What is an “imposter imposter”?

Hi everyone, my name is Megan Janitor. Welcome to my blog. In addition to using this blog for my capstone project, I am going to be reflecting on my journey to become a Software Developer. What does that mean? And for the record, what is an imposter imposter?

Well first and foremost, it’s some gibberish that came to my brain. Secondly, it is a concept that I have been struggling with. If you come from a computer science background, you are most likely already familiar with the term “imposter syndrome”. But in case you’re not, Wikipedia defines imposter syndrome as “a psychological pattern in which an individual doubts their skills, talents, or accomplishments and has a persistent internalized fear of being exposed as a ‘fraud’. It is something that a lot of people–but people especially in my field struggle with. But why is this? And when do you stop feeling like a fraud, one who is about to be found out by their employer at any given moment? Some people never stop feeling this way, even people that we consider to be extraordinarily successful, like Albert Einstein, who was quoted to say:

“The exaggerated esteem in which my lifework is held makes me very ill at ease. I feel compelled to think of myself as an involuntary swindler.”

While some look at this and say, “well if Einstein felt this way, what chance do the rest of us have?”, I find this revelation that someone as highly accomplished as he to be a relief. This forces me to realize that imposter syndrome then obviously has no ties to the actual abilities of an individual, if someone remembered by many as a genius felt like an imposter. It is a feeling, then, to be discarded (as best as we can). This will be one of the main focuses of this blog, to chronicle my attempts to leave imposter syndrome behind, and in fact become, an imposter imposter.