Imposter syndrome wants to take my life

does anyone ever get over it?

One of my major goals this year is to be hot. Yep, coming into 2025, I called it my “year of HEAT”. What that meant was that I wanted to level up in all the areas of my life— the pursuit of purpose, my career, social relationships, physical fitness, spiritual growth, etc. I want 2025 to be a year of holistic fulfillment. HEAT, if you will. I think I’m on track to achieving that; baby steps in some directions but steps nonetheless. At this rate, by the end of 2025, I will be hot in all the major areas of my life in a lot of ways but one— my career.

At various moments in my career, I have felt the hold of imposter syndrome around my neck; tightening, choking until I surrender to it and hide in the background. Then, I see someone who can do the things I do gassing up their achievements, getting into places I desire to get into and it makes me venture out once more. But not for long because the cold fingers of this phenomenon are long and unyielding. They steal around your heart and I don’t think they ever truly leave. This month, I’m trying to take my life back.

I love my career. I work in marketing in tech. I’m skilled at digital marketing, content marketing and recently, product marketing. However, I often feel lost at sea when it comes to believing and positioning myself as the badass I think that somewhere deep down, I am. I’ve been working in this field for more than 3 years and if there’s one thing you need to know about marketers (especially in the tech industry), they need to be able to sell themselves well. You will quickly realise that a lot of people don’t know more than you, they’re just louder about it.

The plan was for me to be loud this year too. I wanted to talk about my experience, the amazing things I’ve been able to do, get jobs with higher pay, work on more impactful projects and all of that good stuff. I start out high-energy trying to deceive myself into feeling capable— fake it till you make it, as people say, but then self-doubt tip-toes in. Who am I? What do I know?

It stuns me when I see other people’s CVs and portfolios or discuss with them and learn that they’re doing the same things as me. Although I am a fairly confident person and I am quite adept at the delulu culture, when it comes to my career—despite consistent evidence that clearly shows otherwise—I feel like a fluke. Some people say that imposter syndrome isn’t so bad because it spurs you to become better. They say it is a sign that we are all in one phase of experimenting or the other and nobody really knows what they’re doing (side-eye). They say it should be embraced because growth never comes from being comfortable.

I don’t want to embrace it.

I’m really good at what I do, and I know that feeling stuck like this will not allow me to go far. There’s only so much that external validation can do; and despite having a lot of those from founders, colleagues, etc., I still feel like it’s luck. I can see the folly in my thinking but they’re my real thoughts. So, like I said, I don’t want this to be my normal. I don’t know if there are people who live without it or if it can be erased entirely, but I want the voice of my self-confidence to be louder than the other voices.

I want to begin to take steps to combat this feeling. I plan to build a scrapbook of my wins and accomplishments or maybe a new portfolio. I want it to be a confidence booster that I can return to whenever I feel inadequate. I also want to learn to be where my feet are, doing one thing at a time. I’m not under pressure from anywhere, so I will also try to toe the fine line between comparison and inspiration.

I hope that the next time I write about this part of me, it is with better stories. I hope that I will be able to tell you that my skills and self-perception are on par, or at least that their divide has been considerably lessened.

Till next time.