I get a lot of insights while lying on the bathroom floor hiding from my children (and working on my collagen and immune system with my red light).

But one of the biggest ones came about two years ago listening to a free training I’d opted in for. (You’ll always find me learning something.)

The woman leading it was sharing stories of how a few household-name folks had skyrocketed their careers in seemingly miraculous ways, and I couldn’t ignore how all the people she was talking about had one thing in common.

What struck me even more was this one thing they all had in common had been eluding me for years.

The thing all of these people had in common was that they all had a moment where they’d simply decided that they were meant for greatness and they simply stepped into it.

I thought back to one particular friend of mine who started in the personal development world at the same time as me, but whose business grew way faster and bigger.

She had it…that conviction. I’ll never forget her certainty, even when we were twenty-somethings running our businesses from our studio apartments.

Up until this bathroom floor moment, I hadn’t realized that getting past the revenue plateau I was experiencing at the time might have something to do with how I was wobbling internally.

While I wouldn’t have named it as such, in retrospect, I was dealing with imposter syndrome.

Do you ever feel like, “Who am I to be a leader and be visible and have an impact?”

I became aware that day that I had this sneaky belief that some people are just special and some people aren’t special and there’s really not anything we can do about the level of specialness that’s pre-determined for us.

I was completely arbitrarily putting myself in the category of “special lite” meaning it was ok for me to have the career that I already had but growing it any bigger was out of the question. Way too much for someone like me.

The realization of how I’d unconsciously been playing small unnecessarily because of a silly story in my psyche kinda made me want to barf.

WTF?

Here’s what I’ve learned about imposter syndrome:

1. It’s a lie.

Everyone of us was born equally, infinitely worthy of all the success, satisfaction, and joy we desire. Do we need to learn skills along the way? Yes. Do most of us already know enough to have a positive impact in the lives of others? Yes. And if we’re not out there doing it because of imposter syndrome, we’re preventing ourselves from being someone else’s answered prayer.

2. It means we care.

A little bit of a wobble inside keeps us on our growth edge and I actually think that’s a great thing. The day I don’t get a little nervous before stepping out on stage or that I don’t feel a little stretched (in a good way) by showing up for the people in our programs is the day it’s time for me to pack it up or reassess. Imposter syndrome is just a less healthy version of a desire to show up in our fullest capacity. So if we can focus on doing the best we can with what we’ve got, we’ll keep expanding (without staying small unnecessarily.)

3. We can regulate our way through it and expand anyway.

We don’t have to have absolute certainty that we’re the sh*t 24 hours a day in order to be successful at what we do. I know the celebrities featured on the training I was listening to have days when they wonder if they have what it takes. But they have practices to regulate themselves through the wobbles so that they can still take action and show up for their mission (like meditation, visualization and nervous system tools.)

Bottom line: We can’t wait until imposter syndrome goes away or we feel ready to take action on our dreams. If I’d waited until I felt ready I’d still be in mountains of debt. We can regulate through not feeling ready and imposter syndrome and take action and, as we do, our dreams will manifest much faster.

Listen:

You matter.
Your experience matters.
Your expertise matters.
You’re just as ready and worthy of success as anyone else.

Don’t let anyone (particularly you) let you believe otherwise.

Xo,
Kate