SJ Longthorne

Wondering how much writer (or equivalent) imposter syndrome is down to those around us repeating over and over that "you've wasted your degree", "it's never going to happen" and "hardly anyone makes it, so why should you?"

My social circles drummed into me that my dreams were impossible for all but a few exceptions, which I was not. So now that they're becoming reality, I find that hard to accept, because everything I know tells me this wasn't supposed to happen. There's been a mistake.

A lot of people go off about the idealistic parenting of the nineties, saying it somehow ruined my generation. But that's not the issue here. The issue is the lengths others took thereafter to compensate for and annihilate my ambitions.

We're made to feel like failures before we've even had the opportunity to fail. No wonder tall poppy syndrome is so rife.

One memory stands out during what was an otherwise great undergrad course. During a final tutorial basically every possible obstacle was rhymed off, needing agents, how few people would be successful etc etc. It was really odd, when it should have been a celebration...

What a downer. I'm sorry. I've noticed people have a habit of that though, watering down moments of celebration or accomplishment. Nobody's allowed to feel TOO good.