Tag: imposter syndrome

A Free Food Dream Adventure

I was in a store with friends. This clean, mostly white, and well-lit place was like a fancy grocery store. No friends from real life were present but the people there were all known to me as friends. I knew that we were there for the second time. The first time, we’d made minor purchases. Liking the place, we returned to buy more.

So, we’re in line to pay, and we’re comparing how much our purchases will probably cost. Most of what we’re buying is food, especially cheese and bread, it seems like. The owner, a young and petite white woman with black curly hair and red lips, is behind a counter ringing up purchases.

I estimate to my friends that I’m buying several hundred dollars of food. Then it’s my turn and I step up to pay but the owner waves me off. She tells me that she knows who I am, that I’m a writer that she admires, and that she loves my books. I’m perplexed as I’ve only self-published a few books and had a few stories sold, so I tell her that I think she’s thinking of someone else. No, she insists, she knows me, knows who I am, and I will never need to pay for anything in her store. Her insistence stirs guilt in me; that’s not the way the system is supposed to work. I’m also flattered but doubtful. We talk more; she stays on point. I surrender and walk out without paying.

Dream end.

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Well, It’s Obvious

Daily writing prompt
Share a lesson you wish you had learned earlier in life.
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I’ve not read others’ posts about lessons they wished they’d learned earlier in life yet. I wouldn’t be surprised if others express the same lesson learned which I learned, a lesson I’ve learned several times. It’s simple: trust yourself. Though I’m not the smartest or wisest individual, I need to trust my intelligence. Though not the most talented, trust my talents. Pay attention to the little voice when it’s trying to encourage me and pay attention when it’s warning me.

Pause, here, to note, I feel naked staking this claim, naked, vulnerable, egotistical, and needy. But I’m swallowing those things to push myself to be honest and open here, to share this so that others can take a lesson from my lesson.

My self-confidence was frequently smothered when I was young. I kept getting bludgeoned by a stepfather who told me I was stupid. He told me that all the time: “You’re stupid. You don’t think.” That recurring process eroded my self-confidence. I started shutting my mouth, retiring to a place to be stupid by myself, becoming a loner. I was and am comfortable as a loner, so that wasn’t that great a change. But my doubt about my potential was really a killer. Since I stayed quiet and didn’t participate in things, I constantly surprised classmates with high test scores, good grades, and accomplishments. When honors came my way later, people were astonished. Then, later, people nicknamed me ‘The Professor’.

Yet, I continued to doubt my skills and abilities. I still do. Everything I attempt requires not one but several pep talks. That usually accompanies procrastination until I build up the courage to make an attempt to myself out, to brace myself to be exposed as an imposter. It also causes me to overtry, which can also end in bad results. In short, like bunches of other people, I’m a headcase.

I have come a long way. Some minor successes have fed that. My wife’s trust in me has fed it, too. So have comments and support from friends and bosses. And teachers; my teachers often saw and cultivated good things in me, and I owe them a doubt too large to ever be fully repaid. I’ve been fortunate in that I have had good friends, good teachers, and good bosses. Despite them, I keep forgetting that lesson about myself. My self-confidence gets smothered again and again. I still hear my stepfather telling me, “You’re stupid.” I do keep learning the lesson that I’m not, but I wish I could keep that lesson in the forefront of my being: trust yourself. You’re not stupid.

You’re better than you imagine yourself to be.

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One More Time

Daily writing prompt
What strategies do you use to cope with negative feelings?
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I regularly endure negative feelings, but weirdly, I consider myself an optimist.

Dealing with negative feelings, though, had to be, um, dealt with. By the time that I was in my teens, I knew that I tended to be negative. I’ve always felt like an imposter, less capable, less intelligent, less talented, than others give me credit for being. It’s difficult for me to accept praise. I literally cringe from it.

I found answers in books. From them, I evolved some coping mechanisms.

One, I write down the worse that I think can happen from a given situation. Somehow, writing that down like that lays bare my concerns. It helps me visualize that the likelihood of many of my fears are not as great as they loom in my mind. Secondly, writing them down helps me develop insights into how to counter these fears and make them less likely to come about. It also helps me perceive the emotional side, where my negative feelings reside, and the intellectual side, where the wherewithal to learn, try, and succeed, actually resides.

Next, I learned to grit my teeth and accept that I will not succeed at everything I attempt. I will often fail. But if I don’t give up and try again, then I can learn from my mistakes, keep trying, and maybe, just possibly, succeed.

Third, I let myself rail at myself. I do this alone and I’m pretty hard on myself. But after railing, I feel an emotional release. I’m ready to take a deep breath and try again.

Lastly, I let myself procrastinate. I know that probably sounds flimsy as hell, but giving myself time to find the right energy to take things on has proven to help me overcome my fears and worries. Along the way, hand in glove with that, it gives me time to think back on similar situations where I thought I would fail or something bad would happen, but then ended up with a good outcome. That fosters encouragement that maybe this isn’t as bad as I’m making it out to be.

And now, really, lastly, I learned to laugh at myself. To not take myself and my failures or my successes too seriously. I learned how to have fun while trying these things, to admit that I screwed up, to mock myself for screwing up.

That always made it easier to try one…more…time.

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Driving With Dad Dream

Another slice of the nocturnal mind’s workings to share.

To begin, I’m with my father. Each of us are similar to our real life appearances but I think we both were a little younger.

I’m getting an award. I don’t know what it’s for. Dad wants to attend. He tells me, “We’ll go together. We’ll drive there.”

He gestures toward a car. A silver behemoth, it may have been manufactured in the 1930s and features a long wheelbase — think of a large SUV here — running boards, an upright radiator, and spindly, narrow wheels and tires. Its condition is show-car perfect.

“What is that?” I ask. I see from looking around that he has other, more modern cars but still several decades old. All are well cared for. A graceful, polished gray model’s dazzling shine catches my eye from one.

In answer, he says, “You drive. We better get going. It doesn’t have a high top speed.”

I am floored. At that moment, two sisters arrive. They want to go with us.

Dad is against that. Telling them so, he finishes, “But I want you there. Take one of my other cars.”

A large steel garage door which was previously unnoticed grinds open. Behind it are modern sports and luxury cars. “Take one of those cars,” Dad says.

My sisters are already clamboring into a new red Mazda Miata. I say, “Why can’t we take one of those?”

Dad responds with non-sequitors. I interrupt him. “If you want to ride with me, why don’t we take one of those cars?” I see a BMW in the garage. “Like that blue BMW. Why don’t we take it?”

Evasive as before, Dad basically declares, “I want to take this car.”

We climb into his old car. I ask, “Is this a Bugatti?”

Dad doesn’t respond. Firing up the old machine, I keep looking for clues about what it is.

That’s where the dream ends.

I tote this dream down as another manifestation of unspoken worries and doubts about my life and where it’s at. Pretty standard stuff. Retired from corporate and military careers, I’ve staked a lot of time and hope on writing fiction. I’m driven to write, but will it go anywhere beyond my computer? Or, as the dream suggests to me, am I interested in trying another vehicle?

As I pass over the post again, though, the driving theme raises new questions. Writing = driving. Whether I want to or not, I need to go on. Some of my choices seem taken away from me by some deeper driving force within me.

Looking at it another way, though, I can point out, it’s a silver car I’m being forced into, a classic which is in good condition, and I’m driving off to collect an award. Looking at it that way, my subconscious is encouraging me to go with what I’m doing.

It’s amusing how these dream elements can be addressed. Even if I find success beyond writing for myself, I think that I’ll always be wrestling with the drive and need to write, and my doubts. Just part of my imposter syndrome surfacing again.

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The Quarters Dream

To begin, something had gone wrong with the engineering. Unexpected failures in a system were causing problems. Root cause analysis was leading nowhere.

But I, a non-engineer, had been speaking with a supplier. His comments and concerns led me to insights and conclusions. Now I just needed to prove them. To do that, I discovered that quarters put in a certain place would expose the shortcoming. I then began collecting quarters to find and then mark the failed pieces. All the parts were white and black. This assembly wasn’t large, about the size of a hand drill.

Everyone was being hostile toward me about. I’m a non-engineer. What could I know. During conversations and meetings, the supplier decided they needed to cover up their failures so they hid those units in a stack of other units. I was going through them, trying to find them.

As I did that, the engineers announced their frustration and irritation, and because of that, they were going on a trip. I told them to take quarters with them, not for testing, but to use to call back for help when a system failed, stranding them. The chief engineer, a short, angry white man with a gray burr cut, didn’t like the suggestion, didn’t like me, and told me all of this while his engineering staff stood around him, nodding their approval of his comments. The all left.

I was determined to prove myself and continued my search and uncovered a stash of failed units. Using all my quarters, I marked then, then hid them so others couldn’t hide them.

End dream.

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A Dream of Five

Oh, we’d been working, a long, hard period. There’d been many of us but now…well, the situation was different. Changing parameters meant only five remained, plus the overseers. I didn’t know who any of these were, outside of myself. Selected as one of the final five, I felt privileged and flattered. Then, classic imposter syndrome kicked in. I had no idea of what was going on.

It seemed like different things were ‘going on’. We were trying to help someone else find direction. There was a map to that effect. But we needed to gain their trust. Also, how did we convey map directions to them? Borders and other problems precluded simple, direct methods.

A huge map dominated one wall. I was summarizing to myself. Fix the borders. Define them. Find the person we were to help. Gain their trust. Get them over the border.

The map seemed to be taking shape. Mountains dominated — very mountainous place. We were adding borders but I stayed mystified. Why were we the ones finding the borders? Didn’t the borders already exist? Asking these questions, I learned in roundabout manner, the borders were known but were lost, so we’re recovering them.

We thought we’d done a pretty good job. Black borders were drawn in, though some areas, like in the south, remained open.

But the overseer was furious. She told us, “You’ve drawn a face.” I looked at the map but didn’t see it. “These are not the borders. You’re running out of time. What is wrong with you? Get it done.”

This berating restored my bewilderment and confusion. Worse, to me, it seemed to make sense to the other four. But I couldn’t comprehend it. What was wrong with me?

I was beginning to feel left out. Abandoned. The other four turned attention to drawing the other to us and gaining his trust. I was befuddled about who the other was. They all knew and seemed to think that I should know. With some surprise and suspicion, I thought a few of the other five were different people. When did that happen? Had they changed?

One stormed in with an idea. He — the one we were trying to lure to us — whoever that was — was a Niki Lauda fan. While I knew about Niki Lauda, this revelation only deepened my confusion. But, wanting to belong, I spouted Niki Lauda info that I knew. Niki Lauda, young scion of a wealthy family. Getting a loan to go racing. Racing in the seventies and eighties. Three time Formula 1 world champion. Big accident, almost killed. Retired from racing, had a failed business, Lauda Air, returned to racing. Also raced BMWs, didn’t he?

Wasn’t sure about that last but saying these things earned a greater measure of trust from the other four. We decided that we needed to rest. There was one bed. The five of us got into it together and rested, shoulder to shoulder on our backs, like we were in coffins. None of us slept. We were too keyed. So much remained to be done. What else did we need to do? The time was almost upon us.

I still didn’t know much but I felt better because I was more accepted and included by the rest. One would always pause to ensure that I was there whenever they went off to do something else.

We had some sort of breakthrough. The end was near. Naturally, I didn’t understand. We were so tired and hungry by then. Going to a new location, a venue where a celebration had been held, we stole in to find food and drink. You can’t be in here, we were told. You must leave. But another said, you can come in.

We went in. A woman came over and told us that we must leave. Another came in and told her that we could stay for a few minutes. She also said there was leftovers for us to eat. They had chicken. Would I like chicken?

Yes, I said. They brought me a bucket. Here’s a piece in here for you, I was told. That’s not chicken, I thought as I picked it up. Something about what it was made me not want to eat it. One of the other four said they would eat it, and took it from me. He tore into it. Rabbit, we all realized, it was a fried rabbit breast. Why would they tell us it was chicken? They lied to us.

I shuffled into another place. There, I saw people dressed in very fancy evening dress who’d been present for a celebration. The celebration was over. They were preparing to leave. A server, male, in white coat and black bow tie, brought me a cup and shot glass on a gold tray. He spoke soothingly to me as he poured a clear liquid in the shot glass and espresso into the cup. I told him I couldn’t drink that now. He reassured me, firmly stating, “Oh, you need to drink both of these now.”

Dream end.

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Stuck In Arsehold

I was stuck in Arsehold for the last two weeks. You may have experienced the same.

I’ve been writing a novel while locked away. That’s not so different from my normal life, where I’m always working on a novel. Many people think I’m working on one novel forever and a day, but I’ve finished many. I shrug them off; I enjoy novel writing.

I think under ordinary circumstances, this would have been finished a few months ago. These aren’t normal times, at least for me. I’m assuming a lot with those words. It’s sadly probably normal for quite a few people to stay locked up in one place, with limited contact for other people. I think of prisons. Nursing homes. Hospitals. Yeah, getting downright depressing, isn’t it?

Some say that such solitude is a gift. I’m not one. While I’m a solitary person, I like outside stimulation. (Sounds a bit naughty, doesn’t it?) Like to walk to clear my mind, shift into writing mode, and slip into the noisy solitude of a good cuppa coffee in a coffee shop, hunch over my laptop, and tap away.

All that normal-for-me isn’t available now. Coronavirus lockdown, you know. Although I have coffee and space, I also have wife and cats. They struggle with my writing boundaries. My wife tries respecting them, but news of the world sets her off. I also don’t try enforcing my isolation with her, as she’s in the same situation as me. She’s much more verbal, however, and craves other contact. While she’s dancing and exercising Monday through Friday via Zoom, and meets with her book club once a month with Zoom, and Zooms into a coffee klatch almost every week, she likes expressing her opinions and insights vigorously and out loud. There’s usually a lot of swearing involved, too. She’s quite passionate about social justice, equality, human rights, and women’s rights. She also hates Trump and has little respect for most other Republicans. So I try to indulge, but then I suffer. Either way, one of us must suffer in our situation. We get over it, but it’s not ideal.

The cats, however, don’t give a damn that I’m writing, reading, playing a game, sleeping, eating, showering, or sitting on the toilet. Three cats share ownership over me. They have their own secret agendas, which surprisingly, often involves me. Part of that is which cat owns the most of me, and whether that’s acceptable to the other cats.

Between wife, news of the world, the coming and going of the muses, and the cats, novel writing progress has been uneven.

But I persevere. Sometimes, the worse interruption is by me to myself. Self-doubt. Imposter syndrome. General malaise. It struck hardest in Arsehold.

Arsehold is a place in my novel, wholly made up. I came up with the name months ago, a whim that made me laugh. I stuck with it, creating the setting around the name, devising the history of how it came to be. Yet, my characters struggled to get through Arsehold. I naturally responded, per my proclivities, to overanalyze what was going on and why, attempting to seek the root of my issues. I thought it might be the general tone. Perhaps some of the introduced characters weren’t clear enough. Maybe, maybe my characters shouldn’t be in Arsehold. And what happens after Arsehold?

Writing helps me think by creating a funnel through which I must focus. With all this mental flaying, I did a lot of writing about the novel in progress, addressing the concept, characters, story, plot, locations and settings, etc. Eventually, I took all the assembled material of the novel in progress, one hundred twenty-five thousand words, and began reading, editing, and revising, putting the story into the order that I think it’ll be in published form.

That helped. By the time I’d reached Arsehold (almost sounds like a song lyric — I can hear CCR doing stuck in Arsehold instead of Lodi), I’d discovered that the errors that I thought I was seeing weren’t there. It always scares me to think or say, hey, this is pretty damn good, about what I’m writing, but that’s what I concluded. Of course, it’s my work; if I didn’t think it was good, maybe I should be working on something else, right?

Anyway, I think I might get through Arsehold this week (knock on wood, he said, tapping the side of his head). Got my coffee; time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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Three out of Five Dreams

Three out of five dreams. It sounds like one of those old commercials about dentists and gum.

Of my five remembered dreams last night, two were intriguing but don’t pester my brain as the others do. The last one was downright depressing.

In the first of the three, I’d come to have a new Aston Martin roadster. Gorgeous car, ticketing out to a quarter million dollars. Deciding to keep it, I forged documents to show myself as the owner. Then I drove it around, showing it off.

People were admiring. I basked in it. Young friends asked for rides. I obliged, turning off traction control and shredding expensive tires with smoky burnouts.

Then…I started wondering, what’s going to happen? How will this end? They company will realize that the documents are forgeries. I thought, I need to get it back to them, and began crazy plotting to do that.

I assign this dream to the imposter syndrome surfacing yet again.

The second dream, brief, was amusing and sardonic.

I was in a large warehouse sort of building. Pale green, it was well-lit. Several others were with me. As we walked around and looked around — the dream provided no excuse for this setting — someone said, “What do all those buttons and switches do?”

And I, still looking up at the ceiling, answered, “Try them and see. That’s what I always do.”

Yeah, see? I always press my own buttons.

In the third dream to be discussed, I was leaving one overseas location to go home. I don’t think I was in the military…at first.

Ah, yes: confused identity. Still fall back on identifying myself in the military as who I am.

There was a gathering first…for someone else, another, who was younger. I supported that, giving gifts. I had a collection of things I wanted to keep together. Some many things were happening in parallel, all became a hasty rush. Going to leave — because it was time — someone gave me a pile of shredded docs and torn papers.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“That stuff you wanted to keep because it was important.”

I was incredulous, of course. “It’s all destroyed.”

“But it’s all there.”

They thought was a joke.

I tried shaking it off. Champagne was there.

“Let’s have champagne to celebrate my friend.” I picked up the bottle and unwrapped the cork, then popped it off. It discharged with tired energy, barely emitting a pop and shooting off about six feet. So dismaying.

Champagne foamed out. I stoppered it with my thumb. “We need glasses.” All started searching for something to pour the champagne in. No drinking glasses could be found. We improvised with paper cups that we made.

Then I was off to leave. You ever see the show, “Burn Notice”? Bruce Campbell plays Sam Axe in it; he sometimes employs a fake identity, Chuck Finley.

Well, here was Bruce as Sam, saying he was Chuck, accompanying me to the checkpoint.

I’m in an Air Force uniform now, last in light. An old guy is checking me through. You put your name onto a clipboard and sign it, then produce your document. He was looking for a form 126. I didn’t have my form 126. I searched and searched. I had it earlier; now it was gone.

“Then you can’t go in,” he said.

Sam Axe to the inspector, “Come on, buddy, can’t you cut him a break?”

The inspector just looked at him.

Sam tried again. “You know who he is?” He indicates me. “You don’t want to piss him off.”

I pulled out my wallet, the one purchased in the Philippines long ago. I still have it, it’s lovely, but I don’t use it. In the dream, it started falling apart in my hands. “My wallet,” I said. “I bought this in the Philippines when I was young.”

The inspector graced me with a sad headshake and walked away. Sam said, “Well, I tried.” He handed me clothes and walked off.

I was in my uniform. I would change now. I removed my Air Force trousers and put on the new trousers. They were about two feet too long and way too large at the waist. They also emitted a weird black dust.

Sighing, I removed them, intending to put my uniform back on. A tour group of women arrived, talking about books, as I was changing. “One woman said, “Sir, you need to leave. You’re in our way.”

Ouch. Dream end.

I half-awoke with dreams drifting through my head. Grey morning light dully lit the room. A cat could be heard puking in the other room.

Ouch.

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The Pants Dream

Yep, here we go, another pants dream.

It began with being at work. I was settling into a new place. It was an open work space. The CEO, who seemed to like me a great deal, was showing me around the place and introducing me to others.

He showed me my work space. Big desk, computer, etc., off to one side of everyone else, besides some steps that went up to a loft area where there were more work spaces. After he told me my assignments, he left. I got to work and finished very quickly. I then began hunting something else to do. Walking around the place, I had a sense that I didn’t belong. After a bit of that, I ventured to visit with the CEO to express that.

Busy with clients, he couldn’t see me right then, but I told his assistant that I didn’t think I was the right fit. She told me not to do anything, be patient, and she’d pass the message on, and then the CEO would speak with me.

I told another friendly co-worker that I didn’t think I fit. He tried to convince me that I did, but really lacked any solid points.

My wife arrived to see if I could go to lunch. Yes, I could, but I needed to change my clothes. I was in shorts. Thinking myself underdressed, I wanted to put on pants.

I’d brought some pants with me to the office. The first pair were dirty, so I didn’t try them on. I had fewer pants than I expected, and than spent some time looking for more. It came down to two pairs of pants. One fit perfectly but wasn’t a style or color that I liked because they were too different. White, tight, with narrow legs, they had diagonal black stripes. I was surprised that they were mine. The next pair were too large but I liked the style. I realized, though, since the first pair fit, I could put them on, and then wear the second pair of pants over them. Then I found a favorite shirt and put that on.

That combination seemed to work. I spent some time walking around, trying that out, verifying that I could move comfortably, and watching others’ reactions. I thought that others admired how I looked. Coming down the stairs from the loft, I saw a reflection of myself, and thought, yes, I look good.

I then left. It was lightly sprinkling outside. The CEO was at a table with clients under an awning. He called me over and introduced me to them, enthusing about me, which embarrassed me. I left to meet my wife.

There was a row of stores and cafes. She was supposed to be waiting for me outside. I figured that since I’d taken so long, she’d probably gone on to a store to kill time. I would check them until I found her.

I was checking the first one when she came in, finding me. As we were talking, she was telling me that she’d run into one of my new co-workers. As she was telling me that, he came in and asked  if he could join us for lunch. We said, sure, and went off.

Later (with a dreamshift), my wife had gone. It was growing darker, with daylight fading and lights coming on. My co-worker and I were walking back toward the business. As we were, we saw a party going on and remembered that it was an office party. He went right up and in, urging me to follow. I declined. He said he was just stopping for a few minutes. I decided that I’d wait outside, just past the entrance, and leaned back against the wall.

The party broke up a short time later. My co-worker came out. He joined me, chatting, asking me why I hadn’t gone inside. I told him that I didn’t think that I belonged. As we were talking, another co-worker was striding by below us. Seeing us, he came up the steps and handed me a cup.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“It’s for you,” he answered.

“Why?”

“I thought you needed it, and wanted to give it to you.”

I felt flattered that he’d thought of me, and thanked him. He left. As he did, my friend and I began to walk. I drank from the cup that’d been given to me and discovered it was strong, sweet tea. It tasted wonderful. I began thinking, maybe I do belong here.

The dream ended.

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