One of my readers has asked me to talk about the concept that is now widely known as imposter syndrome so I thought I’d do an introduction blog discussing the phenomenon, how to know whether you are suffering from the symptoms and thinking about how it affects you personally.

As imposter syndrome is closely linked with low self-worth, which I will be writing about in future blogs, I will offer more ways to work on it in those future blogs so look out for them.

Definition

The term imposter syndrome was first coined in the 1970’s but wasn’t a new concept even then – it was a label that they gave to certain internal feelings that seemed to be experienced by a large section of people.

Imposter syndrome refers to an internal experience of believing that you are not as competent as others perceive you to be. It has some links to perfectionism but also has some differences. It has since become known by many names like imposter syndrome, imposter phenomenon, imposterism and the imposter experience. As the world of psychology is trying to move away from medicalising human experience I will refer to it as imposterism for this blog.

To put it simply imposterism, it is the experience of feeling like a fraud — feeling that, at any moment you might be caught out, like you don’t belong where you are, where you doubt your accomplishments, feel that you haven’t earned your position and that you only got there through sheer luck.

Since the time it was first named it has been studied more and more and seems that most human beings identify with these feelings at one time or other during their lifetime. How much they suffer with them will differ though – some are able to talk themselves out of it easily while others might constantly suffer.

Quick Test – Perfectionism or Imposterism?

So, how can you know whether you might have perfectionist tendencies or might be suffering the symptoms of imposterism (or both)? I often will use one quick test with my clients in the room to get an idea of what they might be experiencing…

I want you to take the critical part of yourself and sit them in a chair across the room from you. Then I want you to gag them. They can not talk right now. I am now only speaking to the rational, logical part of yourself. The one that only deals in facts and figures. Now I’m going to ask the logical part of you one question and the answer has to be based on facts and evidence because the critical part of you can’t talk.

Are you capable of what you are trying to achieve right now? By this I mean – are you practically capable? Do you have any disabilities that mean you can’t achieve this? Is your intelligence level up to it?

If the answer is yes then you may possibly be suffering from the symptoms of imposterism. If the answer is no then it more likely means that you are striving to achieve something that you are not capable of achieving and might be suffering from the symptoms of perfectionism.

So, you’ve done the test and you’ve realised you are capable of achieving what you are currently doing. What is the problem then? Well, the fact that we sat your critical self in another chair and told it to shut up will give you the simple answer to it. You have a voice telling you that you aren’t capable. It’s telling you you shouldn’t be here. It’s telling you you are a fraud. It’s telling you that others deserve success more than you. Etc etc. This is the imposter and I liken it to having a monster on your back.

Know Your Monster

The first thing to do with a monster is to bring it out into the light. Everyone knows that monsters are more scary in the dark. So we need to shine a bit of light on your monster and get to know it a bit better to take away some of it’s power. To get to know your monster a bit you can ask yourself some simple questions to figure out why it might have started to grow in the first place.

Imposterism is a symptom of low self-worth. Low self-worth can develop for any number of reasons. Here are a few ways that low self-worth and imposterism can develop to start you thinking in the right direction…

Did you have caregivers/parents who were inconsistent in their praise/criticism? Would they praise you one minute and then quickly turn to criticism? “You did great but, if you studied a bit more, you could get an A.” Or did you have adults that constantly compared you to others – a sibling, friends etc? Did you have adults in your world who would always put achievements – yours or their own – down to luck and not take credit for anything? Did you have adults in your world who had their own issues with not being good enough? Were you always praised for being ‘the clever one’ or ‘the best’ with a lot of focus on your intellectual abilities? Basically, anything that leads a child to not feeling good enough can lead to the monster being created.

What we need to remember is that this does not necessarily mean you had bad parents or caregivers – just that they were human themselves. However, children do not understand psychology and that the adults in their world might be flawed. Children think in black and white – good and bad. The monster is created because of the messages they think they are receiving about themselves and their place in the world.

So, hopefully, you have started to get an idea why your monster might have been created. If not, then this could be something you could explore with a trusted friend or a therapist. Knowing how your monster was created does one very important thing – alleviates any blame. You are not to blame for the monster on your back. So far, everyone I have met has a monster in some form. Some are larger than others because they’ve been fed more during the person’s life, but everyone has one. Do not be angry at yourself, or punish yourself, for your monster because that just feeds it more and makes it bigger. Instead of blaming yourself you could realise that your responsibility, now you know your monster, is to start to fight it.

When does your monster jump out?

Knowing when your monster is most likely to jump out or start whispering in your ear is one of the best ways to start to fight your monster. This may then give you some pre-warning. If you have an idea of which situations cause it to come out you can go into them prepared for it to happen.

Below is a list of possible triggers for Imposterism. Have a look and see if any of them fit with you.

Possible Triggers for Imposterism

Fighting Your Monster

As I said above, because imposterism is closely linked to low self-worth which I will be talking about in future blogs, I’m not going to go into how to fight the symptoms in detail in this blog – it’ll be too huge! I’m just going to say one thing about fighting your monster and leave you with this…

As human beings it seems that it is easier for us to see and fight other people’s monsters than our own. I can probably guarantee you that, when you hear one of your good friends being critical of themselves, you notice it straight away, jump right in and fight their monster for them. Yes? However, when your monster starts whispering in your ear you have got so used to it you just shut up and listen, or shrug and give in. Yes? Again, don’t panic about this – this also is normal. The good thing for us to realise is that, because you have the skills and ability to notice and fight your friends’ monsters, you have everything you need to notice and fight your own.

Look out for my next blogs on low self-worth and how to work with it as this will include many more ways to help you to fight your monster.

Happy fighting!

If you have anything you would like me to talk about just Contact me and I will see what I can do.