I

I is for Imposter Syndrome

A for Anxiety is a weekly publication that takes an alphabetical journey through my life with anxiety.

It’s been nearly four months since I posted on Substack.

Four long, yet incredibly short, wintry months. My favourite time of year, in fact. When leaves fall and pumpkins decorate our doorsteps. When fireworks explode and Christmas trees decorate front windows.

Yet somehow, those four months are over, already. All that light and warmth gone, extinguished by the cold gust of New Year.

It’s in this bleak, January landscape that I’ve begun to think about returning to this corner of the internet.

I hadn’t planned on taking a break. When I published my last post, I definitely hadn’t foreseen a four month hiatus. I was genuinely loving writing.

Yet, and as with everything I enjoy, I managed to ruin it for myself.

Sometimes, when I’m enjoying something - when something feels worthwhile or rewarding - my happiness shifts to fear.

The stakes, I realise, are raised. The thing I’m doing now has value and therefore losing it, or - even worse - failing at it, would be catastrophic.

Some time around October, after an incredible trip to Uzbekistan, all of the words I wanted to write, and everything I wanted to say, began to feel overwhelming.

Like a mountain I couldn’t quite climb.

I was convinced that moving past the foothills of my little project would risk an avalanche; a racing cloud of embarrassing admissions and innermost thoughts, poised to engulf me.

I no longer felt confident that I could order this tsunami of feelings into neat, published posts. It all felt too important - too messy - to carve anything coherent from.

Even if I did start to write, perfectionism would appear; an icy blizzard of judgement. Nothing I wrote was good enough. Substack was only a place for professional writers. Everyone else found it so easy to grow and connect.

How could I compete with the likes of Emma Gannon?

Caught in the storm of these emotions, it felt much easier to give up and retreat.

Imposter Syndrome had defeated me.

I headed into my wintry cave and hunkered down.

Imposter Syndrome

Imposter Syndrome is a pretty everyday and regularly cited sort of affliction.

Coined in 1978 by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes, ‘Imposter Syndrome’ was said to be a phenomenon largely affecting ‘high achieving women’. These were women who, by any standard, were successful, but had difficulty accepting or believing it.

Instead, these women assume that they’ve simply tricked or defrauded their peers. That their inherent everydayness, their utter lack of talent, has somehow been missed.

Each working day, or social occasion, is therefore like a perpetual rerun of Catch Me if You Can - an adrenaline and anxiety filled episode of fakery and improvisation; a lifetime spent trying to shake the FBI.

In short, Imposter Syndrome is a lifetime of purgatory. A battle between what people assume you know and your screaming awareness of everything that you don’t.

Imposter Syndrome and Me

With this description in mind, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say I could be the face of Imposter Syndrome.

Imposter Syndrome personified.

Whatever the situation, regardless of the scenario, I’m haunted by the constant and malingering feeling that I’m a fake, a charlatan - someone who is perpetually failing and under delivering, yet managing to slip quality control.

I’m a Oreo biscuit with no middle, a house with subsidence. A sandwich with no filling. While all looks good on the outside, on the inside I know that I’m missing the meaty bit - the ham or the cheese.

I feel a lot like Guy Goma, the guy who went for a job interview at the BBC and somehow ended up on live TV, after being mistaken for an IT expert.

If there was ever somehow to play me in my own biopic, it’s Guy.

Of course, on the face of it, it’s easy to argue that this is all ridiculous. I was a straight A student. I have a 1st class degree and a Masters from Oxford. In my day job I’m a consultant, hired by charities to help support their major gift programmes, and outside of that, I run a profitable blog, female only tours and a lovely social media account.

I’m also Mum to the world’s smartest and funniest of boys, Henry.

Not that this matters, of course.

It’s all smoke and mirrors - an attractive cover to an otherwise dull and average book.

A glittered turd.

Skip through the pages and you’ll find a student who worked day and night to get those grades - spurred on by a mortal fear of failure. Reach the middle chapters and you’ll uncover a consultant who regularly drops their day rate, as they feel like a fraud asking for any more.

I honestly believe that travelling the world thanks to my blog was a fluke - a bizarre algorithmic glitch, and every tour I organise is underpinned by the fear that I’ll be a complete disappointment to any paying guests.

And when it comes to motherhood? Well, I’m the biggest imposter of them all.

I’m Talented Mr Ripley.

When it comes to parenting, I regularly feel like I’m in an anxiety dream, trying to mother a child when I’m only a kid myself. I worry my son can see through my motherhood act - can recognise my raging incompetence - and realises I’m not the adult he was promised.

Deep down, I wonder if he’s searching for a more mature, capable sort of woman. Someone like Susan Kennedy off of Neighbours. Anne in Motherland.

So, and to cut a life’s story short, it’s this lifelong curse, this constant sense of not being good enough, that persuaded me to step back from Substack.

I looked around, at all the other authors and their elegant words, and felt ridiculous.

I didn’t want to write again.

I didn’t want to be exposed as a fraud.

But, Whose Fault Is It?

Now, believe me when I say that I’ve done plenty to rid myself of this Imposter Syndrome.

I’ve taken this issue personally - completing confidence training, hypnosis, coaching and therapy. If I needed to sit a doctorate exam in CBT tomorrow, I’d honestly pass.

I’ve practiced ‘taking up space’ in meetings, I’ve driven to the supermarket with mantras playing - ‘I am the mother my child needs’. I’ve re-written my LinkedIn profile and adopted that slightly odd, third person narration.

Laura is ‘experienced’. Laura is ‘successful’.

I try, daily, to see the value in myself; shining my silver as best I can.

Yet, nothing seems to have really helped. In fact, I’m fairly sure it’s getting worse.

Imposter Syndrome is becoming an increasingly heavy label to wear.

The Imposter Syndrome Misdiagnosis

However, I’ve recently begun to think about this mysterious ‘syndrome’ a little differently.

From what I can tell, Imposter Syndrome has always been a largely female ‘affliction’. A patronising ‘there there, darling’ kind of malady, applied to women who are trying hard, but still a bit insecure.

By and large, it seems that Imposter Syndrome is a burden placed squarely on the shoulders of women; their problem to deal with. I’d even venture that men are rarely told they are suffering with such a crisis of confidence.

Instead, women are sent away with possibly well meaning, but depressingly predictable, advice. Try confidence coaching, people might suggest. Dare to be more assertive, they’ll say with a wink. Go away and cultivate your own value.

Fundamentally change, seems to be the underlying message.

Is it me, or has Imposter Syndrome begun to feel like gaslighting?

Confidence or Competence?

The more I think about this, the more suspicious I get.

Looking back on my life, there are some common themes surrounding my apparent Imposter Syndrome; some key triggers.

At school, I was regularly labelled as ‘quiet’ and ‘conscientious’. My teachers would report that I’d benefit from being a bit more assertive, from trying to voice my opinion more in class. Could I not be just a bit louder? Like the other noisy extroverts?

Listening to this feedback with a mixture of shame and embarrassment, I was already beginning to equate confidence - that dominant, masculine energy - with competence. Loud assurance with external validation.

I came to the conclusion that if confidence meant success or approval, then quietness must mean incompetence and - well, rejection. My own personality, a relatively quiet and shy kind of flavour, was therefore an issue.

A big one.

As such, I worked myself to the bone at school and university, trying to make up for my lack of glittering extrorevtism - channelling it through good grades.

When I started work, things got worse. I was the youngest on my team by 15 years - a shy 23 year old - surrounded by confident and experienced academics. I would sit in meetings and panic. How could I interject? Say something of value - anything at all?

I kept imagining my English teacher, sympathetically scalding me: ‘don’t be so quiet, Laura’.

Within a few weeks, I tried to hand in my notice.

Even in relationships, this theme arose again and again. I had, shall we say, an unfortunate relationship in my 20s with someone who - by modern standards - was the picture of success. A company of his own, money and a loud, noisy sports car.

He was opinionated, to the point of aggressive, and my perceived passiveness was (once again) an issue. Why didn’t I fight back? Defend myself? Why didn’t I loudly voice my own opinions? I was an Imposter in my own relationship, the girlfriend that wasn’t.

I wouldn’t be treated so badly if I just stopped being such a push over.

Flipping the Bias

Now older and self-employed, in a loving relationship and, dare I say it, happy - I have a bit more perspective on my apparent Imposter Syndrome.

And I’m angry about it - livid in fact.

While I don’t dispute that many of us, women in particular, often struggle with feelings of worth, or doubt their abilities, this is not our burden to bear. Nor is it an individual problem.

This is not some psychological weakness in us, some attack of our humors. Instead, it’s the result of institutionalised and long-term bias; a capitalist society built around the masculine ideals of brash confidence, loud opinions and endless posturing.

It’s systemic sexism, prejudice and bias, boiled and distilled into one neat product. A tonic called Imposter Syndrome, forced down the throat of any woman who is made to felt incompetent just because she might value thoughtfulness over opinion, inaction over action.

It’s a label hastily plastered onto the chest of any female who might (rightfully) feel nervous in her new job, who might find the working environment unsympathetic towards women at best and at worst, hostile.

It’s a diagnosis that comes from trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, before declaring that the peg just needs to completely reshape itself; to unravel its corners and lengths, before adopting an entirely new identity.

I can’t help but think that Imposter Syndrome has become a little too convenient a diagnosis - just another way to make women feel inferior.

Maybe, ladies, just maybe - the problem isn’t you, but them.

Substack and Imposter Syndrome

So, how do I apply all of this to my project, to my little Substack account?

It’s something I've been mulling over.

In short, I’ve decided just to quietly continue - to carry on typing away. I’ve realised I don’t need to compete, or be louder, or more profound. I don’t need to sit at the back of my class, endlessly raising my hand and voicing an opinion just for the sake of it. I don’t need to fake extrorevtism, or fawn over popular accounts, in the hope that they’ll recognise something in me; something of value.

I don’t need to work on being profound or viral, quotable or respected. I don’t need to be the loudest person in the room. I can just write and publish, in a peaceful, authentic sort of quietness.

Social media, and even Substack, can often value those more extroverted qualities - those loud voices or disruptive personalities. But, I don’t need to fake those qualities in order to be a credible voice.

I am, truly, happy to be a square.

If you enjoy my work and fancy supporting me, you could buy me a coffee to help keep the words flowing. Thanks in advance!

Check out my blog for more mental health tips, or follow me on Instagram.

Substack?