Imposter Syndrome Overcoming

1. Imposter Syndrome Overcoming Have you ever felt like a fraud and you feel it plays out in different situations?Well, you’ve been hit by Imposter Syndrome! Here’s the good news though! Even the most successful, powerful and accomplished women (and men, too) have been unsure of themselves at one point or another. Einstein once said that he thought his research got way more attention than he thought it deserved. Even though feelings of self-doubt can stir up a lot of fear, anxiety and stress with Imposter Syndrome, here’s more good news,you can stop thinking like this and CHANGE! Addressing the Imposter Syndrome shadow will lead to greater leadership success for you. STOP thinking like an IMPOSTER Valerie Young is an internationally-recognized expert on impostor syndrome and has had more than three decades of speaking to an estimated 500,000 people and leading workshops on Impostor Syndrome. Up until just a few years ago, I always ended my talks by giving audiences a list of ten ways to combat impostor

2. syndrome. Audience evaluations were overwhelmingly positive. The one criticism? “I wish she’d given us more solutions.” Or during the Q&A someone would come up to the mic and say, “This was great… but do you have any other solutions?” My response was always, “Of the 10 things I just gave you, what have you tried so far?” To which they’d invariably reply, “Well, nothing – I just wondered if there’s anything else we can do?” I spent years thinking, “I just gave them TEN things to do! Is it them? Is it me? What am I missing?” Then one day it hit me. Take the best advice from Australia’s leading advisor Sonia McDonald. What people want is to walk into the room feeling like an impostor and to walk out of the room not feeling like an impostor. That’s not how it works. In fact, feelings are the last to change. So now, before I even get to the solutions, I make sure my audience understands that people who don’t feel like impostors are no more intelligent or capable than the rest of us. The only difference between them and us is that during that same situation that triggers an impostor feeling in us, they think different thoughts. That’s it, folks. Which is really good news — because it means all we have to do is learn to think like a non-impostor. And because impostor feelings are indeed the last to change, today I make sure everyone understands that”The only way to stop feeling like an impostor is to stop thinking like an impostor.”