What I didn’t know about impostor syndrome
A few months ago, I was in a hotel room in Arizona the night before a speech.
I was scrolling Instagram (and enjoying In-N-Out Burger!) when a post about impostor syndrome caught my eye. My speech the next day was about the themes in my book, Permission To Screw Up, and impostor syndrome is a topic I often touch on, so I was curious.
The post led me to an interview about the origin of impostor syndrome—and that’s where I learned about Dr. Pauline Clance.
In 1978, Dr. Clance and her research partner, Suzanne Imes, published a paper titled The Impostor Phenomenon in High Achieving Women. That paper led to the term we all know and use today. (And fun fact: It was originally supposed to be “impostor phenomenon,” not “impostor syndrome,” because it actually doesn’t meet the criteria for being a syndrome. Dr. Clance joked in her interview that she thinks it’s because people can’t spell phenomenon, so syndrome it is!)
To me, the story of how this term came to be is fascinating:
It started when Dr. Clance was in school. As she progressed in her academic career as a PhD student, she began to experience a ton of anxiety. The better she did in her classes, the more she worried about being able to maintain that success. Even more than that, she often felt like a fraud: She had a very specific fear that, at any moment, someone was going to find out that all her success came from sheer dumb luck and that she didn’t really didn't have what it took to get to where she was.
For years, Dr. Clance kept these feelings to herself—until she became a professor. That’s when she began to notice that her students (mostly women) seemed to have similar anxiety around being “found out.” Interestingly, these students were also the ones who were doing the best in her classes. She started to talk about this trend she noticed with her research partner, Suzanne, and the duo published their observations in what would become a very pivotal paper.
My goodness, can I relate to Dr. Clance’s story—and also to her students. Can you?
When I think back to when I started my company at 19 years old, I can remember walking into meetings and just waiting for someone to figure out that I really had no clue what I was doing.
I suppose it might seem normal to feel that way at 19, especially because I was often the youngest person in every room I walked into. But the thing is that that feeling didn’t go away.
The more my business grew, the more anxiety I felt about maintaining it. The more success my company achieved, the more I feared that someone would uncover at any moment that I got lucky and that it was all timing… and that that’s the only reason my company and I had “made it.”
Even today, at 36 years old, I sometimes question why anyone would want to hire and pay me to speak. I look at the facts: I have 17 years of being an entrepreneur and building a renowned culture under my belt, as well as more than 12 years of being a professional speaker and teaching people how to create cultures like my company’s—and I still doubt myself at times. Today, one of my biggest challenges is navigating anxiety, even though my company is the most successful it has ever been.
The way I cope with impostor syndrome today is very different from how I coped with it at the beginning of my journey. I’ve learned how to navigate it. I don’t let it get the best of me. When moments of doubt pop up, I remind myself that it’s human and that it comes with the territory of being a leader. I remind myself of the facts and what I’ve been able to do in my life. The feeling never goes away, but I’ve learned to move through it and not let it stop me.
But after reading this interview with Dr. Clance, I realized something else really important that will help me in those difficult moments: In her research, Dr. Clance noted that the people who experienced impostor syndrome most were the people who cared about their success. They were ambitious. They were people who were doing exceptionally well.
In other words, feeling like an impostor is something that comes along with caring. Think about it: If someone doesn't have any desire to be successful or achieve something meaningful to them, they probably aren’t thinking about this stuff… at all.
The article I read also shared examples of people we all know and admire who often doubted themselves and their work: Maya Angelou, who had written 11 books at the time, was once quoted as saying that she keeps thinking the next one is when everyone's going to find out that she has no clue what she's doing. Albert Einstein once said that the more his work becomes known, the more angst he feels. These are people who most of us would look to and say without question that they were successful—and still, they felt like impostors at times.
So as I sat in my hotel room with that In-N-Out burger, I began to find comfort in a phenomenon that has often felt isolating and difficult for me. And I hope that in sharing this with you, you can find comfort in it, too.
If you struggle with self-doubt or find yourself feeling like an impostor who is just moments away from being “discovered,” congrats! It means you care. I encourage you to talk about it with people close to you. You might be very surprised to learn that the people you most admire and look up to have felt this way—and sometimes still do.
What has been your experience with impostor syndrome? I’d love to know. Hit “reply” and tell me more!
Big hugs,
