Imposter Syndrome X 3

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I just had a live community call of librarians – it is a once a month thing for new librarians to get together and talk about their successes and struggles, and to support each other in their new careers. After hearing people share some of their failures, I spoke up on the call and told everyone that I actually felt really encouraged to hear that people were brave enough to try something they might fail at.

I personally find myself avoiding being put into situations where I feel I might fail, as if failure would be the worst thing that could possibly happen to me. Anyone else out there like that?

Another librarian responded to my comment, sharing a failure she had experienced during a presentation, and she mentioned the idea of Imposter syndrome. There are a lot of definitions of imposter syndrome that you can find online, but the general idea is that you believe most of your achievements are a fluke, despite evidence that you are skilled and competent. You feel you don’t deserve recognition for the things you achieve, and you continually feel pressure to prove yourself to others.

It’s like a lightbulb went off in my head – I feel like I’ve been experiencing this in my job. And the more I thought about it, the more it makes absolute sense. I got hired for my job without having the required degree listed in the job posting, or even any library experience. I’m working on my degree now, and have about 8 months of experience at this point –  but I’m kind of doing it “backwards” so to speak. There are many times I don’t know exactly how to do something, and I start to worry that maybe someone made a mistake somewhere…

At the end of the call, it was mentioned that another upcoming call is happening later this month, specifically on the topic of Imposter Syndrome. (What a coincidence!) To me, this caused more lightbulbs to go off in my head – okay, I feel like someone’s trying to get my attention.

After the call, I went downstairs for my noon shift at the research desk. There are typically many college students milling around on this floor, and as two students were walking by, I overheard one of them say to another, “Have you ever heard of Imposter Syndrome?” (I’M NOT EVEN KIDDING, THIS REALLY HAPPENED!) At this point, I was like, “I have got to research Imposter Syndrome!”

Is it too bold to say that God wants me to think about this today? I’m gonna say that He does – I had it mentioned to me three different times today in the span of about 30 minutes.

I found an article online that recommended a book called, “The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women: Why Capable People Suffer from the Imposter Syndrome and how to Thrive in Spite of It.” The book identifies five types of people who may commonly suffer from Imposter Syndrome, and two of the types I immediately identified with:

  • The Perfectionist
  • The Natural Genius

It’s easy to understand why a perfectionist would have Imposter Syndrome – they set excessively high goals for themselves and if they don’t meet those goals 100%, they can feel like a failure. No matter how good they are at something, they always think about how they could be better.

The natural genius is the type of person who if they have to work hard at something, may feel like they are automatically bad at it. This is a person for whom many things have come easy, for example, maybe they always got straight A’s in school. So the minute they realize something doesn’t come naturally, they assume they should avoid it because they aren’t already good at it, and probably never will be.

I know I may get some flack for saying I connect with the natural genius one, but I really do. I never struggled in school until I got to 8th grade math, and things did not come as easily to me – I wasn’t the “best” in the class anymore. I distinctly remember just deciding that I didn’t like math because I wasn’t good at it. This happened for me later in high school Chemistry, and I even decided I shouldn’t pursue becoming a veterinarian because I wasn’t good at science. (I had always thought I might be a vet, or an artist for Disney, I loved to draw!)

So I’ve definitely got some things to think about today – the main takeaways for me are:

  1. It’s okay to not be the best at something – and it doesn’t mean that you aren’t still very good at it.
  2. It’s okay to be a work in progress and still be learning.
  3. I don’t have to avoid something just because it is a challenge – there are a lot of things I’m naturally good at, but if I avoid the things that take a bit more work, I’ll never know how good I could have been at them if I’d only tried.
  4. It’s okay to try and fail. It doesn’t make me a failure.

 

Even though it puts me out of my comfort zone, I’m going to keep trying to do things I’m not always good at. This can be something as simple as playing a board game I know I’m going to lose, because I’m not good at it. (I’ll admit, I’m the type of person who only wants to play games I can win!) Or, it can look like coming to my job every day and being brave enough to try new things, and even fail at some.

P.S. I’m also a Ravenclaw, so I obviously take a lot of pride in being “smart” and feeling like I know what I’m doing… I assume Gryffindors are more comfortable with taking chances and failure…

 

 

Minimalism – A Cure for Anxiety?

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There’s a huge part of me that wants to be a full-out minimalist. CLUTTER is a huge problem for me – mentally and emotionally. I get overwhelmed by clutter – every flat surface of our house seems to be a magnet for gathering papers and all other forms of clutter.

http://alliecasazza.com/blog/husband-not-on-board-minimalism-decluttering

Life has ramped up for me a bit now that I’m back in school – this means my base level of anxiety has ramped up a bit too. My normal tolerance level for clutter has decreased because I’m already a bit more anxious than normal. I’ve shared a blog post (above) about a woman who mentions that her anxiety and depression got so much better when she discarded a lot of her things. She also gives good perspective on not forcing your significant other or family members to join you on your minimalist journey – rather you support their need to keep more things than you, and they support you in your need to free yourself of things – it’s a compromise (there’s that dreaded word!)

I also recently finished reading the book, “Goodbye, Things” by Fumio Sasaki, and I’m SO ready to just throw away everthing!

I’m really motivated to do this minimalist thing, but when I start going through my stuff, it’s actually a lot harder to get rid of things than I hoped it would be. Not to mention it takes TIME to do this. (Something we all have an abundance of, right?) It’s easier to just let things pile up and stuff things in the closet or garage. It’s easier to just buy a few more boxes or storage bins and call it quits.

The moments I have taken the time to go through my things, I’ve found it’s really easy to second-guess yourself and find a reason why you MIGHT need it someday, or you worry that you’ll regret getting rid of it.

A few helpful takeaways from the book:

  • If you’ve been wondering if you should keep something or not, that’s a sign you should just get rid of it.
  • The author claims 95% of the things he has gotten rid of, he has not regretted. And a few items he did regret, he could easily replace by going to the store or ordering online.

I try to keep these things in mind while going through my stuff – there’s a few items I passed over that I know I probably should put in the giveaway pile. I have things I have kept from my elementary teacher days, because I wonder if I’ll ever need them again. And I have more than a few boxes of purely “sentimental” items…

This is a post to mark the start of a journey – I’m hoping to have a garage sale in May with a ton of items! I’ll try to remember to take some before and after pictures along the way.

Any minimalists out there? Was there any impact on your mental health when you downsized and decluttered your space?

(Paraphrased from book) “Happiness is not a destination, like reaching the top of the mountain or crossing the finish line – it’s a choice you make daily to be thankful and grateful for what you have.” We fall into the lie that “if I only had ______, I would be happy.”

P.S. I also just (like literally a minute ago) got an email about a new book by Gretchen Rubin coming out in March 2019 called Outer Order Inner Calm. You can bet I will be reading that!

“Bravery, Not Perfection”

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I’ve got a lot going on in my head – so I’m going to write and see where this blog post goes. I’m leaving the title blank until I finish, because I’m really not sure what’s going to appear on the screen. Do you ever write like that?

Yesterday I went to the doctor because my eye is infected – it’s been red and puffy and gunky the last few days. Calvin has been to the doctor 4 times in the last 3-4 weeks, and has been referred to an ENT doctor, which we see next week. ‘Tis the life of a toddler, I suppose!

One of the things on my mind this past week has been the theme of bravery. For one of my online graduate classes, we watch quite a few TedTalks. One I watched has really stuck with me, called “Teach Girls Bravery, Not Perfection” by Reshma Saujani.

She makes some good points, and hypothesizes that our society is teaching our girls to be perfect and our boys to be brave. While I don’t always buy into gender stereotypes, I can understand this distinction. She talks about how boys grow up to be men who aren’t afraid to take risks and fail – which many times leads them to be successful, typically in the workplace environment. On the other side, girls grow up to women who were taught to value perfectionism so much, that they are afraid to try at something that might fail. They tend to play it safe, and make their choices based on what they feel certain they will succeed at.

Being a woman, and a recovering perfectionist, I can relate. And I have had conversations with other women that lead me to believe that a lot of what Saujani says is true. Many women I talk to have a lot of anxiety that they aren’t good enough, that they need to do more, that their value comes from the appearance of having it all together.

I really have felt inspired by this talk – and I’m challenging myself to be more brave in my day to day life and in the goals I set for myself. Sometimes this looks small, like for example, introducing myself to a person I don’t know (which can be a brave thing for us introverts!) Sometimes this looks more obvious, like deciding to make a career change or go back to school. People have told me that I’m brave for sharing my personal stories on this blog – funny enough, it didn’t feel “BRAVE” to share them – I think bravery looks different for each person, and what’s scary for one person might not be for another.

Who inspires you to be brave? This may sound silly, but when I have to do a task that requires a significant amount of bravery, I try to emulate Hermione. (She’s from Harry Potter for those who don’t know…) She doesn’t let the fact that she’s the only girl in her trio discourage her, but rather, she is many times the key to the missions that she, Harry and Ron embark on. She is intelligent, clever and not afraid to stand up for what she believes is right.

Emma Watson, the actress that played Hermione, is also someone that I feel is brave in real life. (You know you are getting old when you begin to look up to people who are younger than you!) I appreciate her willingness to have an opinion on issues and (just like Hermione) stand up for what she believes in. She is not afraid to try new things, and not afraid to be criticized for them. I mean, she was the lead in the live action version of Beauty and the Beast, which means she put her singing voice out there to be criticized by millions of people – talk about bravery! She seems brave enough to be herself, which is something I feel like I’m finally starting to be able to do now that I’m in my 30’s.

What does bravery look like for you? Who encourages you to be brave?