Imposterism, perfectionism and burnout
can often occur together
and can leave devastating effects of depression and anxiety.
I'm going to define it for you
and show you what you can do to make it better.
I'm Dr. Tracey Marks, a psychiatrist,
and I make mental health education videos.
Imposterism is an experience that you can have
where you have trouble internalizing your accomplishments
and attribute them to luck or chance
instead of skill and ability.
You also fear that you'll be found out
and considered to be a fake or a fraud.
Some people refer to this as imposter syndrome,
but it's not a disorder, but more of a phenomenon
or an experience that anyone can have.
It was initially conceptualized
studying high-achieving women,
but further research has shown
that it occurs equally in men and women.
However, it tends to be more common among women
and minorities in certain settings.
If you feel your environment is telling you
that you don't belong or that you're not good enough,
those messages reinforce your inadequacies
and make you question your skills.
Another character trait that can set you up
for feeling this way is maladaptive perfectionism.
And this is the tendency to set unrealistic expectations
and an inability to accept anything less than perfection.
Maladaptive perfectionism leads to feeling shame,
embarrassment and inadequacy.
These feelings can make you fear failure and create anxiety,
so you work harder to disprove your beliefs
and overcome your fears that you'll be found out.
Overworking, though, doesn't resolve
your negative self-image, and then you become burned out.
Another thing about perfectionism is it can make it hard
for you to delegate tasks to someone,
so you can become overloaded with work
because you want to make sure things are just right,
so you end up with more work than you can do.
Some people use perfectionism as a coping strategy
to avoid facing fears and insecurities.
How would this look?
If you overly focus on minutia,
you don't have to deal with the criticism you expect
because the work is always in progress.
Or if you can get it perfect, then you don't run the risk
of people seeing that you really aren't that good,
you just got this one right.
So if you can always do things perfectly,
no one has to know
that you don't really know what you're doing.
Imposterism and perfectionism form a dangerous loop
because when you fail to meet your impossible standards,
you validate your fears of inadequacy.
So you overwork to disprove your negative view of yourself,
and this leads to emotional and physical exhaustion.
Imposterism, perfectionism and burnout doesn't happen
in a vacuum only in your professional setting.
You can transfer the same set of dysfunctional beliefs,
unrealistic expectations and overwork to your personal life.
It can affect your relationships, finances
and personal achievements.
What can you do to lessen the impact of this triad?
To chip away at the perfectionism, practice delegating tasks
and accept things as good enough.
For example, let your partner do something,
even though you know they will probably do a sloppy job
and leave some unimportant things incomplete.
But if you do it yourself, it'll be neat, efficient
and yield a better outcome, maybe.
But doing it yourself means more of your time and energy.
In this case, accept your partner's efforts
as good enough without criticism.
You don't want to mention that they should have done this
or they should have done that.
It's like they're doing it presses the reset button,
and this is now the new way that it's done.
Another thing that you can do is practice self-compassion.
Things that are hard become overwhelming
when you beat yourself up over it.
According to psychologist Dr. Kristin Neff,
self-compassion has three components, mindful acceptance,
connection to humanity and self-kindness.
Here's a five-step exercise
that you can do to practice self-compassion.
Step one is picture in your mind a difficult situation
that's causing you stress.
Then step two, see if you can feel the stress
of that situation somewhere in your body.
Step three, say out loud, "This is stress,"
or, "This is hurt."
Acknowledging this aloud is a form of mindful observation.
You're presently observing your emotions
without making a judgment
about whether the experience is good or bad.
So if you think about an argument you had with someone,
and you feel pressure in your chest,
you don't say, "My life sucks."
Instead, you say, "This is stress," or, "This is hurt."
For step four, you say, "Suffering is a part of life,"
or "We all struggle with stress or hurt."
Saying this connects you to common humanity.
It gives you the sense that you're not alone
in your suffering.
Other people have difficulties, too,
so suffering does not make you stand out as defective.
Then for the last step five,
you put your hands over your heart,
preferably touching your skin, and say,
"May I be kind to myself."
You can also say, "May I accept myself as I am,"
or, "May I be strong," "May I be patient."
This is the step where you're showing yourself kindness.
Touching helps bring gentleness and warmth to the statement
rather than just saying it into the air.
This self-kindness step helps bring clarity
to your intention to show yourself empathy.
Try this when you're in a stressful situation
to help you replace self-critical thoughts
with compassionate ones.
Another approach to preventing burnout
is focusing on the things that matter
and eliminating things that don't.
Watch this video on identifying and clarifying your values.
Thanks for watching. See you next time.