Confidence Problem?

Keep calm and work hard

Do you feel defenceless facing self-doubt, arguing with a strong authoritative voice that tells you to step down, to stop trying for success, to cease seeking recognition? Angelika Sosnova shares her experience of emotionally intense internal conflict.

Some time ago I diagnosed myself with a confidence problem, after my lack of it prevented me from taking an interesting job position abroad, from taking on a whole new world of opportunities. Later on I discovered the existence of the imposter phenomenon. 

But let us start at the beginning. Self-confidence is important in the professional world. Naturally, you need to convince a manager that you can do the job you applied for, that your performance is worth a raise, that you deserve to get a promotion. The difficult part is that one needs confidence to succeed and that confidence is born of success. We are in a loop.

✧ No confidence—no success, no success—no confidence. 

Getting out of the loop is possible: with time and discipline the quantity of the attempts will transform into the quality of the outcome. But lack of confidence grants you a miserable time of second guessing every decision you ever make. And the feeling of inferiority persists even after the bright light of success enters your work life, albeit with a new label on it—the imposter syndrome. The plasticity of our minds is truly wonderful: we have the ability to ignore the hard evidence of success and prevent our flowers of confidence from blooming.

✧ How to fight the imposter syndrome?

Jokes aside, there might be some reason for keeping self-doubt alive. Perhaps it’s a way to avoid going towards the other extreme—overconfidence. Superiority complex can lead to the same or even more disastrous results than imposter syndrome. On the other hand, feeling inferior might be a coping mechanism. The level of anxiety that rises every time you think of a risky new project might be there to stop you from trying. Never try—never fail. 

If it sounds far-fetched to your ear, hear me out. I believe that most of us are driven to work hard in this thriving world of meritocracy, but don’t we have reasons to be terrified of failing? Failing can easily be perceived as:

1. Wasting time and effort.

2. Disappointing those who believed in us.

3. Proving yourself to be a loser or—even worse—a mediocrity.

Imposter syndrome might be a signal from your subconscious of too much pressure to do well, to achieve, to succeed in life (I shall avoid giving psychotherapeutic advice. I trust my dear reader to look into their deep fears on their own). But let us talk about the inevitable consequences of living with imposter syndrome.

⚈ It suffocates you with anxiety and drains your energy.

The brain is a big calorie consumer. All the mental exercises we do—hours of work, hundreds of big and small decisions (what to cook for dinner, when to apply for a promotion), emotions, overthinking late at night—run on the same source of energy as our muscles. When one of your needs consumes too much energy, there is no juice left for the others.  A mental workout (like an exam or a test) burns as much energy as a gym-night. The same goes for generating and experiencing heavy emotions, like anxiety. It literally devours your vitality, sucks it out of you like a vampire. 

Now, when we agree on the unhealthiness of the situation, it is time to move to the solutions. Yes, depending on how deep the imposter syndrome took roots in you, your strategy will differ. I encourage you to look at where the pressure comes from. Do you have overly ambitious goals? Are you fulfilling your parents' dreams of success? Do you take every misfortune personally? Could you shift focus from being goal-oriented to enjoying the process (from the future to the present)?

It helped me to realise that pure luck plays a big role in my life; that no one gets what they deserve but only what they get; that abilities are important but cannot compensate for lack of education, money, connections, and free time. And thus there’s no reason to put too much pressure on yourself. Just keep calm, go to the gym, take vitamin D in winter, sleep enough, and work on improving your skills.

P. S.:

The attentive reader will say here that I spent more words describing the problem than offering a solution. Someone might even point out that my advice is dry and obvious like a leaf from last year. Not exactly. The exciting part is to look inside and ask difficult questions: Who am I? Why am I frightened of not reaching my goals? Am I trying to be a good boy or girl in my parent’s eyes? Why do I put my self-worth into money, job titles, printed books, PhDs,… (fill in the blanks)?