HOW TO RELIEF PERFORMANCE ANXIETY (IMPOSTER PHENOMENON)

Today we'll discuss the essential factor that can sometimes make or break the success or joy of spiritual, educated, and intelligent women. This is a phenomenon called Imposter Phenomenon that the pop culture later changed into Imposter Syndrome, much to the dismay of the creator of this phenomenon, Dr. Pauline Clance. In 1978, Dr. Clance and another college professor, Dr. Suzanne Imes, wrote the groundbreaking article "The Imposter Phenomenon in High Achieving Women: Dynamics and Therapeutic Interventions." Once this article was published, it opened the floodgates of letters and calls from women, relieved they finally knew what was wrong with them. Why were they so anxious and fearing that they would "find me out"? So, if you have this fear, no matter where you are in life, if you're the head of your company, CEO of a corporation, or president of a parents committee in your kids' school - you can suffer from the Imposter phenomenon. But let me tell you - you are in the excellent company. The brilliant poet Maya Angelou once said," I have written 11 books, but each time I think are they going to find me out? I've read a game on everybody, and they are going to find out".

So now let's see how you can tell if you have this phenomenon. Then we'll talk about how it reflects in your life outcomes and about some possible originating causes - so you will understand how it might affect your life. Finally, we will conclude the article with how to challenge and change it -that is possible. One quick way to see if you have IP is to go to Pauline Clancy web site and run the IP imposter phenomenon scale, which takes 5-10 minutes to complete (https://www.paulineroseclance.com/pdf/IPTestandscoring.pdf).

Now let's see how we can spot the presence of IP in our behavior and reactions.

Attribution of the cause to performance outcome: People with IP usually attributed their successes to Temporary causes, such as luck and extraordinary effort, that would be hard to repeat. On the other hand, the failures are attributable to Stable causes, such as abilities, skills, and talents. So how does it work? I am getting a promotion at work and thinking: "I might have put some extraordinary effort to get here, but I will not be able to duplicate it next time. Or maybe this position opened up at a perfect time; I was in the right place and got lucky." People who don't have IP go the other way. They attribute their successes to stable causes and failures to temporary causes. Do you see how it changes the paradigm?

Another common characteristic of people with IP is the external locus of control. That means that I don't make things happen, but things happen to me. With an external locus of control, we know we have agency and free will in life and can make changes that are in our control.

Women with IP have difficulty accepting positive feedback while quickly absorbing and concentrating on negative feedback. Why? Because they don't believe it, they think others are just being friendly or playing games. But, at the same time, they usually latch on to negative feedback because they have a subconscious belief that, deep down, they are not worthy and flawed. So, the negative belief is accepted as truth. So, notice if you usually dismiss positive feedback but take it to heart and believe negative feedback.

Another hallmark of IP is the Denial of Success. Suppose you know that your life is successful from the outside viewpoint or even by your rational analysis, but you cannot feel it. You might think your life is like a house of cards that can crumble any moment if you make one wrong move or if others are behind your mask.

Sometimes, denial of success might be a strong subconscious driving force, reflecting as underperforming, working, or acting under our true abilities. You can be so fearful of success that a vital part of the subconscious mind arises to protect you and prevents you from tapping into your talents and achieving something you can be proud of. One reason might be that success is associated with the inevitability of failure. This part of your subconsciousness is fearful that you might not be equipped to handle failure and survive.

So how does IP reflect in everyday life? It can show up as rigidity, lack of flexibility in performing your job or doing some tasks, even in the daily routine. Rigidity happens because your mind wants to be in control and fears that any uncontrolled, not pre-mediated change might lead to your painful discovery as an "imposter." Therefore, the mind preventively ensures that your "secret" is always protected. As a cousin of rigidity comes perfectionism and "analysis – paralysis" – when we feel that anything less than "a perfect job," whatever this "perfection" is created in our minds, will not suffice to protect us from "discovery."

As a flip side of perfectionism, we might slide into a low goal setting and deny any arising ambitions – the mind goes into protective hibernation. It protects us from perceived "failure" by not allowing us to even dream about a bigger future. The subconsciousness does not believe that any success will be possible without eventual failure and feels that for your safety, it's better not even to attempt success. Some people swing between these extremes of perfectionism, rigidity, complete laxity, and conformity, making progress difficult.

Many people with IP have a damaged Sense of Self and overestimated perception of others – they tend to overvalue others while undervaluing themselves.

As a result, persistent anxiety, fear, and depression are common symptoms of unrecognized IP.

What can lead to impostor syndrome? One of the major contributors is family dynamics. For example, in childhood, we might have a sibling that is a "star" of the family, and parents always remind us how brilliant this sibling is and compares our skills and abilities to this sibling.

Another option is that you were the only child told by the parents that she's the most brilliant thing out there. But then reality kicked in; you realized that others are more talented and that you are not omnipotent but were stuck in the "star child" role and had to protect this image.

Childhood trauma can also contribute to IP as a low sense of self and fear that maybe we'll go and achieve outwardly, but inside to always feel like this little hurt child.

Another cause can be cultural conditioning. In some cultures, people were instructed to put themselves down in a way that never acknowledges their successes. For example, I was raised in a collectivistic culture of socialist Russia, where an acknowledgment of individual achievement was considered egotistical and had to be subjugated to the group's interests.

Earned helplessness can lead to IP and shows as a feeling of inability to control life after a series of unfortunate events, such as critical illness, divorce, job loss, etc. We might start life assured of ourselves, but at some points, often after a series of problems and difficulties, we lose this assurance and create feelings of helplessness and inability to cope.

Some research shows introverted orientation can be linked to IP. Introverts tend to look for the origin of the issues in themselves and then transpose the findings to the outside reality. While extroverts usually start with external reasons, they bring these reasons inside themselves.

At this point, you might say, Yes, I have an Imposter Phenomenon. So, what do I do with it? Is it even possible to heal? Absolutely, but it takes time and effort.

As with a chronic illness, we can achieve remission or even healing with treatment and the proper medication. I will present you with some treatment options for IP. One essential thing to remember is that you must approach this treatment gently and kindly like you would treat an illness in a small suffering child.

Self-compassion is the most critical first step in working with the impostor phenomenon in yourself. You can go here to read (https://www.irinamarc.com/blog/72rfmca36erx8iwltm35t0clu3sj7t) or view (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fA2H0e95hjo) more about self-compassion, but here I will briefly summarize how to nurture self-compassion. When you feel that feeling of fear, or any feeling related to IP coming up, you can follow these five steps:

First Step: Noticing that you are experiencing a feeling. This step requires you to be in an unbiased, not judgmental observer state of mind and be sensitive to your energy.
You can tell yourself, "I am noticing that I am struggling with fear. Let me tune in to myself and sense my feeling now. I will not try to judge, rationalize, analyze, or push away this feeling; I will only notice this feeling".

Second step: Fully allow yourself to feel your feeling. During this step, watch out for a need to placate, reduce, or judge the feeling. If this need arises, gently move your attention back to the feeling. You can say: "I am sensing that I am fearful. Let me stay with this fear and see how it feels in my body". Now, you can connect to your body and sense where this emotion resonates. Don't judge or placate this feeling; witness and be with it.

Third step: Acceptance of validity of feelings experienced in a moment. You can say: "Yes, there is fear. I accept that I am fearful because fear is a human emotion. I completely validate and accept this fear as I am experiencing it at this moment".

Fourth step: Desire to Reduce Suffering. You can tell yourself: "I am self-compassionate and loving by my nature, and I wish that I won't suffer. I wish to do what I can to reduce my suffering".

Fifth step: Action to Reduce suffering. You can say: "I will connect to myself and see how I can reduce my sufferings, and I will do it, if possible, for me and will not harm myself and others."

If no answer is coming or relief is impossible, see if you could be with yourself and compassionately witness your suffering. Self-witnessing and self-validation can be amazingly supportive and healing in times of distress. However, regardless of the action, please approach this step with self-kindness and gentleness.

When we try to be kind and compassionate to ourselves, we often hear the inside voice that talks about us harshly and insultingly. We can call this voice Self-critic. This voice can belong to your parents, society, or other outside forces, but you hear it as if it's your own. Remember that a cruel and insulting internal voice is never yours.

Here are the Steps on how to reduce the influence of the Internal critic*

1. Noticing and observing: Say to yourself: "I am hearing an internal voice that is painful and critical to me." Acknowledgment that this voice does not belong to you. Say to yourself: "This is not my voice. I don't have to listen to it".
2. Talking to your critic. We can be either firm and even harsh with the critic and tell him to shut up or kindly but firmly say to the critic that we hear him but not going to pay attention to him or take orders from him. Say to yourself: "No, I will not listen to you. Go away and don't come back" ** Or: "I understand that you are trying to protect me, and this is the only way you how, but now it's safe for me to be kind and gentle with myself, and this is how I will treat myself."
3. Imagine that you are a precious suffering child. If it's hard to imagine, bring up to your mind any child you care about, and imagine that you are talking to this child. Consider looking at your childhood pictures to aid in this task.
4. Talk to yourself as you would have loved to be talked to when you were a child or how you would have spoken to a loved child who is suffering.
   You can say something along these lines "I feel your sadness, I feel your pain. I know that it's scary to lose hope. It's ok to feel what you feel. Just know that I am here for you now, and always will be. How can I help you now?". Please ensure your words come from your heart and reflect your true essence.

*Important note: If you have been diagnosed with PTSD, C-PSTD, have complex trauma, or suspect that you might have complex trauma, please get in touch with a trauma-informed therapist before starting work with Self-Critic. The tailored, specific-to-your-situation approach is essential for optimal healing in these cases.

**Important note: If you are working on self-compassion alone, I suggest using only a kind approach to the critic. A harsh approach should be used if advised by your therapist only.

On a practical level, what to do if facing an important presentation or client meeting, but IP-related feelings arise?

1. You can put these feelings "aside "so they won't prevent you from performing optimally. Later, you would need to come back and address these feelings with your therapist or by applying some tools listed in this article. In the meantime, you write the feeling on the piece of paper and put it in your purse, your pocket, or somewhere where this piece of paper is safe and won't fall out. This practice helps us honor the feeling by acknowledging it but consciously connecting to the observer's state of mind and separating ourselves from it.

2. You can also briefly imagine the worst-case scenario – for example, "If I fail this presentation, I will get fired. "Then you can imagine writing these words on the computer screen. For instance, imagine this sentence, "If I fail this presentation, I will get fired," on the screen, imagine that letters are either in different colors or jumping all over the screen and dancing in all directions. Notice if you feel any differently.

3. You can also sing your "worst outcome" sentence in a funny voice or in the voice of a cartoon character you like. Then stop for a second and notice a difference in the intensity of feelings.

4. Imagine a dialog with a friend you care about but feel separate from. This friend will share your concerns about your performance and abilities as if they were hers. What would you tell her? What would you objectively think about her talents and ability to do the job?

5. When you have more time, write a story about your life as an objective observer and spend some time on the achievements and why these results were achieved. You another than your name for the story's heroine – this would help with emotional separation and objectivity.

6. Accept the "Imposter" Part and approach this part of yourself with kindness and compassion, but at the same time, do not take directions on how to act from this part. Instead, approach this part as a kind and competent parent approaches an acting- out a struggling dear child. When the IP part comes up, talk to yourself like you would speak to a child – with compassion and kindness, acknowledge and encourage her feelings, yet always remember that you are in control.

Make sure you praise yourself, comfort yourself, and accept yourself with love and admiration for the perfect child of God as you are.