“It’s like I’m living my life in third-person.” I’m not sure how these words came to me some time ago but these are the only words that have somehow managed to describe my imposter syndrome.
Ever since the December of 2015 happened, I’ve tried my sheer best to internalise how drastically my life changed. With that change, came an enhanced imposter syndrome.
I’ve tried to do everything right for the last three years now; from cultivating the right habits to behaving the right way to taking the stairs instead of escalators.
It has been the whole spectrum with (hopefully) nothing left behind or overlooked. While I’d change nothing, I know now that my doing of these come from a place of fear instead of a place of gratefulness.
College was a volatile time and things changed faster than dates. Some days were so long, I can fill pages and then get tired of writing. Yet, every day has had the ever-looming presence of a feeling of undeserving; not that I talked about it ever.
It is a difficult feeling, the feeling of undeserving. Every single thing in your life seems like an unfair blessing. Something that you shouldn’t have but was somehow bestowed upon you and while everyone views you with appreciation or even envy, you view yourself as a liar, a fraud.
In fact, if the upper veil of my life or my filtered portrayal of it were lifted, you’d see me breathing heavily with anxiety, sitting on a floor, trying to make sense of things that I don’t understand but you probably don’t know about that part because of my spam of music recommendations, blog posts filled with some often accurate pep talk, and cups of coffee. Perhaps, it is our generation.
As a major phase ends and as I leave for whatever comes next, I do it with the understanding that it is not in whether you think if you deserve something or not, just if you’re grateful for whatever you get.
The reason I haven’t written lately is that I wanted to get this out but I wasn’t able to do just that in a way that would do the gap some justice. As the gap increased, so did that feeling and it was a classic catch-22. So, here it is.
At least, some part of it.