There have been plenty of times throughout my career that I have had deep seeded fear about my ability to do my job.
Not because I felt incapable but because I felt undeserving.
"What if people don’t think I am good enough?”
“What if I don’t live up to everyone’s expectations of me?”
Getting into my corporate leadership seat by age 27 was not easy.
I worked extremely hard to get there after setting lofty career and financial goals others usually laughed at.
So when I finally reached my goal and got there, I worked hard every day to prove myself because I thought I was a fraud, not because I actually was one.
At first, I thought I felt this way because of my age. Wrong.
Then I thought it was because it was just more challenging leading in a male dominated industry as a female. Wrong again.
I let the thoughts that “everyone else could probably do this part of my job better than me” “or that project faster than me” creep in.
“Just be better, Mel” was the looping message in my brain for a better part of a decade.
Doubt, lack of confidence and unintentionally raising my own bar to try to compete with the illusions and thoughts I made up going on in everyone else’s head was an exhausting place to live.
Four years went by in that role and even after I had proved myself “successful”, the feeling still showed up.
Even after I knew I was capable. I still doubted myself.
I thought it was just me until I realized it wasn’t. It was everyone around me too.
I started to talk to others. Leaders I never in a million years thought would feel the same way.
People that I looked up to describing the same things.
So here is the truth.
Imposter syndrome is real.
Impostor syndrome is typically experienced by highly driven individuals who have an inability to internalize their accomplishments and a persistent fear of being exposed as a “fraud”.
They feel inadequate or undeserving of their success.
70% of professional women experience this.
40% of professional men experience it as well.
WHAT it sounds like:
“I feel like a fake.”
“I feel like a fraud.”
“What if I am not good enough?”
“Something bad will surely happen to erase all of the good stuff happening.”
“I won’t be able to live up to everyone’s expectations of me.”
“I don’t deserve this.”
“I will be found out eventually.”
So WHY do so many incredibly successful people feel this way?
Your subconscious mind holds every single belief you have ever felt or developed.
Most of these beliefs are formed before age 7.
“I am not enough” is the number one belief humans hold overall. It compounds with other beliefs deeply rooted overtime.
The more we achieve in our lives, the louder our negative beliefs get, just to try to sabotage us.
So we challenge our success as a fluke or good luck.
We keep pushing ourselves to be better. To do better. In the hopes that nobody “finds us out.”
We are riddled with self-doubt.
When we reach achievements, others applaud us for we feel like a fraud because we do not feel worthy.
WHERE does it come from?
These deep seeded beliefs that are rooted are enhanced in the world we live in. They come from many places.
Our childhood.
Our surroundings.
Our relationships.
The media also causes us to compare us to people whose lives are not even real.
We live up to images, delusions and BS that do not even exist.
The world creates a false image of what success should be vs. what we want it to be.
This is exhausting.
HOW do we break this pattern and belief system?
Where is this belief coming from?
What new belief can take its place?
I am a great believer that we can’t fix what we don’t understand.
I see so many clients who try to battle their minds using sheer force or willpower.
Willpower will not work. Not more than short term.
Equally, they try ignoring it and fight on.
You can’t fight your wiring, but when you understand how and why your mind operates the way it does, you can then work with it, instead of against it, to learn how to control your thoughts and get all the changes you want.
Imposter syndrome does not have to be who you identify with. I see clients daily who through rewiring the subconscious are free!
Stop feeling like a fraud. You are not!
