? Why are you here in that job? How does all of your years of experience actually help you, give you perspective or knowledge that's going to be valuable? What results have you actually produced? What skills have you genuinely developed over your career? Decide that you will spend more time thinking about this instead of giving over all of your energy to ruminating on how you fall short or how you don't belong. Most people who experience imposter syndrome have a significant gap between their actual track record and how they evaluate that track record. The evidence is there, but you might just not be looking at it or using it as evidence. Maybe you're dismissing it, attributing it to luck, or simply not counting it. Building your own confidence is about learning to count your own evidence properly. To use what you've actually done and learned and achieved as the basis for new, more accurate, more useful thoughts about yourself. This is not about faking it. This is not about fake confidence. This isn't about telling yourself you're brilliant when you do not believe it, just finding the more accurate story, the one that includes the things that you do well alongside the things that you're still learning, and then practicing thinking from that story rather than the imposter syndrome one. And I want you to know that people aren't just either confident or not. Confidence is something that develops and grows that you can take charge of. In the same way that it can be knocked by circumstances or people around you or by years of being in toxic environments that didn't see your value. It can also be rebuilt deliberately with the right tools and support over time. And this is something I work on with so many of my coaching clients. And I weave it through the whole career change process that we work on together because learning how to take control of your confidence is foundational. And if you are always doubting yourself, always waiting to be found out, always attributing your achievements to luck, that makes every part of career change feel so much harder than it needs to be. And this, by the way, is a life skill I really wish everyone had, and is a great reason to take on coaching because it's not just about career change. It will help you with career change, right? But learning to take control of your own confidence, to build it and sustain it yourself rather than relying on external validation is something you deserve to know how to do. Everyone does. It's going to help you in your next job, whatever that ends up being. It's going to be a skill that you will have for the rest of your life and career. And that's why I'm really passionate about helping women build up their own confidence. So here is what I would love you to take away from today's episode. If you've been saying, I have imposter syndrome, as if it's simply part of who you are, I want you to reconsider that framing, to reframe it. Not because it's not real, the experience doesn't feel real, it absolutely is, but because accepting it as a permanent identity is costing you things you probably can't quite see yet. Imposter syndrome is a collection of symptoms, it's a signal, it's your brain telling you that your self-belief and your confidence need some attention. They don't quite match up to where you are and the opportunities ahead of you. And that's not a verdict on who you are, it's an opportunity, an invitation to do some thought work. And the question is not whether you have imposter syndrome, the question is whether you're gonna let it run the show, whether you're gonna make your career decisions from inside that imposter story, or whether you're gonna decide that your confidence is something you're gonna take control of and build. Because I promise you you can. But I've seen it happen with client after client. Women who came in describing themselves as someone who just has imposter syndrome, who then left with a real grounded confidence. Not because they became a different person, but because they did the work of examining those thoughts with me that were driving the feeling and replacing them with something more accurate, more constructive, more useful. You deserve to know how to do that, not just for your career change, but for every chapter that comes after that. If you want help with this, come and have a free consultation with me. Like I said, I'm really passionate about helping people believe in themselves and build up their confidence to create change in their life so they can be living a better life. A life with work in it that helps facilitate the way you want to live. A life first career. Thank you so much for listening this week. I'll see you next week. Bye for now.