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Belongs to: Jake Luhrs Reacts to Slaughter To Prevail for the first time. (Kid of Darkness)
I struggle with imposter syndrome, doesn’t matter how experienced I may be. Thank you Jake for your constant mental health advocacy!
Imposter syndrome is the worst. I’m sorry you’ve been struggling with it, friend. It’s hard how much you can know rationally that you have the skills, that you have the abilities, that you do belong - yet to still feel as if you don’t. You might pursue tons of goals and reach various achievements in life while ending up still feeling like a fraud. The fear of being uncovered somehow seems to be stronger, which can feel so discouraging. Just feeling like you never really fit and would always have something to prove is exhausting. It takes so much of your mental and physical energy on a daily basis, while also doing your best to hide it - for seeing this fragility would be giving reason to the thoughts of being an impostor in the first place… It’s such an isolating, vicious cycle.
My heart truly goes out to you. Impostor syndrome is something that has been following me for most of my life, and it’s insane how sticky this struggle can be despite our best efforts to work on it. Two master degrees here, woking full-time, in a job that I love and where we are truly valued for what we do - still, doing a presentation will feel like the end of the world inside of my mind because it means I’ll take the risk to being exposed and seen for what I think I truly am - and able to do. Ugh!
It’s even more difficult when there’s people you love around you who truly see the beauty in you while you don’t. They would compliment or congratulate you in various occasions, but on your end you would just feel way too uncomfortable, as if the concept of even thinking that you could let yourself be proud of yourself is absolutely foreign. It sounds wrong. But it’s also heartbreaking as people around you wish for you to see yourself as they see you. You want to show that you trust them and their judgment, but something feels blocked within.
One of the most powerful things to do when facing this struggle though is to name the beast for what it is… and you just did it here, which isn’t an easy task. You can be proud of yourself for this (see what I did here 8)). More seriously, there might have been a time in your life when you were not aware of this struggle and how it was affecting you - which isn’t the case anymore, and that alone testifies a lot of your personal growth. You understand yourself, you named the struggle, you see the patterns at play, which is a strength because it creates distance between the struggle and you. Impostor syndrome happens to be a part of your life, but it isn’t you, which offers perspective and might allow you to start questioning the thoughts that are not serving you in the long run. You are on your way to start catching them when they show up, an little by little you might practice more and more just questioning if these thoughts are truly serving a purpose in your life, or if you can start trying to free yourself from it - sometimes with the help of loved ones and/or a professional too.
One thing is sure: the thoughts trying to convince you that you don’t belong are wrong. They say something about your story, but certainly not about you, and absolutely not about your worth. You matter and you belong because you have breath in your lungs. Even though it might feel like a strange concept to wrap your head around, there is something absolutely untangible about your worth and value in this world. Something that no thought, no accomplishment and no failure could ever affect or erase in any way. You matter, because you are.
Thank you so much for being here.
Thank you so much for being.
-Marie-Anne, Heartsupport Staff