Last week, I had the opportunity to interview Dr. Valerie Young, the author of The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women: Why Capable People Suffer from the Impostor Syndrome and How to Thrive in Spite of It. She is an internationally-known speaker, a leading expert on the impostor syndrome.

Read this book if you have fear or insecurities and feel undeserving of your hard-won success. (You are not alone!)

The imposter phenomenon in high achieving women was actually studied by psychologists who found that women have a pattern of dismissing accomplishments and believing that their success would disappear once others discovered the awful secret that they were, in fact, “imposters.”

A few highlights from the Dr. Valerie Young interview: 

• Expect to be lucky. Put yourself in situations to find luck.

• You can’t control what other people think. You can only control your own response.

• Women don’t give themselves enough credit for what they can do. “I want everyone to know just how bright and capable you really are. But the person I most want to acknowledge your brilliance is you.”

• Make it a skill to wing it.

• People who feel like frauds sometimes believe that they are where they are because they happened to be in the right place at the right time. Don’t dismiss your achievements because of timing.

Thanks, Valerie!

Does imposter syndrome sound familiar to you? Read these articles to learn more about how to overcome imposter syndrome.

• Learning to Deal with Imposter Syndrome – The New York Times
• Is Imposter Syndrome Real and Does it Affect Women More Than Men? – Slate
• I Don’t Deserve to be Here: Presence and the Impostor Syndrome – Lean In

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