How to Tell Imposter Syndrome to Royally F*ck Off
Five thoughts that have gotten me through the terrible cycle of self-doubt while launching the next thing.
***Fair warning: Potty-Mouth McGhee apparently wrote this post late at night. If cursing bothers you, I highly recommend just skipping straight to the five thoughts that helped me get over my self-doubt, which are near the end of this article.***
Here I am, a week away from launching my first two courses on MeghanFrenchDunbar.com, and I’m swimming in self-doubt. I was literally just watering my newly planted lilacs, hose in hand, staring out into the darkness of the night, and became wracked with fear. I had the thoughts that we should pull the plug on the whole thing because “who the hell am I anyway?” And, wow, this feels really hard to put myself out there like this. And this is all despite the fact that my team and I have worked on these course materials for months; that I’ve launched, built, and sold a company already; and that I have people in my life who are literally asking me to do the thing we’re about to do — I still keep hearing the nagging questions inside:
What if the products totally suck? Like, what if my first students sign up and absolutely hate what I created?
Am I actually qualified to teach these topics? Even though I’ve studied it for years, interviewed thousands of leaders, and put the principles into practice, I keep questioning if I should be the one to teach these subjects. Isn’t there someone who is “better” at this than I am?
What about the fact that there is some very real incongruence with what I am preaching and how I am living? I have days where I don’t feel entirely purposeful, conscious, or happy. Does that make me a hypocrite in trying to teach what I know? Do I have to be perfect in all aspects of what I preach to effectively teach others?
Am I doing enough? My heart told me to dive into these initiatives, but I just watched Hamilton and now I feel like I should be leading a f*cking revolution rather than teaching some online courses.
And the internal dialogue just keeps going. So how do you tell imposter syndrome to leave you alone? How do you overcome your own brain, which is filled with fear-based thoughts and conditioned social narratives about how we, especially as womxn, are just never enough?
5 Thoughts That’ll Crush Imposter Syndrome:
Here are the helpful thoughts that anchored me into believing in myself and my products, and led me to thinking, “What the actually f*ckity f*ck — let’s try this damn thing and see what happens!”
If it helps one person, it was time well spent.
You will definitely have failed if you don’t even try. The bigger risk here is not putting yourself out there and moving forward leading a purely mediocre life, wishing you had done the thing that you actually wanted to do.
If you try and everyone hates it, then you’ve learned and gained valuable life experiences that can inform the next thing.
Following your heart has never led you astray — not following that voice is an actual sense of betrayal to who you are and how you lead your life.
Our time here is extremely short — fail fast, love hard, jump into the deep end, and, above all, use the skills that you have to contribute to a worthy cause that you care about while attempting to build a life you love.
So, I’m “koala-bearing” onto those five thoughts (and if you’re not familiar with my annoying habit of koala-ing onto things, it literally just means that I hold on for dear life to things, people, and dreams that I love and snuggle them so hard that it gets awkward). So, go for that launch, my friends! Even when your brain is being a total b*tch.