Imposter Syndrome: It's Not You, It's What Happened to You | Sheaba Chacko | TEDxChattanooga

[Applause] well y'all it's a bad time I don't know about you but I am tired I am stiff I am exhausted I was ready to do this at 11 A.M this morning no I'm just like oh my gosh I know it's gonna happen if I try to recite my talk it's going to be like trying to suck a really Frozen slushy see my brain's already doing the thing through a really narrow straw have you do you know how frustrating that is yeah so I'm gonna rely on my script yes thank you thank you you know what you are my hero Chloe let me tell you why because I love Renee Brown yes and I'm like having a conversation with you I'm like can you just like talk here okay so what I love about brene Brown is what she says about authentic leadership and it is the courage to show up even when you cannot control the outcome and that's where we're at tonight okay so big round of applause for Chloe please please [Applause] like the beauty of imperfection my fear was realized and she showed me how to navigate it so really really grateful for you Chloe and then I'm thinking of Peter's talk and what he shared and I was like oh dream fact feeling and then eventually realization I'm like the dream was to be here one day the fact is I'm here and I want to go home what to do what to do but thank you thank you well I am so grateful to have you all here I'm so thankful that you are lending your ears opening up your minds and allowing your hearts to be stirred by topics you may or may not have been interested in but hopefully you walk away with the new fresh perspective so the title of my talk is imposter syndrome it's not you it's what happened to you we're going to begin with a loose definition for those of us that may not be familiar with what it is lightly put imposter syndrome is doubting your abilities and feeling like a fraud even though your performance is adequate and likely above average people have a hard time taking it seriously because they just think you're insecure and they want to be helpful so they'll say lovely things like don't make it harder than it is you're supposed to fake it until you make it or you know you just need to trust yourself stop worrying you are fine but let me tell you why that rarely works imposter syndrome actually has its origins in trauma now before I lose you consider this even though imposter syndrome is flippantly tossed around the office if you can just catch it and then peel back the layers you will often discover An Origin story that is pickled with difficulty complexity and imbalance it is not irrational it's not something light small and fluffy that hopped into your head it is neurobiological it is actually a deeply rooted way of Behaving that is meant to support you or help you navigate unsupportive environments what I mean is if your situation required you to emphasize productivity efficiency and good behavior way more than it emphasized your true whole authentic self then you were raised on the breeding grounds of imposter syndrome all you need to do is inhale the pressure to live up to someone else's definition of success and snap you have contracted it and then your chances of presenting as symptomatic compounds like interest if you are a firstborn only child grew up poor identify with a minority group and or come from a single parent or Blended household once the conditions are right imposter syndrome will settle in and Crouch and lie and wait until an event or transition that requires you to leave your comfort zone three of the most common that I have seen are suddenly having big shoes to fill having to be out on your own or having to compete for a seat at the table these Ops these opportunities feel like obstacles because they do not fit what you know they are not familiar to you so you start doubting yourself and you wonder who am I to play big despite my angle imposter syndrome isn't a disease but it can be debilitating with real life consequences on your ability to lead love and perform so let's get to it I'm Shabba I am a trauma-informed licensed therapist and I'm going to walk you through the ripple effect of relational trauma and how it forms imposter syndrome over time here's a really interesting thing that you may not know about trauma there are actually two types there is Big T trauma and then there is Little T trauma Big T trauma is obvious think Wars earthquakes violence but little T trauma it's more subtle more like bullying breakups rejection or having to move around frequently which do you have I like the way my mentor puts it it actually does not matter because Big T trauma explodes on you while little tea trauma erodes away at your confidence and sense of safety over time today we are interested in Little T trauma because that's where a lot of overlooked relational trauma camps out relational trauma is the thing that happens in your formative years where your sense of feeling loved and protected is consistently disrupted outside of your control and sometimes even your parents control okay fine so maybe the word trauma just doesn't resonate for you because you don't want to blame you don't want to play the victim you know so many others have it much worse here's my ask of you today from a behavioral perspective consider that trauma shows up in one of two ways it either causes you to over function or under function so just take a moment to see if you've ever had stints in life where you're described as overdoing it or underdoing it we're either all on or all off and you can't find a middle ground moderation simply is not an option most of the people who come to see me are classic over functioners Who start to freak out because they start getting sluggish or committing the Cardinals in dropping the ball since Society sees them as high performing and high producing and high functioning they never feel the burn until a key area of their life starts to suffer like romance parenting performance reviews or the big one that really gets their attention their physical health by staying with me to the end of this talk you will get the chance to determine how you may have been impacted by the ripples of relational trauma and find out for yourself how imposter syndrome may be holding you Hostage to an unfair view of yourself your abilities and your responsibilities fair warning I am a therapist so while it's not all your mom it definitely is childhood some of you are out there like wait a minute I have imposter syndrome and I had a great childhood and you know what I cherish that with you I am so happy and things can be great and still missing key ingredients for your all-around success that's pretty normal you're allowed to be grateful for the shoulders you stand on and honor what they weren't able to provide for you because they didn't have access to it themselves also another little secret that you probably don't know about trauma trauma is not just the bad things that happen to you it's also the good things that didn't the bottom line is if you chronically struggle with imposter syndrome you are over compensating for something that was missing at an earlier time and you're probably going to need some help unpacking that feel free to approach me later I'm missing people okay so do you have a hunch that maybe you have it or someone you know might have it now's your chance to shed some light on how things may have gotten this way for you or them listen to my story with imposter syndrome and see if there's any truth in it for you I can trace the ripples of my own imposter syndrome as far back as fifth grade but I'm sure they go further back than that since memories don't function as history though I'm just going to say this is based on a true story our South Asian immigrant family didn't talk much but we got told plenty we were in what psychologists call an authoritarian household which is code for very strict there were high standards rigid rules and plenty of critical feedback that was meant to be helpful and keep us on track for the American dream but really looking back we didn't know what we were doing we didn't have the mentors and we didn't have the proper Community Resources but I digress and we'll go back to family Dynamics besides doing as you were told you are left to your own devices to figure things out and learn from your mistakes on your own without a ton of emotional support or psychological guidance the underlying message don't fail because failure is not an option no one was trying to be mean or unsupportive everyone was doing the best that they could with the resources that they had at the time plus it's really tough to fully be there for who you love when you're irritable and stressed and on edge all the time the final main feature of my family that I'd like to share with you we weren't talkers but we were deep feelers dad managed his big Feelings by adopting a kind of stoicism and my mom clung to her spirituality to work out her stress my feelers took more of a survival approach and narrowed down my option to my options to two modes of functioning you guessed it either over functioning or under functioning that's to say I managed my big Feelings by either staying busy and working hard or by numbing and checking out later this translated into a seesaw of hyper productivity followed by Benders of procrastination and that actually isn't uncommon for people with imposter syndrome think Tortoise and the hair your nervous system unconsciously decides when to conserve resources and when to act swiftly hair one morning it was one of those act swiftly moments for a ten-year-old Sheba I can't explain how I knew but I just felt the urge that I need to stay home that day and the chances were unlikely since nothing short of a fever ever landed me stay at home privileges but surprisingly I was allowed to stay that day Looking Back Now it's probably because Dad knew my my mom was struggling and could use some help looking after my one-year-old sister at the time ins in service of sparing you the gritty details I'll summarize it this way that was the day my mother attempted to take her own life but by A Stroke of Luck ten-year-old me happened to be there and was able to swoop in and save her I didn't know it at the time but I can tell now that was the moment I started to actively compartmentalize and split I became a double agent who had to be a grown-up and a kid at the same time the kid was shoved to the back seat while someone who grew up too fast Took the Wheel had two versions of me there was the real me with needs wounds feelings then there was the performant of me who was polished upbeat hyper independent I helped Mom raise my siblings I became her mental health Advocate dad's right hand man basically their marriage counselor compartmentalizing everything helped me not complain and I was able to keep my emotions at Bay because I just get them in a little box I never went to that all sounds pretty impressive Until you realize no underage person should have a resume like that but that's where my habit of over functioning to make up for members who are under functioning began so there you have it the groundwork for my imposter syndrome it involved five main components the pressure of high standards emotional suppression hyper-compartmentalization growing up too fast and over functioning these coping Styles compiled to create the profile of the Imposter because when you have an origin story that requires high performance to put out buyers and fill in the gaps and keep Spirits High you are set up to wonder as an adult oh besides being a fixer doer and helper who am I and why am I so unhappy did I just Bluff my way through life yes I just need to do more and try harder so you end up burning the candle at both ends with imposter syndrome you were never allowed to be fully you at an earlier time you had to become what was needed instead of what was natural of course you feel like a fake you've been more true to others than you have to yourself for a really long time I hope you're starting to see it your cake won't look the same as mine but it will have similar ingredients now if you're still on the fence about whether or not you have it or you just want a couple of highlights to be able to see how it looks at work look out for these things despite working twice as hard you fear being only half as good and funnily enough even if someone tries to praise or reassure you you will deflect it and credit it to something like luck someone's oversight divine intervention or just say it was nothing imposter's syndrome also means you never get to relax because the wheels of guilt and pressure are grinding you into overthinking over planning and spreading yourself super thin you allow it in hopes that one day it will all be worth it only to end up with your head spinning after smacking into the brick wall of burnout how many of you are nodding along saying yep shut up and they're still doing that how many of you are sitting here thinking wow I would love to be on stage doing something like that but what would I even have to say no I'm just going to leave it up to the professionals I see you and the shadow of imposter syndrome behind you I wish we could chalk up imposter syndrome to something like dashes of insecurity remedied by doses of confidence thought management affirmations but by now you can tell it is more Sinister than that in terms of my clientele when a person comes to see me they are typically struggling with the inevitable burnout that comes from this high performance high anxiety filled lifestyle and I am an Enthusiast about working with them because I can relate I remember reaching that point it took me over a quarter Century to finally see myself clearly for the first time I discovered that I had been swimming in a sort of high functioning anxiety and depression soup ever since the fifth grade but I didn't know any better because it was the air that I breathed and then I discovered that my over involvement as a fixer and helper type in people's lives was actually less about them more about me and my need for control and inner peace I couldn't stand seeing the people that I love struggle so I would swoop in without being asked cue those go the extra mile and over achieve her tendencies so what sequence of events exactly led to My Moment of Truth I would have to say it was the moment where I was no longer able to keep up the wall between the shiny stage me and the messy overwhelmed me the consequences at the time though my marriage dissolved my family was confused my spiritual Community was disappointed my health took a hit I was doubting my profession a socially withdrew I physically could not go back to working myself into the ground something had to change and that's where I know that so many of you have similar stories many of you who feel like everything's on on track there's no reason to complain and that you probably think or feel like you had a great childhood so your imposter syndrome is just a quirky you thing I get it me too but if you don't want a crash and burn like mine then I implore you to be proactive instead of reactive get help because you want it not because you need it it was only when this therapist started going to therapy that she was able to get to the bottom of the divide that was pulling her apart the battle between the real me and the performative me so here's what we really need to understand about imposter syndrome it's not in your head it's wired into your body It's A coping Style jam-packed with action your self-doubt low confidence and fraudulent feelings are all stemming from a fear response that is stored in your body and remember that trauma isn't just Big T it can also be having two parents but really only having one if you know you know it's being socially othered because you're hairy short big-nosed gay redheaded or black-skinned it can also be as simple as just having family and friends that you had to support a lot as a kid the thing that helped me overcome my or the thing that helped me overcome the debilitating aspects of my imposter syndrome was processing and working through the ripple effect of relational trauma on me and my confidence now if you were listening to my story you might be like shepa but I didn't have a loved one try to take their life in front of me okay here's what I will say as a therapist I hear plenty of shocking things and it's not because of the actual content but because of how cool distant aloof and Eerie the story a person is telling me when they're reporting on the really hard things they went through I'm sitting here going oh my God and they're like it's cloudy outside so and sitting with me today I would like for you to consider whether or not big or little tea trauma could be hiding behind your imposter syndrome if so being able to look at it could be really helpful I mean this is the thing if you want to dial down the um over functioning and if you want to enhance your prowess for authentic presence and transformational Leadership so instead of dismissing imposter syndrome what if we could show up just a little bit more trauma aware and not minimize our colleagues or our own trauma what if we could actually with curiosity and courage investigate it a little bit more and come up with systems processes containers that actually support and cultivate our best and highest selves if this conversation has gotten you thinking about imposter syndrome different differently then that is a huge win for your awareness and if you are wanting a trauma-informed way of working with your imposter syndrome and reclaiming joy in your life I can definitely recommend you some resources y'all have been great thank you [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 26,401

Keywords: English, Identity, Life, Life Development, Self improvement, Self-help, TEDxTalks, Therapy, [TEDxEID:53386]

Id: 2nlSD0zD8Gk

Length: 25min 48sec (1548 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 25 2023