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Are You Not Good Enough? Imposter Syndrome - FutureIQ

4,600 views Wait, is this logic right? • Apr 06, 2024
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Slog Reference: Impostor Syndrome

Description

What is imposter syndrome and how to overcome it? If you feel overwhelmed by your surroundings and think you're not good enough, there's a good chance that you're suffering from imposter syndrome. It's so common that even the greatest chess player and the first person to step on the moon had it. So, what can you do about imposter syndrome to defeat it or overcome it? Find out in this episode of FutureIQ.

Videos and books mentioned in the episode:
Books:
Talent by Tyler Cowen: https://tapthe.link/TalentBook

Videos:
Magnus Carlsen insecurities: https://youtu.be/6T6LRnqHJfU
Barnum statements: https://youtu.be/FcSuHP113NI
Dunning Kruger effect: https://youtu.be/GtmcY3t5hB4
Dunbar numbers: https://youtu.be/ekAtODyfkyw

Hope you enjoyed FutureIQ by Navin Kabra and Shrikant Joshi. Do hit us up on Twitter:
@ngkabra http://twitter.com/ngkabra
@shrikant https://twitter.com/shrikant

Listen it on the podcast provider of your choice: https://tapthe.link/FutureIQRSS
Watch other episodes of The FutureIQ podcast: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAppTB0r5_TaYueZ0adD42Wiw5X-wTE4v

Chapters:
00:00 Example
02:00 Everyone has it
04:40 What is Imposter Syndrome
05:50 Effects of Imposter Syndrome
10:00 What to do about it?
14:00 Imposter syndrome is good
16:35 Imposter vs Perfectionist

#futureiq #impostersyndrome

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Transcript

Shri Kant do you think all successful people have a high opinion of themselves they're very confident of themselves oh yeah absolutely so most people are worried that they got lucky and they don't deserve to be where they are okay it's called imposter syndrome and we're going to discuss there's a name for it yeah in fact there's a lovely example let me start with that okay Neil giman is a very popular author okay he's written many books and a lot of his books have been converted into movies TV shows all kinds of stuff right American Gods you must have heard of and uh good omen good right so Neil Gman G was once invited to a gathering of artists
scientists writers discoverer of things right okay that seems to be like an illustrious Society to be yes in fact Neil Gan himself F oh my God these are such great people and what am I doing here right I just wrote some books and they're not even that good uh right so he was feeling very out of place there and he was kind of sort of hanging off on the side and he ran into another Neil another person at the same party whose name was was also Neil and that guy told him the other Neil told Neil Gan that you know what I don't know what I'm doing here I just look at all these people and I think what the heck am I
doing here they have made amazing things I just went where I was sent huh shall I tell you who the other Neil was please do because I think I have an idea about who this Neil is Neil Armstrong okay okay so both of them these great people felt that they didn't belong in that Gathering right so this is a problem and I am sure you have this in some part of your life most people have there are a few Psychopaths who don't have this but don't look at me I'm not one of those Psychopaths you have you you have a lot of imposter syndrome right uh in fact I mean we don't know for sure but some
estimates by actual research uh done indicates that up to 80% of the people might have uh this problem right that's four out of every five people right so we will link a video of Magnus scalon okay the chess whz well chess whz as in he is the greatest best chess player ever okay in tennis we can have a big argument about who is the goat right SAS it could be SAS I mean we can argue and we can go on and on argu in chess there is no question in chess there is something called an ELO rating which gives a number okay and Magnus kson has a number higher than anybody in history higher than kasaro higher than anyone
else right he is the greatest chess player ever and you should watch his video where he says that you know once in a while in a game he makes a mistake and then suddenly he starts getting all nervous and he's like I don't know what I'm doing and I don't know and all of that Magnus Carlson Magnus Carlson has imposter syndrome okay another lovely example is a professor called Jun her Jun her so he's a Princeton mathematician okay and he got the fields medal right that's like the Nobel Prize of mathematics I shouldn't make that comparison but yeah because Nobel prizes don't give prizes in mathematics because you know nobel's wife ran away with a
mathematician that's why actually that is not true I know it's not but it's always a fun story to tell people she did run away with the mathematician but that's not why there is Enterprise it was complicated reasons okay another episode Another Day ah but Jun her Jun her won the Medal and then somebody asked him how did it feel to win the fields medal and he said huh he said not very good huh because he said you know what what if they find out that I'm not really that smart right and then they'll say how did he get the fields medal yeah these these imposter syndromes are making my imposter Syndrome look absolutely unnecessary and pointless I'm
feeling imposter syndrome about my imposter syndrome my imposter syndrome isn't as good as other people's imposter syndrome it's not I mean Magnus Carlson junea Fields medal chess grandm ELO rating number one yeah Shri yeah what's so a lot of people a lot of accomplished people you your boss your colleagues I mean we do a good job of hiding it but inside a lot of us have this problem right by imposter syndrome what do I mean right the feeling that our ideas are not good enough yeah to be shared with to to be discussed by so many people our skills aren't that great we kind of lucky to be where we are I am I'm very lucky to be where I am sitting
next to na hello a good number of people also worry that you know someday they're going to be found out and kicked out tomorrow yes I will be found out tomorrow 100% a feeling that we haven't earned our accomplishments I haven't right and feeling of being a fraud a little bit right so this is imposter syndrome okay you know that episode on bar statements these sound like baram statements to me but they are not because they are about me they are no no this one this is again true about a lot of people right and this has been a well studied problem and it is a problem okay okay I mean we have to take it seriously
you have to take it seriously because the effects of imposter syndrome can be quite bad and serious if you're not careful oh like what what so one is that it causes stress I mean if you're constantly worried that you're going to be found out and demoted or yelled at or scolded or something right it causes stress it also makes you work harder push yourself that's a good thing depends up till a certain point it's a good thing beyond that it will cause burnout okay burnout is a serious problem yeah yeah the anxiety and pushing yourself beyond that limit that limit it actually decreases job performance there are studies showing the relationship between how much imposter syndrome you feel and how
your performance dips you know somebody once pointed out that I have a foure cycle as in I work for four years then take a sabatical for four years then work for four years again and now I'm at the end of my fouryear sabatical I can see how my impostor syndrome contributed to this fouryear cycle that stress that burnout it's a fouryear cycle for me for you it might be different also I mean it undermines your confidence it does it does because of that exam performance gets worse if you have imposter syndrome right yeah now and I mean like although I said that it affects almost everybody but some people are affected far more than others
right okay uh for example minority groups yeah right because they already I mean the all they already in a minority and therefore they already have that additional stress all of society for centuries has probably been convincing them that they're not good enough and on top of that they poer syndrome is saying the same thing right that's double imposter syndrome imposter in in in in the society setting and imposter in your own personal head another thing is that young people suffer more right as you get older after a while you do figure out two things right one is that everybody else is in the same boat and second is that you probably have like 20 30 years of experience that you didn't
get fired nothing bad happened right women suffer more right again all of society spends a lot of time telling women that they are inadequate right and then they feel inadequate so I mean in fact in general this whole gender and imposter syndrome it's a very interesting uh interesting problem right because women suffer more but you can't just go around telling women that oh well you know it's just your imposter syndrome so you have to now be more aggressive on the job yeah that's that's that's not that's not going to I mean I get why it is being said but it puts more pressure on them yeah right and maybe you know there in fact what
some women have said that you don't don't even call it imposter syndrome right it like imposter is like a fairly bad word right okay so instead just keep trying to convince them that don't sell yourself short yeah right but uh so what you want to do is you know putting the burden on the women that they should fix their imposter syndrome right that's just that's not the right way right I mean imagine one they are already in a minority group called women second they have imposter syndrome and then on top of that you're piling them on with the responsibility of fixing themselves whereas they don't really need to fix anything right what you should be doing
is change the culture of your organ ization so that women minorities people with imposter syndrome everybody are listened to without having to become aggressive right everybody is appreciated I mean generally increase the kindness yeah in general I think it's a good thing for all organizations to do where uh acknowledge efforts acknowledge people acknowledge their contributions and be kind generally be kind don't talk about going to P City yeah I'm referring to that video correct yeah yeah so I think you know we should talk about if you have imposter syndrome or if it it is affecting you right what should you do about it oh yeah good question yeah I was still first of all accept that it is imposter syndrome
right so accept that you're probably as good as any of the others talk to people about it right because one of the problems is that you feel you're an imposter and you have to hide it from everybody otherwise you will get found out everybody is like that right so talk to at least find someone who's a safe person that you can talk to even better if it's a somebody senior who's been through that scene uh things right yeah mentors help a lot with your imposter syndrome and this I can uh vouch for with personal experience I found some really great mentors naen being one of them um and a couple of others uh who have really helped me come out of my own
head yeah understand that it is normal and then reframe it in positive terms right because like you said initially at at least until some point it makes you work harder and that's good right it just make sure that it doesn't go beyond that right but other little things can help keep a success Journal okay I do make a list of your accomplishments I I have recently started keeping a success Journal it's still empty okay that's where you take the help of others ask others to give you suggestions to put in there and you take their I still haven't put I still haven't put this series in My Success journals do you think I should do you think I should I think I I
I don't know if I you know keep a success Journal get others help in adding things to the success journal and visit it once in a time we tend to forget yeah our successes and focus everything on our failures yeah that's because you're always looking to improve you we've always been told that you have to improve yourself you have to get better so successes are take there are another Milestone along the way but the focus is to get better to get to make yourself better and all that so that's good if it is helping you to make you better it is bad if it is stressing you out and causing your performance to go down right so understand the difference
between those and look for organizational support right the more established uh an organization is the better the chances that there is someone somewhere in there who can or will help in such situations and worst case there are some people for whom it is like like a major anxiety sometimes it causes Panic right they should visit a professional right yeah uh that also definitely helps if you are the kind who is prone to anxiety and panic you should definitely anyways go see a professional therapist and work anxiety and panic are clinical mental conditions and a professional can help both uh a therapist who can help you understand how to deal with it I can vouch for it a psychiatrist who can give
you actual medication because some of this is because of chemical imbalances absolutely agreed again I can vouch for it it helps we have a huge stigma against mental health and mental health practitioners and mental health issues in this country and that stigma needs to go away because uh therapy um medicines are both very helpful and a I can vouch for it from personal experience and B you don't you can't knock it until you've tried it so all your stigma needs to be put in a box and that box needs to be thrown into the gutter and you need to think out of that box come out of that box and yeah but uh tell me
something uh your from whatever you've told me so far it seems like I need to shed my imposter syndrome and become no no no no no no no no okay imposter syndrome is a good thing if you get rid of it completely right you are going to think you are like the cat SP you like the coolest right the bees knees bees knees you are going to stop improving you're going to get lazy and you might be at the danger of running into the Dunning Krueger effect right we will do another episode on it but the basic idea I've heard of this what is this remind me again the basic idea is that the most
accomplished people have the least confidence in their abilities and a little bit of vice versa so you don't want to be in the vice versa part of that right you can't get better if you're not worried that you are not good enough right so you want to have imposter syndrome just a little bit just a little bit but it shouldn't affect you that much right in fact U Tyler koven is an economist at GMU very smart person I GM is George Mason University I love uh his writings he has written a book called Talent where he talks about you know interesting ways for looking for the most talented people and one of the things he looks for is imposter syndrome
oh right okay he looks for imposter syndrome yes he will not hire a person who does not have imposter syndrome right because where can I apply it means that you're setting your sights high right if you don't think you have imposter syndrome then your standard are so low uh right um so yeah anyway any any last thoughts on imposter syndrome one question that people have is that why are you calling it imposter syndrome isn't that just being a perfectionist also I mean basically it's a matter of degree right from here to here imposter syndrome is good as it gets here it's bad right and if you are like a perfectionist can be used in a
good way and bad way right so depends on your definition but there are definitely bad ways of being a perfectionist right because always the perfect is the enemy of the good right I mean there are I know a lot of perfectionists who never get anything done because it's never perfect enough for them right so yes in that sense I mean that's a bad thing but yeah and imposter syndrome is a little different it's like you know anything you do isn't uh good enough for you right so yeah one thing I want to point out we did an episode M called dbar number oh yes we did so we have evolved huh we understand about 150
people that's been our life our brains understand that right understand in terms of okay uh 150 people I can know to a good degree and no so basically we our brain evolved at a time when our tribe was 150 people and all of them 150 lived together and there were a few campfires where you know we all hung out correct and this group of 150 people had like one who was the best singer one who was the best drummer one who was the best whatever right so modern world has suddenly bought a billion people together and now you can't be the best out of a billion correct right I mean your brain is wired to say that I need
to be the best among 150 now that's an easy target but suddenly that same I need to be the best among the people here when the people here becomes billion now you're setting up yourself for an impossible Target that's imposter syndrome right yeah that's actually a great uh frame of mind to be in so look for the 15 people that are in your circle and try and be the best in those 150 in one little not everything not everything in one the best drummer was not the best dancer of course he was not yes yeah because [Laughter] yeah he was drumming he was drumming if you are drumming you don't have time to concentrate on dancing man your hands
are dancing for you srikant naven future IQ not imposters