Imposter Syndrome Affects All Equestrians - As Riders And In Business
Updated: 3 days ago
Imposter syndrome is quite simply the belief that you aren’t ‘good enough’. No matter what you achieve you won’t feel ‘enough’. You’ll always want to win more, learn more and do more, and I think it’s fair to say that we’ve all experienced this as equestrians, as well as business owners.
The Cambridge Dictionary defines an imposter as ‘a person who pretends to be someone else in order to deceive others’ and this is the worst thing about imposter syndrome- you feel like a fraud. You feel like you are going to get found out.
As a business and mindset coach to equine practitioners and vets, I have supported many people to acknowledge and release these feelings, and I’ve had my own battles with feeling like an imposter as well.
The good news is that rid yourself of imposter style feelings, and feel the opposite; confident and secure, enjoying your work or riding time.
Firstly an awareness of how these thoughts and feelings are manifesting in your world is essential. Then you can take action on working through this (and don’t worry I’ll show you how!).
I see imposter syndrome showing up in a variety of different ways, and it can be easy to miss. Feeling restless and struggling to switch off can be signs of not feeling good enough.
Here are some sneaky ways that Imposter Syndrome shows up. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list, but it will give you a good starting point to stop whether these feelings are stopping you in your life and business.
Perfectionism, inner critic, unable to take action, someone is going to find you out. What will people think? Fraud, doubt, I’m not good enough, I just got lucky. This can't last.
Restlessness, nervousness, negative self talk, questioning,downplaying success, self sabotage, overthinking, fearful, sense of doom
Feeling like ‘I just got lucky’ and that ‘someone will find me out’ have certainly plagued my riding career, but interestingly this has been less so as a business owner, and not at all as a parent.I found ways of keeping the imposter style feelings at bay for myself, and I’ve developed a 3 step process to help release imposter syndrome and keep it at bay.
Here’s an overview of how:
1. Acknowledge The Positives
I personally don’t like the term ‘imposter syndrome’ . It sounds like a disease for which there is no cure. When actually you don’t need to feel like this forever
Now these feelings are horrible, toxic and soul destroying BUT the first step to releasing not feeling ‘good enough’ is to acknowledge how feeling like an imposter has actually helped you.
I never felt good enough as a rider. I never felt like I belonged. Horrible. It ruined every show, and many amazing experiences, as I was literally waiting for someone to ask me to leave. I competed at country level with my wonderful old horse, but I was always waiting for a show official to tell me to leave the showground. Like they had made a terrible mistake letting ‘little old me’ in.
But it drove me forward, it made me jump out of my comfort zone a million times, it pushed me and motivated me.
This was a positive. This got me here.
So realise that feeling like an imposter has been helpful to you. It’s served a purpose, but now it’s time to move onto step 2 to allow yourself to release feeling like this.
2. Discover The Root Cause
NOTE - if you have experienced significant trauma in your life, or have some known triggers, please work through this step with a counsellor, therapist or qualified professional NOT on your own.
The human mind has two parts, the conscious and the subconscious. Our conscious mind is the part we are aware of, the one telling us to make a phone call or to remember to order more horse feed. The subconscious part is like a giant filing cabinet where all our memories and experiences are stored. Our subconscious allows us to do things on ‘autopilot’ like ride a horse or drive the car, we aren’t consciously thinking of every action we do when we are riding, we just ‘do it’.
To allow this autopilot function we have mental programming, just like a phone or a laptop, has programming to make it work. Our mental programming guides us to make decisions, tells us what we can or can’t do or achieve and is our very own personal filter on how we see the world. This programming is largely formed in our early childhood, and seemingly inconsequential events can have a big effect on our mental set up.
Finding the root cause of feeling like an imposter is simple. You need to get yourself into a relaxed state, where you can access your subconscious mind.
This might be by meditating, relaxing in the bath or in a more active way, like walking your dog or mucking out a stable.
Then you need to ask yourself - “When did I first feel like an imposter?” Tell your mind to take you back to a time that you first felt like this.
You will get a memory or an image come to mind, and if you don’t be patient. Your mind has the answer.
Once you have this memory try and see the event for what it was. Look at it as an adult. What are the lessons and learnings from this?
In my experience as a mindset coach the moment that an individual decides they ‘aren’t good enough’ isn’t always about them. It was either about another person, or it was simply a factual statement that they took to mean they weren’t good enough.
Quite simply your brain takes 2 + 2 and makes 5.
You experienced something and you made it mean something else, we all do this because of the filters on the subconscious. Your mind made it mean that you weren’t good enough and you’ve felt this way ever since.
It might be a big event or something small, which took on more significance.
For example imagine you learnt to ride at a barn or stables and wanted to ride a particular horse, let’s call him Rocky. You asked the trainer and got met with a no.
It went something like this…
Being told as a child …
“You can’t ride Rocky, he’s for the experienced riders only”
What was meant was …
“That could be dangerous, we don’t want you to get hurt, we want to look after our riders”
What would have been helpful to hear …
“Rocky is a super fun horse, and you are going to love riding him in a few years time once you can canter, or jump a certain height. Meanwhile you are going to have the best rides on Pixie and she will get you ready to ride Rocky”.
What the mind made it mean
“You aren’t good enough to ride Rocky” which turns into ‘you aren’t good enough as a rider.’
Can you see how a strong belief can develop and then keep you stuck for years to come?
Reflecting on a memory like this, as an adult, allows you to see that you are actually in fact ‘good enough’, and it is the most effective way to release these feelings for good.
3. Celebrate and train your mind for success
Your subconscious mind is powerful and stubborn, and it will resist change, but change is possible.
There is a powerful search engine in your subconscious called the Reticular Activation System (RAS) and this system is constantly looking for proof of your current beliefs.
You can train your mind to support the new belief of “I am good enough” by collating evidence of your many achievements. Creating a success list, of everything that you are proud of, both in business and your personal life, is a fantastic next step. This ‘evidence bank’ will start training your mind, and together with your new awareness of how imposter feelings can show up, you will be able to work through these feelings, no longer letting them define you.
Wishing you every success and please do reach out and say hi to me on Instagram - nkcbusinesscoaching.
Nicola Kinnard-Comedie (Msc, BHSAI Int. SM)
is the owner and founder of NKC Equestrian Training, delivering horse care training to horse owners and business and mindset coaching to equine practitioners.
Nicola is a qualified riding instructor and has over 20 years industry experience, and now uses her coaching skills to assist equine practitioners. Nicola decided to combine her experience of equestrian science, sales and marketing, and teach this to others. Nicola works with veterinary physiotherapists, massage therapists, osteopaths and other equestrians across the world to help them build their dream business. Nicola's work focuses on harnessing the power of your mindset, together with cutting edge marketing strategies to support equestrian business owners to realise the business of their dreams.
You can find out more about Nicola here: www.nkcequestrian.com
This article is from the September issue of Equine Business Magazine
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