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Lie of the Imposter Complex #5: You Must Not Tell Anyone About This
Because of Lies #1 and #2 of the Imposter Complex, you don't speak of your big thing. To ANYONE.
And you definitely don’t mention that you’re nervous about it, or feeling anxious, or, you know, struggling with the Imposter Complex.
(And yes, we call it Imposter Complex, not imposter syndrome, and you can find out why here.)
Because speaking your fears will just draw attention to said inadequacy, right? Besides, what they don't know won't hurt anyone, right?
(Except, of course, maybe you.)
I famously (infamously?) call this “slipping things into the water.”
When you launch the product, release the album, write the book, finish the course, achieve the goal…
But you don’t want to make a big deal about it….
(Because secretly you’re nervous, anxious, afraid it isn’t any good…)
So you make such a little deal about it that even your nearest and dearest don’t know.
That’s slipping it into the water, trying not to make waves, trying not to rock the boat.
And then, when the product doesn’t sell, the album doesn’t top the charts, the book doesn’t get rave reviews, and nobody congratulates you on the thing, your Imposter Complex translates that as proof positive that you weren’t ready, aren’t successful, don’t deserve it.
See? Nobody cares. You’re not good enough…
The reason I’m infamous for it is that I tend to call people out on it.
You didn’t get the sales / reviews / recognition that you wanted? Did you slip it into the water?
It’s not to make anyone feel worse — absolutely not. It’s about naming what happened and shining light on that tactic of the Imposter Complex that convinced you not to tell anybody about it because they would judge you.
Naming the thing removes some of its power
We think that by naming whatever is inside of us that others will judge us.
The converse is more likely true. And more productive.
By naming the experience, you are speaking the shame and bringing compassion into the fold.
Try this: ''I'm excited to be doing this and nervous because it matters."
“I’m putting out this product because I’m proud of it and I know people need it.”
“I poured my heart and soul into this, and I’m anxious that people won’t like it, but I want to share it.”
Discernment alert: I'm not talking about Lie #6 — I must tell everybody about this.
I'm just inviting you to name it. And to sit back and watch as relief spreads across the room. Empathy too. And where there's empathy, connection is possible. (And isn't that what this is all about. after all?)
Yes.
How fear of speaking your big thing + the Imposter Complex might manifest for you
Depending on which of the six behavioural traits of the Imposter Complex you most often experience, you might go quiet with Lie #5 because of different things:
If you’re a people-pleaser, you might find you don't want to "bother" people with whatever you have going on. And you certainly don’t want to annoy anyone by being “promotional” or “too salesy.”
If you have leaky boundaries, you may find yourself NOT wanting to get feedback or hear other people’s thoughts on your feelings or doings. (Note: it’s perfectly ok to say something like, “I’m not interested in feedback right now.”)
If you tend to compare, you don’t want to talk about your thing because you think it’s not as good as somebody else’s; and you certainly don’t want to name your fears and anxieties if she isn’t…
If you’re a perfectionist, you don’t want to share because you feel like what you have to share isn’t perfect — or that your feelings just put your imperfections on display.
If you’re a procrastinator, you might be prone to convincing yourself that you’ll say it, promote it, share it later. When you get around to it…
If you tend to diminish, you’re probably going to convince yourself that nobody cares, nobody is interested, it isn’t that good, nobody’s going to listen anyway… etc.
Of course, these are all just variations on a theme — variations on the lie, designed to keep you alone and isolated, out of action, and doubting your capacity.
That’s what the Imposter Complex wants.
But when we name it — name the lie, but also name what we’re feeling, what we’re doing, how we’re showing up — we rob it of its power.
Name it.
Click here for my free training:
Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.
Lie of the Imposter Complex #4: You Have Nothing Useful to Say
I find that Lie #4 of the Imposter Complex tends to show up a lot in the guise of writer’s block.
(By the way, here’s why I say Imposter Complex instead of Imposter Syndrome).
We sit down to write a blog post, or an article, or an email, or a book, or a course, or a flippin’ Facebook post and we pause…
“You have nothing useful to say,” a voice whispers inside.
“(Or original. Or important. Or valid.)”
And it puts a hard stop to any creative output we might want to produce.
Of course, it might show up for you somewhere else — in conversation, in a meeting at work, at a party with friends, or anywhere your voice might be heard.
When we believe this lie, we say nothing. We don't communicate with our audience, our clients, our fans. We pass up opportunities to share our message (what message?) and don't collaborate with our peers (everyone knows more than I do about the topic!) And we miss out on growth, learning, and connection.
We imagine speaking to a thousand-person audience about the topic for which we feel woefully ignorant and entertain two possible outcomes: crickets or pelted tomatoes.
I hear this a lot, in particular, from people who want to write books — fiction or nonfiction.
They’ll be toiling (or poking, as the case may be) away at an idea or a manuscript, and then something with a similar premise hits the bestseller list.
CUE THE END OF THE WORLD!
OK, so there is indeed a distinct possibility that what you're saying HAS been said before.
But it’s never, ever, ever been said in the way you will say it.
YOUR WAY will be informed by your unique and complex structure of values, perspectives, experiences, strengths, heart, and your very character. And your people want to hear YOUR WAY.
Going back to our author friends, they say that there are only 7 plots (or 20, or 36 depending on who you ask).
Yet there are hundreds, maybe thousands of original books and stories published every year, each one a different version of the archetypes we already know and love.
The details are what’s important, and the details come down to each individual author — each individual person who brings their own voices, opinions, experiences, and values to the stories.
How this whisper of the Imposter Complex might manifest for you
Depending on which of the six behavioural traits of the Imposter Complex you most often experience, you might experience the self-doubt of Lie #4 in different ways:
If you’re a people-pleaser, you might find you don't want to "bother" people with your unoriginal thoughts. If it's not earth-shattering, there's no point in clogging their airwaves.
If you have leaky boundaries, you may find yourself NOT wanting to read what anyone else has said for fear it will influence your own thought process, so you isolate or deeply curate your input (perhaps to your detriment).
If you tend to compare, you’re probably super familiar with this lie! Because you’re always comparing what you want to say with what others have already said (and probably finding your version lacking).
If you’re a perfectionist, you hold such a high standard for yourself that nothing but perfect originality will suffice.
If you’re a procrastinator, thinking about how someone else has said it better will be the perfect reason to put off saying it yourself.
If you tend to diminish, you’re certainly going to get stuck on the idea that not only has it been said before, but it’s been said better.
No matter which behavioural trait is keeping you from speaking your truth in the way that only you can, the solution is to remember that your people want to hear your take, your version, your view.
These very words are a curation of learnings you've probably already heard. But they're told through MY own lens. Packaged in a way that I have intended to be practical and valuable and useful.
May it be so.
Your way’s the way.
Click here for my free training:
Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.
Lie of the Imposter Complex #3: You are all or nothing.
I do a lot of public speaking as part of my business, teaching from the stage about the Imposter Complex (and I call it Imposter Complex not imposter syndrome for a good reason, which you can read all about if you’re interested).
And one day I realized that I had a little measure of success that I held myself to:
If I got a standing ovation for my speech, I had done a good job.
And if I didn’t, well…
It feels a little absurd even telling you that. Of course, logically, a standing ovation is not the only measure of success when speaking — but my own Imposter Complex would say otherwise.
The Imposter Complex loves worst-case scenarios and speaks in competence extremities. If you don't know everything, then you know nothing. If you are not a complete success, then you are a complete failure.
At both ends of these extremities are traps.
"Part of me thinks I'm a complete loser and the other part of me thinks that I am God Almighty." - John Lennon
Loser. God Almighty. Knowing everything. Knowing nothing. Complete success. Complete failure.
Can you imagine someone at a dinner party speaking in such absolutes?
I imagine three outcomes.
Ignoring them.
Switching seats.
Challenging them.
Numbers 1 + 2 might work for a dinner party that has a clear end. But now imagine a never-ending dinner party. The Hotel California of dinner parties, if you will.
Will you politely endure their boorishness for all eternity? Continue to avoid and evade? Or will you challenge them once and for all? Yeah, that. This life IS your dinner party, friends.
And the Imposter Complex does not have to be invited.
Challenge competence extremities with one word: really?
This takes practice, but you can try having an internal monologue when your Imposter Complex starts to get sassy with you. (Some of my clients even name their Imposter Complex — whatever works for you!)
When it says, “You didn’t get a standing ovation. They hated your talk. You’re a failure.”
You can counter gently and simply with, “Really?”
Is it really true that I’m a failure or that they hated my talk if I don’t receive a standing O? Of course not.
It’s a little trick that can help you recognize the voice of the Imposter Complex — and stop it in its tracks.
How extremes of the binary in the Imposter Complex might manifest
Depending on which of the six behavioural traits of the Imposter Complex you most often experience, you might experience Lie #3 like this:
If you’re a people-pleaser, you might put a lot of stock in what other people say about you — and then your all or nothing-ness will swing wildly depending on how those winds are blowing.
If you have leaky boundaries, you may let people’s opinions about you, your abilities, and your worth dictate whether you feel all or nothing at any given moment instead of resting in your own self-knowledge.
If you tend to compare, you will feel like nothing whenever you notice someone else being all — and vice versa.
If you’re a perfectionist, you may never get to feeling like you’re all — because you’ll feel like everything you do falls short, meaning you are nothing.
If you’re a procrastinator, you’ll spend time thinking and worrying about whether you are all or nothing instead of getting busy with your own work.
If you tend to diminish, you may never let yourself feel those feelings of being “all” and you’ll explain it away until you’re back down to nothing.
No matter which behavioural trait is whispering to you that you are all or nothing, the best and only way to wriggle free is by deepening into the truth that there are very few absolutes in this life — despite what the Imposter Complex would have us believe.
Click here for my free training:
Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.
Sixteen
Dearest Lauren -
You know how we do this by now.
You get a year older, and I sit here, gobsmacked at how incredible you are.
I try to find the words to express the overwhelming emotions I feel, but it’s not unlike trying to catch fireflies.
Bless me, I have tried.
On your eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth, I have tried.
I don’t want to give the virus more airtime...this is YOUR day. Your month. Your year.
Because your sixteenth is...SIGNIFICANT.
But the virus bears mentioning because it has forced us into close quarters with nowhere to hide. We have watched, up close and personal the YOU you are. The realest YOU you are.
Kind and impatient.
Thoughtful and silly.
Sweet and salty.
Focused and lighthearted.
Simple in your desires, complex in your emotions.
But do you also know how courageous you are?
You aren’t afraid to feel.
And you’re not afraid to question.
And you’re not afraid to challenge.
And you’re not afraid to take a stand...for what matters.
So we wanted to mark the You You Are in the best way we could given the restrictions of the physical distancing.
Instead of a bash, and sitting fifth row at Hamilton as planned, we surprised you with a Sweet-Sixteen-in-Quarantine-Surprise-Zoom-Party.
And your friends showed UP. They made you stuffies, and original art, and Tik-Toks and videos and an original song that makes me cry every time I hear it.
So instead of me trying and failing to find the words, I’ll defer to those lyrics written and performed by your friends:
How to explain it?
Trying to find the words to say out loud
Where to begin this?
You always make me laugh somehow
Wish we could find a better way to be with you right now.
Life’s better when you’re around.
Aren’t your father and I the lucky ones? We get to be around YOU.
As you evolve into your truest self, independent and carefree, certain of mind and heart, you are the all.
And we give deepest thanks.
Click here for my free training:
Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.
Lie of the Imposter Complex #2: Successful People Don’t Experience This
Oprah says that every person she has interviewed — including Barack Obama and Béyonce herself — have asked her the same question as soon as the cameras were off:
“After every interview at some point, somebody would say, ‘How was that? Was that OK? How’d I do?’”
Even Béyonce!
Now, the Imposter Complex would like us to believe that successful people never feel like imposters.
(And I call it Imposter Complex instead of imposter syndrome for a good reason — but this is true whatever you want to call it.)
It would like us to believe that when (if) we reach a certain level of success (somewhere far beyond where we are currently, obviously), then we will know for certain that we are successful. That we are no longer imposters.
It pretends there is some bright line that separates the imposters from the truly successful.
And it colludes with Lie #1 to have us believe that the very fact that we are doubting ourselves is proof that we are imposters.
The Imposter Complex, quite frankly, is kind of like a traveling companion. The more you do, the more places you succeed, the more opportunities it will find to point out all you still don't know… and other places in your life that you may not be living up to its incredibly high standards.
In fact, it's the reason so many of us don't climb too high in the first place; we’re afraid of falling (or failing). Staying close to the ground is insurance against getting hurt. You don’t want to shine too bright, or you’ll be cut down.
And yet, the desire to climb is palpable (and your birthright).
How successful identity and the Imposter Complex might manifest
Depending on which of the six behavioural traits of the Imposter Complex you most often experience, you might experience Lie #2 a little differently:
If you’re a people-pleaser, you will probably find yourself wondering how you got invited to the cool kids’ table at some point, convinced that none of them are wondering the same thing and that they only invited you to be nice, after all.
If you have leaky boundaries, you may defer to other people’s opinions about you, your abilities, and your worth instead of standing in your own knowledge and power.
If you tend to compare, this lie is all you, baby! You are comparing yourself to those you perceive to be more successful and are certain you don’t measure up.
If you’re a perfectionist, you’ll probably be telling yourself that those people you perceive as more successful than you could have, would have done it better (completely ignoring how well you did it in the first place).
If you’re a procrastinator, you’ll spend time thinking and worrying about those “more successful” people instead of getting busy with your own (amazing) work.
If you tend to diminish, welp… doubting your capacity, or at least DIMINISHING your capacity is what this lie is all about.
No matter which behavioural trait is keeping your belief about your capacity at bay, the best and only way to wriggle free is by deepening into the TRUTH: that successful people absolutely do experience this.
That’s why I take such delight in collecting stories of the great and the good who feel the same way you do.
And if you find yourself thinking, “Yeah, but…,” here is one more charming illustration that successful people absolutely do experience the Imposter Complex as acutely as anyone, from bestselling author Neil Gaiman (emphasis mine):
Some years ago, I was lucky enough to be invited to a gathering of great and good people: artists and scientists, writers and discoverers of things. And I felt that at any moment they would realize that I didn’t qualify to be there, among these people who had really done things.
On my second or third night there, I was standing at the back of the hall, while a musical entertainment happened, and I started talking to a very nice, polite, elderly gentleman about several things, including our shared first name. And then he pointed to the hall of people, and said words to the effect of, “I just look at all these people, and I think, what the heck am I doing here? They’ve made amazing things. I just went where I was sent.”
And I said, “Yes. But you were the first man on the moon. I think that counts for something.”
And I felt a bit better. Because if Neil Armstrong felt like an imposter, maybe everyone did. Maybe there weren’t any grown-ups, only people who had worked hard and also got lucky and were slightly out of their depth, all of us doing the best job we could, which is all we can really hope for.
Amen, Neil(s). Cosigned 100%.
Click here for my free training:
Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.
Lie of the Imposter Complex #1: Your Self-Doubt is Proof of Your Inadequacy
The Imposter Complex has three objectives:
So, it’s no coincidence that Lie #1 of the 12 Lies of the Imposter Complex is that your self-doubt is proof of your inadequacy.
(By the way, here’s why I say Imposter Complex instead of Imposter Syndrome).
It’s one of the Imposter Complex’s oldest refrains…
If you doubt yourself, how can anyone else trust in you?
How can you lead and serve others when you're full of self-doubt?
In fact, as far back as 1978, when Clinical Psychologists Pauline Clance and Suzanne Imes were studying the Imposter Phenomenon at Oberlin College in Ohio, they noticed that at its most basic:
“Despite outstanding academic and professional accomplishments, women who experience the impostor phenomenon persist in believing that they are really not bright and have fooled anyone who thinks otherwise. Numerous achievements, which one might expect to provide ample objective evidence of superior intellectual functioning, do not appear to affect the imposter belief.” The imposter phenomenon in high achieving women: Dynamics and therapeutic intervention. (Emphasis mine.)
In other words, folks who suffer from the Imposter Complex have an innate tendency to doubt their capacity — and use it as concrete proof of their inadequacy.
But the very fact that you’re experiencing the Imposter Complex in the first place is proof that you are conscientious, high-functioning, and have strong values of integrity and excellence. Honestly; high-achievers are statistically much more likely to experience the Imposter Complex.
It’s also often a byproduct of the world and culture we live in that certain folks doubt themselves because they have been taught to do so.
This is conditioning, but it can be overcome.
How that self-doubt as proof might manifest
Depending on which of the six behavioural traits of the Imposter Complex you most often experience, you might experience the self-doubt of Lie #1 a little differently:
If you’re a people-pleaser, it’s pretty much a given that you will discount the praise of others, when they tell you you’ve done a good job, or when they invite you to step up and lead. They’re just being nice, after all. (No...actually, they’re not.)
If you have leaky boundaries, you may shelve what you think you know, what you THINK you are capable of, in favour of others’ perspectives, which erodes your confidence in your knowing even more.
If you tend to compare, you know all you’ve done will never quite stack up to what others have done. Or you may despair that you’ll never be capable of what you see others doing.
If you’re a perfectionist, anything you’ve already achieved will never quite stack up to your impossibly high standards of what you OUGHT to be capable of.
If you’re a procrastinator, every second you spend not doing the thing erodes your confidence in your ability to do the thing in the first place.
If you tend to diminish, welp… doubting your capacity, or at least DIMINISHING your capacity is the name of the game. You don’t want to shine too bright, or you’ll be cut down.
No matter which behavioural trait is keeping your belief about your capacity at bay, the best and only way to wriggle free is by deepening into the TRUTH: that self-doubt is proof of your humanity, not your inadequacy.
Self-doubt is proof of your humanity.
Not your inadequacy.
Flip self-doubt on its head
Although it’s easy to see these lies as only negatives, holding us back, there is a bright side.
This doubt you experience? Keeps you on your edge, striving for mastery. And that is what MAKES you a good leader.
Your standards and expectations of yourself are realllllllly high. And though you won’t admit it to many people, you want to be THE BEST at everything you do.
But that’s how you will create your impeccable impact.
You just need to gather some tools to help you root into the truth about your abilities.
Even more great news: they exist.
Start with my free training on the Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex. and I guarantee you’ll find yourself nodding and “aha!”-ing at at least one of them.
Stick it in your toolbox. Bring it out the next time you’re certain that your own self-doubt means you’re less worthy.
And remember what it really is: All lies.
Click here for my free training:
Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.