Imposter syndrome

so here is my younger self speaking to all of us about imposter syndrome. I wonder if my older self (maybe ti be reviewed in year 5).

Imposter syndrome is loosely defined as doubting your abilities and feeling like a fraud. It disproportionately affects high-achieving people, who find it difficult to accept their accomplishments

Through out my life , I have had a feeling of not fitting in, in most environments. I have often been disliked for the silliest of things( well now that I’m older I think it’s silly). The fact that teachers in primary liked me - as I was very active and was always willing to do essays or plays, dance, netball etc. Without them pushing me or without me dragging my feet. I suppose top students in general are teachers pets but that creates tension with ones peer group as they see it rather as favouritism, whereas for the teachers it is solely that my achievements in their areas gets them good feedback and performance appraisals.

my high school days were not any much different. I got deep into church as a teen, and I was involved in everything ( worship team, deco, intercesion, you name it).And that led to me being part of the church leadership as a youth. Again, the fact that the pastor liked me, that too became a problem to those who observed from the outside, they missed the part where I felt a lot of responsibility and had to execute a lot no matter how I felt, and how that led to what seemed like promotion, as opposed to favouritism.

so my whole young life was made of moments where it felt I was years older and more experienced than I was. I felt out of place , unvalidated and unaccepted by my peers, yet I was doing well to those in authority of me. And we have to admit as a young person, what people think or say ay at that age matters, and to be cool to teachers and pastors as opposed to your peers is not really what a young person wants right? You want to be relevant, liked and accepted.

I have since in my life seen much more incidents of being a leader who works hard yet there are moments imposter syndrome kicks in. And to date, peer seclusion still remains the pinching point of my success.

every human longs for belonging, acceptance and relevancy .However part of learning to be appreciative of your success also means unlearning the picture/perspective of how one filters information in order to make decisions. I now have learned that true acceptance starts with self, and true belonging isn’t stemed by approval by people, but rather the inner person. Nothing outside of your permission can affect you.

imposter syndrome is but fear of rejection, so when you define your own guidelines of what is success and move in line with that, then it doesn’t matter whether people believe you are deserving, do you believe you are deserving??

whatever is your filter/ perspective of life, pursue that and you will enjoy your strengths, and more so you will admit your weaknesses and grow them.

you are not an imposter, you are exactly where you need to be😊.