How to Overcome Imposter Syndrome
Therapy for Anxiety & Imposter Syndrome in Colorado Springs
Imposter Syndrome is not just a “mindset problem”
Imposter Syndrome is a pervasive fear that you're not competent or not good enough, that your success is fragile or a mistake, and that you'll be found out and something terrible will happen. It's more common than you would think among highly successful and high achieving people, in spite of evidence that they've actually earned their success through competence, hard work, and being well respected.
Imposter Syndrome can really derail your mental health. If you've experienced it, you know... you're probably able to continue performing and achieving at a high level, but the constant sense of impending doom can be truly debilitating and take a huge toll on your personal and professional life over time. If you've experienced it you probably also know that it can feel impossible to overcome.
Most of the advice you'll find for Imposter Syndrome revolves around ways to manage it, but not how to get rid of it for good:
sharing your feelings
challenging your thoughts
changing negative self-talk
focusing on successes
taking action to do the things that scare you
These are all ways to cope for sure, and they can help. The problem is that coping helps you, but it doesn't heal you. The most widely recommended skills for coping with Imposter Syndrome treat it like it's a cognitive process, and if you can just think about it differently it will change. But Imposter Syndrome is not simply a mindset problem - it’s also a physiological response that happens naturally when your mind fears something bad could happen, and the automatic, physical nature of it can make it feel impossible to think your way out of it.
Imposter Syndrome is anxiety
One of the first things I help clients do when they come to me with Imposter Syndrome is to understand and get back in control of the anxiety that's coming up for them. I always say that anxiety grows in the mind, but it starts in the body. Anxiety is physical - it’s actually the activation of your hard wired automatic stress response cycle, and that is not a process that starts in the thinking part of your brain, it starts in the part of your brain that produces body sensations.
The foundation of healing Imposter Syndrome is finding things that calm your body - like breathing, grounding, and resourcing - before you try to work on things that change your mind. Until you interrupt the automatic stress response cycle and diffuse the anxiety associated with Imposter Syndrome, you won't be able to think clearly to address and change your beliefs.
Imposter Syndrome is a story in your mind that is not completely true
Imposter Syndrome usually revolves around a story in your mind that needs to be rewritten for it to reflect a balanced truth. The thoughts that exist around Imposter Syndrome are often out of balance, and the beliefs underlying it usually don't match with real evidence in your life. Imposter Syndrome can show up mind with thoughts like…
I'm not good at what I do
People can see through me and recognize I don't belong here
I'll be called out and get in trouble
I'll lose everything
I don't have the skills to keep up with what's required of me
... and the list goes on.
I often sit with people and make lists in two columns, the first column for evidence that these beliefs are true and the second for evidence that these beliefs aren't true. When we weigh the actual facts based on real evidence, what we typically find is that they reflect a different reality. In most cases, the reality is that there is plenty of evidence that the beliefs are not entirely true, and the evidence that they could be true is very often tied to past experiences or problems that no longer exist in the present.
Persistent Imposter Syndrome has a root cause
We all experience Imposter Syndrome from time to time, but when it’s persistent deeply ingrained it’s often tied to something hard that happened in the past. Sometimes the past event is simple... I didn't meet a goal, or I didn't perform well in a situation where there was pressure. Sometimes the past event is more complex... I experienced a trauma, I was raised in a family where I was never good enough, I’ve had to perform in a certain way to be loved. Without healing the root cause of Imposter Syndrome, it's easy to find yourself in a constant cycle of managing the feelings to try to make them smaller, only to have them resurface and try to manage them again. It's exhausting.
How to overcome Imposter Syndrome
I help people overcome Imposter Syndrome by learning skills for nervous system regulation that lower anxiety, and by using EMDR. EMDR is a structured protocol that processes underlying root causes and deeply held negative beliefs so that they lose their power and feel neutral. EMDR allows us to move beyond just trying to change thoughts and mindset at a cognitive level to healing Imposter Syndrome at a much deeper level.
Imposter Syndrome that is just helped but not healed puts a continual burden on your life. It impacts you personally and professionally. The anxiety can interfere with your relationships by making you a less available and connected person. The deep fear can cause you to procrastinate and avoid your work, further compounding your fears of failure in a vicious cycle. But Imposter Syndrome is resolvable. I've helped people go from feeling so overwhelmed by it that their regular day to day functioning is impaired, to feeling back in control and able to experience and enjoy their success. A small degree of anxiety and a fleeting sense of Imposter Syndrome here and there is normal, but it should never escalate to the point that it's interfering in your quality of life.
