Do you ever get the feeling that some day people are going to find out that you’re not as intelligent or thoughtful or adventurous as you’ve led them to believe? Does it ever cross your mind that someone might discover that you’re a fraud who shouldn’t be gracing the halls of this fine campus? You’re not alone; in fact, it is believed that up to 70 percent of students have felt this way at some point, according to Forbes. It’s called imposter syndrome.
Imposter syndrome was first coined in 1987 by clinical psychologists Pauline Clance and Suzanne Imes. It refers to the idea that people are unable to accept their own accomplishments even if they are very talented, according to Mollie Goodfellow in The Independent. These feelings can occur even when all evidence points to the contrary. Many famous movie stars like Emma Watson and Kate Winslet have admitted to feeling fraudulent on set and thinking that they’re not good enough or that they don’t belong. According to Forbes, even Nobel Laureate Maya Angelou once said, “I have written 11 books, but each time I think, ‘Uh oh, they’re going to find me out.’”
Feeling fraudulent for a period of time is incredibly common, especially in the transitional phases of our lives including starting college, going to graduate school, and beginning our first professional jobs. It’s the thought that an observer of your life knows the truth about how you don’t belong and has the power to reveal it, just as Toto reveals the man behind the curtain in The Wizard of Oz, said professor of psychology Tomi-Ann Roberts. College kids might think they were accepted into their university by mistake and that someone is soon going to inform them they’ve been found out.
The syndrome manifests itself in three ways, according to the counseling department at Caltech. First is the feeling of being a phony undeserving of success. This comes with the fear of being discovered or “unmasked” by someone who knows the truth. The next symptom is attributing success to luck or other external reasons. This category includes people who refer to their achievements as “just getting lucky.” The third category is discounting success entirely. These people might attribute their good grade to an “easy class” or just shrug it off. Likely, most people will fit into one or all of the categories or will know someone who does.
Why do we feel this way? Perhaps it’s because we’ve developed a persona, or a side of ourselves we show to the world, and we feel lonely thinking we’re the only one who isn’t pulling our persona off very well. “What we forget is that everyone is feeling the same way,” said Roberts. Additionally, our society today places so much emphasis on developing our self-esteem that it can be crippling. Many times, noted Roberts, we refuse to try new things because we are so afraid we will fail.
Fortunately, there are many ways to combat these self-depreciating feelings. Firstly, it is important to release goals of perfection. You don’t have to be a master at something to have deserved all of the success you’ve achieved along the way, said Margie Warrell of Forbes. Set the bar at a realistic goal for yourself. Next, own your success. Give yourself credit for the things you’ve worked really hard for. Being proud of your successes does not make you automatically hubristic. Additionally, try reducing the time you spend on social media. While social sharing has its perks, overuse of sites like Facebook, Instagram, and Tumblr lend themselves to the evil of comparison. “Comparisons are always subjective, often biased, and rarely helpful,” Warrell said. We tend to diminish our own accomplishments when we compare them to others’, and that is counterproductive to our own happiness.
Above all, said Roberts, employ self-compassion. It takes practice. It takes courage. Loving yourself and being kind to yourself allow you to recognize that you’ve made it this far based on your personal accomplishments, whether or not anyone knows about them. If you want to belong here, you do.