Fake it till you make it.
You probably heard that phrase in your life before especially if you heard of the Law
of Attraction movement or read The Secret.
In this video, I’ll explain what the phrase means, how people apply it, and whether it
is good advice or not.
Fake it till you make it suggests that if you imitate confidence and competence, you
will realize those qualities and be more confident and competent.
The phrase gained more popularity from the Law of Attraction movement.
One interpretation of the Law of Attraction is that positive or negative thoughts will
bring positive or negative experiences into one’s life.
One of the core concepts is to act as if you already have it.
Another core concept of the law of attraction is visualization.
One has to visualize their future success and achievements in order to manifest the
behaviors needed to get there.
So how do people apply the concept of fake it till you make it?
Most of us have an element of our personality or character we want to work on and improve.
Maybe you want to be more confident or disciplined.
Once you identify what it is, you start changing who you are forcibly with the goal of having
that trait in the future naturally.
For example, let’s say you want to be more confident.
You are not that comfortable meeting and talking to new people and want to get better at talking
to people.
Staying away and hiding in the corner of an event while hoping someone doesn’t notice
you isn’t going to help you meet new people.
Instead, you have to force yourself to be someone that is fine with conversations, smile,
and talk to someone.
While it won’t be easy the first time, the goal is for it to be easier in the future
and feel more natural.
You might not ever like the idea of approaching and talking to someone but you will hate it
less in the future.
The idea is to change your behavior and trust that the feelings will follow.
As long as your motivations and reasons for faking it is in the right place, it shouldn’t
feel inauthentic and faking it till you make it can be very effective.
One big mistake to watch out for when faking it till you make it is if you are faking to
prove your worth to someone.
A study published found that people who tried to prove their worth to someone by faking
it tend to dwell on their shortcomings.
Professionals who wore luxury clothing in order to give off the image of a successful
person and to increase their self worth ended up feeling like a bigger failure.
The attempt to project a false image of success also messed with their self control and decision
making skills.
They use up a lot of mental resources to fake the image of success which interfered with
their ability to make good choices and control themselves.
Make sure your reasons for doing it are in the right place.
Now is this advice solid or not?
The answer is that it depends.
Faking it is great advice when it comes to behaviors as you can mold and change your
personality in the moment.
Faking it is terrible advice when it comes to competence and skill.
You either know how to do the thing or you don’t.
No matter how much you want to be better, you can’t just change it in the moment.
For example, you can’t just boast about how your product can do all these amazing
things when it can’t.
That’s how you quickly lose trust from your customers.
Another example is in entrepreneurship.
Gary Vee has noticed that a lot of people want to be entrepreneurs and are faking it.
So many people say they are there when they are still on the journey of becoming an entrepreneur.
So many people are projecting they are something on social media when there is nothing behind
it.
That is clearly not a good look as anyone experienced in the field can easily spot it
and call you out.
Faking competence and skill will only end badly so don’t do it.
Even if you get away with it for a few times, the probability of that happening is quite
slim.
If you have a deep desire to change or improve something about yourself and you fake that
behavior with conviction in order to get there, then eventually the power of habit will kick
in and you will get where you want.
Just believe fully in yourself, your ability to change and the reason you’re doing it
in the first place and things will go the way you want.
Make sure to only fake it till you make it for behaviors and not for competence and skill.
Do you like the idea of faking it till you make it?
Leave a comment below and check out the video shown on the end screen if you enjoyed this
video and want more content.