If you experience Imposter Syndrome are you likely to be able to recognise and celebrate your achievements? Are you likely to feel proud of yourself? The quick answer is no, unless you’ve started to challenge your thought process around this.

The reason I say this is Imposter Syndrome is the feeling that your achievements are not real or that you do not deserve praise or success so if you can’t recognise your own achievements then of course you’re going to disregard any evidence of success or praise. You’re highly likely to brush off the compliments and put any success down to things like luck, fluke or charm. Sound familiar?

One of the reasons for this is how you judge yourself and your Inner Imposter has high standards that are near impossible to reach (to understand your Imposter type and how you judge yourself, click here to find out yours)

When working with my 1:1 clients part of the work we do is helping them to be proud of what they’ve achieved to date as well as continue to do this as they move forward (I know cool stuff right!).

As a society we define success by how much we got done or how far we climbed the success ladder and whilst that can be a good indicator, it’s not the only way to measure achievements.

So if you’re in the space now where you are not able to recognise your achievements, accept compliments or see where you’re having success, here are some alternative questions that can help you to start to change this.

Here are 7 things you can be proud of this week:

You did less - productivity isn’t the be all and end all. Knowing when to slow down is a skill and one that you should be proud of
Recognising your effort - sometimes things don’t go to plan but recognising the effort you put into something is something to be proud of
Got out of your comfort zone - it can be scary getting out of your comfort zone and your brain does every tactic to try and keep you comfortable, so if you got out of your comfort zone then you should be proud of that (regardless of the outcome!)
You took time to rest - we can push ourselves and switch off to the signals our mind and body are giving us, so if you listened to your mind and body and it needed some rest, be proud that you listened and gave it what you need (your to do list is always there to come back to when you’re ready)
You got shit done - ok I’m not one for celebrating the hustle but perhaps you had good energy so you felt in flow and you got lots of things ticked off your to do list so when this happens it’s something to be proud of
Quality over quantity - too often we look at achievements by how much you got done but how about recognising when you gave something the attention it needed and you choose quality or quantity. That’s definitely another reason to feel proud.
You helped someone - you did something that made someone else have a good day, now that’s something to be proud of

So how did you do? With these things can you find things to be proud of this week?

If you are someone who wants to work on overcoming Imposter Syndrome so you can start to recognise the success you’re having as well as become someone who celebrates their success, then get in touch. Let’s have a call and discuss working together.