Impostermaxxing
It turns out that I barely knew imposter syndrome before becoming a parent
For all the times at work, in school, or otherwise when I thought I was faking it until I made it…
Nothing holds a candle to the moment I was discharged from the hospital to bring home an entire human.
I see people on the street with strollers and my brain labels them as parents. And yet somehow I forget that I’m out there with a stroller doing the exact same thing. The moment I remember I’m allegedly a parent, my mind implodes. Me? A parent? Is this a baby I’m responsible for? If I got a dime for every time I catch myself looking at my baby in shock, questioning my qualifications to be a parent, I’d probably have enough saved for college.
I don’t feel like a parent any more now than I did without a baby.
I’m just me with a baby. This discombobulation is quite similar to what I’ve felt before—during my first days at college as a freshman, my first summer internship at a real company, my first day as a startup exec, etc. In all scenarios, I didn’t feel like I was anything other than just me. I was simply a version of me cosplaying some new role. And it seemed odd, uncomfortable, new, misfitting, and all sorts of other new feelings.
As I thought back to those times, I wondered how I’d come around. It seems that I’ve always just done roughly what I thought people in such a role ought to do. Eventually, with more time, I built confidence that no one was going to show up and strip me of my title / duty / role / whatever because I wasn’t qualified. Either I proved to myself that I was qualified or just let myself get wrapped up in the day-to-day and forgot about my doubts.
So much of imposter syndrome for me is feeling like I’m still “just me.”
I realized that imposter syndrome is fundamentally tied up with the reality that I have a multi-faceted identity. There are moments when I’ve been without the baby, feeling like “just me” and wondering how it’s possible that I can be someone’s parent and “just me” all at the same time. That paradox is what underpins my imposter syndrome—the feeling of being multiple, incongruous things at once.
How is it possible that I can still be my old self, and somehow also this version of myself that I associate with someone much older, wiser, or otherwise advanced in life than me? How is it possible that I’ve achieved some lofty goal and I’m still the same me? How can I feel the same but possibly be some different person to the world?
As I’ve learned over time, it feels impossible. But clearly we all live through the impossible as we grow and change with life around us.
As I grapple with imposter syndrome once again, I’ve found it particularly helpful to embrace the reality that as people, we’re multi-faceted and we can be super different but still very much the same all at once.
For those of you who’ve also started to crack the code on imposter syndrome, what’s your take? Shout in the comments ⬇️