I've talked a few times in the past about the impostor's syndrome. If you do not know what that is, a short way of explaining it is saying that it's the feeling you get when you feel as if you are a fraud, that all your achievements are the result of cheating, even if there's no proof of such a thing, that you are unfit to have any responsibilities and that everyone is mistaken for thinking you have any abilities at all.
It's basically a huge amount of self doubt that constantly makes you think that you're nothing but a pretender. You're worthless, and you know it, you cannot do anything, and you know it, and yet you somehow trick everyone into thinking that you're the exact opposite - that you're capable.
This can be quite an exhausting phenomenon and it can have quite an impact on your mental well-being. It can drain your energy and make you feel useless regardless of how hard you work and how much you achieve.
Because of this there's quite a lot of content out there meant to help you get over the impostor's syndrome. Seeking out mentors, fighting your fear of being rejected (because, you know, you're a fraud, so no employer in their right mind would hire you), sharing your work with others who you know will give you an honest opinion, and just trying to accept yourself for who you are, all these are great things you can try so that you can reduce all the negative thoughts that you're getting on a daily basis.
Depending on what type of person you are however, there's one more thing you can do that can actually help you deal with this phenomenon in a fairly simple way - ignoring it. It can sound counterintuitive, because we're constantly trying to fix our mental health, not ignore it, but this strategy can actually work for some people.
If there's anything I learned after being stuck with the impostor's syndrome for years and years is that sometimes, for some people, all those strategies that are meant to help you might simply not do anything. You can end up trying everything you find that is supposed to help you just to realize, when you're working on a project or posting something online that gets a moderate amount of praise, that you're once again questioning your abilities and feelings as if you're not worthy of the compliments you received and that you're deceiving people.
Once that happens, you're back where you started. And you can try all those strategies and methods again in an attempt to rid yourself of those annoying thoughts, just to find yourself in the exact same position in a few weeks. How do you deal with that?
The route I chose was to ignore the thoughts and move on with my life. They are there, they are still bothering me, but I accepted two facts that helped me keep on doing what I do without any intention of stopping. The first fact is that I might never be able to work for a very long time without doubting my abilities, without considering that my achievements were nothing but luck or without feeling as if I'm tricking people into thinking I'm capable. The second fact is that despite all those feelings, my achievements and my work are still valid, and out there. No one can take that away from me, not even my own negative thoughts.
As I write, create and post, I continue to increase the amount of work that I publish online, and once in a while, when I feel down, I can simply go and look at all the things I managed to achieve and realize, just for a few seconds, that I did way more than I ever thought. I even feel proud when looking back at some of my projects and realizing that it was me who created them, regardless of the negative thoughts I had back when I was working on them.
For a lot of people, using a multitude of methods meant to improve their life can help them get rid of the impostor's syndrome and feel more fulfilled as they achieve more and more. If you're one of those people, congratulations - you're lucky, and you should feel good about being able to get better.
For others, like me, no matter the amount of effort we might put into improving our situation, we will simply find it impossible to get rid of those negative thoughts that are haunting us even in our sleep. What do we do when that happens? Well, there's always the option of giving up, which, if you ask me, is a terrible one. Or you can simply ignore the voice in your head that tells you that you're not good enough. Toughen up, as you did many times in the past in a lot of other similar cases, show the middle finger to that voice, and keep on working.
After enough time has passed you'll look back at the mountain of work that you finished, and all those negative thoughts won't mean anything any more, because the work is there, and you can see it, and it was your achievement after hours of constant effort. And everything will be well, for a while.