Imposter Syndrome is
actually a collection of feelings of inadequacy that persist despite evident
success. "Imposters" suffer from chronic self-doubt and a sense of
intellectual fraudulence that overrides any feelings of success or external
proof of their competence. It is the persistent fear of being exposed as a
fraud. There is always a constant nagging feeling that "I am a bad
programmer", "I am a mediocre programmer, "I cannot code well
without Google search", "I cannot code without Stack Overflow"
and "I am not fit for a coding job yet".
As a beginner Programmer, or as a Programming
learner, this is actually a feeling of insecurity due to not knowing everything
as compared to others doing the same thing. It could also be a feeling of being
lost amidst expert programmers, software engineers having a vast experience in
this industry. Sometimes, this is also the fear of being exposed as a fake
programmer not having enough expertise as self-promoted to others/peers in the
industry or at work or in the place of learning.
Let us understand the reasons for this feeling of
Inferiority complex, in order to combat this challenge. Read these details to
understand why you feel that "I am a fake programmer, about to be
exposed":
You do not have a formal Computer
Science degree
There is a common myth among many programming
students and programmers as well who think that you need to have a formal
Computer Science degree in order to do well in Programming. This a myth
because, many companies hire Programmers and Engineers based on their knowledge
and portfolio rather than a fancy computer science degree! A Computer Science
degree may help you in getting attracted to hirers but during the interview, it
is only your knowledge and portfolio that matters, rather than your degree
certificate.
You are a self - taught
programmer
You think that since you are a self-taught learner
in Programmer, you may have left out something behind and not well-equipped as
those who have gained formal degree certification from computer science
universities. You also do not have the full confidence as a Programmer as you
are not attending full time classes, and there is no mentor holding your hands
and leading you all the time in your learning journey. Let me tell you this important
point, companies always prefer a self-taught Programmer rather than a
Programmer who studied Computer Science and Programming in a University. The
reason for this is due to the fact that companies need independent learners and
not someone who is dependent on seniors or colleagues all the time to learn new
programming languages. Once you are hired for one Programming Language, say,
Python, you’re learning journey doesn't end there, but your employer will
expect you and also ask you to keep learning new Programming languages, like,
Java, JavaScript, PHP and so on and so forth. If you are a self-taught
Programmer, then, your employer knows that you will find it quite exciting and
easy to learn more programming languages all on your own without burdening others
around and then you will prove to be an asset for your employer!
You are not the best programmer
compared to others around you
You are always getting this nagging feeling inside
you that you are not as good as other programmers around you. You feel that
they know much better than you and that compared to them, you are just nothing.
You can not help feeling that you are so foolish compared to other programmers
who are too smart with coding and completing tons of projects quickly without
taking help from others. This is completely wrong on your part to think as
such, because, every person is unique and it is not at all a good idea to
compare yourself to others. It is like comparing your beginning to someone
else’s middle!
You suffer from Success Phobia
You have a nagging sense of Success Phobia that
keeps stopping you from reaching the top and hinders you from doing better and
better. This Success Phobia is the biggest obstacle to the path of achievement
and you need to get rid of this phobia in order to move forward. If you have a
tendency to rush your goal, and speed up on completing your learning phase or
compete with your peers to become better than others, then, you will end up
taking short cuts and short-cuts can really lead you to the success phobia
tunnel where the going can get very tough indeed.
Planning in accordance with your goals, lifestyle
environment, personal commitments, etc., is very important or else programming
journey can become very humdrum or strenuous. If you want to succeed as a Programmer,
being consistent, persistent and patient is very important, in order to avoid
being lost in the tunnel of the Success Phobia while rushing things. Remember,
"Rome was not build in a day!"
You fear reaching the top as you feel that you may
fall down any time! This feeling of insecurity only comes to you since you are
rushing to reach to the top and you are rushing to become successful too soon
in order to compete with others around you. If you want to achieve something,
you must set a goal and you should compete with yourself and not with others,
so that you can win slowly but surely.
You suffer from Failure Phobia
(it won't work out)
Just as success phobia deters you from reaching the
top, even the failure phobia does the same thing to you in stopping you from
your achievements and goals.
The Failure Phobia is common to all beginners, be
it in the early learning phase or in the early working phase, whereby, you keep
getting this nagging feeling that you will fumble and fail somewhere along the
way and that it won’t work out the way you planned. This feeling arises
from the fact that you are rushing too much either trying to learn everything
fast or trying to prove to others that you are also the best. It is all about
proving to yourself that you will become your best self rather than trying to
become better than others around.
You steal codes from google
In order to complete complex projects to show off
that you are the best, you fumble in the beginning and being unable to complete
the code with your limited knowledge, on your own, you decide to steal codes
from google. This is where the feeling of imposter syndrome starts attacking
you and you feel so let down that you feel a very poor image about yourself. In
order to be successful, feeling good about yourself is good and by feeling bad
about yourself, you cannot proceed to complete your more complicated projects
or secure programming jobs and even if you get a job in the beginning by
stealing codes from google or others around, you are bound to get caught in the
process.
You are poor in Mathematics. This is based on a
common belief that programmers need to be good at Mathematics. If you do not
have a Mathematics background, that does not mean that you cannot be a
programmer, however, this insecurity of not being an expert in Mathematics, is
surely bringing you down from your feeling of an ideal Programmer image
expectation.
Only Nerds can code
You suffer from this negative feeling that only
Nerds can code successfully and that you are not a nerd, hence, you are
incapable of being successful in a coding job. This feeling persists inside
you, because, you have a certain image of a Nerd as being someone who is the
most knowledgeable person who knows everything in science and mathematics and
who is born intelligent in programming. You feel that you just cannot
understand what are the complications within the coding languages and you feel
completely lost in the maze of all the coding concepts, their logical
statements, data structures and algorithms etc. You fail to realize that you do
not need to be a nerd in order to code and that coding comes from understanding
the concepts and logics. If you have average understanding power, then, you are
able to understand the logics behind every block of code, provided, you invest
your time and focus on grasping the concepts of the programming languages that
you have learnt or trying to learn.
How to deal with the Programmer Imposter
Syndrome
The reason you feel this imposter syndrome is due
to the fact that you are comparing yourself to others in the industry doing the
same thing, be it a programming student like yourself or be a software
developer or Engineer like yourself. So, the first ACTION that you need to take
is to STOP comparing yourself to others. Even if others are doing better than
you with similar work or learning background or experience, stop comparing them
with you. They are THEY and you are YOU! Nobody is same, everybody is unique.
Again, even if you consider yourself smart and intelligent and yet cannot pick
up the skill better than others of the same level, just don't compare, because,
no two different persons have the same lifestyle, background, environment or
monetary scales. Just because others around are practicing coding 8 hours a day
and becoming smarter to code faster, does not mean that you are a fool. You
should understand that you have some other priorities at work or in personal
life due to your commitments that just does not allow you the time to take out
8 hours a day to learn code or practice coding, hence, you may end up getting
familiarized with the skills in a longer duration of time span as compared to
them. There is nothing wrong with that, hence, it is always wiser to compare
yourself with yourself, that is, keep comparing your current status with your
past status and keep improvising in improving your skills, be it at work or
learning to code. This way, it would be much easier to fight the Imposter
Syndrome inside your brain!
"Don't compare your beginning with someone
else's middle."-Thorin Kozlowski.
You must never compare your early phase of coding
career or learning phase with others’ advanced phase of a long coding
experience as that will only discourage you from going further in your coding
career. It is always better to compare your middle with your beginning in order
to measure your progress level and helping you to target your goal more
precisely.
Embrace Not knowing everything
It is always a good idea to accept the fact that
you are not a “Know it all! “. If you pretend to know more than you actually
know, then, chances are that you will end up hurting your reputation in the
community, and also damage your ambition to move ahead in this journey. Embrace
the learning phase and embrace not knowing everything, as not knowing
everything will make you curious in this coding journey. Curiosity will trigger
your power of thinking logically and that is what will take you forward in your
programming journey. In fact, you will never reach the stage of knowing
everything in Programming as this a huge industry in itself and even
experienced Programmers need to keep learning new things.
"Everything will be okay in the end. If is
it’s not okay, it's not the end." John Lennon
You should have an open and daring mind with a
strong determination that is already focused upon success in the end and
simultaneously ready to bear the brunt of failure, weaknesses and challenges
that may come in the way of your ambitions, but you have to take it as a
learning point rather than considering it as the end of your journey! As long
as you continue having a strong willpower, you will surely make it until the
end with great success.
Programming is forever evolving
Programming trends keep changing- sometimes the
language that you learnt today may become obsolete tomorrow. Also new languages
may become the trend of the time. New technological tools and frameworks keep
coming up in the industry year after year and in order to keep up with this
industry, you need to keep yourself updated with these trends and keep learning
new languages, frameworks, and other such things that are required to keep up
with the latest information. Hence Programming is an ever-evolving science and
you need to keep up with your learning journey for life. Hence, the best
Programmers never stop learning, never stop thinking and never stop creating.
Good programmers need not be a
good mathematician
You don’t need to be an expert in Mathematics in
order to get involved in coding. But even if you do not have a mathematics
background, make sure that you prepare yourself with some basic level
mathematics in order to understand the coding data structures and algorithms
that will get you on to the road of Logical Thinking. Also, you may take up
front-end web development and languages that stay away from mathematics. But,
as a programming teacher, I myself would suggest that you learn basic maths in
order to understand some basic algorithms that may arise in front-end projects
as well, that involve a bit of structural thinking. If you are a person who
loves designing, you could opt for web designing that has nothing to do with
Mathematics.
You don't need to be born as a
nerd to code
Many people are scared of even venturing into the
coding industry as they think that programmers are nerds born with high
scientific mind and that only nerds are able to become good programmers.
Thinking attitude can be developed
While doing coding projects, you need to think a
lot, but, remember, this is nothing to do with nerds. Thinking mindset can be
developed if you put your mind into it.
Understand that expertise takes
time and experience
Even experienced programmers google and conduct
research to do lots of their projects. Experts also look up code snippets in
Stack overflow for more ideas on doing things in different ways. Looking at
other coders’ work also gives you creativity to do projects in other ways to
get the same result. Remembering what to google is important and it is not a
shame to google for coding concepts in case you get stuck in the midst of a
coding project. Remember to google for concepts and methods, but not for final
solutions. Even if you google for solutions, ensure that you understand all the
concepts and steps that goes into doing that project rather than blindly
copying it for end results.
There is no such thing as expert
programmer
You will never reach the stage of knowing
everything in programming. Even experienced programmers need to research and
look up google a lot. There is so much to learn and understand in the
ever-evolving industry of coding, that, you will never be able to call
yourself, an Expert Programmer, even after years of working and training in
this industry, since, there is too much depth in the vast sea of knowledge.
To conclude, please remember that you will reach
your goal if you are patient. You will make it to the end if you really
persevere. Never give up coding for wrong reasons. If you feel frustrated at
any stage, re-think why you started learning to code in the first place. Stop
copy pasting from google and stack overflow code solutions. Google for methods
and concepts, not solutions and train yourself to google for steps and methods
not solutions. Learning to code the hard way is often good for long term basis,
as challenges along the way will trigger our power to think and solve problems,
even better. Taking few steps backward when things get hard is better than
taking short cuts!
Your journey as a Programmer can turn out to be
very rocky if you cannot handle the challenges that come with it and you may
even end up giving up your coding career if you are not careful in keeping up
with your confidence level either while learning to code or in our newly
acquired Programming job position. In this book, you will learn about the
challenges that drives the force of Programming Imposter Syndrome and how to
tackle and fight this syndrome in order to achieve your goal of becoming
successful in your Programming career.
How to remember code in your learning phase
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