Balance between Imposture Syndrome and Over Confidence
I always strive for the middle ground, to balance my life, my dreams, my daily tasks and my thoughts. Finding the Balance between Imposture Syndrome and Overconfidence is a daily practice.
I have to stay in my balanced triangle. The triangle is my self-portrait. My head, heart, and gut are all connected, as each one moves and changes, it impacts the others. Each angle provides information, feedback, and most importantly, pause to be true to myself, to balance.
Let’s start at the top. The Head.
People always ask me, Why do you analyze everything?
Well, It’s my superpower. With advanced degrees in social work and policy analysis and an undergraduate in Psychology, it’s pretty evident. I mean don’t be obtuse! For the record, the definition of obtuse is: annoyingly insensitive or slow to understand (and you know how I love annoying..).
My head ruled the roost. Notice the past tense. My head, my heart, and my gut all fight for their fair share of 180° and the head dominated. If my triangle was 3-D and had to stand up in the real world like a three-legged stool, my head, in any situation, would prevent those other two legs from ever reaching the ground.
Onto the Gut.
My gut, where intuition lives didn’t work very well. My gut would signal to my head that this feels good or bad. This is right or this is wrong. But, the head just shook them off like a determined baseball player trying to get to home plate and ignoring his teammate frantically waving signals and jumping up and down. My gut was used to being ignored and shut down. Where was my heart?
And finally the Heart.
The truth is when I did aerobic workouts in the 80s I could never find my pulse during those intervals the Instructor would yell: Find your pulse rate and make sure your optimum workout level!
I just faked it. Seriously, I had no clue where my heart was.
I am not alone.
Presenting this topic at Techstars Start-up Day (6/28/22), it was evident that I am not alone. It was heartwarming (yes, my heart felt it) to have 300+ people listening and lighting up the chat, relating to me and saying they have felt that way.
What’s Next
I’m still obtuse and strive daily to make the most obtuse angle, my heart, giving my head a break from the last 60 years. I open my heart wide to love myself, those around me, and all the beings in the universe.
Look at your thoughts through the triangle lens. Are your heart, head, and gut symmetrical? Do you depend on one more than the other? Can you do better today? I know I can.