135. Imposter Syndrome in Public Health
This week, you’re hearing a recording from a workshop and webinar I led on imposter syndrome for the CDC Fellows Professional Development Collective. This is a group of fellows who are generally early to mid-career professionals, so this topic will resonate with all of you, no matter where you are in your career.
Imposter syndrome is something particularly women, People of Color, immigrants, and other folks with one or more marginalized identities experience when we navigate spaces where we feel or have been told we don’t belong. Power imbalances and hierarchies exist across the field of public health, which can contribute to feeling like you don’t belong, but the good news is it doesn’t have to stay this way.
Join me this week to hear what imposter syndrome is and isn’t, and how to navigate the world with self-trust and internal belonging, even when there are external challenges or barriers you’re facing. You’ll learn what’s creating your experience of self-doubt and insecurity, and how to build the emotional capacity to shift from a feeling of inadequacy to confidence.
To ensure you get the coaching you need while this podcast goes on a break, I’m providing 12 organizations with webinar workshops on topics that apply to your organization. If you want a slot, email me by clicking here and we’ll discuss a collaboration!
What You Will Discover:
What imposter syndrome is and is not.
How we can unwittingly end up taking imposter syndrome on as an identity.
What’s creating your experience of self-doubt and insecurity.
How we internalize messages about where we belong and what we’re capable of.
The difference between internal and external belonging.
How to shift from insecurity to confidence.
Resources:
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CDC Fellows Professional Development Collective
Full Episode Transcript:
Hey you all, I’m Marissa McKool, and you’re listening to the Redefining Rest Podcast for Public Health Professionals. Here we believe rest is your right. You don’t have to earn it, you just have to learn how to take it and I’m going to teach you. Ready? Come along.
Hi, everyone, I wanted to pop in and set the stage a little because this podcast episode is slightly different than our typical episodes. It’s actually a recording from a workshop and webinar I led on imposter syndrome at the CDC for the Fellows Development Collective, which are a group of fellows who are generally early mid-career professionals. So I knew this topic and this presentation would resonate with all of you listening, no matter where you are in your career stage. So what you will be hearing this week is the recording from that webinar.
Now, before we get into that, just two kind of announcements/updates, I guess. Some of you caught a couple weeks ago, I mentioned on a podcast episode that I have decided that The Redefining Rest Podcast will be going on a rest in 2024. We are going to be taking a break next year and not putting out new podcast episodes. Don’t worry, the existing ones aren’t going anywhere. You’ll still have access to them. And the plan is to come back in 2025.
And over the next several weeks leading up to our last episode, I’ll be going into more details of why I made that decision, the purpose of it, how it’s going to impact you. And a lot of the ways I’ve been thinking about how to provide you all resources free, low cost. So you can continue to get coaching and teaching support from me, even while the podcast is on a break. So the first announcement is really the final date of the episode before this break. January 1st is going to be our last episode before we go on a hiatus.
And I guess technically that’s in 2024, but it worked out nicely that New Year’s Day was on a Monday, which is when we release. So it just felt right, serendipitous, to put that last episode there. Secondly, one of the ways I can share that I have been working to make sure you all have opportunities to get coaching and teaching from me next year, even when the podcast is on a break. One of them has been to set a goal to provide 12 organizations with a webinar or workshop on various topics of what might be specifically needed in your organization. So it can be imposter syndrome like you’re going to hear today or a workshop.
I’ve done workshops or webinars on how to get more rest, on developing leadership skills, on creating more confidence, on creating work life balance, on how to advocate for your needs as a staff member and many, many other things. And part of the reason I wanted to make sure you all were aware of this is if you want me to provide a workshop or webinar at your organization, I want to prioritize you as a podcast listener and make sure your organization gets one of those slots.
I already have some that have reached out to me because one of their staff members was my former client or I’ve done a webinar for them in the past. So some of the slots are starting to get filled. But we have plenty and I want some of them to go to you and your organizations. And don’t worry if you don’t have a budget for it. I’m reserving some spots to be pro bono or for free. So I still want you to reach out if you think this would benefit you and your organization. So please email me whether it’s where you work or a volunteer organization you’re on the board of or your school or your alumni group.
I’ll leave my email in the show notes below, it’s info@mkcoolcoaching.com, but please feel free to reach out to me. We’ll chat about what we could do, what the format could be, what the needs are. And just go from there and see if it would be a good opportunity and a good collaboration. So with that, just to set the stage a little bit for this episode, which will give you a good idea of what webinars or workshops are like, and if it might be a good fit to bring to your organization.
In this episode, you’ll hear me presenting on imposter syndrome. And it’s going to sound slightly different than my podcast episodes because of that. And the other thing I want to mention is there’s two things I cut out just for time and also for privacy. In the original webinar I presented various different implementation activities. I had to cut that out really for time. But most of the activities I shared I have talked about on the podcast here in some shape or form.
I also cut out the Q&A. The Q&A was pretty long and even though it was really rich, it was such a good Q&A, which is one of the biggest benefits to doing a webinar workshop is you get to ask me live questions and get live coaching or feedback. Even though that would have been really valuable to share with you, I cut it out just for privacy because people were asking me live, not just through the chat box, but unmuting themselves. And it’s not fair to provide that and put that out publicly without their consent.
So just know your workshop or webinar that we might be bringing to your organization, it can include activities. It can include Q&A. It can include breakout groups. It can be in whatever format that the topic or your community might need or benefit from. So with that, I’m sorry that was a lot, preventing you to get to the episode. With that, I want you to tune into this recording of my webinar on imposter syndrome in public health. Please enjoy.
My name is Marissa McKool. I now coach mostly women or people socialized as women around burnout, feeling stuck, feeling overwhelmed. I am familiar with the CDC. I was on ORISE fellow there in the Injury Center for about two years. When I was at CDC I was one of five folks who started the Fellows Development Collective because we really saw a gap, a need in professional development geared towards fellows specifically. And I’m so excited to be back now years later, to share this topic with you because this is something I struggled with a lot when I was a fellow.
And today what we’re going to talk about is what imposter syndrome is and is not, what confidence is and is not, how you can shift from that insecurity to confidence. So what is imposter syndrome? A while ago I was working with a group of folks in public health and I asked them, “What does this term mean to you?” And here are just some example quotes that came out of that but I think they highlight the general theme. Feeling inadequate. Not feeling good enough. That you don’t belong. That peers have an advantage.
That you can’t do something even though others believe you can, or even if deep down you think you can. That other people are more capable than you. This is often how we feel or what we would describe how we feel when we think of the term, imposter syndrome. But let’s break down what it actually is. On the screen is an illustration of a person with short dark hair and dark skin looking upset at a computer. And while what I just described about feeling inadequate and not good enough does describe your experience.
I do want to acknowledge that what we call imposter syndrome is something that particularly women, people of color, immigrants. And other folks with one or more marginalized identity, experience when we navigate spaces that either we feel or have been told we don’t belong. Or ourselves or our community have historically been excluded, when there are power imbalances, hierarchy, and other things like that which exist across the field of public health.
And this term was coined in 1978 by researchers, Dr. Pauline Clance and Suzanne Imes. I do want to note, however, the original research only looked at white women in the workplace. And since there’s been a lot more research looking at different populations but that’s really important to consider when we’re talking about this topic. And I’m not going to go too much into the research because (a) you can look that up, but (b) what I find more helpful is talking about how we can shift out of this and not get stuck.
Because what I find, at least for people I’ve worked with and talk to and myself, when we first heard imposter syndrome and we put a name to our experience, we felt relief. It’s not just me. We felt seen. This is explainable. We felt validated. I’m not alone. And that was a good shift but then we can get stuck there. And that’s not where you want to get stuck. So let’s talk about why that happens.
Let’s talk about what imposter syndrome is not. It is not a medical syndrome. It is not an identity and it’s not out of your control. A medical syndrome is a set of medical signs and symptoms that are correlated with each other and associated with a disease or disorder. Even though we use the term, imposter syndrome, that experience we’re having is not a disease or disorder. Your experience of not feeling good enough, of that you don’t belong, it’s not a disease.
And even though intellectually you might know that. I think it’s important to name that and call that out, because the term syndrome, even unintentionally, can imply to us that there’s not much we can do about it, that it’s out of our control, that we’re just stuck with it. And that’s not true. It is normal to have moments where you feel like you don’t belong or you doubt yourself. And I’m not saying normalized in you’re stuck with it. Just to say it’s very human. All humans have that experience from time to time. As humans, we experience all ranges of emotions.
Even think about thousands of years ago when we were in hunter gatherer groups. You wanted to belong. You wanted your community, your tribe, to want you there because if you got kicked out, you were screwed. You were probably going to struggle to survive to be on your own. We are social species, of course we have thoughts about belonging, of course we desire to fit it. Nothing is wrong with you for having that experience.
And if you’re feeling like you’re not good enough, you don’t belong, you doubt yourself, you can change it. It’s not out of your control. And what ends up happening, even though when we first learn this term, we might feel relief, we might feel connection, we might feel seen. We can end up taking it on as an identity unknowingly, unintentionally. And then we can feel trapped as if that’s just who we are, there’s nothing we can do about it. And that is also not true. And lastly, it’s not out of your control.
I think because imposter syndrome and what we experience when we use that term really does happen in those spaces where there might not be signs of welcoming. Where historically we or our families or community might have been excluded, where there are power imbalances. Those external things that, yes, need to change. Because we experience this in those settings, it can feel like it’s completely out of our control. That those things have to change for us to feel better.
And first, that’s not true, which is the good news because if you had to wait for those things to change, the hard truth is our world is messy. At least in our lifetime we’re going to constantly be working to change those external factors. And when you believe it’s out of your control and you can’t change it, then you feel trapped and stuck but you can change it. And this is not an overnight magical fix. I’m not here to lie to you.
On the screen is an illustration of kind of two cartoon-esque characters across each other on a cliff, breaking a pencil. And you can do this change even if your boss doesn’t change or even if you don’t quit your job or even if the office culture doesn’t change right away. Because those things may or may not happen. Some of them take a long time, like norms change. And here’s how we know that.
When we talk about imposter syndrome, we’re really talking about our emotional experience, feeling insecure, doubting ourselves, not trusting ourselves, questioning ourselves. That emotional experience, that doubt, that insecurity, that gut feeling, that fast beating heart, that flushed face. Maybe it’s shame or guilt or anxiety, or even something else that comes up. That emotion, those emotions, those physical sensations, that’s created by what you are thinking about yourself.
When you are thinking consciously or not, I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m going to mess this up, everyone’s going to know I’m not good enough, I shouldn’t be here, they hired me by mistake. I’ve heard all of these from so many people I’ve coached, and I’ve thought them too.
When you’re constantly worrying what other people are going to think, your colleagues or your mentor or the other leaders or you’re ruminating over what you don’t know or how everything went wrong or what you did wrong. What’s happening with those thoughts and in your brain, that’s what’s creating that emotional experience of not feeling good enough, doubting yourself, feeling insecure. And here’s how we know.
Think about all the times that you have doubted yourself while simultaneously having a boss, a friend, a colleague, a partner telling you verbally or written that you are doing great, that you have nothing to worry about, that you’re not giving yourself enough credit. You still don’t believe it. How many people in your life think you have it all together because maybe you have a graduate degree or you work at the CDC? This used to be me, everyone around me thought I had it so together and I felt so insecure and like a fraud. You still feel like you don’t belong.
That’s because it’s coming from the internal place. If it was that external piece, then if you had people in your corner cheering you on, that would just change your internal experience. But it doesn’t, maybe it helps for a second but not long term. This is because that emotional experience is created internally. And listen, I know some of you are probably thinking, well, what if you do have a toxic workplace? What if you do have a boss that treats you terrible? We are going to get there in a minute.
This isn’t about denying that those things happen and they do have an impact on you. Research shows that our brains have anywhere between 4,000 and 60,000 thoughts a day. I know that’s a huge kind of range. As you can imagine, that’s hard research to figure out the exact number. But no matter what it is, that’s a lot of thoughts. Most of those we don’t think consciously, they are happening unconsciously. And those thoughts are informed from the world around you, which we’ll talk about more in a second.
But even if you’re not thinking them all consciously, they all impact your experience. And they aren’t necessarily, I’m putting this in quotes, ‘true’. But believing they are true and letting those thoughts run the show is creating your experience. So here’s what I mean by that. So on the screen we have an illustration of a brain and prongs coming out of it, pointing to school, parents, religion, media, books, oppressive systems. There’s other examples but that’s what I could fit on here. The thoughts we think aren’t necessarily true. They are subjective. They are optional.
And we get our thoughts from all around us, all the places I just named. We were not born thinking the thoughts we have. We get thousands of messages every day since we were very young, from watching TV shows or what we’re taught in school or what we hear our parents saying or a neighbor or anything else and our brains absorb that and take that and rephrase it into our own voice.
The messages of you don’t belong, you’re not smart enough or they just got there by luck. They’re not hard working. They’re lazy. And your brain internalizes those beliefs. And here’s an example. We live in a society that sends messages all the time, directly and indirectly, that women cannot lead. That people socialized as women aren’t good leaders, are too emotional.
And even if you look at the field of public health, the workforce is largely women, but a lot of the highest positions across our field, across the country, are held by men. Movies with female leads largely depict women as their main thing in life is finding a husband. If I asked you if women cannot lead, you’d probably say, “No, I’ve had great female bosses. I believe in women. I believe they can lead.”
But if you are socialized as a woman, how many times have you prevented yourself from speaking up in a meeting or stopped yourself from going through that promotion or a raise. Thinking I shouldn’t, it’s not my place. I’m not good enough. I don’t have enough experience. I don’t meet all the criteria in the job description. I’m the youngest one here. I’m the least experienced. They all know better than me. They’ll probably laugh at me.
I used to think this all the time when I was at meetings as a fellow, being the only fellow in the room with people who had been at CDC for decades. And this is just one example. It doesn’t always have to do with gender or the patriarchy. I just wanted to illustrate how this looks. Because we have internalized so many messages of where we belong, who’s capable of what, what we should or shouldn’t do. And our brain rephrases those and says them back to us and they sound true. They’re in our own voice.
That voice is imposter syndrome. It is not your identity. It is not true. It’s been absorbed by the world around you. And let’s talk about what confidence is. On the screen we have an illustration of a light skinned person with dark hair looking in the mirror at their reflection with hearts around them. I think most people, consciously or not, think confidence means having all the right answers, knowing what to do, the absence of doubt, not worrying what others think.
I have a lot of clients who come to work with me and they say, “My main goal is I just don’t want to care what other people think.” And they think that’s what confidence is. Number one, we are humans. We will always have that piece where we do care what other people think. We can lessen its impact on us but we are not trying to become robots and that’s not possible anyways.
But when we think about confidence, you probably have this image of someone who’s just so sure, like in movies, walks around with their chest, their head held high, they just own the room. And you might know someone that you look at and think they must be really confident or that’s what I want to be. That is not confidence, at least I don’t think so. And I’m not saying that’s arrogance either.
But believing that confidence means you have all the right answers, you have no doubt, you don’t worry what other people think is only increasing your doubt and insecurity because again, you are human. You are not a robot. Of course you care what other people think. Of course you have doubt, that is very human, that’s very normal.
Confidence as I have found coaching hundreds of people and myself is actually allowing yourself to make a choice in the absence of all the knowledge, even if you feel scared, is taking action, even if you’re uncertain. Is doing something even if you’re questioning yourself. It’s trying something new even if other people disagree. And that means all of you here have more confidence in yourself than you’re giving yourself credit for.
That again, that lawyer in your brain that’s arguing you’re not good enough has kind of smothered because that part of your brain is taking up too much of the floor. And if we bring the contrary evidence, we have so much more evidence that you actually are more confident than you’ve been giving yourself credit for. And I think we conflate confidence and arrogance and we conflate confidence and certainty. If you are certain about something, you have zero need for confidence, there is no need. That emotion is not necessary.
When you don’t have certainty, when you have some doubt, where you aren’t sure. That’s where you have the confidence come in. Confidence is a feeling just like doubt or insecurity. It is a feeling created by thoughts you think about yourself. Doesn’t mean you have to believe you’re the best thing on the Earth or better than everyone. It means you think thoughts about yourself that help you feel confident or empowered or have pride in yourself. Maybe it’s not 100%, maybe it’s 10%, that still makes a difference.
And you can feel both confident and doubt, empowered and worried, proud and unsure. Feeling confident doesn’t mean you eliminate the doubt or the anxiety or the questioning, they can be there at the same time. It’s about building that trust in yourself. And you all are already doing it, you’re just not recognizing it.
So let’s talk about the external piece, why this matters. On the screen is an illustration of three people, two have short black hair, one has long black hair, they’re all light skinned. Let’s talk about external versus internal belonging. External belonging is signals from other people or organizations or spaces that you do belong. Internal belonging is believing you belong no matter what’s going on externally. You don’t always have control over your external environment.
You don’t have control of how welcoming your office mates are or if your organization is receptive to your accommodation requests. Or if the leadership puts an effort to giving you positive reinforcement or creating growth opportunities or if there is discrimination or anything else. This is one of the reasons why creating that internal belonging and that confidence and that pride matters so much. Because what are you supposed to do if you just have to wait for those external things to change? Just stay feeling shitty? No, you don’t have to do that.
I’ve met so many people who have come to me after they’ve quit five/six jobs trying to job hunt, to find the perfect job that has that all external belonging. It might exist but do you want to spend your career tiptoeing and hiding from all the different spaces in a world that is super flawed? Or do you want to create internal belonging so you can navigate the world even when there are things, challenges, barriers, things we don’t like or trying to be harmful? Where you can have your back, where you can still believe in yourself, where you can trust in yourself.
That’s why creating this internal belonging matters. And here’s the kicker. We have all had the experience being in a space that has external belonging, that was supportive, that was communicated we belonged and we still did not feel like we belonged.
For example, when I was at UC Berkeley, there was a new staff group for Middle Eastern and North African staff. I went to a few meetings and the organizers were so thoughtful of creating a space where everyone felt like they belonged. They were really welcoming. They were really thoughtful about how they organized it and how they did community. I still felt like a fraud. I still felt like an outcast, not because of them, because of my internal belonging, because I hadn’t created that. You can probably all think of similar examples.
Internal belonging is something no one else can take from you, no matter what barriers you face, no matter what’s going on around you. Again, it doesn’t mean you’re going to be a robot. Obviously, things will still impact you. But when you have that internal belonging you can move through it with more emotional capacity and ease. And you can be in a room of people who are completely different than you or in an organization that maybe doesn’t encourage belonging or doesn’t promote inclusion.
And you can have that internal belonging to help you move through, to help you make decisions of what’s best for you and how to support you. Creating this internal belonging and building your confidence and trust doesn’t happen overnight. I’m not going to lie to you. It’s not, hey, do these three activities and one day you’ll be good to go. The truth is, it’s a lifelong journey. For as long as you and I are alive, the truth is, this world is going to be flawed. It’s going to be messed up. There are going to be things we need to change.
And so that means we’re still going to be getting messages directly and indirectly our whole lives that we don’t belong, that we shouldn’t be here, that we’re not good enough, that we’re not smart enough. So it is a lifelong journey to counter those messages and create internal belonging and shift our thinking. But the more you do it, the easier it gets, the stronger those beliefs get and then they take up more of the space. They are arguing more [inaudible]. They are the louder radio station. And it gets so much easier and so much more enjoyable, but it is a practice you have to take in.
If you found this episode helpful then you have to check out my coaching program where I provide you individualized support to create a life centered around rest. Head on over to mckoolcoaching.com, that’s M-C-K-O-O-L coaching.com to learn more.
Hi, everyone, I wanted to pop in and set the stage a little because this podcast episode is slightly different than our typical episodes. It’s actually a recording from a workshop and webinar I led on imposter syndrome at the CDC for the Fellows Development Collective, which are a group of fellows who are generally early mid-career professionals. So I knew this topic and this presentation would resonate with all of you listening, no matter where you are in your career stage. So what you will be hearing this week is the recording from that webinar.
Now, before we get into that, just two kind of announcements/updates, I guess. Some of you caught a couple weeks ago, I mentioned on a podcast episode that I have decided that The Redefining Rest Podcast will be going on a rest in 2024. We are going to be taking a break next year and not putting out new podcast episodes. Don’t worry, the existing ones aren’t going anywhere. You’ll still have access to them. And the plan is to come back in 2025.
And over the next several weeks leading up to our last episode, I’ll be going into more details of why I made that decision, the purpose of it, how it’s going to impact you. And a lot of the ways I’ve been thinking about how to provide you all resources free, low cost. So you can continue to get coaching and teaching support from me, even while the podcast is on a break. So the first announcement is really the final date of the episode before this break. January 1st is going to be our last episode before we go on a hiatus.
And I guess technically that’s in 2024, but it worked out nicely that New Year’s Day was on a Monday, which is when we release. So it just felt right, serendipitous, to put that last episode there. Secondly, one of the ways I can share that I have been working to make sure you all have opportunities to get coaching and teaching from me next year, even when the podcast is on a break. One of them has been to set a goal to provide 12 organizations with a webinar or workshop on various topics of what might be specifically needed in your organization. So it can be imposter syndrome like you’re going to hear today or a workshop.
I’ve done workshops or webinars on how to get more rest, on developing leadership skills, on creating more confidence, on creating work life balance, on how to advocate for your needs as a staff member and many, many other things. And part of the reason I wanted to make sure you all were aware of this is if you want me to provide a workshop or webinar at your organization, I want to prioritize you as a podcast listener and make sure your organization gets one of those slots.
I already have some that have reached out to me because one of their staff members was my former client or I’ve done a webinar for them in the past. So some of the slots are starting to get filled. But we have plenty and I want some of them to go to you and your organizations. And don’t worry if you don’t have a budget for it. I’m reserving some spots to be pro bono or for free. So I still want you to reach out if you think this would benefit you and your organization. So please email me whether it’s where you work or a volunteer organization you’re on the board of or your school or your alumni group.
I’ll leave my email in the show notes below, it’s info@mkcoolcoaching.com, but please feel free to reach out to me. We’ll chat about what we could do, what the format could be, what the needs are. And just go from there and see if it would be a good opportunity and a good collaboration. So with that, just to set the stage a little bit for this episode, which will give you a good idea of what webinars or workshops are like, and if it might be a good fit to bring to your organization.
In this episode, you’ll hear me presenting on imposter syndrome. And it’s going to sound slightly different than my podcast episodes because of that. And the other thing I want to mention is there’s two things I cut out just for time and also for privacy. In the original webinar I presented various different implementation activities. I had to cut that out really for time. But most of the activities I shared I have talked about on the podcast here in some shape or form.
I also cut out the Q&A. The Q&A was pretty long and even though it was really rich, it was such a good Q&A, which is one of the biggest benefits to doing a webinar workshop is you get to ask me live questions and get live coaching or feedback. Even though that would have been really valuable to share with you, I cut it out just for privacy because people were asking me live, not just through the chat box, but unmuting themselves. And it’s not fair to provide that and put that out publicly without their consent.
So just know your workshop or webinar that we might be bringing to your organization, it can include activities. It can include Q&A. It can include breakout groups. It can be in whatever format that the topic or your community might need or benefit from. So with that, I’m sorry that was a lot, preventing you to get to the episode. With that, I want you to tune into this recording of my webinar on imposter syndrome in public health. Please enjoy.
My name is Marissa McKool. I now coach mostly women or people socialized as women around burnout, feeling stuck, feeling overwhelmed. I am familiar with the CDC. I was on ORISE fellow there in the Injury Center for about two years. When I was at CDC I was one of five folks who started the Fellows Development Collective because we really saw a gap, a need in professional development geared towards fellows specifically. And I’m so excited to be back now years later, to share this topic with you because this is something I struggled with a lot when I was a fellow.
And today what we’re going to talk about is what imposter syndrome is and is not, what confidence is and is not, how you can shift from that insecurity to confidence. So what is imposter syndrome? A while ago I was working with a group of folks in public health and I asked them, “What does this term mean to you?” And here are just some example quotes that came out of that but I think they highlight the general theme. Feeling inadequate. Not feeling good enough. That you don’t belong. That peers have an advantage.
That you can’t do something even though others believe you can, or even if deep down you think you can. That other people are more capable than you. This is often how we feel or what we would describe how we feel when we think of the term, imposter syndrome. But let’s break down what it actually is. On the screen is an illustration of a person with short dark hair and dark skin looking upset at a computer. And while what I just described about feeling inadequate and not good enough does describe your experience.
I do want to acknowledge that what we call imposter syndrome is something that particularly women, people of color, immigrants. And other folks with one or more marginalized identity, experience when we navigate spaces that either we feel or have been told we don’t belong. Or ourselves or our community have historically been excluded, when there are power imbalances, hierarchy, and other things like that which exist across the field of public health.
And this term was coined in 1978 by researchers, Dr. Pauline Clance and Suzanne Imes. I do want to note, however, the original research only looked at white women in the workplace. And since there’s been a lot more research looking at different populations but that’s really important to consider when we’re talking about this topic. And I’m not going to go too much into the research because (a) you can look that up, but (b) what I find more helpful is talking about how we can shift out of this and not get stuck.
Because what I find, at least for people I’ve worked with and talk to and myself, when we first heard imposter syndrome and we put a name to our experience, we felt relief. It’s not just me. We felt seen. This is explainable. We felt validated. I’m not alone. And that was a good shift but then we can get stuck there. And that’s not where you want to get stuck. So let’s talk about why that happens.
Let’s talk about what imposter syndrome is not. It is not a medical syndrome. It is not an identity and it’s not out of your control. A medical syndrome is a set of medical signs and symptoms that are correlated with each other and associated with a disease or disorder. Even though we use the term, imposter syndrome, that experience we’re having is not a disease or disorder. Your experience of not feeling good enough, of that you don’t belong, it’s not a disease.
And even though intellectually you might know that. I think it’s important to name that and call that out, because the term syndrome, even unintentionally, can imply to us that there’s not much we can do about it, that it’s out of our control, that we’re just stuck with it. And that’s not true. It is normal to have moments where you feel like you don’t belong or you doubt yourself. And I’m not saying normalized in you’re stuck with it. Just to say it’s very human. All humans have that experience from time to time. As humans, we experience all ranges of emotions.
Even think about thousands of years ago when we were in hunter gatherer groups. You wanted to belong. You wanted your community, your tribe, to want you there because if you got kicked out, you were screwed. You were probably going to struggle to survive to be on your own. We are social species, of course we have thoughts about belonging, of course we desire to fit it. Nothing is wrong with you for having that experience.
And if you’re feeling like you’re not good enough, you don’t belong, you doubt yourself, you can change it. It’s not out of your control. And what ends up happening, even though when we first learn this term, we might feel relief, we might feel connection, we might feel seen. We can end up taking it on as an identity unknowingly, unintentionally. And then we can feel trapped as if that’s just who we are, there’s nothing we can do about it. And that is also not true. And lastly, it’s not out of your control.
I think because imposter syndrome and what we experience when we use that term really does happen in those spaces where there might not be signs of welcoming. Where historically we or our families or community might have been excluded, where there are power imbalances. Those external things that, yes, need to change. Because we experience this in those settings, it can feel like it’s completely out of our control. That those things have to change for us to feel better.
And first, that’s not true, which is the good news because if you had to wait for those things to change, the hard truth is our world is messy. At least in our lifetime we’re going to constantly be working to change those external factors. And when you believe it’s out of your control and you can’t change it, then you feel trapped and stuck but you can change it. And this is not an overnight magical fix. I’m not here to lie to you.
On the screen is an illustration of kind of two cartoon-esque characters across each other on a cliff, breaking a pencil. And you can do this change even if your boss doesn’t change or even if you don’t quit your job or even if the office culture doesn’t change right away. Because those things may or may not happen. Some of them take a long time, like norms change. And here’s how we know that.
When we talk about imposter syndrome, we’re really talking about our emotional experience, feeling insecure, doubting ourselves, not trusting ourselves, questioning ourselves. That emotional experience, that doubt, that insecurity, that gut feeling, that fast beating heart, that flushed face. Maybe it’s shame or guilt or anxiety, or even something else that comes up. That emotion, those emotions, those physical sensations, that’s created by what you are thinking about yourself.
When you are thinking consciously or not, I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m going to mess this up, everyone’s going to know I’m not good enough, I shouldn’t be here, they hired me by mistake. I’ve heard all of these from so many people I’ve coached, and I’ve thought them too.
When you’re constantly worrying what other people are going to think, your colleagues or your mentor or the other leaders or you’re ruminating over what you don’t know or how everything went wrong or what you did wrong. What’s happening with those thoughts and in your brain, that’s what’s creating that emotional experience of not feeling good enough, doubting yourself, feeling insecure. And here’s how we know.
Think about all the times that you have doubted yourself while simultaneously having a boss, a friend, a colleague, a partner telling you verbally or written that you are doing great, that you have nothing to worry about, that you’re not giving yourself enough credit. You still don’t believe it. How many people in your life think you have it all together because maybe you have a graduate degree or you work at the CDC? This used to be me, everyone around me thought I had it so together and I felt so insecure and like a fraud. You still feel like you don’t belong.
That’s because it’s coming from the internal place. If it was that external piece, then if you had people in your corner cheering you on, that would just change your internal experience. But it doesn’t, maybe it helps for a second but not long term. This is because that emotional experience is created internally. And listen, I know some of you are probably thinking, well, what if you do have a toxic workplace? What if you do have a boss that treats you terrible? We are going to get there in a minute.
This isn’t about denying that those things happen and they do have an impact on you. Research shows that our brains have anywhere between 4,000 and 60,000 thoughts a day. I know that’s a huge kind of range. As you can imagine, that’s hard research to figure out the exact number. But no matter what it is, that’s a lot of thoughts. Most of those we don’t think consciously, they are happening unconsciously. And those thoughts are informed from the world around you, which we’ll talk about more in a second.
But even if you’re not thinking them all consciously, they all impact your experience. And they aren’t necessarily, I’m putting this in quotes, ‘true’. But believing they are true and letting those thoughts run the show is creating your experience. So here’s what I mean by that. So on the screen we have an illustration of a brain and prongs coming out of it, pointing to school, parents, religion, media, books, oppressive systems. There’s other examples but that’s what I could fit on here. The thoughts we think aren’t necessarily true. They are subjective. They are optional.
And we get our thoughts from all around us, all the places I just named. We were not born thinking the thoughts we have. We get thousands of messages every day since we were very young, from watching TV shows or what we’re taught in school or what we hear our parents saying or a neighbor or anything else and our brains absorb that and take that and rephrase it into our own voice.
The messages of you don’t belong, you’re not smart enough or they just got there by luck. They’re not hard working. They’re lazy. And your brain internalizes those beliefs. And here’s an example. We live in a society that sends messages all the time, directly and indirectly, that women cannot lead. That people socialized as women aren’t good leaders, are too emotional.
And even if you look at the field of public health, the workforce is largely women, but a lot of the highest positions across our field, across the country, are held by men. Movies with female leads largely depict women as their main thing in life is finding a husband. If I asked you if women cannot lead, you’d probably say, “No, I’ve had great female bosses. I believe in women. I believe they can lead.”
But if you are socialized as a woman, how many times have you prevented yourself from speaking up in a meeting or stopped yourself from going through that promotion or a raise. Thinking I shouldn’t, it’s not my place. I’m not good enough. I don’t have enough experience. I don’t meet all the criteria in the job description. I’m the youngest one here. I’m the least experienced. They all know better than me. They’ll probably laugh at me.
I used to think this all the time when I was at meetings as a fellow, being the only fellow in the room with people who had been at CDC for decades. And this is just one example. It doesn’t always have to do with gender or the patriarchy. I just wanted to illustrate how this looks. Because we have internalized so many messages of where we belong, who’s capable of what, what we should or shouldn’t do. And our brain rephrases those and says them back to us and they sound true. They’re in our own voice.
That voice is imposter syndrome. It is not your identity. It is not true. It’s been absorbed by the world around you. And let’s talk about what confidence is. On the screen we have an illustration of a light skinned person with dark hair looking in the mirror at their reflection with hearts around them. I think most people, consciously or not, think confidence means having all the right answers, knowing what to do, the absence of doubt, not worrying what others think.
I have a lot of clients who come to work with me and they say, “My main goal is I just don’t want to care what other people think.” And they think that’s what confidence is. Number one, we are humans. We will always have that piece where we do care what other people think. We can lessen its impact on us but we are not trying to become robots and that’s not possible anyways.
But when we think about confidence, you probably have this image of someone who’s just so sure, like in movies, walks around with their chest, their head held high, they just own the room. And you might know someone that you look at and think they must be really confident or that’s what I want to be. That is not confidence, at least I don’t think so. And I’m not saying that’s arrogance either.
But believing that confidence means you have all the right answers, you have no doubt, you don’t worry what other people think is only increasing your doubt and insecurity because again, you are human. You are not a robot. Of course you care what other people think. Of course you have doubt, that is very human, that’s very normal.
Confidence as I have found coaching hundreds of people and myself is actually allowing yourself to make a choice in the absence of all the knowledge, even if you feel scared, is taking action, even if you’re uncertain. Is doing something even if you’re questioning yourself. It’s trying something new even if other people disagree. And that means all of you here have more confidence in yourself than you’re giving yourself credit for.
That again, that lawyer in your brain that’s arguing you’re not good enough has kind of smothered because that part of your brain is taking up too much of the floor. And if we bring the contrary evidence, we have so much more evidence that you actually are more confident than you’ve been giving yourself credit for. And I think we conflate confidence and arrogance and we conflate confidence and certainty. If you are certain about something, you have zero need for confidence, there is no need. That emotion is not necessary.
When you don’t have certainty, when you have some doubt, where you aren’t sure. That’s where you have the confidence come in. Confidence is a feeling just like doubt or insecurity. It is a feeling created by thoughts you think about yourself. Doesn’t mean you have to believe you’re the best thing on the Earth or better than everyone. It means you think thoughts about yourself that help you feel confident or empowered or have pride in yourself. Maybe it’s not 100%, maybe it’s 10%, that still makes a difference.
And you can feel both confident and doubt, empowered and worried, proud and unsure. Feeling confident doesn’t mean you eliminate the doubt or the anxiety or the questioning, they can be there at the same time. It’s about building that trust in yourself. And you all are already doing it, you’re just not recognizing it.
So let’s talk about the external piece, why this matters. On the screen is an illustration of three people, two have short black hair, one has long black hair, they’re all light skinned. Let’s talk about external versus internal belonging. External belonging is signals from other people or organizations or spaces that you do belong. Internal belonging is believing you belong no matter what’s going on externally. You don’t always have control over your external environment.
You don’t have control of how welcoming your office mates are or if your organization is receptive to your accommodation requests. Or if the leadership puts an effort to giving you positive reinforcement or creating growth opportunities or if there is discrimination or anything else. This is one of the reasons why creating that internal belonging and that confidence and that pride matters so much. Because what are you supposed to do if you just have to wait for those external things to change? Just stay feeling shitty? No, you don’t have to do that.
I’ve met so many people who have come to me after they’ve quit five/six jobs trying to job hunt, to find the perfect job that has that all external belonging. It might exist but do you want to spend your career tiptoeing and hiding from all the different spaces in a world that is super flawed? Or do you want to create internal belonging so you can navigate the world even when there are things, challenges, barriers, things we don’t like or trying to be harmful? Where you can have your back, where you can still believe in yourself, where you can trust in yourself.
That’s why creating this internal belonging matters. And here’s the kicker. We have all had the experience being in a space that has external belonging, that was supportive, that was communicated we belonged and we still did not feel like we belonged.
For example, when I was at UC Berkeley, there was a new staff group for Middle Eastern and North African staff. I went to a few meetings and the organizers were so thoughtful of creating a space where everyone felt like they belonged. They were really welcoming. They were really thoughtful about how they organized it and how they did community. I still felt like a fraud. I still felt like an outcast, not because of them, because of my internal belonging, because I hadn’t created that. You can probably all think of similar examples.
Internal belonging is something no one else can take from you, no matter what barriers you face, no matter what’s going on around you. Again, it doesn’t mean you’re going to be a robot. Obviously, things will still impact you. But when you have that internal belonging you can move through it with more emotional capacity and ease. And you can be in a room of people who are completely different than you or in an organization that maybe doesn’t encourage belonging or doesn’t promote inclusion.
And you can have that internal belonging to help you move through, to help you make decisions of what’s best for you and how to support you. Creating this internal belonging and building your confidence and trust doesn’t happen overnight. I’m not going to lie to you. It’s not, hey, do these three activities and one day you’ll be good to go. The truth is, it’s a lifelong journey. For as long as you and I are alive, the truth is, this world is going to be flawed. It’s going to be messed up. There are going to be things we need to change.
And so that means we’re still going to be getting messages directly and indirectly our whole lives that we don’t belong, that we shouldn’t be here, that we’re not good enough, that we’re not smart enough. So it is a lifelong journey to counter those messages and create internal belonging and shift our thinking. But the more you do it, the easier it gets, the stronger those beliefs get and then they take up more of the space. They are arguing more [inaudible]. They are the louder radio station. And it gets so much easier and so much more enjoyable, but it is a practice you have to take in.
If you found this episode helpful then you have to check out my coaching program where I provide you individualized support to create a life centered around rest. Head on over to mckoolcoaching.com, that’s M-C-K-O-O-L coaching.com to learn more.
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