Fake it 'til you make it”
It’s one of the biggest take-aways I have from my childhood. I do not know how many times my mum told me this little nugget of advice, but it has stuck with me, informing my behaviour and granting me opportunities I otherwise wouldn’t have had.
If I was feeling down, “fake it till you make it”. Before I knew it, I’d be having fun, laughing and smiling (even if only for a short time).
If I was scared or nervous, “fake it till you make it”, so I’d throw my shoulders back, get my strut on and no one would know I was shaking on the inside.
If I was offered a job that felt outside my range of experience, “Fake it till you make it”, just say yes to the job and then work my arse off to learn how to do it.
That isn’t to mean that we should ignore how we feel emotionally in the moment, we should recognise how certain situations cause us to feel. We just need to realise that that doesn’t have to be the end of the process. It means we have choices every second of the day as to how we respond to those emotions internally and externally.
Too often in life we allow our doubts, our fears and our perceived lack of experience get in the way of allowing ourselves to create true happiness in our lives. For years, I put off starting this blog because of two fears 1. No one would read it and 2. A lack of experience writing. But once I started calling myself a writer or blogger or podcaster (depends on the day) I just started writing, blogging and podcasting. And you know what? I faked it long enough that now it doesn’t matter to me whether anyone reads my writing, I just love to write.
Now you may be thinking
“but Alex, you wise and handsome man, isn’t that the same as lying to people?”
To which I would say “how did you get in here? But also, good point”.
The big difference between lying out right and “faking it till you make it” is the former is an intentional deception for nefarious means, the latter is a self-deception for the purposes of personal growth.
Like anything that is for your personal growth, it will take time, practise and consistency. You don’t walk into a gym and expect to be able to deadlift 200kg on your first day, nor should you expect to be perfect at this process straight away either. Sometimes you’ll feel like you’re coming on with leaps and bounds and other times It can be slow going. That’s to be expected but don’t give up. If you stick with it and you can train yourself to “Fake it”, you’ll be surprised just how much you can change your immediate circumstances. Before you even realise it, you’ll not be faking your confidence, you will be confident. You’ll have stopped pretending to be excited and you’ll genuinely be excited. Change the way you present yourself to the world and not only will you fool others, you will trick yourself into believing it to, and what we believe about ourselves inevitably becomes our truth.
So Get Up, Get Out, and Get Awesome
And Fake it till you make it.
