ALLURE MEDICAL - all•u Magazine all·u Magazine Fall 2017 | Page 23

SHORTLY AFTER I was hired to be
a columnist for Time’s website, I was
asked to write about a book called The
Confidence Code. Having actually been
recruited and hired as a columnist,
one would assume there’d be certain
things I was capable of, such as writing
a column. But this was my first column
as a “columnist,” and I was rattled.
I labored over my introduction, writing
and rewriting, deleting and retyping,
cutting, pasting, moving sentences
around, moving them around some
more, then spending the next 10 minutes
command–Z’ing my way back to where
I’d started. Eventually, hunched over
my sad desk (kitchen table) in my office
(living room), clad in my freelancer’s
uniform (pajamas), I decided I had no
business having a column at all. In fact, I
was pretty sure my new contract would
be revoked by the end of the week.
It wasn’t—but the irony was that the
book I was supposed to write was
about imposter syndrome, or that
crippling sense of self-doubt that women
often feel in the face of challenge,
which in this case was the very thing
that was making it impossible for
me to complete the task at hand.
“Imposter syndrome” wasn’t coined as
a term until the 1970s, but it’s safe to
assume women have always felt it: that
nagging feeling that, even after you’ve
just done something great, maybe you
actually don’t deserve the praise.
Imposter syndrome affects minority
groups disproportionately: women, racial
minorities, the LGBT population—or
as Valerie Young, the author of a book
on the topic, The Secret Thoughts of
Successful Women, explains, people
who have the pressure of “accomplishing
firsts.” It’s common among high
achievers, creative people, and students,
and it persists in college, graduate
school, and the working world.
IMPOSTER SYNDROME COMES
IN MULTIPLE FLAVORS
That feeling comes about in different
ways, though. Here’s a quick sampling:
BEING ABSOLUTELY 100% SURE
YOU’RE GOING TO FAIL
Even Sheryl Sandberg, the unflappable
COO of Facebook, has said she often feels
this way. As she described it in Lean In,
“Every time I was called on in class, I was
sure that I was about to embarrass myself.
Every time I took a test, I was sure that it
had gone badly. And every time I didn’t
embarrass myself—or even excelled—I
believed that I had fooled everyone yet
again. One day soon, the jig would be up.”
"...imposter
syndrome, or that
crippling sense
of self-doubt that
women often
feel in the face of
challenge..."
FEELING LIKE A COMPLETE FRAUD
Every so often, even when we’ve “made
it,” we’re somehow unable to shake the
feeling that it’s all smoke and mirrors, that
we’ve still got everyone tricked, that at any
moment we’ll be found out and exposed.
Three days before this manuscript was
due to my editor, when I was alone in
my apartment, running on no sleep, I
remember walking into the bathroom and
thinking to myself: Why would anybody
actually want to read about a bunch of
experiences that are just . . . my own?
To which my editor, also a woman,
later replied, “I constantly ask myself
the same question about my editing.”
DEVALUING YOUR WORTH—
EVEN AS SOMEBODY ELSE IS
ACTIVELY SUPPORTING IT
In my case, that recently manifested
as me talking somebody out of giving
me money for work. “Why don’t I just
do it for free?” I wondered. To which a
male friend—who happened to be in
the room where this phone conversation
was happening—practically shook
me. “Jessica! Just take the money!”
he said. (At which point I said yes.)
UNDERESTIMATING YOUR
EXPERIENCE OR EXPERTISE
I was talking about this very thing
with a friend who is a teacher, and
in the next breath she told me about
a job that she was being recruited
for, followed by, “But I’m totally not
qualified.” (They had recruited her!)
Another woman I interviewed—a
postdoctoral engineering student named
Celeste—told me that while she was
working as a mechanical engineer, a
supervisor once noted in her review that
she wouldn’t call herself an engineer.
“I didn’t realize I told my coworkers I
wasn’t an engineer when I was,” Celeste
said. “And I think, for me, it was an
excuse just in case I made mistakes.”
SEVEN WAYS TO FIGHT
THE FEELING
So how do you combat imposter
syndrome, in all its pernicious forms?
Here are a few strategies you can use.
1. FIND A WINGWOMAN
Talk to a colleague or friend: Has she
felt like an imposter, too? Knowing this
is a thing that others feel will help make
it just that: a thing, but not your thing.
If you feel that doubtful voice begin to
creep inside your head, repeat: “It’s not
me, it’s the imposter syndrome talking.”
2. SQUASH NEGATIVE SELF-TALK
Ask yourself what evidence exists that you
are any less qualified than anybody else
to do this work. Now ask what evidence
exists that you are just as qualified—or
even, I daresay, more qualified—to do
the job. Make a list of at least 10 things.
3. STOP LETTING SCREW-UPS
HURT YOUR SELF-CONFIDENCE
When women screw up, they question
their abilities or qualifications. (“What
did I do wrong?”) But when men screw
up, they more often point to bad luck,
poor work, or not enough help from
others—in other words, outside forces.
Remember this: even the best athletes
screw up, the best lawyers lose cases,
2017 FALL
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