Who Do You Think You Are? (Building Personal Authority and Defeating Imposter Syndrome)

It was the end of a hectic Saturday, and my kids had gotten into it again.  By ‘it’ I mean an argument. While my son and daughter don’t fight all the time, they do tend to argue about the same types of things -- not abiding by the ‘rules’ of a game, one of them touching or messing with something the other one doesn’t want them to touch, or some such related dispute.  Unfortunately, my husband and I are usually in another room when this happens, so we are relegated to the roles of judge and jury with only their respective accounts as evidence. It is in these scenarios that I most commonly feel the troubling affliction of Imposter Syndrome come over me; How do I know which account is more accurate?  How do I know what to say or how to guide these children if I don’t really know what happened? How much parental involvement is actually required in these situations before we drift into the helicopter parenting zone? Who trained me for this job anyway?!

Imposter Syndrome

I can easily say this is just one example of the many times that I have felt Imposter Syndrome.  If you aren’t familiar with this term, it is that feeling we get when we imagine we are unqualified or unprepared for the role or job we find ourselves in. Along with it usually comes a fear of being ‘found out’ or exposed as a fraud.  I think we often feel this so acutely as parents because we don’t get any real training for this role. The training is on-the-job, and we don’t have a manager or mentor looking after us to guide us on our way. Sure, we can call our mom or our best friend for advice, but at the end of the day it will be simply that -- advice, not a solution stamped with a divine seal of approval.  Some of us are still recovering from the fallout of our own parents’ misguided notions, and parenting from a reactive stance can complicate things further if we are not approaching it with self-awareness and perspective. And what about when one of us disagrees with our spouse on how to handle a parenting dilemma? If we don’t tread carefully here, words can become weapons, and easily disrupt the fragile ecosystem of The Unified Front.  

The clever and succinct term “adulting”  has materialized in the popular vernacular in the past few years, and to me it perfectly encapsulates the feeling I had that moving into adulthood happened without proper preparation -- and definitely without an instruction manual.  Early in our careers, when we are learning to “adult” in all areas of our lives, the seeds of Imposter Syndrome are often planted in our work lives. I believe a certain amount of this is perfectly normal, and even healthy, as it can prevent us from being overconfident and help us to learn important things we will need to know in order to succeed.  It becomes a problem however, when the roots are so deep that they prevent us from engaging with the process of developing authority in our work.  

Authority

What does it mean to have authority in our work as performers and teachers?  Authority is broadly defined as “the power to give orders or make decisions.”  Simply put, I believe this means confidently looking to our own accumulated knowledge and inner wisdom when making decisions on how to prepare music, perform music, and teach music.  Ideally, this is what we go to school to be trained to do -- to become independent thinkers and practitioners. I don’t mean that we should be autonomous to the point that we never seek advice or wisdom from others, but that we have the tools to make choices on our own, and that we have faith in those tools. Yet so often we feel lost, lacking confidence in our own authority.  If your experience was anything like mine, a good deal of hard earned resources went into funding your education.  So why this disconnect?  

In her book “Playing Big, author Tara Mohr postulates that the “outside-in” paradigm of the  traditional education system effectively rewards adapting to goals and standards of an outside authority figure.  In essence, we learned that achievement and success are associated with pleasing a single authority figure, and that authority figure is not ourself.  My observation is that this phenomenon is even more distorted in the music field, as the one-teacher-to-one-student ratio is often established at a very young age.  Add to this the tendency of master teachers to carry and perpetuate the idea that their opinions and teachings are absolute, and you have a recipe for a very difficult transition into the real world, where believing in your own authority is paramount.  

Shifting Perspective

I will confess something to you now.  In part, I am tackling this subject because I have struggled deeply with it in my career as a musician.  Looking back, I can see that I have danced around this issue for years, without being able to articulate my thoughts and feelings clearly.  As a result, I know that this is a process, and not something we should expect to be fixed overnight. I do believe that we can start by shifting our perspective inward.  It is imperative that we approach this step with self-compassion, because this is a classic moment for Imposter Syndrome to take center stage. It can all too easily derail us in our vulnerable state. 

The imposter voice in our heads is one of the many disguises of our Inner Critic, and it can be helpful to name or personify this character.  In her Tedx talk, “The Surprising Solution to Imposter Syndrome,” Lou Solomon suggests not only naming your Inner Critic, but also creating a “Radical Hero” as a positive and supportive alter ego. The Radical Hero is a wise straight-shooter, ready to call out lies and limiting beliefs. In journaling about this difficult topic I had a vision of teaching myself, and what that would look like.  How would I speak to myself? What would I have to forgive myself for? How would I guide myself to get the answers that I was unable to find within myself?  

To develop our own authority is to begin to question everything.  This is why the process can be terrifying, and why so many of us give up on it -- sometimes without even realizing that is what we are doing.  The process may lead us to realize that we don’t actually want what a parent or a teacher wanted for us. This can happen on the micro level, such a choice to phrase something a certain way in a sonata, or on a macro level such as choice of a job.  In this way the process parallels that of growing into our authentic selves.  

All of this brings to mind an incredible experience as told to me by a young percussionist that I was dating at the time.  We were still students at Northwestern, and the music department had somehow landed a weekend-in-residence on campus with the legendary drummer Max Roach. This talented young man found himself in a starring role on the weekend’s closing concert, trading off drum solos with one of his idols while his classmates cheered him on.  After the performance was over, while he was still riding an adrenaline high, the legend turned to him, nodded his approval and said, “kid, there’s a lot of room at the top.” It was an unforgettable moment that couldn’t have been better scripted for a movie. I have thought about these wise words many times over the years, and its meaning has shifted and changed as I have grown.  Today I take “the top” to mean that space we arrive at, usually by means of considerable struggle, when we finally realize how uncrowded the arena actually is if we honor our authentic selves. There are an infinite number of deserving voices out there, many authorities on many subjects, and our own voice has a unique and deserving place among them. To believe that we each have a destined path is bold, and low self-esteem and the lack of genuine support around us can make this seem like a fantasy.  Although the following quote is famous (for good reason) and perhaps overquoted, I think it applies here: 

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.  We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God.  Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.” --Marianne Williamson

To pursue your own authority in your work and in your life is your birthright.  Pursue it.