Overcoming Imposter Syndrome: How Weightlifting Helped Me Accept My Place in Tech

I'm going to be talking about overcoming

imposter syndrome so hi everyone I'm

Kristin

and I'm a front-end developer at

Palantir net and prior to that I was a

front-end and Ruby on Rails developer

and if you would like to find me on

terpil or Twitter or pretty much

anywhere on the internet my handle is

Chris May so before I get into how we

can overcome impostor syndrome I wanted

to first talk a little bit about it and

what it is so basically impostor

syndrome is the idea that you're a fraud

that your success is you know do more to

good luck or good timing or maybe the

fact that you fooled everyone around you

and kind of the feeling that eventually

everyone is gonna figure out that you

know you are this giant fraud and just

out of curiosity how many people in this

room have ever felt so quite a lot of

you it's estimated that you know 70% of

the people in the US have experienced it

at some point so that's not surprising

so I'm gonna talk a little bit about my

career path and how I've had impostor

syndrome throughout that so even though

I work as a developer now it's not

really something I originally planned on

doing if you had asked me 10 years ago

what I thought I was gonna you know do

with my career I thought I was gonna be

an architect that did not pan out for me

if you had asked me five years ago I

would have said UX researcher so we're

getting a little closer but I ended up

just kind of falling into development

after college I

got a job that originally started as UX

research quickly transitioned into you

know we don't have time for all this

research we need someone to help our one

front-end developer so why don't you do

that and then that transition into oh we

need more people doing Ruby on Rails so

now you can learn that so that was kind

of an intimidating process getting

thrown into all of this stuff without

really having a background in it there

was a lot of learning as I was going and

you know at first I was intimidated and

I thought oh it's just because I don't

know that much as I get more experience

I'm going to start feeling better about

this but I actually found that that

wasn't necessarily the case no matter

how much I learned I always felt like

everyone else knew more and you know my

own skills were not enough and there's a

lot of downplaying the things that I was

accomplishing um so a lot of the things

that I were thinking was you know I only

got here because I got lucky I'm you

know not really actually good at this

they just needed someone and I happened

to be here and kind of feelings of not

really belonging and I also noticed that

an addition of feeling imposter syndrome

at work I was also kind of feeling it in

my free time so I was just you know

impostor syndrome everywhere I also

weight-lift which at first glance it

might not seem like coding and

weightlifting have a lot in common one

involves you know sitting at a desk all

day the other involves being pretty

physically active but they have more in

common than you might think so both have

certain terminologies and languages that

you have to learn and it can be kind of

a steep learning curve if you're coming

in not knowing any of this they both

have certain ways of doing things

and they will have consequences if you

do something wrong you know no one wants

to make the change that totally you know

breaks a website and you really don't

want to hurt yourself while you're at

the gym either in addition to all that I

think in both arenas I felt a lot of

pressure to succeed and to do both of

these things well and having that

pressure just kind of always made me

feel like I wasn't performing well

enough and another thing that was a

factor was I would say I don't

necessarily look like a typical or I

guess stereotypical member of either of

these groups so on my very first

development job after college the team

size fluctuated a little bit but this is

kind of a general representation of what

it looked like there was only one other

woman and there were definitely a lot

more men on the team so I was already

different in that regard and then you

know being a queer woman was just

another step that I was removed from

everyone and I was actually way younger

than the rest of my team so I really

felt like I didn't fit in with any of

them and I kind of felt you know the

same way when I would go to the gym it

would usually be me and a bunch of other

men so I always get cited when I see

other women at the gym so I had both of

these arenas in my life where I was kind

of feeling like I didn't fit in I was

feeling like I wasn't measuring up the

skills that I had weren't good enough

but I realized that I was able to

overcome impostor syndrome a lot easier

with my weightlifting practice than I

was at work

it took like a fraction of the time

and I still struggle with impostor

syndrome at work sometimes so some of

the things that I found helpful were to

not not compare yourself to other people

so with weight lifting I kind of

accepted that I wouldn't be an expert

immediately and I was okay with that um

you know for some reason in my mind it

was okay that it took a long time to

work up to being able to lift really

heavy weights I focused more on what I

was capable of doing and not what others

were doing which you know can be hard

sometimes especially at the gym when

it's very easy to see what other people

are doing it's very easy to compare

yourself because everyone's kind of out

there in the open and at work I felt

like a failure when I couldn't figure

something out and I was comparing myself

to what other people were able to do

even though a lot of them had you know

many many many many years more

experience than me if they could do

something and I couldn't I still felt

like a failure and I was just constantly

worried about my performance compared to

other people's performance but there's

always going to be someone who you know

knows more than you so you can't compare

yourself to everyone and so this led to

me thinking you know I don't belong here

because my skills are not adding

anything to the team you know anyone

else on the team could do the things I'm

doing it doesn't have to be me

and so you know as I was kind of

expressing this to someone once they you

know came up with this hypothetical

situation for me

so imagine that you are watching a

varsity high school football game and

one of the players is not even in high

school they're in eighth grade so

they're you know a lot younger than the

rest of the players and you know this

eighth grader is not necessarily the

quarterback or the star of the team but

they show up and they make good plays

and they're contributing and they're

there for their teammates when they need

him what would your impression of him be

so if anyone doesn't mind being put on

the spot and wants to tell me what their

impression would be impressed by them it

would be like you're trying so hard in

here doing a lot of work a journalist

when you're on and see what people are

so much older than you and similarly

been doing

that is the correct here okay so your

skills matter and you can still provide

value to your team you know even if you

are still new and still learning things

and in all honesty there probably are

things that you might be able to do

better than some of the other people on

your team and if you can figure out what

those are and feel good about them that

can help a lot so for me I found that at

my previous job that was writing CSS

most of my co-workers were back in devs

and they did not really understand CSS

so figuring out that that was something

that I could feel like I was really

contributing back to the team was

helpful and made me feel good about

myself so focusing on that as well as

focusing on what things I did accomplish

helped me kind of gain confidence in my

abilities

so of course you know it's good to focus

on the things that you're good at and to

know what those are but we're not always

gonna know everything all the time so

sometimes you do need to ask for help

and a lot of times so with weight

lifting if I you know didn't know how to

do something I was totally fine you know

asking my teacher or a personal trainer

you know how do I do this I want to make

sure I'm doing it correctly or there are

a lot of things called assisted

exercises it's like if you can't do a

pull-up on your own you can use a band

to kind of help you get up and so I

would do assisted exercises if I

couldn't do the full ones whereas at

work I often have felt pressure to

always have to figure things out on my

own feel like I needed to be able to do

it without asking for help

I was worried that people would think my

questions were stupid and if I asked

them they would think that I was stupid

or you know if I ask this question

they're gonna realize that I don't

actually know what I'm doing at all but

in reality no one has all the answers

even the person that you think has all

the answers I'm sure that they don't and

kind of realizing that it's okay to ask

for help when I need it has helped build

my confidence and then you have now

learned how to do something new um so

you've added to your skills you know

also I have had other people ask me for

help so kind of being on the flip side

of that you realize like I'm not judging

this other person for asking me for help

so I should not go into that

I'm thinking other people will judge me

for it so of course you know it can be

kind of discouraging if you feel like

you're getting stuff or needing to ask

for help a lot but in reality not you

know not every day is going to go

perfectly and there are gonna be things

that can be discouraging but it's

important to you know not internalize

that and blame yourself for it

so with weight lifting when I wasn't

able to perform well I will you know

would blame the circumstances like maybe

I didn't get enough sleep the night

before or maybe I had you know been

working out for too long and it was

making me tired I was blaming it more on

the circumstances than saying that I

myself wasn't good enough

whereas at work if I had unproductive

days I tended to blame myself which

would make me feel kind of like a

failure you know there's this feeling

that if you spend all day working on

something and you still have not been

able to figure it out like that can be a

very discouraging feeling at least for

me so it turns out that life effects

work and workouts sometimes things are

going on outside that you know have an

impact on your day to day life and

sometimes will have bad days and it

might not be because of work it could be

because of you know something that's

going on in our personal lives or we're

just going through a tough time

and kind of accepting that will have bad

days and has helped me stop it's not

feeling bad about myself when they

happen just accepting that you know okay

today wasn't great I spent a long time

working on this problem I'm gonna look

at it tomorrow with fresh eyes a lot of

times that is really all it takes and

you know the next morning I'll look at

something and within ten minutes I have

figured out you know what I couldn't

figure out yesterday in eight hours

that's yeah so just kind of not not

putting that on yourself and feeling

like a failure of course you know when

we're feeling discouraged it can be

tough to stay motivated or want to keep

working at something so I found that

setting goals is helpful in kind of

keeping that momentum even when you are

feeling a little bit too spirited about

something and it kind of keeps you

progressing towards where you want to be

so I was kind of setting goals in both

of these areas but they were a little

bit different as you'll see

so with weight lifting for example one

of my goals these slides are from last

year I did not update it one of my goals

was to be able to deadlift two hundred

pounds by the end of June which I got

very close to but did not quite meet

whereas in tech I had very vague goals

like get better at coding what does that

mean good question

so there's really no way to know if I've

kind of met that goal sure I could be

better at some things um but it's not

really very specific so because of that

I think it was easy to fall into this

trap of thinking like I'm not really

good at this because I wasn't really

meeting specific goals and there was no

way for me to track my progress so I

found that you know when trying to set

goals it's helpful if they are

quantifiable that way you can actually

tell whether or not you specifically met

your goal also setting a time frame I

found that for me that kind of helps

keep it on my mind and keep me from

putting it off and it's okay to adjust

that my deadlifting goal I originally

thought I would meet it sooner and it

didn't happen so I adjusted it a little

bit and that's okay and it's also okay

not to meet your goals sometimes

priorities change just because you've

changed your goal to something that is

now a priority doesn't make you a

failure from for not meeting your

original goal

so you know you can't meet your goals if

you don't know what they are and I found

that saying achievable goals help has

helped me to stay more motivated and

excited about things and has helped me

keep progressing even when I might

otherwise feel discouraged another thing

that is important is owning your

achievements so when you do something

well it's okay to acknowledge that with

weightlifting I found that it was very

easy for me to celebrate achievements

and be proud of progress that I was

making you know even if week to week I

was maybe adding only one more pound

that was still an achievement and that

was still something that I was happy

about where as tech I kind of downplayed

my achievements and you know didn't

necessarily think that I was

accomplishing things and when people

would tell me I did a good job on

something something that I would say all

the time was oh it wasn't that hard

um which you know it's kind of

suggesting that if it was something that

was hard I wouldn't be able to do it

which is not true so when other people

acknowledge you it's okay to believe

them um I think this has been probably

one of the hardest things for me

but you know thinking about it when I'm

acknowledging others for the work that

they have done I'm not lying

or you know saying it to make them feel

good I'm saying it because I think that

it's true but yet when other people were

complimenting me I thought that they

were just you know trying to be nice so

you know when someone does compliment

you want something take it at face value

something that one of my coaches has

also said is that downplaying a

compliment from someone else is actually

like very hurtful to the person who gave

you the compliment like they thought you

did something so well that they went to

the effort of telling you that you did a

good job and for you to turn around and

say I don't really believe you you know

it's kind of hurtful to them so it's

okay to just take it and believe them so

of course this also has helped to

improve my confidence you know feels

good to have people think that you're

good at things it helps you feel good

about yourself

another thing that I found helpful is to

find mentors so with the weightlifting I

have worked with personal trainers and

taken a lot of classes to help me

improve things that I wanted to improve

on

whereas with work I didn't necessarily

immediately see like what value I would

get out of mentorship so it wasn't

something that I put a lot of time into

I you know I was used to relying on

myself and I felt like having to have

someone mentor me was you know again

admitting that I couldn't do something

on my own

so you know I always kind of felt this

need to be self sufficient kind of going

back to the idea that asking for help or

needing help from anyone would prove

that you know I'm not good enough to be

here but you know sometimes having

someone else to help kind of give you a

push on something can help make you

better so like when I'm working out a

lot of times I would have trainers that

would you know put a lot more weight

onto a bar than I thought that I would

be able to lift and they would you know

tell me to lift it and I would kind of

look at them and be like I don't know

about that

but I would try and I think you know

most of the time I would end up being

successful

so even though I would not have done

that on my own

something that I was able to do so you

know working with the mentors Tech has

been helpful in you know pushing me to

try things that I wouldn't necessarily

tried on my own or wouldn't have thought

that I would have been good at and has

helped kind of move me out of my

original comfort zone to feel

comfortable working on more things and

kind of on the flip side of that having

someone to mentor you can be helpful but

mentoring other people is also really

helpful so with like weightlifting and

working out I that was something that I

talked a lot about with friends and

encouraged them to try and you know if

they wanted me to go work out with them

that is you know I would go and help

them out and make sure they were doing

things correctly

[Music]

whereas with tech I kind of always had

this feeling that I wasn't skilled

enough to really be helping anyone else

and so like back when I was a grad

student I would help friends out with

coursework you know which seems like a

pretty low risk kind of thing like oh

we're in class together and you're

having trouble with homework so I can

help you out with it

and then I you know I signed up for

tutoring lists at our school and the

first time that I ever got a request

from anyone I kind of hesitated because

I you know I felt like oh like I don't

know if I'm good enough for you to be

paying me for my help so I you know

always had this feeling of like you know

what what value was someone else gonna

get out of me trying to teach them this

but I did in the end agree to help tutor

this student and they ended up saying

that they did get a lot out of it and

they at the end of it they understood

the material a lot better so even though

something that I doubted it was

something that I was totally able to do

even though I you know initially felt

like I wasn't knowledgeable enough and I

wasn't really going to be helpful to

them and sometimes that meant saying you

know if they had a question that I

didn't know the answer to sometimes I

had to say you know I'm actually not

sure on that I'm gonna look at I'm going

to look at it before our next session

and I will have an answer for you then

and you know it's okay to say that you

don't know the answer but everyone is an

expert at something and if you can find

you know that thing that you're an

expert at or even something that you're

not an expert at and mentor others it

can help you accept your own skills so

kind of going through that process of

tutoring someone kind of helped me

accept that this was a way that I could

add value and it also helped me learn

the material better for myself

so talked about finding mentors and also

about mentoring people so you know how

do you find people like that that's kind

of where things like mid camp and the

people in this room come in joining the

community so with weight lifting I

connected with other friends and people

who also did it and you know it was nice

to have that community of interest and

have something that we could talk about

together but with tech again I kind of

felt like you know I didn't want to get

involved because I didn't feel like I

would be adding any value to the

community and I also didn't really

recognize what value I would get out of

being part of the community so there

were a lot of feelings of you know I

don't have anything to contribute but I

have since learned that really anyone

can contribute last year I went to

Drupal con for the first time and I went

to the Sprint Day on Friday and I

actually was able to make my first patch

while I was there which you know if you

had asked me before going to Drupal con

if I thought that was something that I

could do I would have said no probably

not but you know being there and being

involved with the community I was able

to find an awesome mentor who kind of

helped you know walk me through tickets

and making patches and contributing and

having that support you know helped me

and you

showing me that really is possible for

anyone to contribute and I've found

within the truthful community there are

tons of people who would be happy to

help mentor you if you know that is

something that you are interested in

doing so I found that getting more

involved in the community has given me

more support and has helped me improve

my skills and become a lot more

comfortable doing things and then so

I've talked a lot about skills and

feeling you feeling comfortable with my

own abilities but if you remember back

to the beginning of the talk one of the

other reasons that I have kind of felt

impostor syndrome is feeling like I'm a

little bit different than kind of a

stereotypical

member of the community so something

else that I found important is finding

role models so finding other people who

do look like you and are doing great

things can help you feel like there is a

place for you in the community so

weightlifting and working out I looked

out for other women who excel to inspire

me so I don't know if anyone here has

watched American Ninja Warrior

this is Kacy Catanzaro she was the first

woman to complete the qualifying course

for American Ninja Warrior

have fun video

so you can kind of hear a lot of what

the commentators were saying that Casey

doesn't really look like a typical

competitor on an American Ninja Warrior

she's a lot smaller and shorter and

can't reach as far but yet she still

made it to the end so you know seeing

someone who like me also does not

necessarily look like you know a typical

weightlifter or someone who is into

fitness stuff seeing her be able to

compete like that and achieve you know

inspires me to do the same things it

kind of shows that even if you look

different you can still be a part of a

community and you can still you know

achieve at the same levels as everyone

else so you know while I was finding

role models for you know weightlifting

and fitness with tech I was only

comparing myself to the people that were

immediately around me and I was seeing

that I didn't look like them and I was

letting that influence me into feeling

like I didn't belong so you know I don't

look like my coworkers maybe that's

because I don't actually belong here

so representation matters and I have

found that you know finding other people

who look like me and who are able to

excel has helped me to feel you know

more like I belong and more like

I can contribute to the community at the

same level as anyone else so kind of

takeaways your skills do matter and you

are adding value even though it might

not necessarily always feel like it

no one has all the answers even the

people who you think do so it's okay to

ask for help if you need it um life

effects work sometimes you'll have bad

days but that doesn't mean that you

yourself are a failure or that you're

not good enough to be here goals are

important for staying motivated but it's

hard to meet them if you don't know what

they are so make sure you are setting

clear goals so that you can feel good

about yourself when you do meet them

[Music]

when other people acknowledge you it's

okay to believe them

don't downplay it or assume that they

are lying because they're not sometimes

having a push from someone else can help

you go further and get you out of your

comfort zone and help you improve

everyone isn't expert at something so

find out what things you are an expert

at you know and help others to learn

those things

and anyone can contribute so don't be

afraid to get involved with the

community you will add something to it

and you will also get that value back

out of it and representation matters so

if you feel that you know you don't look

like a member of the community find

someone else who does and kind of let

them show you that you do belong and

that you can contribute and possibly the

most important overcoming impostor

syndrome takes a lot of time it's

something that I still struggle with

sometimes and I've you know been a

developer now for four years so a lot of

these things don't necessarily come

naturally and that's okay but if you you

know keep them in mind and work towards

it it does get better so that is all I

have

does anyone have any questions or

comments or stories

talk about a position that worked a lot

like its is really personal to you and

I'm sure it is that it's also something

that a lot of women think it's just

across workplaces like they've done

studies that men will see a job posting

and say I can do that kind of like talk

like they can figure it out and then men

or women rather will have a job the

students I don't have all those skills

and then how to apply and so beyond your

personal experience which i think is

really valuable and it's really

interesting to see side by side with

like I can see that myself like I've

always treated myself differently in

hobbies

how do you what do you think would be

the shift in sort of broader culture for

women in the workplace around the

classroom um I think a lot of that

probably does come back to a

representation at least I don't know

that has kind of been my experience of

feeling like I didn't fit in or like you

know oh you know I'm different or I you

know don't have a background in this so

I need to make sure that I can meet

every single criteria or else you know

why are they going to hire me so I think

if it if you feel more like you are just

a regular member of the community

there's kind of one

fewer barrier when you're thinking about

trying to be involved

and say that it's always terrified that

I feel like I might be able to find the

answer

so it goes on

yeah no matter how long you've been

doing something it can be tough

sometimes to admit that you don't have

the answer so I'm on a team with people

that are really across that's what it's

like that's when I start okay

all right if there's no more questions I

will let you all go early

[Applause]