Episode #819
- The Nature of Impostor Syndrome: Understanding its roots and why even the most successful people can feel like phonies.
- Personal Reflections: Tim and I share our personal encounters with impostor syndrome, including the challenges and breakthrough moments.
- Overcoming Self-Doubt: Practical strategies and tips for recognizing, confronting, and ultimately overcoming the crippling self-doubt that impostor syndrome brings.
- Building a Supportive Community: The importance of sharing and connecting with others who understand what you’re going through.
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Transcription
Tim Matthews 0:00
I think one of the things that can keep a lot of men trapped when they feeling like they’ve got this imposter syndrome is that nobody understands them. Nobody gets it. And they typically hide it from the people that love because they don’t want to burden them with whatever they’re going through. What would people think if they knew the real me? Well, they tell themselves if people knew this about me, then they wouldn’t like me, then whatever it may be, and that further fuels the imposter, right?
Doug Holt 0:22
What it does is it gives you the opportunity of realizing, Hey, I’m not alone. And this feeling of imposter syndrome of of somebody finding out that I’m not that good. It just dissipates because you realize, oh, crap, everybody’s got this issue. So therefore, I can’t be an imposter. And then when I start to talk to them actually find out that they’re battling with the same things I’m battling with, or maybe even overcome them. All of a sudden, I’m not an impostor anymore. I’m just a normal dude.
Doug Holt 0:58
Hey, guys, welcome back to the TPM show. You know, guys, if you ever felt like a fraud, kind of like you’re you’re hiding out and you don’t want anybody to find out. That really, you’re not as good as you think you are, or good as they think you are? Well, you’re not alone. In this episode, Tim and I are going to talk about this concept of imposter syndrome. That’s something that all of us suffer from, from time to time, we’re talking about what it is, how to overcome it, when you recognize it. And then what are some of the hacks you can do to not only recognize and overcome it, but move way past that? And as always, I’m really excited to have Tim back in the saddle. Tim, thanks for being here, brother. Of course.
Tim Matthews 1:38
It’s a pleasure.
Doug Holt 1:39
It is it is well, I’m really excited about get you back in the studio man as as we do more of these podcasts moving forward. Get them. For the guys, if you guys gotta go over to YouTube, Colton got me set up with a new setup and makes it hard because I can’t see you, Mr. Tim. But we look at this, Tim, when I think about impostor syndrome, you know, it was really interesting, I was on a call with one of the guys that I work with one on one for the year, and he was going through a really tough time. And he said, Doug, I just I wonder if I’m just not good enough. Maybe I’m just a fraud. At the end of the day, maybe I just can’t handle all the things that are coming at me, my my, my wife, my business, and this guy’s going through a rough period, we all go through rough patches. And the end of the day, he was just like, maybe I’m just an imposter. Maybe I’m just not the man that I think I am the man that looks in the mirror. And Tim, I’ve had this conversation with myself many times. You know, throughout my career, when I first started being a coach, the businesses I would start I remember when I first became a an interim CEO of a company, these these feelings of self doubt come to all of us. And at times, it can be almost devastating if you don’t catch them and move forward.
Tim Matthews 2:54
Yeah, I mean, I’d like to meet them on that hasn’t struggled. And if he really hasn’t, then I would question whether he’s really playing to win. Because as you really push your own limits and discover what you’re capable of, and continue to level up and level up. In my experience, I tend to go through this each new level, it’s always kind of precursor with this question early and naturally comes up. I mean, it can be quite healthy as well.
Doug Holt 3:27
Well it can be and keep you in check, right, your ego and check a little bit. And then I think when this comes up, the problem that happens is when that self doubt, starts to feel like a character flaw. Right? And then it immobilizes somebody from taking action. You know, I remember, gosh, way back in the day, it’s and when podcasts renew, I had another project I was doing podcasts on. And I had this whole thing. I’ve talked to guys about this before, and maybe some of the guys listening can relate. But I remember setting up for this podcast and my goal and intent was a little bit marketing but I wanted to give back right I really wanted to give back to the world and and I thought it would be a good thing. start a YouTube channel, podcasting. This is early early days, I’m sure people can go back and find videos of me and my, my 20s when I was doing this, but I remember doing the first getting set up and doing the first kind of podcast or YouTube show that I was doing. And then going Oh yeah, okay, the lighting is not good enough. Okay, so go over to Amazon, buy some lighting, you know, wait a few days comes arrives, get it set up, you know, ready to start the podcast, hit the button, start to record go oh, you know, I need a better background. So when it got a map, you know, and make it look cool, because you know, I was traveling around the world and I wanted to you know, I want everybody to be impressed by me. Then you know, wait a few more days and hit record getting ready now now get the lighting at the bet the map and everything’s gonna be ready. Oh, you know what? My camera’s not the problem. The cameras not good enough. And this goes on and on. on and on, you know, do I really realize it’s me? It’s me. That’s the issue. The content I have is great. I think, you know, at the time and I retrospect it was it was something that nobody was talking about least that I knew of in the marketplace, but was holding me back was this idea of imposter syndrome. Right? It was a subconscious belief that I had to have the right camera I had have the right lighting, or nobody would take me seriously. And it wasn’t until I actually hit record and made myself do 365 videos that it made myself do one video a day to overcome this experience. But that if I didn’t get over that negative self talk, we wouldn’t be here today. Hmm.
Tim Matthews 5:39
Yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head, when it becomes debilitating, right? Either it could hold you back, or it robs your happiness. Because we speak with a lot of guys who have achieved the dream. Yeah, the dream feels a lot more a lot more like nightmare for these guys. And a lot of it is this story that times selves have been a fraud and an imposter. What would people think if they knew the real me, just waiting for the rug to be pulled from beneath them? And it should robbing them of happiness and fulfillment? And it’s terrible? Because they’re in a position where they thought that everything that was going to be the answer, when they realize it’s not to feel even more lost than before?
Doug Holt 6:24
Yeah, when when something, you know, rubs up against your beliefs, right? As an example, you know, talk to I’ve talked to a guy last week, and he thought when he hit, you know, a certain amount in his net worth, who happened to be over 20 million for him and his net worth, then everything would be great. Right? Everything would come together. And when he hit that net worth, which he did, it didn’t it was actually worse. He didn’t have that high that fulfillment. You know, his marriage didn’t get better. All of a sudden, his kids didn’t love him more. All of a sudden, he didn’t become a better man. And so his story started come wait a minute. Am I just a pasta? Am I really just a failure? That was I lying to myself this whole time about being a good father by being a good husband, about being a powerful man as we define it, the power within? And it was really crippling for him, you know, and it really hit he had kind of a depressive state, if you will. And he didn’t want people to find out, right? He didn’t want people to notice on social media, right, that things weren’t really good behind closed doors. He didn’t want people to find out in his community. What would they think? If you know he’s, you know, they find out that this successful guy, this leader in the community, this leader at his church, or they found out that really inside he was crumbling, right, he was falling, the world was falling around him, you have the self doubt. And it’s because he had this imposter syndrome, this debilitating feeling, you know, when he told me was something was very serious. He said, Doug, I’m literally thinking about suicide almost every day, just ending it. It’s just too much. It’s just too much, and I can’t take it anymore. Now, clearly, you and I take these conversations extremely seriously. And he was able to move past it was just really, and we’ll talk about these tricks or ways that you can not tricks, but hacks, if you will, of how you can set yourself up for success. Is that something that you’ve ever experienced him?
Tim Matthews 8:13
Yeah, I was just having a look at a couple of guys tell me today. What did the sex actually write down it, it really struck home, I had it all and I was miserable. I had reached the point where this particular guy had worked for decades to get to the peak of his career, built the dream home, had all the trappings of success, yet it was miserable. And the other guys that have made it to the top of the mountain, but I realized Money doesn’t buy happiness. And yeah, I’m at the top of the mountain, but I’m alone. And I’ve burned people on the way as well, because, you know, people hurt people at the end of the day. And for some of these guys with this impostor syndrome, they can end up lashing out because they don’t know how to deal with it. You know, we speak about the five agonist quite a lot, don’t we? And the first agony is greed. It’s feeling like no matter what you have, it’s never enough. And then it can lead to anger and then shame. But underneath Allah, there’s this story that’s fueling it. And a lot of the guys struggle to really pinpoint what the story is, or even what it is they’re feeling. Because of that they really struggle to find a solution as well.
Doug Holt 9:20
Yeah. It happens to all of us. And I think one of the keys was, this is why when men, I started working with a guy, initially, one of the first things I do is have him start recording his wins, right? Because it’s easy to look at your losses. And if you’re constantly looking at your losses, which is normal, right? For as far as businessman, we’re looking for problems to solve. We’re looking for constraints in our business, we can go up to the next level. You know, I’m as guilty as anybody with this. I feel like I find problems within the business every single day. However, if we’re doing this daily in our own lives, whether it be in our marriage or in our personal lives, we start to feel like an impostor because we see all these failures Right, the things that could be better. And then we create a gap, a gap between where we are and where we think we should be. And it’s within that gap that this imposter syndrome slips in, if you will, because we have this vision of who we could or should be, right should be in the operative word here. And we have that vision of who we should be, we’re not there. And therefore, we think that people believe that we’re, we should also be at that same place. And there’s the gap between where we really are, right, because if you do a self assessment of yourself, right, then you realize that there’s some gaps in your game, we all have gaps in our game, no one’s really running at 100% optimization. You know, some guys, most guys that I talked to, you are running about 60% or so by their own self assessment. And so within that gap that’s created between the man you are today and the man that you know, you could be a impostor syndrome slips in, and he start counting all your failures. Ah, you know, maybe I didn’t do the work. Or maybe this is a problem. I’m not as nice to my kids as they should be. Watch too much Netflix, I’m not a good lover, whatever the story may be. And so one of the first things I do Tim, when I’m starting to work with a man is I haven’t stopped recording his wins. So one quick tip is do the self assessment but grab a journal or notebook for us in TPM, right, we use the chart of intentional living for businessmen, right, it’s called we call the coil for short. And in that chart of intentional living, one thing I want you to do, or grab a piece of paper, is write down at least the minimum, five wins every day. Now, even if you’re having a shit day, you can come up with five wins, right? The fact that you’re listening to something right now or watching us on YouTube, right, you’re bettering yourself, that’s a win. Right? If you if you’re even like, Doug, I just don’t understand how bad my life is, well, look, you have connectivity to the internet, otherwise, you couldn’t be hearing me, right. So that’s a win, you’re probably a business owner, that’s the one you’re alive, make it easy. The key here is to make these wins as easy as possible when you’re starting out. Now eventually, over time, these wins will start to build on each other, right, you’ll start to be more elaborate with your wins, if you will, those wins will be in your relationship wins with yourself wins in your business wins with your kids, wins in your health, wins in your wealth. Maybe it’s even wins in your spirituality that you want to really conquer. But we have to do or you get to do is choose five wins every single day. Now, the reason this is important is twofold. One is we’re going to repattern your brain, your brain is now going to start focusing on wins rather than problems. This is a big, big deal. And by doing this repetitiously you’ll actually create new neural synapses in the brain that we’re going to fire off and you’re going to start seeing more wins in your life. Once you start seeing more wins, of course, you start getting more wins. It’s just the way it works. The second reason we’re going to do this, and we want you to keep this in a separate journal, is when you hit those low points, like the two men that I mentioned, in this episode, the two men that I talked to, they can go back and refer to their journals, right? Maybe your wins are all just about why you’re such a great dad. And the next time you feel like a shit Dad, you open your journal. Oh, that’s right. I took my son camping. Oh, that’s right, I took my daughter to soccer practice every single day. Oh, that’s right. I took the kids to the piano to the school conference, or whatever it is, you’re going to start looking back and reading your wins. And that’s going to elevate you and help you break through this imposter syndrome. And once you break through that impostor syndrome guys, you close the distance of the gap between the man that you are and the man that you know you can be that gap gets smaller, thus, ergo you are becoming a better man.
Tim Matthews 13:51
I love that. I think another thing to give these guys as well as to, for them to realize they’re not alone. Yeah. There’s so many guys that we work with, even up and today on the inner circle call one of the men in there who he actually said he was one that said I made it to the top of the mountain. And it didn’t buy me happiness. And this guy, you know, sold his company for over 50 million. So it was a significant amount of cash. As we were going through the the inner circle call today. And he’s new to the group. He’s been in there a couple of weeks, he found it very refreshing and comfort in knowing that he’s around other high caliber men that share some have shared some of the same struggles. Because I think one of the things that can keep a lot of men trapped when they feeling like they’ve got this imposter syndrome is that nobody understands them, nobody gets it, and that they should be happy. And that story of I should be happy makes them feel more ashamed or more guilty than not happy. And they typically hide it from the people that love because they don’t want to burden them with whatever they’re going through. So try and hide it and pretend like everything’s okay when in reality To the people around them consensus, something’s off, they can feel it or see it. In my experience when they start opening up and sharing and finding other men who have been through something similar, the other guys share their experience. And they realize that the definitely not alone, far from being alone, I think that can really help them to alleviate and close a gap, essentially. Well,
Doug Holt 15:23
yeah, I mean, what they say is iron sharpens iron. And I remember, and I’ve talked about this before on the podcast, I distinctly remember this for some reason is I was in fifth grade, and my fifth grade homeroom teacher, so you rotated different classes, or what have you, at this particular school that I was at, she had this like, you know, paper mache, or that teachers put on, you know, the walls. And it said, birds of a feather flock together. So choose your friends wisely. And I mocked it, you know, and I don’t know why it stuck in my head, though, I can’t remember much more. I don’t know the teacher’s name or anything else about her. But this friggin thing that she had on the on the wall, I just remember, it sticks out in my mind. And what I found over the years, right since now, in 47, it’s true, is the people you surround yourself with is going to make all the difference in the world. And that’s why, you know, we have over 1400 active men within TPM right now. And we break guys down into smaller groups called packs. And within those packs, you’re gonna find business leaders who share the same virtues and values that you do. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be here, right? We just don’t attract those kinds of guys. And when you’re in that pack, you start to find out, hey, I’m not alone. And men start to share the real deal because they’re in a safe environment. What I mean by safe is not not only physically safer, it’s not like everybody’s sitting there, you know, talking but guys are just open and honest. It’s like the open kimono effect. Guys don’t hold back. And so guys, we’ll talk about financial dealings or business problems or businessman, so they talk about business, but also problems in their marriage or problems with being a father, right? Sometimes you feel guilty about being a dad about not showing up the way you want to maybe snap at your kids. Maybe instead of playing with them, you throw in Netflix or YouTube or work because you just don’t know what to do. But when you have those feelings, you share those and you find out oh, wow, there’s three other guys in this group have the same thing. Or every guy’s been through that you’re able to shatter that impostor syndrome effect. And that’s the key with having that brotherhood around you. Big
Tim Matthews 17:22
time. Big time. We’ve seen that happen time and time again. It’s it’s literally like a weight has been lifted from the guys when they share something they’ve been carrying so heavily for so long. And then they risk and share it and realize oh, yeah, I’ve been through that. No problem. It’s like, why are you just gonna say so nonchalantly? Like is nothing I’ve been carrying this thing for years. Yet when they do choose to share it, like I say that the weight lifts so easily and quickly? Well,
Doug Holt 17:54
I think that’s the thing, right? When you see somebody who has the same problem, but they’ve conquered it, right? That makes you inspired you gives you hope. Right? And especially if they can give you tips like wait, okay, you’re in the valley, you’re in the darkness right now the tunnel, if you will, of this situation in your life, whether it be business or anything else, if they’ve been in that same tunnel, and they know the way out, they can show you in fact, what they can do is probably show you a shortcut, like so instead of taking years and years to this is an example we have The Activation Method for relationships, which is designed to help married businessmen, fix their marriages bring the passion back into the relationships. And so with that, the reason we’ve done is we’ve gotten men, myself included, who have actually solved this problem, instead of taking years to try to figure it out, you stumble through marriage, we’re going to give you a short shortcut and a matter of weeks, that are going to give you the tools to get there. It’s the same thing within the packs. And within the groups, especially when you’re playing at a high level like the men in the inner circle, which is our highest level mastermind group. Those guys are playing big games, right? Some of them are multiple businesses, we’re talking, you know, their players out there in the world. And the thing that’s always interesting to me, Tim, is these guys are playing, they’ve been very successful in business, not because they’re stupid. It’s because they’re smart, right? And they create the time for these meetings. And What’s always interesting to me, is the guys who haven’t been successful in business, always say, Well, I don’t have the time. I don’t have the time to do this. I don’t have the time to work on myself. I don’t have the time. It’s it’s ridiculous. Success leaves clues. If these very successful people are investing in themselves, they are taking action. They’re surrounding themselves by other people of the same ilk, if you will. Then why wouldn’t you write? Why wouldn’t you? That’s what I do. I saw people around me. And when I started seeing really successful people and sitting when I was in Santa Barbara, and I found out Wait a minute, these guys meet together. You know that It’s interesting. They’re in their own little group. Hmm. Wonder what those conversations are like? What kind of conversation is that group having at lunch, or online now, now that we’re able to do this virtually back then it just didn’t really happen. So now that you can create that space, what it does is it gives you the opportunity to realize that, hey, I’m not alone. And this feeling of imposter syndrome of, of somebody finding out that I’m not that good. It just dissipates because you realize, oh, crap. One is, you know, nobody’s watching me and thinking the things that I think they’re thinking to, you know, everybody’s got this issue, so therefore, I can’t be an imposter.
Tim Matthews 20:38
Yeah, exactly. And especially when we see at The Alpha Reset, as well, it’s one thing seen on the virtually the group calls, but we see that shift happen in The Alpha Reset when the guy is really sharing some of that deep, deepest, darkest concerns, really and fears, the ways in which regret probably is a better word when they share those deep, dark, dark regrets. That the ones that they keep carrying with them, whereby people, well, they tell themselves, if people knew this about me, then they wouldn’t like me or then whatever it may be, and that further fuels the imposter, right? Well, we actually get those things off the chest in a group of other men, who are also business leaders to your point. It’s incredible. And it’s one thing online, it’s great online, and we see a similar thing, but to have the guys in person as well, I can do it The Alpha Reset, is just the different.
Doug Holt 21:34
Well, it is because right, this again, was going to go back to that gap idea, Tim, is if I think wow, I’m an imposter. I don’t know, as a dad, I’m gonna keep using x is kind of neutral, that I’m a dad. And then all of a sudden, I see these I’m in a room virtually or in person. Have other guys who look like amazing fathers, I’m gonna feel less than I’m like, man, these guys are all amazing fathers, they’re, you know, they’re taking their kids to baseball games and all these things and man and what a shit dad I am. And then when I start to talk to them actually find out that they’re battling with the same things I’m battling with, or maybe even overcome them. All of a sudden, I’m not an imposter anymore. I’m just a normal dude. I’m a normal guy, working his way through life. I’m on this journey of becoming a better man, a powerful man if you will. And so that helps it dissipate really, really quickly. And so got to understand that when imposter syndrome kicks in, if we don’t recognize it, and squash it as soon as we can, it has psychological tolls on us that carry over, right, because we feel less than we’re a little bit down on ourselves, we take care of that energy, whether we try to fake it till you make it or not, you carry that into your home, when you walk in the door, your wife can pick up on that. Or she can pick up on the fact that you’re down or you feel like a fraud or a fake, you know, and that’s not sexy, your wife’s not there just to pick you up, you’re not another child to her, or your kids, right? You want to give your kids the best version of yourself, not the one who’s just always down and talking negatively about yourself or whatever else you may be. And then your business, right, your business is not going to operate at its highest level, if you as the leader are battling this whole thing of imposter syndrome. Now, again, we all have it. It’s really just like arguments in our marriage. We all argue in a marriage. Everybody pretty much does. There are a few exceptions. But it’s how quickly you get through those. You know, when my wife and I used to argue would be like two weeks if not more, before we come back together because we’re so bullheaded, and now it’s literally seconds. If yeah, sometimes minutes when I can, I’m still a little bullheaded at times. But it really is quick. But you can do the same thing with imposter syndrome. So here, here are two things that I want you guys to do coming out of this, and Tim throw in any that you have as well. But there are two things that I want you guys to do. One, I want you to grab a journal right? If you don’t have a journal already if you’re in, you’ve been through the movement, TPM, go ahead and grab your coil, the chart of intentional living for businessmen. And what I want you to start doing is writing a minimum as a minimum of five wins a day. Now, bonus points, if there’s a particular area of your life that’s not working as well as you’d like to like, Maybe you feel like an imposter. As I’ll keep using the analogy. As a father, I want you to find five wins as being a father, find five of them. And again, one of them can be the fact that you’re here. Now with Gemini, that could be one that’s an easy one for you. And it actually is authentic, right? There’s not a lot of people out there. It’s a very low percentage that better themselves. You know, we have over a million downloads of the show. But if you look at the grand scheme of things in the population, there’s very few people there’s even fewer people that take action guys, so be one of those guys. So five wins minimum bonus points. If you’re in our community and you want to share those. I love it, love to see them. The second thing I want you to do if you’re doing this is starting reviewing your wins each and every week. Right, so I bet you five wins a day. You guys can do the math. Five times seven, right? So you got those 35 wins every single week that you want to look at, review them, and stack them. And if you want to, you can do what Tim and I do is every month, you review the whole month, and you review those wins, you review them, and you’re going to start building on yourself, I’m going to use the analogy, the father again. And now if I’ve got a building a case like a lawyer or a solicitor would do, right now, all of a sudden, I’ve got all this evidence that Doug is an amazing father, right. And so when I do get crippled, when I do get backed up against the fact of, I’m feeling like I’m not good enough, because I want to watch Netflix, rather than getting on the ground and playing with my kids, because I’ve had a hard day or whatever else it is, I start to feel guilt, I start to feel shame, I can go back and look at that historical evidence of how great of a father I am. And I could allow myself to relax, allow myself to enjoy the Netflix or choose to play whatever it is, but I can do it guilt and shame free. And that’s a huge difference. Guys.
Tim Matthews 25:58
I love that. One thing I’d throw in is lovely to find another guy who you can open up to, and to share with him what it is that you’re feeling. And it might be a little bit weird. So begin with that, hey, this might be a little bit weird. But can I just share something with you just call out the elephant in the room, allow yourself to claim that he’s gonna be weird or strange, or whatever it may be. And just share with him what it is you’re experiencing. Now, depending on who you have in your life, that will dictate the response that you get from them, some people will be shocked and wonder what to do with it. And it’s okay, other people may open up as well and say, Hey, I’ve been feeling something similar. But you’re not doing it to get any kind of response, but just begin to open up and share it with somebody. Now if you’re in the movement, obviously, you have the benefit of sharing it with whoever you would like and you know, the kind of response you’re gonna get, you’re gonna get a brother that’s there for you that is going to hold space for you and really enable you to really go to those places that you want to go and that you need to go, quite frankly. But if you’re not in the movement, then you could go into the Facebook group, put share in there, you could take a further step and booking with one of the advisors because they will ask you certain questions in order to get clarity on your situation, that is a really great opportunity to get honest and real. But if you don’t do any of that, then like I said, find somebody you could do this with and just begin to share. I know it might seem scary. It might seem weird. It may be very private person. But I would really invite you to challenge some of the stories you have about why you’ve got to keep this to yourself, and just begin to share.
Doug Holt 27:48
I love it. I love it guys in the movement, share with your coach, right a coach can help you look through this and look through your stories. Look through your limiting beliefs so much quicker. There’s one asset that we have, that we can’t get back. Right, that’s time. And so by doing the things that Tim and I are sharing with you, you can compress time, shorten the gap here from the man you are today to the man that you know you can be. And that’s what we want for you. And again, like Tim said, if you want to talk to one of our advisors, you want a shortcut to that. Just go to the powerful man.com forward slash apply now that’s the powerful man.com forward slash apply now, guys don’t waste time. And remember impostor syndrome, we all face it, right? I face it, Tim faces it, you face it the guy next to you driving or run on the treadmill. They face it and recognize that the key here is taking steps to get over it. Be a man that takes action as we always say, in the moment of insight take massive action. We’ll see you next time on the TPM show.
