How to combat imposter syndrome
According to Psychology Today, those who experience imposter syndrome may feel that they do not deserve the accomplishments they have earned, that they are not as smart or competent as their peers, or that sooner or later, everyone will find out that they don’t deserve the status or acclaim that they have. Imposter syndrome is often experienced by people who are highly accomplished, both academically and professionally. Some of the most common suffers are, you guessed it, college students.
Imposter syndrome can hit at the worst of times for college students, in whatever field you are studying. Whether it is a daunting project for a history class, or an economic paper, at one point in students’ college career, they will be plagued with ideas like: what am I even doing? This is paper I wrote is absolutely GARBAGE! Why am I in this major? I am faking this all…
Well, you are not alone. There are many ways to combat this, especially as midterms are fast approaching. Consider the following the next time you start to feel that you don’t deserve or belong in the life you experience.
Give yourself time
When you procrastinate and put things off until the last minute, the stress can get so bad that it incites mental burnout; at that point, you don’t want to do any work. Try to do your work when you have the most concentration, whether that be late at night with music playing in the background, or early in the morning with complete quiet. Set enough time aside for you to get your work done, as well as scheduling in breaks. For every hour of work take 15 minutes and do something to recenter your brain—then, you can go back to it without feeling overwhelmed.
Don’t compare yourself to others
Just because you are struggling with one thing does not mean that you are incapable of all things. Writing can always be improved, and maybe while someone else may be able to write great speeches, you can write great narratives. The point is, what makes you great is different from someone else—find strength in your achievements and find improvement in your weaknesses. Nobody is perfect. Even if they try to present themselves that way, everyone makes mistakes.
Break it up
Break up your work into paragraphs or parts and try working when you are most comfortable and can concentrate best. Organize your work into sections that are more manageable than a 15-page essay or short responses. Try starting by telling yourself, ‘I will do a page now, and a page tomorrow.’ It tricks your mind into thinking that it's shorter and a much easier task. You can find yourself focusing more as well as doing better when you don’t take the whole pie, but instead just a slice.
Meet with Writing Learning Center (WLC) staff or peers
The best way to improve your writing is by having others review your work. At Fraser Library, there are wonderful people ready to help you with your writing, your work and your questions. Friends and even professors can review your work and give feedback on what to improve upon. Even if seems time-consuming, the more people that review your work and give feedback, the more you can improve.
Learn from your mistakes
If you know you commonly mess up grammar or tenses, take time to edit for those mistakes. If your writing tends to get wordy, look back at good examples and try to mimic the writing to be more succinct. If you know that you struggle with passive vs. active sentences, then spend some time writing sentences relating to your work and go from there. You do not have to be perfect, and everyone slips up from time to time. Just try to take the time to look back and improve for the future!
Edit. Edit. Edit.
As you complete different sections of work, wait to edit until you have a good chunk so you can see how everything fits together. It tends to help with organization. But, any way you do it, editing is necessary for improvement.
Remind yourself why you joined your field in the first place
Everyone goes into different disciplines and careers, but ultimately, we all do it for a reason. Sometimes we need to remind ourselves why it will be worth it when we graduate—why this class, even if you don’t like the professor, will help us in the long run. No matter what, every day you are here, you are doing something that is creating your future. And what is your ideal future? What can you accomplish? Everything.
Grades do not determine your worth
This is not high school anymore, and we all know things got more difficult as we got older, and the pandemic did not help. Maybe you always got A’s in high school and now your grades are lower college, or maybe you did horribly in high school and better in college. Whatever the case, as long as you try, there is nothing wrong with bad grades because you can do greater things, whatever path you choose.
If you need a mental health day, TAKE IT!
You need to understand when you need a break. Take a day, take an hour, but don’t force yourself to continue trying mentally stimulating to the point exhaustion is filling you. Your health matters, mental and physical, so do what you can, when you can, and let yourself breathe when the day is really bad. You matter more than a grade.
Find a friend group to support you
Imposter syndrome can feel very isolating—it always seems like everyone is killing it while you are fighting for every inch of progress you make. Having a friend group to share in the triumphs and struggles, and to remind each other that sometimes things are hard for everybody and that you aren’t alone, can be essential.