How to Overcome Imposter Syndrome

Imposter Syndrome is that little voice in your head that might say ‘Are you even qualified’ or ‘Why would anyone pay for my services’? EVERY entrepreneur of every level experiences imposter syndrome. So welcome to your cheat sheet! Join me as we learn how to push past these negative thoughts and take inspired action!

Prefer to read? Here’s the blog version…

What Is Imposter Syndrome?

Hey guys. Welcome back to the podcast podcast and welcome to a long overdue episode about Imposter Syndrome. Imposter syndrome is a topic that comes up very regularly.

It’s something that all entrepreneurs face at one point or another. I notice with my clients, many of them face this when they start their online business or when they start a new platform. So showing up for the first few times, and I notice this as they are reaching new heights with their business, it’s this discomfort before tackling anything big or new that you know will level you up and make you a better business owner. 

So let’s first start off by defining what exactly imposter syndrome is. It is defined as the condition of feeling anxious and not experiencing success internally, despite being high performing in external objective ways, this condition often results in people feeling like quote unquote a fraud or a phony and doubting their abilities.

What’s really fascinating is seeing this come up with every single one of my clients who are naturally high achieving, ambitious, and from the outside, super successful. They excel in their careers, they excel in their studies, they excel in whatever they set their minds to, and in all cases, the internal dialogue, the little voice inside their heads, tell them that they’re not good enough, that they’re a phony. Who are they to be doing this? There are so many people out there better than them. The list goes on and on. Can you relate to this and raise your hand, if you have experienced this for yourself, know that it is so common. You are not the only one. 

Why Imposter Syndrome Is So Prevalent In Entrepreneurship

In this episode, I’m going to help you navigate through those feelings so that you can bounce back faster and you can execute because the execution piece will really get you to the next level. There’s really no thoughts that you can think to kind of like push back the feelings of Imposter Syndrome. That’s not what we want to do. We’re not going to make those voices go away, but what we’re gonna do is give them less of the stage. The voices can say whatever they need to say, but we’re not going to listen and we’re going to move on with more empowering thoughts. 

As an online business coach, I’ve seen a lot of what Imposter Syndrome can do to a person. I see my clients first being paralyzed by Imposter Syndrome, but then breaking free of it. I also understand where it comes from. So having grown up in America, I notice that a lot of Western societies are very credentials based. We value education. We value letters after our names. We value degrees and certifications, and it makes sense for the most part to a certain degree because you wanna work with people who are experienced, right? They have studied their craft, they have mastered it. But what I’ve also noticed, and especially working with online business owners, is that there are certain niches and industries that simply have exploded over the past few years and certifications and the business of offering certifications simply have not developed.

And so the experts in these industries like Pinterest marketing, Facebook ads, online business, all the experience comes from doing it themselves. And the experts are the ones with the most experience, not essentially the most credentials. Things like doctors, lawyers, they have been around for years. And so the universities that have formed a curriculum around all of these practices, they’ve been in business for decades and centuries all around the world. Technology is so new. Being a creator is so new. Being on social media is so new. And so a lot of my clients who want to build businesses on social media feel like they’re not experienced enough because they don’t have the degree or they don’t have a certification and they start asking themselves, who am I to be doing this if I am so new to this?

But newsflash, everyone is so new to this. Instagram literally came out when I was in college. There aren’t any Instagram experts. There’s no one who went to school for Instagram. I bet most people on social media didn’t go to school for social media. So the good news is that you are able to learn everything and you are able to build your business yourself simply by doing. And If, you can help yourself do it If, you can help one person do it. You can help thousands and thousands of others do it too. And remember, there are people out there less qualified than you doing what you wanna do simply because they believe in themselves and they take action.

The Imposter Syndrome Cheat Sheet

I am gonna go through with you what I call my Imposter Syndrome cheat sheet that I share in the Wanderlover Business Academy, which by the way, doors are opening next month. So If, you are an aspiring coach or creative looking to start your online business. Sign up for Waitlist in the episode description. I include tons of modules and tutorials to help you really get your business started and monetize online to give you that time freedom, location freedom, and financial freedom. Tackling Imposter Syndrome is so important because every single person experiences it, but the key to success is to figure out your own process to get yourself back on track as fast as possible.

Even Oprah experiences Imposter Syndrome, the most successful people experience in Imposter Syndrome, it is no reason for it to hold you back because I am confident you can Overcome it. Let’s go through a very real example and I’m going to work with you through how you can Overcome your thoughts when you feel like they are holding you back. The main thing to first take note of is the action you end up taking through this process because we always want to act with an action and not just the thought. Here are the steps:

1. How To Remove Negativity 

You need to get yourself out of the funk. Let’s say your task for today is to go live on Instagram. You’ve never gone live before. You know that you have so much valuable insight to share. You have exciting life updates. You know that you wanna connect with your audience, you want your audience to hear you and hear what you have to say. Your message is so important, but the thoughts start creeping up. Who am I to be saying this? What if no one shows up to my live. Other people have like a full system for their lives. I have no clue what I’m doing. How do I even go live? How do I end the live? And all of these thoughts cause you to paralyze with fear. First and foremost. You wanna take a step back from your business and dedicate the next half hour or the next hour to yourself to thinking differently about yourself.

If, you are comparing yourself. We’re gonna stop that If, you are talking down on yourself. We’re also going to stop that and instead we’re gonna start bragging about yourself. So an actionable step is to get out some pen and paper or pull up your notes app and start bragging about every single thing that makes you qualified for whatever it is that you are going to do. And in this case, why you are going to be so good at going live, why you are fully capable of going live, how great of a public speaker you are, how great of a storyteller you are. Stop any limiting beliefs and negativity. 

2. Create Weekly Wins & Affirmations

Number two, we’re going to refer to your weekly wins and affirmations and repeat them to your yourself. So every single week, what I do with my clients is I celebrate every single accomplishment they’ve done in their business, in their personal lives, in their relationships. Anything that moves them farther along, we celebrate and then we collect them. And this is a great resource to pull up at times like this. When you are beating yourself up, we want to really highlight how far you’ve come and why you are so capable of going even farther.

3. Don’t Compare

Number three, remember, do not compare your chapter one to someone else’s chapter 20. Unfollow anyone who makes you feel less than a hundred percent close out of any tabs that’s making you feel a certain way. We’re going to curate this energy field of confidence, of productivity and of showing up for your audience. Number four, realize that worrying is praying for what you don’t want. And the law of polarity states that each possible outcome. So if you’re thinking about the worst case scenario, like no one is going to show up for my Instagram live, there is an equal and opposite possible outcome, which is that 10 people, 20 people, a hundred people might show up for your life.

4. Worrying Is Praying For What You Don’t Want

Worrying is praying for what you don’t want. So if you’re directing energy to the worst possible scenario, guess what? You are going to attract that because it’s going to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. And in order to Overcome that, first we identify the worst case scenario you are stressing out over as in people are going to make fun of me because I have no idea how to go live next. We’re going to rewrite it to be the equal and opposite, as in this live is going to be so much better than I expect.

I am going to speak to my target audience. I’m going to have the video to repurpose into other content. It’s going to be such a great milestone for my business showing up and committing to my business, showing my face in front of my audience and speaking from the heart. I might even get one new client from this experience because you never know who is watching. Do you see how the thoughts influence the feelings? Do you see how the energy shifts when you choose to focus on the best case scenario? Right?

And what do I always say? Your thoughts influence your feelings. Your feelings influence your actions and your actions influence the results. So when you get back to this place of confidence of feeling secure on your path and feeling inspired to do so, we’re going to take inspired action because we never want to operate our business and make decisions from a place of fear. 

5. Take Action

And ultimately, at the end of all this, we’re going to end with the act of moving forward with going live. We’re going to always take the action. There’s no use in going through all of these exercises, if you don’t end up doing the thing that you are set out to do, right? You can think about it, you can journal about it, you can talk to people about it. You can shift your thoughts, but nothing in your business is going to change if you don’t take the action. So we’re always going to measure our results based on the action execution over knowledge.

What Is The Dunning Kruger Effect? 

In the last part of this episode, I want to explain a phenomenon called the Dunning Kruger Effect. Imposter Syndrome is such a natural part of the process of learning something new and becoming an expert that there is even a name for it. So remember, if this path were easy, everyone would be doing it. There are going to be so many more challenges on this journey that’s bigger than deciding just to start and deciding you’re going to try something new. But if you tackle every obstacle with the inner knowing that you can handle anything that comes your way. You can do hard things, then you will be successful. So just a reminder to keep going. 

What the Dunning Krueger effect is, is that our confidence as we learn something, as our competence increases, our confidence goes up and down. So think of an x y graph. So on the vertical axis, you have confidence how much we think we know. And on the x horizontal axis, you have your competence, how much we actually know. And both of these confidence on the vertical axis goes from low to high.

Your competence also goes from low to high, from left to right. When you first start out with something, you learn a lot and you’re reading books, you’re seeing other people, you’re like, I can do this, right? So when you first get started, you have this burst of confidence. So it spikes up over time, it starts to gradually decrease. So when you get to the top of that confidence spike, you’re like, ‘of course I know everything. I can handle anything that comes my way’. But then over time, as your competence, as you’re learning more and more about the industry, you’re starting to think thoughts like, oh, there’s more to this than I thought.

And then it starts decreasing your confidence. ‘I may never understand this. There is so much I don’t know’. And then your confidence starts going down even more. You’re like, there’s so many people who have years and years of more experience than I do in doing this. And from the all time high of confidence, you then reach an all time low. This is usually where people give up. This is usually where people stop executing because they’re so in their heads. If you use this Imposter Syndrome cheat sheet to Overcome those thoughts. What you’re then going to see is your competence continues to move forward.

You continue to grow on this path, and then it starts shifting again. Your confidence starts increasing. You’re like, oh, it’s finally starting to make some sense. I understand how this works now because I am acting on it. I’m gaining the experience. And from doing from learning by doing, you start gaining confidence and you start gaining competence until you’re one of the experts. Was it easy? No. Was it complicated? Yes. But how many people are looking at you now? How many people are wishing they are where you are now simply by executing and overcoming that Imposter Syndrome?

And remember what I said in the beginning, these thoughts are never gonna go away, but you learn to manage it better. And over time you recognize that it’s no reason to be held back. Personally, I’ve gotten to the point where I just love being a beginner at things I love not knowing. And I love seeing other people know so much more than me because I know that I’m capable of learning everything. Like I’ve reached a few points in my business where I’m like, Hmm, this is getting like a little stagnant. It’s getting a little boring. What can I learn today? And I find myself like this with real estate now because real estate is just this whole new world.

I felt this way when I first started my online business when I first started the Wanderlover, and now I feel the same way with real estate. And it’s exciting. You don’t have to feel ashamed, you just have to show up. And you know it’s okay to be a beginner, right? It’s okay to be like, this is my first time doing something. I probably suck at it and I’m probably gonna do it wrong. There is no shame in that. So if Imposter Syndrome is something you are struggling with, If, you need like a little pep talk, know that my dms are always open. You can find me at The Wanderlover, at The Wanderlover Podcast. And if this episode helped get you out of some of those limiting thoughts, please take a screenshot and share it to your stories and tag us so that we can repost it and share it with more of our audience who needs to hear it most.

I’ll see you guys in the next episode sending love to you all.

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