Remember that the goal of the Imposter Complex is to keep you out of action, doubting your capacity, and alone and isolated?

Well, Lie #12 leans hard into that third leg of the stool. (It also sounds like: I should be able to figure this out for myself.)

This lie is a nasty cocktail of several of the lies you've already encountered. And it's a killer that you need to cut out.

The reason so many of the lies of the Imposter Complex have to do with you being alone and isolated is that that's where you are the most vulnerable. And the least impactful.

(By the way, here’s why I say Imposter Complex instead of Imposter Syndrome).

In fact, it COUNTS on you feeling alone and isolated… keeping you singled out with your head down.

Don't let it.

I remind my clients of this in every program, every mastermind, every group I run: that they can and should ask their fellows for help — solving problems, promoting offers, reaching the right people, etc. — and yet, inevitably, people “forget” to mention that they’re launching something new, struggling with a problem, or looking to connect with a certain type of person.

Even I fall into this trap, occasionally.

No one needs to go this alone. In fact, no one should. Asking for help means you're serious about your success.

How resisting asking for help 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 #12 a little differently:

If you’re a people-pleaser, part of pleasing people is about looking like you have all your shit together all the time… right? So you certainly don’t want anyone to have cause to doubt you by revealing that you need help…

If you have leaky boundaries, you probably tend to assume that other people also have leaky boundaries and you don’t want to bother them by asking them for help…

If you tend to compare, you will decide that because someone else was able to do it on their own, you should be able to as well (regardless of whether that other person actually did it on their own or not).

If you’re a perfectionist, it’s likely you believe that your results don’t “count” if you don’t do everything yourself.

If you’re a procrastinator, not asking for the help you need — or deciding that you just need a bit more education, research, etc. on your own — is an excellent way to keep procrastinating from doing the actual thing.

If you tend to diminish, you might decide that you don’t deserve help, or that you’re a failure because you need to ask for help in the first place.

So, what kind of help is yours? ALL kinds of help.

• Helping you to see what you've done in the past (if that was a challenge back in lie #7).

• Helping you refine your vision. 

• Filling gaps. 

• Bolstering you when you need it. 

• Allowing you to practice. 

• Making connections. 

• Pointing out your blind spots. 

• Supporting and championing you.

Lean into your people. Get an accountability partner. Assemble your cast. Gather a mastermind. Hire a coach.

YOUR people want you to succeed.

It may seem pat, but when I feel into what it is that folks listening need to hear and know? It’s that.

YOUR people want you to succeed.

But who are YOUR people?

It’s a question I try to answer as best as I can. I say things like:

They are the ones committed to you knowing what you are HERE for.
They are the ones committed to you showing up in your PRESENCE.
The ones who are not afraid of your power.
The ones who encourage you to know yourself.
The ones who encourage you to show yourself reverence.

This is what we ask in our household when we are trying to discern our people:
Are they expanders?
Are they contractors?
Or are they neutral?

This IS how you know.

This is how you know who to COUNT on.

This is how you know who to RELEASE.

And this is how you know who can stick around... at least for the time being.

This is how you know who YOUR people are.

And trust me.

YOUR people want you to succeed.
That’s just true. (They told me so.)

So ask. Ask, ask, ask, and ask again.

Your people want you to succeed. Let them help you.

---

Click here for my free training:

Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.

How many times have we heard people suggest that we “fake it ‘til we make it” in uncertain or uncomfortable circumstances?

It’s so common — and it’s #11 in the 12 Lies of the Imposter complex.

(By the way, here’s why I say Imposter Complex instead of Imposter Syndrome).

This oft-cited directive has been a well-intended strategy to circumvent the Imposter Complex. And while I completely understand the science underneath playing the game, ramping up our bravado, taking powerful stances until they are baked right into our confidence, I take a strong stand for this simply colluding with our already exacerbated sense of imposterhood.

Because in my experience, you don’t have to fake anything.

You already have qualifications, abilities, skills, and capacities that you’re bringing to any situation.

You don’t have to fake it — you’re ready enough. (See Lie #7 — You’re not ready.)

And of course, per my Ready Enough podcast interview with Janelle Allen, “fake it ‘til you make it” is a perspective that has privilege baked right in. I highly recommend you listen to Janelle’s thoughts on this.

How faking it ‘til you make it 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 #11 a little differently:

If you’re a people-pleaser, you might fall into “fake it” thinking as a way of diminishing or explaining how you’re going to show up — for fear that you won’t live up to other people’s standards.

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 and convinces you that you have to fake something.

If you tend to compare, you will compare your efforts, your readiness, your abilities to someone else’s and find yourself “fake” by comparison.

If you’re a perfectionist, you might feel like you’re always faking it, whatever it is, because your efforts never live up to your internal standards.

If you’re a procrastinator, deciding that you must fake it in order to make it might be just the excuse you need not to try right now (or… ever).

If you tend to diminish, thinking that you’re “faking it” is a way of internally diminishing your own abilities, and talking about it is a way of broadcasting that diminishment to others (see Lie #6 — you must tell everyone about this).

But none of this is inevitable.

You, my friend, are not fake — and you don’t have to be anything other than your most authentic self in order to “make it.”

Rooting into what's true, meaningful, and authentic about your qualifications, abilities, and capacity is far more important and enduring.

“Embody what’s already here and authentic for you” isn’t quite as catchy as “fake it ‘til you make it”, but it’s still the truth.

---

Click here for my free training:

Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.

It's not their fault, really. You've done such a good job pulling the wool over everyone's eyes for so long that they were BOUND to think you were smarter, more competent, or capable than you really are… right?

I laugh at this tweet every time someone sends it to me. It’s funny because it’s true. The Imposter Complex demands that we question the praise of others — but also somehow has us convinced that we are such a good actor that we have everyone fooled!

(By the way, here’s why we like to say Imposter Complex instead of Imposter Syndrome).

So we fall back on lie #6: We best tell everyone about this. Set the record straight. Assure them of the error of their ways. Point out all the flaws in your report, sloppiness of your work, gaps in your logic. Call yourself out for the Imposter that you are.

(And even if you manage to refrain from correcting them, you still don’t quite believe them, either.)

Sometimes we might mistake this for humility. Indeed, humility may be the value that actually underpins this lie if it regularly shows up for you.

Because you were told not to brag.
Not to outshine your siblings or your peers.
Not to rub others’ noses in your accomplishments.

Pride is a sin and all that…

But there’s a difference between not bragging — and not acknowledging your achievements.
Between boasting and accepting a compliment.
Between showing off and showing up in all your brilliance.

And when you take a moment to look inside, I bet you can tell the difference immediately.

How distrusting praise 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 #10 like this:

If you’re a people-pleaser, we think people are complimenting us just because they LIKE us… not because we are skilled, talented, or excellent at what we do. (This is the double-bind of the Imposter Complex in technicolour.)

If you have leaky boundaries, you may live and die by the words of others — which means that even if 99.9% of people praise you, you might be fixated on the 0.1% who don’t.

If you tend to compare, the praise of others won’t match up to the impossible standards you’ve set by looking at what others have accomplished.

If you’re a perfectionist, you’ll immediately discount others’ praise because they can’t see the flaws that you can see.

If you’re a procrastinator, you may discount the compliment because “they” clearly can’t see all the time and struggle that you went through to get to the endpoint. OR, because you procrastinated and didn’t end up producing your best work, then “they” clearly don’t have high enough standards for you to feel any merit in the acknowledgment. (On this one, I had a ton of help from folks in my FB Group. Join us there for great discussions like this.)

If you tend to diminish, you’ll be intimately familiar with this one. Just because someone else tells you something is good, doesn’t mean it actually is...

I get it. I really do.

But can you also, just for a moment. hold this possibility: that they are really and truly reflecting back what they see? A competent. capable, smart (and funny… did you know that you are funny?) individual with so very much to offer?

I like to start small with this one.  The next time someone pays you a compliment — on your hair, your outfit, your shoes, your home, whatever — can you simply say thank you and let it wash over you?

Can you avoid the pull to say “What, this old thing?” or tell them how you need a haircut / got it on sale / haven’t finished painting the deck? 

Can you accept their acknowledgment as the gift it was intended to be?

Dare to believe someone when they tell you how remarkable you truly are.

---

Click here for my free training:

Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.

The best and brightest of us can fall prey to this lie of the Imposter Complex.

(By the way, here’s why we like to say Imposter Complex instead of Imposter Syndrome).

Because this one shows up when we're nice and relaxed. Serene. even.

We feel a bout of gratitude for how good life is. The partner, the job, the income, the health, the beautiful house of David Byrne's existential lament, and then we perk up, realizing that we have committed the sin of letting our guard down.

We've jinxed ourselves with our mini-celebration.

Most assuredly, the other shoe is about to drop. We stop breathing. We stop appreciating. And we panic. And lay low.

Exactly where our Imposter Complex likes us to be.

I always remember this story and essay from Bréne Brown when I think of Lie #9.

I used to stand over my two kids while they slept, and just as a profound sense of love and joy washed over me, I'd imagine horrible things happening to them: car crashes, tsunamis. "Do other mothers do this," I'd wonder, "or am I unhinged?" I now know from my research that 95 percent of parents can relate to my constant disaster planning. When we're overwhelmed by love, we feel vulnerable—so we dress-rehearse tragedy.

And that vulnerability — that overwhelm — is where the Imposter Complex takes over, and that dress rehearsing is how it keeps us alone and isolated, doubting our capacity, and out of action.

How this fear of (inevitable) failure 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 #9 a little differently:

If you’re a people-pleaser, you might start imagining how you’re letting people down, disappointing people, or otherwise NOT people pleasing in your current situation, which will convince you that the good stuff is not sustainable.

If you have leaky boundaries, any suggestion from anyone that you should be doing something more, something less, something different will have you questioning everything.

If you tend to compare, you might be “inspired” to worry by stories of tragedy you see in the news, on social media, through friends and family, etc.

If you’re a perfectionist, you’ll start finding fault with your beautiful life the minute it seems too beautiful.

If you’re a procrastinator, this worry that things are about to fall apart will serve as an iron-clad reason to procrastinate (or continue to procrastinate).

If you tend to diminish, this lie is likely very familiar to you. You’re most likely to discount your success and decide that it’s only temporary.

But I wonder:

How good will you allow this all to be?

(It's up to you. you know.)

This is not to say that bad things never happen. Of course they do. We see proof of it every day. More proof than we need.

Rather, I want you to consider, what if the bad things weren’t inevitable?
What if those things you dread are the outliers?
What if you’re creating suffering for yourself rather than insulating yourself against it?

The data has my back on this. Research has shown that 85% of what we worry about never actually happens.

So the next time the Imposter Complex has you worrying that everything you’ve built, achieved, and cherish is about to crumble beneath you, I want you to ask yourself:

What if the other shoe wasn't about to drop?

---

Click here for my free training:

Five ICONIC shifts leaders use to overcome Imposter Complex.

Hey friends -

Back on May 2nd, my coach Desiree Adaway shared this post on Instagram:

Since May 2nd, I’ve read that quote possibly a hundred times. And these days, I am reading it a hundred more per day as I continue to unpack it.

Because I felt the sting of truth the first time I read it. How many times have I internally pointed the sword of self-righteousness at other white people who aren’t “doing the work”? Oh, the hypocrisy of that. I’ve literally only just begun to unpack my white fragility and whiteness.

And you can only imagine how uncomfortable that is to admit here, in front of my beloved readers. Many of you who are Black and people of colour. And to you, I apologize deeply and sincerely for my complicitness in NOT making my anti-racism an even bigger priority. I promise to you I will do better, learn better, listen better, and take better — more aligned — action. And I will endeavour to show my work as I go (when appropriate and not about centering myself.)

The balance of this letter is addressed to my white readers.

Hiiiiiiii. So this may hurt a little....but it will be NOTHING compared to the pain our Black friends and family endure. AND I want you to know that everything I’m about to say is prefaced with the caveat that this is alllll on me to continue to do as I’m inviting you to do. Imagine a “just like me” as a suffix to my every last invocation. (Dr. Jenn McCabe is a brilliant voice on this matter.)

Allow me to sidebar here for a moment.

Yesterday, my husband and I went for a walk by the beach here in Toronto. There is a family of foxes that has taken residence under the boardwalk and has captured the attention of the city since quarantine began. Much to say on that, but you can imagine that there are some issues: how to social distance when everyone wants a peek at the cuteness? How to not get them too comfortable with humans around? And on and on.

We were a ways away from them when they popped out to play. I paused to take this grainy pic and to send it to my friend. Here was the exchange.

Know what I ALMOST wrote after “That’s the worrisome part. They should be.”? I ALMOST wrote, “Sometimes humans are the worst.” But I just narrowly stopped myself. Because look how close I am to the foxes myself.

Yes. Sometimes humans ARE the worst. Just like me.

/sidebar

Back to Johnny Silvercloud’s words. For any of you who feel the sting of truth as you read them, I invite you to read White Supremacy Culture by Tema Okun if you have not already done so.

It will be tempting to feel defensive and say almost immediately, “but I’m not a white supremacist”. (Which is precisely on-point: “defensiveness” IS a behaviour of white supremacy. This stuff is DEEEEEPLY embedded.)

And I get that because, my dear white friend, you likely think, as I had thought, that white supremacists were white-sheet-wearing, tiki lamp-bearing neo-Nazis and we OBVIOUSLY aren’t that (and the one guy who was on my list that had some horrific things to say about AOC and me has since been banned from my list).

But let’s understand that white supremacy is actually a system that keeps white people in power and privilege. A system centuries in the making (and in its upholding.) All of us who are white and who aren’t working to dismantle white supremacy are still part of the problem because whether we created the system or not, we still benefit from it so our very existence keeps it going unless we do something about it. (The 1619 Project and the podcast by the same name are a pretty good place to start to understand how the economics of this work too.)

You started to follow my work because I am an authority on the Imposter Complex. And I want you to know what I know: the intersections with white supremacy culture and the Imposter Complex are stunningly apparent.

Liiiiiiiiiike:

• Perfectionism

• Sense of urgency

• Defensiveness

• Quantity over quality

• Either/or thinking

• Power hoarding

• Fear of open conflict

• “I'm the only one”

• Right to comfort

Familiar, non? (I highlighted these intersections in a Live in my FB group yesterday.)

If you’re sitting with your mouth open like I was the first time I read those characteristics (heyyyyyy “sense of urgency” as in: NOW THAT I CAN FINALLY SEE THE WORLD IS BURNING I HAVE TO FIX IT), I’ll invite you to sit with that for a moment. (Just like me.)

And then take a page out of Desiree’s teachings (you can get a healthy dose of her depth of wisdom in the first-ever episode of Ready Enough w/ Tanya Geisler). Desiree uses the Liberatory Consciousness framework from Barbara J. Love where awareness comes first, then ANALYSIS, then action and accountability/ally-ship.

It’s tempting to jump straight from awareness to action. (Heaven knows I’ve been here.) But we won’t end white supremacy in a week...or a month. Like Desiree reminds me...that’s dominant culture talking. That aforementioned “sense of urgency”.

Follow (and INVEST in hiring or becoming a patron of) the work of social justice teachers who have made this their life’s work by choice or cruel circumstance looooooong before it started to come into your focus. Shelve your ego, dig in deeply and learn so you are not causing any additional harm and let’s get to it. (Just like me.)

I don’t need to tell you how egregious the world is right now, because like I’ve said...it’s been this way for centuries.

I don’t need to tell you about the extraordinarily colour-blind behaviour prolific in the white coaching/self-development space...it’s been this way for decades.

What I do need to commit to you, my readers, ALL of my readers, is that I am deep in the analysis of my own whiteness and white fragility.

And I do indeed intend to show you my work.

It will be imperfect.

But if I wait for all to be perfect, I will never take action. And if I don’t take action, I’ll never be able to be accountable and lean into ally-ship.

And if I wait for all to be perfect, I will, once again, be colluding with white supremacy that wields perfection as a weapon. No, not like a billy club, nor a gun, nor a knee on a windpipe. But a weapon intended to silence the words that need to be said. The conversations that need to be had at our dining room tables, in our beds, in our cars, and over fences.

I am ready enough to say what needs to be said and done.

I reckon you are too.

Big big love and swaths of care for you wherever you are on your path.

PS - I have made the decision to not overwhelm you with an exhaustive list of resources as there are some excellent ones in circulation that you can find beyond those I’ve invited you to start with here. That said, this anti-racism for white people document is one my family is working through. And, if you want to take more consistent action, Black Lives Matter has this extensive list of ways to donate, protest, educate yourself. Just. Like. Me.