> her mother had taught her that naturally smart people don’t have to study.
Of all the parts of the article, that little bit stands out.
Because I see my older kid do that all the time, as if putting in effort to do something is somehow not the real thing. As if things learned from mistakes and practice is not progress - a substitute for talent.
It's related to pride, in my experience tutoring high school and college kids. That was my own experience while growing up as well, there's a sentiment that "natural" smartness and hard-working smartness are two seperate things.
I feel like kids have been moving away from this mindset, but maybe it's changed names. Growing up being a "nerd" was uncool, and studying was "nerdy". After college, I talked to some of the people who were the "naturally" smart kids and I found out they lied so much about how much time they spent not studying. Everyone lies. Part of it, I learned, was that my graduating class ended up with a lot of cut-throat people, they lied about how much work they put in to gatekeep. I don't speak to a single person from my graduating year now even though I am friends with some teachers as well as kids from other years. A similar concept but less isolated to academics has been kind of a popular "insult". I sometimes hear the concept of "sweaty" being uncool among the youngest ages I teach. Sweaty, as in working so hard towards something that you work up a sweat. It's doesn't have to be a physical activity, you can be called sweaty at video games, or sweaty at math.
Education is a weird place to use the word talent, looking back. You can't wake up knowing new information. Everyone has to learn, the people who look talented just learned it earlier than everyone else. I am not sure why hard working is seen as uncool at that age. I wonder if it's different in other parts of the world, I learned that I have a very typical north eastern USA experience.
It’s a protection mechanism for ones ego. Because if you “don’t try” you always have an excuse for why you’re not doing as well as the “nerds” at school.
If you do “try” but you don’t get a top result, what would that say to a kids fragile ego ? They might think they’re not good at all.
By trying, you reveal your capabilities (as well as your limitations), and that can be terrifying for a kid with a fragile ego.
The correct mentality is to focus on the process, rather than the result.
The result doesn’t matter (especially for kids) as long as you focus on training and improving yourself.
My kid is pretty smart, not genius smart, and he falls into this trap too. He loves succeeding at stuff, but hates putting effort into it. If he tries and fails once, he says "well I'm just not a ____ person" and digs his heels in. If we cajole him into trying, he'll intentionally flub it.
Naturally smart kids really don’t have to study in high school because the material is so easy for them. Just staying awake in class and doing the reading once is sufficient if not moreso. Often times exam answers can be inferred from other exam questions with only partial knowledge of the material. There’s often a rude awakening in store for them though when they hit the second or third year of college and encounter challenging material for the first time while having no experience studying.
How are you dealing with this? I used to feel that way too but now that I actually want to put more effort, I cannot being myself to do that. I cannot focus and get easily distracted whenever I try.
The biggest issue with Imposter Syndrome is the name. It makes it sound like some kind of abnormal medical issue that some people "have". I think part of its popularity is because people make it part of their identity.
It's like people saying they are OCD when really they just like things to be neat.
It's should be called "lack of confidence", but they you probably couldn't write papers and books about it.
You could probably come up with more "syndromes" that are really common and normal human behaviours if you want to make a name for yourself! "morning syndrome" (difficult to get up in the morning), "hunger syndrome" (being hungry even when you've eaten a sensible amount of food), "stranger syndrome" (not being confident at talking to strangers), "Smalltalk syndrome" (being shit at Smalltalk), etc.
This seems to be talking almost exclusively about faking intellectualism, but I believe there's a bigger cultural issue going on. Nevermind that intellectualism requires humility and the ability to be wrong and in fact feel stupid from time to time. Something which is poorly taught. But I digress...
We all have just splintered into so many little groups, pods, and sadly solos, that to fit in anywhere requires a serious bit of "faking it". Unfortunately, this spills over into the workplace, even when much of the work is technical and answer oriented.
I'm not fresh enough to feel like I'm faking it (I never really did), but I haven't been around long enough to be used to the feeling of being left behind (I hope I never do).
I am resentful for how things have changed out from underneath me. And I'm regretful for the people I didn't foster better relationships with.
There's another thread further down of us. Personally I think the author (or editor, whoever chose the title) feels it and is projecting onto everyone else.
To balance things out, the opposite is the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
"I'm bad at this. Oh, but maybe it's the Impostor Syndrome and that means I'm actually good? Oh but then maybe that's the Dunning-Kruger Effect and I'm actually bad."
Repeat until both cancel out and your mind settles on some middle point, not worrying about "maybe I'm bad and nobody else knows", and not being overconfident.
This article does not make any sense to me. It basically explains imposter syndrome as the consequence of having unrealistic external expectations of success and ability, requiring a fake persona, e.g. being the result of privilege and expectations that come with it, but then also dismisses mens experience of this phenomenon, and talks about how it’s basically the result of systematic injustice against women. How can it be both? And how can they justify hand waving away the fact that men also experience this?
Surmising from the article, it appears that Imposter Syndrome was originally conceptualized in the context of feminist thought and at some later point migrated into wider cultural discourse as a more gender neutral concept. But for people immersed in feminist literature and discourse it's probably still very much a feminist concept, especially as it relates to experiences.
Because of how women physically and emotionally mature and the social roles they grow into, I can easily imagine that there are dimensions to Imposter Syndrome as originally conceived which would be less familiar to or less intense for most men. For example, stressors regarding dress, tensions between sexuality and professionalism, dilemmas between following the rules vs breaking the rules, etc.
But I'm being charitable. The quick dismissal by the author is indeed disheartening.
Because for centuries we only had a few professions which were passed down in each family and now we have so many specialist roles to work with material nature that no one really is an expert
Yeah people in hard sciences can't really fake as a workhorse. However, I have worked at a job where almost everyone but me was an onshore offshore copy/paste StackOverflow "software engineer" and they were absolutely fakers but they truly didn't see themself as such. Their main defense was to make sure to only hire other "engineers" who were even worse than them. That type of hiring cascades to zero nicely.
For the latecomers - It was originally posted here with the title on the page, not the title in the URL: "Why Everyone Feels Like They’re Faking It".
I was also was gonna post something like "...uh, no I don't", but decided to hold off and see what others thought. Guess it was a good idea for a different reason, the title on here having changed.
[+] [-] gopalv|3 years ago|reply
Of all the parts of the article, that little bit stands out.
Because I see my older kid do that all the time, as if putting in effort to do something is somehow not the real thing. As if things learned from mistakes and practice is not progress - a substitute for talent.
[+] [-] knaik94|3 years ago|reply
I feel like kids have been moving away from this mindset, but maybe it's changed names. Growing up being a "nerd" was uncool, and studying was "nerdy". After college, I talked to some of the people who were the "naturally" smart kids and I found out they lied so much about how much time they spent not studying. Everyone lies. Part of it, I learned, was that my graduating class ended up with a lot of cut-throat people, they lied about how much work they put in to gatekeep. I don't speak to a single person from my graduating year now even though I am friends with some teachers as well as kids from other years. A similar concept but less isolated to academics has been kind of a popular "insult". I sometimes hear the concept of "sweaty" being uncool among the youngest ages I teach. Sweaty, as in working so hard towards something that you work up a sweat. It's doesn't have to be a physical activity, you can be called sweaty at video games, or sweaty at math.
Education is a weird place to use the word talent, looking back. You can't wake up knowing new information. Everyone has to learn, the people who look talented just learned it earlier than everyone else. I am not sure why hard working is seen as uncool at that age. I wonder if it's different in other parts of the world, I learned that I have a very typical north eastern USA experience.
[+] [-] j7ake|3 years ago|reply
If you do “try” but you don’t get a top result, what would that say to a kids fragile ego ? They might think they’re not good at all.
By trying, you reveal your capabilities (as well as your limitations), and that can be terrifying for a kid with a fragile ego.
The correct mentality is to focus on the process, rather than the result.
The result doesn’t matter (especially for kids) as long as you focus on training and improving yourself.
[+] [-] klyrs|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vba616|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] User23|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lost_padawan|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] IshKebab|3 years ago|reply
It's like people saying they are OCD when really they just like things to be neat.
It's should be called "lack of confidence", but they you probably couldn't write papers and books about it.
You could probably come up with more "syndromes" that are really common and normal human behaviours if you want to make a name for yourself! "morning syndrome" (difficult to get up in the morning), "hunger syndrome" (being hungry even when you've eaten a sensible amount of food), "stranger syndrome" (not being confident at talking to strangers), "Smalltalk syndrome" (being shit at Smalltalk), etc.
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] nixpulvis|3 years ago|reply
We all have just splintered into so many little groups, pods, and sadly solos, that to fit in anywhere requires a serious bit of "faking it". Unfortunately, this spills over into the workplace, even when much of the work is technical and answer oriented.
I'm not fresh enough to feel like I'm faking it (I never really did), but I haven't been around long enough to be used to the feeling of being left behind (I hope I never do).
I am resentful for how things have changed out from underneath me. And I'm regretful for the people I didn't foster better relationships with.
[+] [-] drewcoo|3 years ago|reply
But most of us feel we're surrounded by them.
I hear "fake it til you make it" coming from children's mouths these days, not just startup hustlers.
[+] [-] shureluck|3 years ago|reply
Most of my tech interview strategy has adapted to weed out candidates that are imposters.
[+] [-] vr46|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cultofmetatron|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jessekv|3 years ago|reply
edit: Not to trivialise the article, its a good one and worth reading and learning from.
[+] [-] mensetmanusman|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shureluck|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Izkata|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] quectophoton|3 years ago|reply
"I'm bad at this. Oh, but maybe it's the Impostor Syndrome and that means I'm actually good? Oh but then maybe that's the Dunning-Kruger Effect and I'm actually bad."
Repeat until both cancel out and your mind settles on some middle point, not worrying about "maybe I'm bad and nobody else knows", and not being overconfident.
[+] [-] drewcoo|3 years ago|reply
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/how-do-you-know/2020...
[+] [-] UniverseHacker|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wahern|3 years ago|reply
Because of how women physically and emotionally mature and the social roles they grow into, I can easily imagine that there are dimensions to Imposter Syndrome as originally conceived which would be less familiar to or less intense for most men. For example, stressors regarding dress, tensions between sexuality and professionalism, dilemmas between following the rules vs breaking the rules, etc.
But I'm being charitable. The quick dismissal by the author is indeed disheartening.
[+] [-] 1shooner|3 years ago|reply
No citation on that one...
[+] [-] gotoeleven|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] amriksohata|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] d_t_w|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] andirk|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Izkata|3 years ago|reply
I was also was gonna post something like "...uh, no I don't", but decided to hold off and see what others thought. Guess it was a good idea for a different reason, the title on here having changed.
[+] [-] ip26|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mesozoic|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] temptemptemp111|3 years ago|reply
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