podcast

Overcoming Imposter Syndrome

Hi everybody. Welcome to the podcast today. Glad you're with me. We're gonna talk today about imposter syndrome, about those moments when you feel like your skills, your capacity, your experience, are not a good match for the situation that you're up against, but that you're having to perform in it anyway, and you can think of many other people who would do it so much better than you, and you just don't feel like you're supposed to be here. You feel like a fraud, you feel like an imposter. And I'm gonna give you the beginnings of three stories from my own life when I felt this way. I'm just gonna give you the beginnings right now 'cause the endings are gonna come at the end when you can see what I did with them to try and deal with them.
But here they are. Here's the three scenarios. So the first one is from 2018. I was hired with my trio by the French government to play some concerts in Southern Brazil and because we were hired by the French government, we had to play some French music on the program, and we had programmed a trio by Maurice Ravel. And this particular trio is, in my estimation, the hardest trio for piano that exists, at least of those that I have played, it is the hardest. I had avoided this trio for decades because of that reason, because it's such a hard trio to play. So I'm on the plane. I'm flying toward Porto Alegre toward the city where we're gonna have to play the concert the next day. And I'm feeling just terribly overwhelmed and terrified and feeling like I should not be the one in this situation. I, I just didn't feel like there was a guarantee that I would be able to execute this piece. It's so hard, and I could think of so many people who would play it better than me. I had listened to a lot of different recordings that, you know, played it just amazingly. And I just felt thoroughly inadequate and really worried about going out on stage and just having, you know, an embarrassing flop where I just couldn't get through the hardest parts of the, of the piece and, and being embarrassed in front of all of these people.
So there's my first scenario. I'll move on to my second scenario, five years down the road in 2023. So I'm finishing my doctoral degree in Brazil, and one of the things that I was asked to do was I was asked to be on this committee that was supposed to help evaluate a master's student, what they had written for their master's thesis. Give them some comments and some direction about their thesis. Now, I, I feel pretty fine doing this type of thing in English, but it wasn't gonna be in English because it was at this university in Brazil, of course. And so I was gonna have to do it in Portuguese. Now my Portuguese is, is functional. It's good. I can understand everything that people say. I can communicate, but it's, it's not native by any means. And it doesn't compare at all to the people at the university in academic setting, settings, who speak in this very flowery, erudite, refined, um, academic Portuguese. I'm the last one that has to give comments. The other teachers are giving their comments already to the student, and I am listening to the teachers and the way that they're communing, communicating, and the way that they're framing their sentences and the way that they're speaking. And I'm thinking. Uh, thi this is really embarrassing. I should not have to get up and be compared to these people. I'm gonna sound ridiculous next to them. What I was most afraid of is, you know, when I get up and I feel nervous in Portuguese, then my, my language abilities go way down and I can't even remember the vocabulary that I know super well, and I, I forget basic words, and I get all tongue tied and I sound ridiculous. I sound like a child. And I, I would just, I was just ready to be super embarrassed. So that's my second imposter syndrome scenario.
My third one I'm performing again, right? This is, this last one is from this year, just a couple months ago in February, I was performing with my quartet, the Avery Ensemble. And we had a tour of a few concerts in Connecticut, and the last concert was the concert that was the most, um, high stress, I would say. And the main reason why I was worried about this particular performance is because I was not just going to be playing music with my quartet, but there was one piece on the program that was gonna be solo piano. And in the past 25 years of my career as a pianist, I have done a whole lot more chamber music or performing with other performers than I have done solo stuff. And chamber music is really a different animal than solo performing for a lot of different reasons. One of them is that you're up on stage with lots of other people. The other thing is that when you're playing chamber music, you always get to have the music in front of you, the score in front of you. But when you're playing solo, you're expected to have it all memorized. It's supposed to be all in your head, and you have to just play it out of your brain and everyone's looking at you. So I was really, I was really nervous imagining a catastrophic failure of, you know, blanking out and being so embarrassed on stage and not able to continue and just making a, a big mess of it on stage.
Okay, so there's my three imposter, um, syndrome scenarios, the beginnings of them. And I'm gonna tell you the end, I'm gonna tell you how I made it through these different scenarios. But first I want to talk, detour a little bit and talk a little bit about, um, how our, we tend to view stress as a society, right? Because these are all stressful situations , and our most predominant response to stress and the issues that stress can cause, the, the harm that stress can cause, in society, is that we tend to take this attitude that we need to remove stressors. We need to just get rid of stressors in order to alleviate our stress problems. Right? So if we're gonna apply that type of solution to my scenarios that I just narrated, then the solution is gonna be to find some way to get out of this performance. Right? But the science of stress gives us a few more clues about what actually is harmful. And it turns out that there's, stress isn't necessarily harmful for you. And we've talked about this before. We had an episode last fall where we talked about is stress good or bad for you? And the science of stress points out that there are multiple types of stress. There's a bad type of stress and there's a good type of stress. The bad type of stress really is bad for you, right? This type of stress is what we've talked about in our episodes here as the threat response. This is the kind of of stress that will impair your short term cognitive performance, and it can also affect your health negatively. It can, it can contribute to accelerated brain aging and risk of cardiovascular disease. It's bad for you. It really is. But not all stress is bad. There's also a good type of stress and this good type of stress is what we've referred to in this podcast as the challenge response to stress. And this is the kind of stress that instead of making you wanna run away from the stressor, it makes you want to meet it and to approach it. And this type of stress can actually give us enhanced cognitive and um, physical performance compared to if we're not stressed at all, right? So it can make us perform better than if we don't feel stressed. And it also it, because it helps us to face the stressors and rise to the occasion and, and perform well under the stressors, then it helps us to grow and to learn and to evolve and to thrive and to innovate, which are things that we can't do if we just stay in our comfort zones, if we just eliminate all of our stressors and we just try to be relaxed all of the time. So what we really should be thinking about when we are feeling like an impos, imposter is not, how to reduce the amount of stress in our situation, but how to change the type of stress that we're feeling. So if we are feeling like an imposter, then we're probably feeling that bad stress because we're feeling anxiety about the upcoming situation, whatever it is, and we're having a threat response that, that can really harm our cognitive and physical performance and be bad for our health if we are, having this long term, right, if we're feeling this stress over a long period of time. But if we can convert that type of stress that we're feeling into the good type of stress, then it will help us to perform our best. It will help us to perform even better than we would perform if we were relaxed and not stressed. And it can help us to grow and learn from the stressor. So we really want to switch from bad stress to good stress, not just eliminate or reduce the amount of stress. We want to change the type of stress that we're feeling. And the way that we do that, and we've talked about this many times, is by changing the way that our brain perceives the demands in the situation in relation to our resources in the situation. So when we feel like the demands are way above our resources, or it's just too much for me, I can't do it, then we're gonna have bad stress. If instead we can feel like, I can handle this, if we can feel like our resources are up to the demands, even though it's gonna challenge us, even though it's gonna tax us, even though it's gonna take concentration and focus and, and all of the resources that we have, maybe, but if we feel like with those resources we can meet the demands- if our brain produces that story in our heads, then we can produce the good type of stress that helps us to approach the stress, the stressor, and perform better and rise to the occasion. So I'm going to give you now the end of those three stories that I just told you. Okay?
So the first one where I'm flying on the plane to Porto Alegre to perform the Ravel Trio with my trio, hired by the French government, nervous about playing in this theater for 650 people worried about this piece, which feels like it's beyond my abilities to play under stress. So I'm on the plane and I, I was listening to an audio book by Brene Brown and I, I can't remember which one it was. And so I haven't been able to find this quote exactly, but there was a quote that she said in that book that just really struck me and helped me to feel totally different about the upcoming concert. So she said something to the effect of, "should I stop sharing my gifts just because they are imperfect?" I clung to that phrase and I, and I started repeating it to myself throughout the day, and then finally the hour of the concert came on the next day and I was ready to go out on stage and I just approached it with this feeling like, you know, I'm, I'm not gonna play this perfectly, but I can play what I have. I can show people how much I love this music. I can share the gifts that I have and the gifts that I have are to love this trio. I love this music. I love playing with these other members of my trio. I love exchanging ideas with them on stage. I love responding to their playing. I love this music and I love getting to share it with all of these people all at once. And so I, I focused in that moment on sharing what I had, even though it was imperfect and I just, I just accepted that it was going to be imperfect. So what happened was you know, I didn't play perfectly, but I, but I was able to play better than I had ever played in any of our rehearsals, and my brain was totally on top of everything and I was able to see things coming kind of before they happened and just think in my head how it was that I wanted to play the phrase that was coming up and, and then I was able to create it the way that I imagined it. And it was just an ecstatic experience. Really beautiful. The audience loved it. They gave us standing ovations. Full house. It was a really wonderful experience and it, and it mostly wonderful just because of this intense joy of being able to share this music that I love so much in that moment with these people.
Okay. Second scenario where I am giving feedback to the master's student at the university in Portuguese. Right? And I'm just thinking, I am going to flub this totally. And I'm not gonna be able to handle expressing my ideas under stress. Not only am I not gonna be able to say things eloquently, but I'm going to actually forget the basic vocabulary that that I have, because that's what happens to me when I get nervous and I'm speaking a foreign language. But I started to try and, and get a little distance from my emotions, I started to step outside the mud puddle of my emotions and, and try and look at them from the side and, and understand what it was that I was feeling using some of these techniques that we've talked about in the, in the podcast before. I was writing in a notebook and it came to me, this image of my great-grandparents. I knew my great-grandparents. They actually overlapped with me. They, um, passed away when I was a teenager. But I had, I have several memories of them, of when I was a child and they, um, I started to picture them watching me give this feedback. I started to picture them sitting there in the room and watching me have to get up and speak to this person, and the reason why I. The reason why that was a comforting image to me is that my great grandparents just absolutely loved everything that I did. They thought it was wonderful. They loved to hear me play the piano, and when I would play for them, it didn't matter if it was full of mistakes or if I, you know, if I played well or if I played badly, they just loved it. They would just be effusive about it and talk on and on about it. And so from the time that I was a child, I really felt that, you know, they loved and they admired me no matter what. And I started to think of Nona and GG, that's what I called them, looking at, looking on at me from the other side and seeing me having to get up and speak in a foreign language to a group of people in an academic setting and tell them my ideas, and how proud they would be of me, of the fact that I had learned a foreign language and that I was able to communicate and that I was able to to talk to people and give them my ideas. And I, and I knew that they wouldn't care if I made grammatical mistakes and if I sounded less erudite than the other people. They would just be so impressed that I was doing this really hard thing 'cause they knew where I was coming from. And so I knew that they would've seen it as a big success, a big conquest, because um, because of the amount of work that I had to do to get to the point that I was, even though I wasn't as flowery and expressive as these other professors. And I took off my glasses, which is something that I like to do when I have to perform because it makes it so, like I can only see what's right in front of me. I can't see the other people in the room. And so I don't think as much about what they might be thinking of me, and I was able to just think of my great grandparents and, and just focus on communicating the content that I had. I, I had some important and good things to say to this student, and I just was gonna focus on saying them imperfectly as it was gonna be. But I was gonna try and communicate. And what happened was that I didn't have any embarrassing moments. I didn't forget my vocabulary, I didn't forget how to say basic things. I was able to communicate what it was that I had prepared and, and so for me, that was a success.
Okay, so third scenario where I'm in the, I'm getting ready for the concert and I'm nervous about having to play solo piano. Well, in the morning, again, I'm seeing my, my threat response and my nervousness and my feeling like an imposter. And I start to write in my notebook and I start trying to objectify how it is that I'm feeling, and I started to recognize that, you know, the piece is seven minutes. It's gonna pass quickly, and it's only a moment in time and it won't really change their lives that much. It won't really change their lives a ton. Those people are gonna come in order to hear music and whether it goes, whether it's a brilliant performance or not, they're going to go out to eat afterwards and they're gonna have this nice evening and they're, they're gonna enjoy their time and it, so it's not gonna really change their lives a ton either way. But it is a moment in time. It's a brief moment and it's a moment that we can enjoy together. And I, I remembered what my, my grandpa Jarvis used to say. He said, " you'd, you'd care less about what people thought of you if you realized how seldom people thought of you." and so in realizing how, how the stakes were not quite as high as I had imagined them before, how this was just gonna pass and it's just gonna be a moment in time and it's not really gonna matter that much if I'm amazing or if I'm not so amazing that, it helped me to kind of get a handle on my brain. And I was able to get up in the moment and perform. And I felt tense and I felt really nervous, but I was able to hang on to all of my memory. I didn't have any big memory blanks. I was able to remember everything as it came and express and get into the music and really focus on it. And, uh, one of the audience members who was there told me afterwards that he felt like it was, it just transported him and it was, I was making sounds on the piano that it didn't seem like could come from the piano, and it was, it was so colorful and so delightful. And anyway, I got good feedback from the audience and it, and it helped me to, to feel like it had been a success. I had been able to rise to the occasion and do what I set out to do, and everything had turned out fine.
So what do all of these different scenarios have in common? Well, I, I, I wasn't able to remove the stressors. I wasn't really able to change the situation itself in any material way. I still had to face the stressors. I still had to go out there and do these things, but I was able to change the type of stress that I experienced because I was able to mentally change my perception of the demands in the situation. I was able to bring the demands down to a level that I felt like I could approach, right? Because when you feel that threat, it's because you feel like the demands are way bigger than your resources, right? So you can either do something that helps you to feel like your resources are really, really big, or you can do something that makes you feel like the demands are not so bad. So in each of these cases, I decided to change my goals. Instead of trying to control whether or not people would admire me more or respect me more because of my performance. You know, I, I, I shifted away from this goal 'cause this is a goal that, you know, I, I don't have the resources to meet because there's no way you can control what people will think of you. So I shifted away from that goal to impress people, and instead I shifted toward the goal to share my imperfect gifts, to enjoy the moment, to do my imperfect best, and to celebrate that, right? To celebrate what I could do and, and what I had achieved and the love that I had for what, what it was that I was presenting to people. So you just have to remember that in an, in a situation where you feel like an imposter, in order to have the type of experience where you can rise to the occasion and have facilitative stress where your physical and mental performance can actually be enhanced and facilitated, you don't need to have all the resources in the world. You don't need to have all the possible resources. You don't have to be the person that does it perfectly. What you need to do in those cases where you feel like your resources are weak and flawed are find ways to reduce your perception of the demands in the situation by making a goal that is within your control, something that you can actually do. I could actually show the people and express to the people how much I loved the music in that first scenario. In the second scenario, I could just try and celebrate the fact that I had done something really hard, which was to learn a second language, and that I could try and communicate my thoughts, even if it wasn't gonna be in the most flowery, refined language that everyone else was using. And in the third scenario I could choose to recognize that, you know, this isn't, this isn't the end of end of the world if I don't do this perfectly and we can just enjoy this tiny little moment together, that's gonna pass quickly. So all of these perspectives that I was able to adopt in time before these performances helped me to reduce the demands of the situation and helped me to feel like my resources were up to these demands that were now reduced, that were now within my power, and that's what helped me to get away from focusing on a perfect performance and feeling like an imposter and having that threat response toward feeling like I had what it takes to do what my goals are in this situation, and I'm going to share my imperfect gifts with people with love.
So that's what I want to leave with you today, and I'd encourage you also to stay tuned for the gratitude practice that we have now, the kindness narrative. And if you miss that gratitude episode, go back and listen to it 'cause it'll help you to understand the science behind this. But let me just summarize by saying that having a regular gratitude practice, like just listening to one of these stories that we have at the end of our episodes, can really help you to change your mindset and help you to create an enduring sense that you have the capacity to meet the challenges that you face. But stay tuned now for our kindness narrative and thanks for listening today.
I worked my way through my bachelor's degree and, um, you know, a lot of years ago and came out debt free, but was stone broke, I when I, uh, took a job in the Midwest to try to get back on my financial feat. The job was more than a thousand miles away from nearest family in the west, uh, western United States. But I was up for the adventure and tired of school. Um, not long after I had settled into my new job, my car broke down on the freeway and I was informed that my engine was irreparable. I um, this was for me a devastating twist of fate. After the bad news, I was talking with my brother-in-law, who is an exceptional mechanic, who I would have to say I did not know very well at the time. He asked a bunch of questions, then offered to see if he could find an inexpensive engine that would work with my car. The next day he called me to tell me that he had found a good replacement engine. Uh, my mind raced trying to figure out how, uh, engine a thousand miles away from me, uh, was gonna help me in Kansas City. After excitedly explaining, um, how perfect the engine was and how reasonable the price, he began asking about where the car was parked, uh, what the driveway was like, how much room there was on, you know, the sides of the car, and in front of the car. Then without, without missing a beat, he, uh, he simply told me that there were a few things that I would need to get ready and said completely outta the blue that he would be there with the engine in two days and that it would take him about 10 to 12 hours, um, to have the car running again. I was truly floored and speechless. No one had ever done something so kind and giving for me in my entire life. It was a humbling and totally unexpected act of generosity and sacrifice on his part without any thought of compensation. I asked how I could ever repay him, and he brushed it off saying that um, it was not needed that we were family. Now, I had not grown up in an environment where family had such meaning.