Are You a Writing Success or an Imposter?

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Success, by definition, means different things to different folks. Most writers probably see “success” as being published—repeatedly. They work hard, take risks, and accept that being exposed to failure is part of success. They’re confident souls and keep-on-writing regardless of what others think. Then, there are those who outwardly “make it” but, deep inside, see themselves as imposters.

Yesterday morning, I was reading an online article at Global News which is one of Canada’s leading media sites. The piece was occasionally interrupted with paid ads by prominent players like Ford, Ikea, Microsoft, Audible, and Formica who financially support Global so they can survive in the commercial news biz. All of a sudden I went, “Whoa! Am I really seeing this?”

Before my eyes was an advertisement from Rakuten Kobo, and there was the cover of my newest publication. Kobo chose my book Between The Bikers as their featured promotion and exposed it before I don’t know how many critical eyes. And this Global ad was bought and paid for by Kobo—not me. I knew nothing about the promo before stumbling upon it.

I said to Rita, “Well, will you look at this…” My wife glanced, smiled, and replied, “You’re quite the success.” I had to agree, but then I immediately thought of an earlier email exchange with a highly successful UK writer friend who told me he suffers from Imposter Syndrome (IS).

Before going into what Imposter Syndrome might be, I had to click on Dictionary.com for two definitions:

Success — noun

  1. the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors; the accomplishment of one’s goals.
  2. the attainment of wealth, position, honors, or the like.
  3. a performance or achievement that is marked by success, as by the attainment of honors: The play was an instant success.
  4. a person or thing that has had success, as measured by attainment of goals, wealth, etc.: She was a great success on the talk show.

Imposter — noun

  1. a person who practices deception under an assumed character, identity, or name.

This got me thinking, What if I’m just an imposter, a bullshit clown, and this Kobo recognition hasn’t been honestly earned? I know that friends, family, and former police colleagues—as well as fellow writers—are going to see this thing, click on it, and expose me for what I might truly be. Oh, the humiliation…

I don’t know who, or how many, saw the Kobo ad. I guess upcoming stats will tell if the promo was successful, but the startling experience made me think of my UK friend and what was going on with his IS insecurity. So, I did some Googling and came up with a fascinating article and self-examination on the New York Spirit psychology-therapy site titled What Is Imposter Syndrome? It opens like this:

“Welcome to the world of the Imposter Syndrome. It is a secret world, inhabited by successful people from all walks of life who have one thing in common – they believe that they are not really good enough. They might be men or women, young or old. And imposter beliefs are not always related to work; I have met ‘imposters’ who feel they are not good enough parents, husbands, wives, friends or even not good enough human beings. These are all variations of Imposter Syndrome, especially when there is little objective evidence to support the sufferers firmly held self-beliefs that they are frauds.

The term ‘Imposter Syndrome’ or ‘Imposter Phenomenon’, was first coined in 1978 by clinical psychologists Pauline R. Clance and Suzanne A. Imes in a paper entitled ‘The Imposter Phenomenon in High Achieving Women: Dynamics and Therapeutic Intervention’.

 The condition was described as being ‘an internal experience of intellectual phonies’ that afflicted some high-achieving women. In their paper, Clance and Imes described their sample group of 150 women as follows, ‘despite their earned degrees, scholastic honors, high achievement on standardized tests, praise and professional recognition from colleagues and respected authorities… [they] do not experience an internal sense of success. They consider themselves to be “impostors”.’ They go on to explain that these women believe they have only achieved their success due to errors in selection processes, or because someone has overestimated their abilities, or that it is due to some other external source.”

Drs. Clance and Imes list three characteristics that define Imposter Syndrome:

  1. Persistently attributing your success to external factors like luck or others.
  2. Believing others have an inflated view of your skills, abilities, and talents.
  3. Fearing you’ll be found out and exposed as a fake.

The New York Spirit piece notes that Imposter Syndrome isn’t a recognized mental health condition. (I checked with the DSM-5 and it’s not.) However, through Wikipedia I found a book by researcher Valerie Young titled The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women: Why Capable People Suffer From the Impostor Syndrome and How to Thrive in Spite of It. In her book, Ms. Young identified five subgroups this syndrome falls into.

  1. The perfectionist
  2. The superwoman/man
  3. The natural genius
  4. The soloist
  5. The expert

Ms. Young states more than 70% of people experience impostor syndrome at some point in their career. That’s regardless if they’re a rocket surgeon, brain scientist, or crime/thriller/mystery writer.

Back to the New York Spirit article. I love quizzes and was most interested in taking their short self-assessment to see whether or not I had Imposter Syndrome. This is how NY Spirit described it: This quiz is based on the common symptoms outlined above and is not meant to be a diagnostic mental health tool, but rather a quick and simple way to ascertain to what degree you feel like you are an imposter. It goes like this…

How easy do you find it to accept praise?
Very hard — 1    Quite hard — 2    Quite easy — 3    Very easy — 4

When you do something well, how likely are you to dismiss it as not really much (eg it was easy, anyone could have done that, it was nothing special).
Very likely — 1    Quite likely — 2    Not very likely — 3    Not at all likely — 4

When you do something well, how likely are you to attribute your success to luck?
Very likely — 1    Quite likely — 2    Not very likely — 3    Not at all likely — 4

When you do something less well, how likely are you to attribute your failure to luck?
Not at all likely — 1    Not very likely — 2    Quite likely — 3    Very likely — 4

When you perform poorly, or fail, how likely are you to attribute your failure to your own lack of skill or not working hard enough?
Very likely — 1    Quite likely — 2    Not very likely — 3    Not at all likely — 4

When you do something well how likely are you to attribute your success to other people’s input (‘they helped me’)?
Very likely — 1    Quite likely — 2    Not very likely — 3    Not at all likely — 4

When you do something poorly how likely are you to attribute your failure to other people (‘it was their fault’)?
Not at all likely — 1    Not very likely — 2    Quite likely — 3    Very likely — 4

How important is it for you to be the best at something that matters to you?
Very important — 1    Quite important — 2    Not very important — 3    Not at all important — 4

How important is success for you?
Very important — 1    Quite important — 2    Not very important — 3    Not at all important — 4

How likely are you to focus on what you have not done well compared to what you have done well?
Very likely — 1    Quite likely — 2    Not very likely — 3    Not at all likely — 4

How important is it to you to find a ‘hero’ to befriend and impress?
Very important — 1    Quite important — 2    Not very important — 3    Not at all important — 4

How often do you feel afraid to express your views lest people discover your lack of knowledge?
Very often — 1    Quite often — 2    Not very often — 3    Not at all/rarely — 4

How often do you find yourself unable to start a project for fear of failing?
Very often — 1    Quite often — 2    Not very often — 3    Not at all/rarely — 4

How often do you find yourself unwilling to finish a project because it isn’t yet good enough?
Very often — 1    Quite often — 2    Not very often — 3    Not at all/rarely — 4

How happy are you to live with a piece of work you have done that you know isn’t perfect?
Not at all happy — 1    Not very happy — 2    Quite happy — 3    Very happy — 4

How often do you find yourself thinking that you are a fraud?
Very often — 1    Quite often — 2    Not very often — 3    Not at all/rarely — 4

How worried are you that your lack of skill/talent/ability will be discovered?
Very worried — 1    Quite worried — 2    Not very worried — 3    Not at all worried — 4

How important is validation from others to you (e.g. praise)?
Very important — 1    Quite important — 2    Not very important — 3    Not at all important — 4

How To Score

According to the piece, the lower your numeric score, the more likely it is you have Imposter Syndrome. The scoring range is from 18 to 72 and (as a rough guide) any score below 36 indicates some sort of IS element is going on in your personality. Again, this is not an accredited test and has to be looked at with a bit of “ooo-kaaay…”.

You’re probably wondering how I made out. I tried to be as honest as possible, and I scored 55. I suppose that indicates I’m relatively comfortable with my butt in the chair with my fingers on the keys. What about you? Go ahead. Take the IS quiz and share your score with your fellow Kill Zoners.

Another thing for Kill Zoners… how do you define “success”? While I was surfing the New York Spirit site, I found an article by Jessica Kitching titled How Do We Measure Success? In it, she says, “If you wake up with a passion for what you do, a purpose that excites you, and a momentum to keep going, then you are a success. I am not ashamed to label myself a writer. I am a writer. I love what I do. How many other people can say that?”

*   *   *

Garry Rodgers is a retired homicide detective with a second career as a coroner. Now, Garry has reinvented himself as a crime thriller writer who masquerades as a commercial success.

He lives on Vancouver Island at British Columbia’s southwest coast and regularly imposters as an old boat skipper. Visit DyingWords.net which is the real website and popular blog for Garry Rodgers.

32 thoughts on “Are You a Writing Success or an Imposter?”

  1. For my writing, I hit Imposter Syndrome in the middle of every book, and then when I turn it in to my editor, and again when I hit Publish.

    For the rest of my life, I’m too old to worry about it. What you see is what you get. Although I did make chicken soup yesterday that turned out fantastic. The Hubster liked it, so I had validation, although if he hadn’t, it would mean more for me.

  2. Interesting to read this discussion. Though my score was on the low side, I’ve never felt like an imposter or a fraud (I automatically think of a poser when I think of those words & a poser to me is someone with shallow goals). However, perfectionism, mentioned in your post, gets to the heart of the problem. In writing that takes hold as “I don’t think I’ve done enough research on this topic” or “maybe I need to tweak that scene/chapter one more time…” Tough to fight it off. That’s why writer communities like TKZ are so important–when you spend time with people who are making it happen, it’s uplifting for all, no matter where they are in the journey.

    • I had to think about “journey”, BK. You’re right about the value of hanging around with others who are on the same road, like people on TKZ. I’m not sure where this road leads, but I’m enjoying the journey with folks like you.

  3. I like Terry’s answer. Since I’m a sucker for quizzes I had to take the test and scored a 61. If I were a cartoon character I would be either Margaret from Dennis the Menace or Lucy from Peanuts. 😉

  4. It took close to a dozen books and 15 years before I sold my first book. I felt I earned that so imposter syndrome has never been a problem. Having my younger siblings and their kids insist that I sit at my late mom’s place at the table as the family head totally freaked me out, though.

    • In retrospect, I think were harsher judges of ourselves than what others feel, Marilynn. I don’t think there’s an overnight success in the writing biz – 12 books and 15 years sure shows perseverance!

  5. I think “imposter/failure (the opposite of success)” is a dangerous label, if only because it’s always true, and in equal measure. Success and failure always coexist. Did Eisenhower’s D-Day strategies succeed because they liberated Europe from the Nazis, or did they fail because victory came at the cost of tens of thousands of allied lives? Both are true, because success and failure–talent or imposter–are all relative.

    I have struggled with this mightily. My first novel–my FIRST–dumped 7-figure money into my bank account. Was that because NATHAN’S RUN was better than 99.999% of the books published in 1996? Certainly not. It struck a chord that I had not composed–certainly not intentionally–and publishers wrote ridiculously large checks, and, frankly, they lost their shirts in the transactions. A few authors in the mystery-writing community are still bitter–and make their bitterness clear–because I was paid more in my first outing than they’d earned over a career of writing books.

    I will tell you right now that the “success” of my first novel was largely happenstance. That was a lightning strike. Not that NATHAN’S RUN wasn’t a good book–I’m still very proud of it–but it was not worth the payday that it received. Certainly, I was perceived by many as an imposter.

    Now, twenty-some books later, I can confess to the luck part, but shrug off the imposter part. I am a journeyman writer and very proud of it.

    Who among us has not read a hair-on-fire screaming bestseller and thought, “You’ve got to be kidding me. This author is terrible.” Precious few, I wager, yet the sales speak for themselves. I think we all have fans and we all have detractors, and each of those points of view are equally valid. Understanding that one point is the secret to sanity in an artistic endeavor.

    You ask for my definition of success. For me, it’s when the story I write is everything I wanted it to be as I wrote it. The rest is up to others to decide.

    • Well put, John. Well put from someone who knows a thing or two about writing success and has the chops/confidence to let others decide whether the work is “good” or not.

      I have a friend here in Nanaimo (not going to mention her name but she’s a multi-time NYT bestseller) who lost all confidence in her work. She quit writing for several years and has just got back to the trade after coming to grips with IS. She told me that she finally came to realize that her fans outweighed her detractors and she went back to work. Best for your newest book, Stealth Attack!

    • “You ask for my definition of success. For me, it’s when the story I write is everything I wanted it to be as I wrote it. ”

      Love that.

  6. I think we all have our days when we feel like imposters (it’s a harsh label, but I’ve seen it used in this context before. I’m using it to mean “self-doubt.”). Seems to be “a thing” with writers. The trick is not allowing self-doubt to hold us back.

    • I think a dose of self-doubt from time to time is a good thing, Sue. A reality check. But it’s something to shrug off and just keep on writing. I’ve heard that all walks get IS – professional sports players, actors, even high-flyers like jet jockeys and astronauts. Maybe the only ones immune are politicians.

  7. Very interesting post, Garry. I’m really not given to that much introspection, for better or worse. For me, if I wake up in the morning and put my feet on the floor, that’s success. Everything else is extra.

    Thanks for the extensive food for thought!

  8. I used to feel like an imposter, back during the years I wrote infrequently, when I didn’t tell people anything about the project I was working on, etc. What helped me was 1. Writing regularly. 2. Walking the “Path of Writing Craft”–reading and working through books on the craft of fiction writing, taking workshops, classes etc. 3. Getting feedback on my writing. 4. Being published in magazines and self-publishing and getting feedback.

    I scored “41” on the test you posted above.

    My definition of writing success is on a book by book basis: Did I write and edit to the best of my ability at the time a book that impacts a reader emotionally? If so, success 🙂

    • Nothing wrong with a 41, Dale. I’m not sure there is a real definition for success, but I think you’re very close by measuring it by emotional impact on your reader. It really is a personal thing and on a book-to-book basis. Enjoy your day!

  9. I got to attend John Wooden’s basketball camp when I was in high school, and spend a little time talking to the great man. We all got autographed copies of his famous Pyramid of Success (it hangs on my wall). His definition: “Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best you are capable of becoming.”

  10. Interesting subject, Garry. Most people I know with imposter syndrome are younger women. I certainly had it in my earlier life. As Terry says, age makes you care less b/c, in the grand scheme, other issues are more important.

    That said, I still have IS with regard to TKZ. When I was invited to be a regular a couple years ago, I was gobsmacked. Compared to these heavy-hitting dispensers of wisdom and experience, what do *I* know? When they find out the truth, they’ll fire me.

    To live up to their faith in me, I worked harder than I have on other writing assignments. Still, with every new post, I wake up wondering “will this post disappoint readers? Did I really screw up tackling this subject? Am I telling readers something wrong?”

    Success? No matter where you are on the spectrum, some people will be more successful than you, some people will be less successful. So don’t sweat it.

    • Yes, *success* seems to be a state of mind, Debbie. The older I get (and I’m getting better at getting older each year) the less I worry about status scale. The most important task so far this morning was trying to get the top off a prune juice bottle. To that, I was successful.

  11. It’s comforting to know so many people suffer from imposter syndrome to some degree. I guess it means we all have these feelings at one time or another so we don’t have to take them too seriously.

    I love taking tests. I’d be interested to know how women score vs men. Somehow I suspect there would be a difference. I also suspect age makes a difference. Age offers a truer perspective than youth.

    I like the definitions of success that have been offered here. I will feel truly successful when I can craft an entertaining story that provides readers with the emotional adventure I want them to have. That’s a tall order, but I am definitely enjoying the journey.

    44

    • From the bit I read on IS, it seems to affect women more so than men. It’s probably a male ego thing and a feminine sensitivity issue as well. I’m no psychologist, but I think men (in general) wouldn’t recognize IS if it hit them on the head with a 2×4.

      This like journey keeps getting better the further I travel. Nice to hear your perspective on success, Kay. Here’s wishing you much more of it!

  12. As a former infant, it saddens me that imposter syndrome is a Thing. No one is born with a silver typewriter in their mouth. It has to be learned through endless practice, like ventriloquism or picking pockets.

    That one isn’t a master of the craft of writing doesn’t make you an imposter, it makes you an apprentice or a journeyman.

  13. I’ve heard of IS. And sometimes I feel like I have the symptoms. But, I always come back to my particular definition of success, which I took from some runners I know…my daughter, son, and grandson:

    The only person worth comparing yourself to is you. If you run your best, stay in your lane, and cross the finish line, that’s winning.

    I can look up to some writers and look down on others, but that isn’t success. Success is looking at who is traveling alongside me, and linking arms with them so we all reach the finish line.

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