Navigating Imposter Syndrome
“…you’re told the best way is just to ‘fake it til you make it’”
I’ve always found it funny that the stereotype of the ‘theatre kid’ is foundationally constructed around an individual with an abundance of self-confidence, someone who isn’t phased by how they might be perceived, unafraid of the judgement of others. And often as you’re starting out you’re told the best way is just to ‘fake it til you make it’ or that the key to a good performance is confidence. My amusement with this misconception lies in the fact that around 80% of the people I’ve met in theatre have, at some stage, experienced a bout of Imposter Syndrome.
Imposter Syndrome, as defined by the Cambridge dictionary, is the feeling that your achievements are not real or that you do not deserve praise or success. People of all stages of their career and success experience imposter syndrome. Particularly in this industry, where there’s an assumption that if you’re into theatre, you’re really confident - experiencing imposter syndrome can be really jarring and often it can be hard to break through that barrier and see the true value of your success.
I’m sure like me, any young woman who’s had any interest in the arts at any stage in her life has heard the term ‘drama queen’ thrown at them at one time or another - though there’s a whole blog post to be written in itself about it, I’ll skip past the feminist criticism of the term and stay on task. Whatever it may be, there’s always a stereotype being thrown at us. And I do get it, to an extent, us thespians can be a weird bunch when we want to be - trust me, I have a whole host of extraordinary tales from A-Level Drama to attest to that. However, the perception that even as children, ‘theatre kids’ are just the Rachel Berry’s of the world, born with what some might call an ‘excess’ of confidence, troubles me. This surplus of confidence is certainly not something I’ve ever experienced and the older I get the more I see that for the majority of us the fabled stereotype, that so often is used to define us, couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, I’d argue that no matter how we may present outwardly, as a species, us creatives could not be more insecure.
“we are told that to be the theatre kid is to have a natural flowing confidence”
The irony isn’t lost on me that for most of us, we are introduced to the industry through acting. In schools, Drama teaching and GCSE Drama is centred around the actor. Though I love working with actors, and I admire them in so many ways, not all of us that have an interest in the arts are destined to be actors. Many of us don’t have the confidence (or the desire to handle the constant rejection) yet when as young, budding creatives, often we are made to feel that acting is the only way in - another obstacle in front of a series of seemingly closed doors.
Throughout school and A Levels I thought myself an actor, I even applied and auditioned for drama schools because that’s what I saw my fellow creatives doing and that was what I believed ‘the way to do it’ was. It took a long while for me to realise that though I knew this was the industry I wanted to be in, I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to be within it. I was fortunate that my experience in Further Education exposed me to the other possibilities, but many walk away from their interests at an early age because they simply can’t get past the performance barrier. In the same way we are told that to be the theatre kid is to have a natural flowing confidence, it is reinforced to us that if you like theatre, you must love acting - which doesn’t bode well for those of us who suffer with self-confidence.
For many creatives, our biggest enemy is often our own mind. As someone who suffers with anxiety (and has finally reached the stage where they’re able to own that fact rather than be ashamed of it), since leaving education and beginning my creative career, I’ve become more aware of the treacherous waters of uncertainty that we have to navigate. It’s very easy when you start out to feel like you have absolutely no idea what you’re doing - because more often than not, you don’t. It’s a big deal to take that step from doing something you love and think you know a lot about, to doing that thing you love and realising you don’t know how to make it a source of income. Not to mention then having to convince other people to trust you enough to pay you to do that thing.
“we all tell ourselves that we are the only ones in the room who are absolutely terrified”
Pitching is a good example of this. Whatever avenue you choose to walk in the creative industries, it’s probable that at some stage you’re going to have to encounter a pitch. Whether you’re a director, a designer, a writer, or even a casting director, you have to pitch to people to convince them to give you the job. For actors, we call it an audition, for Stage Managers perhaps an interview, but despite the change in wording, the essence of the process is the same. Pitching as a process isn’t exclusive to creative industries, we’ve all seen Dragons Den, but in the business world you have a product, or a software or strategy to stand behind; a shield. As creatives, we’re always selling ourselves. When you think about it, it’s quite a big ask to have such a level of confidence in yourself to walk into a room and convince someone to take a chance on you.
Obviously, pitching is an important and unavoidable process, to be clear - it’s not pitching I want to challenge. Terrifying as it is, pitching is a really important skill for us to master. The thing that needs to be challenged is the myth that we all tell ourselves that we are the only ones in the room who are absolutely terrified of it. Pitching is a daunting prospect, any interview for any job can be, but it becomes ten times harder when that little niggle of doubt starts to seep into your brain. That train of thought can be so damaging to your rational perception of performance.
As creatives, a large portion of our time is explaining to people what we do and reassuring them that it isn’t just a hobby or a fantasy; that the work we do is actually work and that it’s valuable, be that family members, mortgage brokers or politicians. To make it clear, Rishi - we will not retrain in cyber!
“…the most dangerous tactic this beast employs is making us believe we’re alone in the fight against it.”
The sad truth is that we’re quite accustomed to having to convince the rest of the world that what we do is worthy, but the problem starts when we have to start convincing ourselves. And it is hard. Especially as an emerging freelancer. There’s so much to navigate and learn, it’s very easy to feel like you’re failing. Even when you make a really good achievement, and you’re on a high, the low that follows after can be soul-destroying. The nature of our work means it’s often unreliable and you never know what’s coming next. You might be lucky and land a really good opportunity and then fall into something else straight away, or you might suddenly find yourself in the dreaded lull where it feels like you’re the only person on the planet who can’t find work and you’re just unemployable. It can make matters worse then, when, even in those golden periods where you do land the work, a bout of imposter syndrome comes in to convince you that perhaps you shouldn’t have gotten the job.
Everyone will find their own methods and ways of dealing with this, so I’m not going to outline a step-by-step guide to battling imposter syndrome - and if it wasn’t obvious - I’m far from being a qualified psychologist. But I think the biggest and most important thing that I’ve found myself, and observed in others, is that the most dangerous tactic this beast employs is making us believe we’re alone in the fight against it.
The truth is, everyone has these moments. Perspective is so vital. It’s easy to look at those you admire and see around you and think that they’ve got it all sorted, but remember that you don’t really know their life, their journey or mind. Whether you’ve been in industry 15 years or 15 minutes, you’re still just as vulnerable to self-doubt and you won’t be alone in it.
To round off, I want to return to the frankly damaging misconception that all of us thespians are blessed with a god-given confidence. For the longest time, part of my personal experience of imposter syndrome meant I never felt like I was ‘really’ a theatre kid - because I wasn’t confident enough. That stereotype became a trigger for me to doubt whether I was really good enough. No wonder that as creatives we all struggle so much with confidence when our whole understanding of our collective identity is based on a trait that practically most of us never experienced.
What I’ve learned along the way is that all of those people who I looked up to, who I thought had the confidence that I was lacking, were also acquainted with the same uncertainty and fears that I was. So, next time the shadow of doubt comes knocking, remember that you aren’t alone in whatever it is you are feeling, and feeling that does not mean that you don’t belong in this wacky and wonderful community. Confide in those around you and I can almost guarantee you’ll find that your feelings are shared.
Sophie x