Learning To Be Proud of What I Have Achieved

Today I am going to share something quite different and share about one of my struggles. I feel like this is something that many of us have issues with and that is imposter syndrome. For as long as I can remember, I have played down my achievements. As I sit here and write this post, I realise that I have achieved hell of a lot in my 26 years on this earth. I have had to put in backbreaking hours and educate myself so much.

Even though sat here, I can recognise that, I always downplay the milestones in my life. Sometimes this had had detrimental affects both in my personal, professional and blogging life. So, I thought that I would share some of my experiences. The things that have happened and how I want to change for the better and how I am learning to be proud of my accomplishments.

 

 

It was how I grew up to act.

The crooks of this whole thing I think comes down to how I was brought up. I am from Yorkshire and had a very Yorkshire upbringing. Within my family and certainly the circles that I am familiar with, you don’t brag. I know that to some people it may seem very strange, but I feel that is just the way it is in the North. Granted, you will always get some people that like to scream about their accomplishments, but I do feel like that is rare. I was taught just to get my head down and get on with things. That is what I have done ever since.

 

Didn’t want to seem like a know it all.

As I have mentioned before, I have an eidetic memory. I remember what I see. Honestly, this just pisses people off and I seem like a know it all. From a young age, I got teased relentlessly because of this. People thought I was a freak. In the end, I just learned to keep my mouth shut. If I didn’t open my mouth, I wouldn’t seem like a know it all and the teasing would stop. This I feel really led into me downplaying my abilities and a big part of who I am. I need to work on this, it is a skill not a setback.

 

Didn’t put myself forward for jobs.

This was something major that hindered me a couple of years back. Because I downplayed my abilities in my workplace, I was not considered for my job. The Marketing Director of the company left, opening up the perfect position for me. But, the management team didn’t know that I wanted it because I didn’t believe in myself enough to step forward. In the end, somebody who I am great personal friends with, he is actually like my dad at work, rang the CEO of the company to ask him why he was bypassing me. It was my own fault, and I should have put myself forward for it. I will forever be grateful for him for doing that.

 

Lack of believing in my professional abilities.

This one ties in perfectly to the one that I have mentioned above, but I don’t believe in my abilities. When I got offered the head marketing job at my company, I knew I could do it. I had done every single aspect of the job for years. Even the old Marketing Director that left the company sent me an email saying that I had carried him for the past 5 years that he was working here. Yet, I would go home in an evening for the first couple of months and breakdown because I didn’t believe in myself that I could do the job.

 

Feeling like a thief when setting my price brackets.

For my job in the blogging and freelance world, I set my own prices. Obviously, the more experience that I have gained, the higher my price brackets have become. It killed me to up my prices and for a long time I was undercharging. Mainly through embarrassment because I didn’t think that my work was worthy of more money. I honestly felt like it was day light robbery the charges that I was putting forward because surely little old me cannot product work worth that amount. In the end, I submit my new fees to all my clients and not a single one bat an eyelid.

 

Would talk down my experiences.

One of the other things under the umbrella of my imposter syndrome is downplaying my experiences. Such as, a couple of months back I did a piece of work for Tiffany and Co. It was my dream partnership, and I was over the moon. Honestly, it is companies like that what made me want to get into the fashion and beauty arena. Even when I was telling my husband I just slipped it into conversation without making a big deal out of it. It needed to be a big deal. I should have screamed about it. For me it was a career making moment, but I was too nervous for the attention and people questioning my work.

 

How I am changing.

Everything that I have mentioned above, I know is going to take some work to correct. It is not normal to think or act like this. At least to the extreme level that I do. For me, I am going to progress things slowly but surely. I am planning on talking to those closest to me and explaining what I am doing and achieving. From there, I hope that it does become a little easier to talk to people. My main focus is to talk about my professional career easier. I almost had a massive set back because of my lack of courage in my own ability.

 

I hope that you guys liked this blog post. As I mentioned, by sharing these, I hope if you see any of this in yourself, change it. Obviously, we don’t all want to be tacky and brash, but we need to be proud of ourselves. In this day and age, we have enough people trying to tare us down, without doing it to ourselves.

From this point on, I am going to try and speak about my accolades with price. I know that I am good at my job. Blogging is second nature to me, and I am a hard worker. The things that I have gained from this profession, I deserve, and I need to reaffirm that to myself. This is truly going to be a journey for me.