Imposter syndrome / how do you stop overthinking and doubting yourself at work?

[MrsTeaShore]

Does anyone have any tips on how to stop overthinking at work & doubting yourself ? Perhaps it’s imposter syndrome, I don’t know. I have nearly 20 years of experience in my field but still find myself doubting my ability, thinking i’m not good enough, panicking if I think I have made even the tiniest of mistakes, and pretty much constantly overthinking… (e.g is this the right job for me ? Is it all about to go wrong ? Should I quit ? Am I actually not every good at this ? Do people at work think I am no good? ) even though I have generally never had any negative feedback. It is exhausting and I wish I could just coast a bit , and not let things get to me. Am in my 40s and really don’t feel as ambitious or driven as I used to, so would like to find that middle ground of being content / settled at work , and not feel like a fish out of water all the time.

Someone senior at work did a talk on this recently and suggested reading a book called ‘the chimp paradox’

There's a fab book on this called 'secrets of successful women' by Valerie Young. I tend to dip into it whenever I feel IS threatening to take over.

Brene Brown's Dare to Lead is also great particularly the bits on perfectionism.

One of the exercises is to write down everything you've achieved, with no qualifiers. So 'I was promoted to Head of Department' and leave it at that, don't then add 'but only because I was lucky/Jeremy was on sabbatical/they were desperate' or whatever lies your inner voice is telling you. You've then got a list of evidence to the contrary of your IS