Impostor Syndrome: A Faith Perspective

What is Impostor Syndrome?

Impostor means someone who pretends to be someone else with the intention to deceive. The first time I heard the term ‘Impostor Syndrome’ was a few years back. When I learned that it is a psychological condition in which you are afraid that someone will find you as a fraud and realize that you are actually not as competent, intelligent, qualified and accomplished as others think of you, it stroked a nerve within me. I felt that way when I was in college, majoring in a field that is quite competitive. Looking back, many of my classmates most likely experienced the same thing.

My old friend told me that she recently had had a 30-hour airplane trip and when she got home from the airport late at night, right away she compulsively needed to do some extra office work. She half-jokingly confessed that it was more likely caused by her own impostor syndrome, she felt she needed to do more to prove her worth.

Her comment got me thinking; this syndrome still very much persists even in middle-age women and how this makes all of us feel….tired. Tired of being exposed, tired of needing to prove, tired of comparing, tired of feeling inadequate, tired of needing to compensate and many more tiring pursuits of the heart.

This impostor syndrome is prevalent in CEOs, academics and professionals and some studies show it is more common in women than men. Based on my own experience, I would extrapolate and conclude that this condition is also prevalent within the church circle with different predicaments.

Impostor Syndrome in the Faith Circle

If the impostor syndrome in the professional world questions the intelligence, skills and competencies, the impostor syndrome in the faith circle relates to spiritual and character qualities. Am I spiritual enough? Am I kind and likable enough? Have I been a good role model for my kids? Why is my prayer life not as vibrant? Have I done enough as Christ’s disciple? Why is my life not as transformed? And one thousand possibilities of comparative questions.

The very integral implication of our sinful nature is self-doubt and shame. In the Garden (Genesis 3), the first humans started to feel this new, unfamiliar sensation after they had fallen into sin. We have fallen far from our original design in every dimension (spiritual, emotional, physical). Since then the feeling of never measure up and self-contempt is very deep-seated in our core, it plagues and haunts us all through our existence.

To make matters worse, we also like to compare ourselves with others in an attempt to make us feel better about ourselves but this usually would generate the opposite effect. This propensity to compare is as old as Cain and Abel.

The questioning of our worth starts from within ourselves and Satan gladly joins in condemning us further downward. There are an ever-present nagging and tugging feeling of brokenness and evilness within all of us.

 

How should we biblically cope with these haunting thoughts?

1. Focus our eyes on God, not on ourselves. 

   If we see too much of ourselves, we can become prideful; we either love or loathe ourselves too much. Understand that we are still walking in the path of sanctification, we will live with imperfections until the end of life.

But when we fix our eyes on God, we will see how the Holy Spirit actively, intentionally and continuously working to make us more like Christ until we become perfectly Christ-like. We can be comforted by the progression, have a positive outlook in life and not be judgmental towards ourselves or others.

Hebrews 12:1-2: Let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.

Philippians 1:6: He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

We focus on the trend of getting better and not in our current lowly, sinful state. God himself already sees us as righteous! As we put our trust in Jesus, we put on Jesus’ righteousness and God already sees us as a done deal, a new creation!

God sees everything (Hebrews 4:13), but He chose to see us as righteous women.

2 Corinthians 5:21: God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Philippians 3:9: Not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ – the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.

Romans 3:22: This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.

Romans 3:24: And all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 1:4: For he chose us in him… to be holy and blameless in his sight. 

We no longer need to justify our shortcomings, we are all already justified freely by his grace. We hold firmly to our new identity in Christ: righteous, justified, holy and blameless.

 

2. Celebrate each other, the fellow sojourners. Don’t envy and compare with each other.

   God gives each person different personalities and spiritual gifts. Sometimes we understandably question ourselves why are we not hospitable enough? Or wise enough? Or merciful enough? But don’t let those questions linger too long and corrupt us.

Let not our actions be motivated by our sense of lacking and our need to prove to others by doing more. I pray instead more of our actions will flow out of our abundance in Him.

Ecclesiastes 4:4: And I saw that all toil and all achievement spring from one person’s envy of another. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

Galatians 1:10: Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.

We can try so hard to keep up with others. In reality, we know that God in His wisdom dispenses different gifts to each believer.

There are dangers when comparing ourselves to others:

• We compare ourselves to the wrong crowd or to the wrong things. We could make a disproportionate estimation of our own values by comparing ourselves with the lesser standards we set.

2 Corinthians 10:12: We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves by themselves, they are not wise.

• We can feel conceited when we are good at something when everything is actually dispensed to us by God’s grace. We are not superior to others; we don’t have advantages and power over others. All we are and we have are only by His grace and grace by definition is the gift we don’t deserve.

1 Corinthians 4:7: For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?

I recently heard a podcast by an author, Nicki Koziarz. She said that there is this big race in the big avenue of life, everyone is running towards the kingdom of God. But God already prepares a unique individual lane (progress plan) for each of us. Each lane is different from the others.

Looking at other people’s lives as a source of inspiration is perfectly fine, but if it’s turning our focus away from God to others, then it will start to create all the unhealthy tensions and negative emotions inside us.

 

3. Believe in His sovereignty and commit to our own obedience.

   I find this attitude is very useful and productive in overcoming almost any spiritual obstacle.

We continue to be faithful in our own sanctification process.

Each person has her own progress plan that God has already orchestrated through our circumstances, taken in our unique personalities and giftedness and configured by the decisions we make.

In the Parables of the Workers in the Vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16): Every person’s path will be different according to His sovereignty.

Galatians 6:4-5: Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else, for each one should carry their own load.

 

Conclusion

We don’t have to succumb to the recurrent presence of ‘impostor syndrome’ in our lives. There are evilness and brokenness inside of us undeniably, but God Himself in His grace sees past those. When He sees us, He already sees the righteousness of Christ in us.

We are secured in our identity in Him as already righteous, justified, holy and blameless in Christ, despite our current state that is very much still in the sanctification process.

Even though our heart is aching right now, we can be comforted with the hope that wholesomeness and holiness is our fate in Jesus. Jesus has redeemed our iniquities and inadequacies with His life in the Cross.

Thus we are free to be ourselves, celebrate our progress as we obey His ways and celebrate each other from the heart as we witness His goodness.

We fix our eyes on the final prize (our eternal destiny), not on ourselves or on fellow runners.

Philippians 3:14: I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.