The cure for imposter syndrome

When I came out of school, I was excited. I wanted so much to help other people learn about how to navigate family life. I was filled with information and knowledge, and I was ready to plunge into coaching and change the world of families. So, I did exactly that! I left my day job and started to help people.

Face-to-face coaching is really enjoyable. Watching people set priorities and venture into new ways of looking at life is really fulfilling. I have come to believe that coaching offers a way to be seen and heard, as most of us just simply need an objective look at how we have been going about our lives. In this environment, I feel that I do my best work.

There is a side to what I do that, at times, I feel like a fraud. To be a coach, you have to be in business. To be in business, you have to know about business.

Business is challenging. Why? Most of us, when starting a business, really do not have a clue as to what we are doing! Marketing can be overwhelming. Feeling like the messaging you put out needs to match others in the industry creates imposter syndrome. Many who start businesses have persistent self-doubt, attributing their success externally, and fear deeply that if anyone really knew that they are lacking in areas, they would be exposed as a fraud. So you downplay any accomplishments, you feel like when it is starting to happen, it is driven by luck or the stars align, and not really anything you are doing.

Why is it that when we have a great plan – ideas that we firmly believe will be for the greater good, do we lose traction? Sometimes it is that learning about how marketing a business actually works takes time, sometimes even coursework. It takes financial investment, having a place to do it, and so much more. And that can be very overwhelming and sink your feelings of confidence in your ability to do what you want to accomplish! I am sure that as you are reading this, you likely have had experiences like this.

I have learned that I suffer from imposter syndrome. I look at successful coaches and think – “what do I actually have to offer?” That makes me nervous to market what I can do. Then the “fraud” voice starts up in my head, and I start to disbelieve in my capabilities and the work I desire to do. I have come to realize that some of my personality traits have kept me back from doing things that would push me along. Many who try to succeed at things that they find challenging struggle with self-efficacy. I have realized that maybe why the business part of this can overwhelm and collapse me at times. Do you struggle with imposter syndrome? Do you have low or high self-efficacy? How can you know? Most of us struggle with this. Let’s learn about self-efficacy.

What is self-efficacy? It is your personal belief that you are capable of executing behaviors, managing tasks, and achieving specific goals. This shapes how we approach the challenges we have, our perseverance through obstacles that come along, and regulates our motivation. Unlike self-esteem, which is our general self-worth, self-efficacy is specific to situations. This impacts our behavior. If we have high self-efficacy, we tend to set higher goals, put greater effort toward things we want to achieve, and increase our persistence to keep trying. Low self-efficacy often results in a desire to avoid challenging tasks and resign ourselves to defeat.

So can we overcome our imposter syndrome? Yes! Because self-efficacy is dynamic, meaning it can change. Here are four ways that we can greatly increase our level of self-efficacy.

1. Mastery Experience – what is this? Having successful experiences in performing a task strengthens your belief that you can have success in the future. If we watch a child learning to ride a bike, they have to keep “falling”, until they master balance. When balance is mastered, they become successful in riding the bike. Each of us can think of experiences from childhood that required mastery that once the process was learned, we could do it with ease.
2. Vicarious Experience – These types of experiences come from seeing someone similar to yourself succeed through effort. These can be powerful as you watch someone else go through the mastery experience, observing the pitfalls, the overcoming, the perseverance, and tenacity it takes to do it.
3. Social Persuasion – Do you have a mentor or friend who provides great encouragement? They know you – with all of your strengths and weaknesses. They know your challenges and all of your capabilities. These encouraging pillars create strong self-efficacy by telling you the truth about your accomplishments and your blindspots.
4. Emotional/Physical States – Our stress and interpreting emotional reactions can positively influence efficacy. How does it do that? We have to believe in ourselves. We do this with positive self-talk, how we recover from setbacks and disappointments, create a strong sense of commitment toward our interests and activities, and view challenging problems as tasks to be mastered.

What is the impact of high self-efficacy? It has an important role in our health psychology. It has an impact on academic outcomes. It helps us navigate challenging dynamics in our lives, in our work, in family life, in relationships, and helps usto see the value of sticking with something.

Remember, we started this with imposter syndrome? How does self-efficacy combat imposter syndrome? Self-efficacy replaces feelings of inadequacy with confidence in your abilities and skills. It strengthens your belief that success results from competence rather than luck. This allows you to embrace your challenges, reduce perfectionism, and accept your achievements. It counteracts self-doubt, encourages seeing evidence of successes, shifts thinking from focus to growth, and reduces fear of exposure. While self-efficacy doesn’t change what you don’t know, it reminds you of what you do know. It gives you confidence that learning can happen, success occurs quite often, and you realize that others learn by process too. Self-efficacy turns the focus from “I’m a fraud” to “I can handle it”.

Thanks for reading today! I appreciate you coming to my personal pep talk- and hope you learned some ways to help when you hear that imposter voice come into your own thinking.

Much success to you!

Lisa