Imposter Syndrome is defined as doubting your abilities and feeling like a fraud.
I suffer from a case of Imposter Syndrome and the effects of it on my coding career has been consistent. Think of it as a tiny, loud and opinionated voice on your shoulder telling you nothing is good enough. Although that sounds less than pleasant, there is always a silver lining to be found.
Turning weaknesses to strengths
- Doubting oneself has the ability of always wanting to fill the void of your so-called shortcomings by learning. Learning will help make you a better coder and keep you up to date with the latest trends in the coding world.
- It’ll also help you do that little extra on a task or project in order to avoid hearing that little voice.
- It will keep you humble. I strongly doubt I will ever have an inflated view of myself or my coding ability because of the barrage of negative feedback I provide myself.
- It helps with your motivation and drive. Because of this syndrome you will always feel the need for improvement and learning in order to appease the voices, and that will help maintain your hunger for learning new things.
Although I still feel a lot of self doubt, the feeling has gotten less noticeable (or I’ve just gotten used to it 🙂 ). That’s partly due to learning more over the years and also my growth in general as a developer.
In summary, imposter syndrome takes a long time to overcome or even reduce, but using its effects as strengths will help convert this syndrome to a positive personality attribute.
