Imposter

How long does it take to recognize that you are enough?  Not even just enough, more than enough!  For so long, I tried to hide myself.  I was always afraid people were going to find out I was a fraud, an imposter.  No matter what I accomplished, what others said about me, I didn’t believe it for myself.  

I got a 4.0 in grad school.  I said it was just because it was an easy university.  Anyone could get a 4.0 there.  

I was a teaching intern for 2 years.  I never got a bad evaluation from my mentor teachers, program director, or the principal of the school.  It was just because I was nice to everyone, students, staff, parents, that’s why I got good reviews.

My next position was in a different town where I was a co teacher for 4 years.  My co teacher and I planned together, taught together, graded together, communicated together, she just couldn’t see that I wasn’t a good teacher.  I was so skilled at hiding how bad I was that I must have been good.

After that position, I moved to a school that was so much bigger.  I could hide more in a building of this size, except from my aunt who also happened to be my godmother and a teacher at this school. I was terrified that she would be the first one to discover what a fraud I was.  How embarrassing would that be to embarrass her with my terrible teaching!  She was so happy and proud to have me join the team and now, everyone would find out that I was useless and hadn’t a clue as to what I was doing.  We taught together for approximately 15 years, and she never found out! No one at that school did, either.  Once again, I had fooled them all.  I was a mentor teacher for grad students, I was a mentor teacher for new teachers, I was on all sorts of committees and worked with a plethora of teachers, therapists, students, administrators, families, and no one noticed.  Even when the state came in to observe me teaching, I had them tricked.  

All the while, I was pulling the wool over people’s eyes in another area of my life.  I was a person who runs but not a runner.  People thought  I was a runner.  Someone even once asked me if I was a marathoner.  What? That’s ridiculous!  Just because I have trained for and run marathons that doesn’t make me a marathoner.  I’ve only run 4 marathons. I haven’t run Boston so no, I am not a marathoner.  Well, that is just stupid.  If you have done something, if you have trained for something, and if you have completed that something, doesn’t that give you the permission to say you are that thing?  

Let me try this.  I was a fabulous grad student and an even better teacher who happened to also be not only a runner but a marathoner.  I am no imposter.  I am enough. I am more than enough.