——— HIGHLIGHTS ———
0:01:03 – Imposter Syndrome (90 Seconds)
0:04:05 – Embracing Femininity and Overcoming Imposter Syndrome (119 Seconds)
0:07:22 – Imposter Syndrome vs Imposter Phenomenon (67 Seconds)
0:11:07 – Imposter Syndrome as a Superpower (123 Seconds)
0:18:53 – The Power of Personal Responsibility (91 Seconds)
0:25:18 – Imposter Phenomenon and Personal Growth (70 Seconds)
——— HIGHLIGHTS WITH TRANSCRIPT ———
Imposter Syndrome | 0:01:03 – 0:02:32 (90 Seconds)
0:01:03 Bill De La Cruz
Well, welcome back to the Origination Point podcast, and I have a really wonderful guest that we are going to have a great conversation on what’s called imposter syndrome, and my guest today is Jen Kokin. Jen, welcome, it’s really great to have you here and before we jump into our conversation, I’m going to let you take some time and just introduce yourself to our listeners and tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do.
0:01:35 Jen Coken
Awesome, bill. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast. I really appreciate it because we get to talk about one of my favorite topics imposter syndrome. So, as you said, my name is Jen Kokin. I’ve been a coach for I don’t know 25 years, and predominantly I coach women executives that are in male dominated industries, and I have a vision of a world of people at home with themselves, where each and every person is acknowledged, appreciated and known for their unique contribution. Often, women in male dominated industries don’t feel like they have a voice, and so when we work together, I help them lead with more authority, influence and impact, and imposter syndrome fits right in here. So I’m known as the woman who thinks of imposter syndrome as a superpower, which most people don’t think about it that way, and so I’m excited to be on your podcast.
Embracing Femininity and Overcoming Imposter Syndrome | 0:04:05 – 0:06:04 (119 Seconds)
0:04:05 Jen Coken
Let me want to say one thing to address what you talked about. This is why I love coaching women, because I want them to bring all of themselves to work and recognize you don’t have to be like a man to lead, because now, as we’ve seen, oh, empathy and vulnerability are the most important characteristics that people are seeing from leaders, and women traditionally have been more the empathetic and feeling folks and, unfortunately, when you’re in the water of a male dominated industry, you start trying to whittle away your edges to try to fit in and it never works. So when it goes back to a world of people at home with themselves, I help women stop whittling and really embrace their femininity, their connection, the empathy, the emotional intelligence all those pieces and still able to access the divine masculine where they can get things done, because we need that and each man and each woman has that divine masculine and divine feminine energy. It’s how to tap into both and bring them together in a holistic way and embody those to be the most successful. So I wanted to put that pin in it, but let’s talk Great and I love that phrase at home with themselves.
0:05:16 Bill De La Cruz
So let’s jump in and hear your thoughts around imposter syndrome not being a syndrome.
0:05:21 Jen Coken
It’s not a syndrome, because a syndrome is a medical diagnosis and nobody can be diagnosed with imposter syndrome. And in fact, when Clancy and I I’m 50 years ago, these two researchers who are researching women in academia, they call it imposter phenomenon because it’s experiential, it’s phenomenological meaning, it’s as lived, and what we’re calling imposter syndrome, we call it that because the SEO is better. That’s what people know it as. If we had kept with imposter phenomenon, perhaps that would be the thing that ranked higher for SEO. I don’t know, but just know it’s not a medical diagnosis. Understand that every literally.
Imposter Syndrome vs Imposter Phenomenon | 0:07:22 – 0:08:29 (67 Seconds)
0:07:22 Jen Coken
So what’s happening is that in the moment where you experience imposter syndrome and it’s as lived it could be sweaty palms, heart palpitations, procrastination could be one of the symptoms, let’s say, of feeling like an imposter In all those moments the brain is kind of having this heightened awareness of an experience, of an emotion it didn’t want and doesn’t want, and then it’s trying to make up for that and predict the future. So that’s where this whole thing came from. So it’s not a syndrome at all, it’s a phenomenon.
0:07:58 Bill De La Cruz
So basically, what I’m hearing is I need to stop calling it imposter syndrome and look at it from imposter phenomenon, because it’s not a medical condition.
0:08:09 Jen Coken
Yeah, I mean, if we all, all us coaches who talk about this, if we stopped calling it that we might see a better ranking, I don’t know. But the other thing of it is people always search for imposter syndrome.
0:08:20 Bill De La Cruz
Right.
0:08:20 Jen Coken
And as somebody, I have a course on you to me. As somebody called me out, they were like well, why do you keep calling it that? Because it’s so ingrained in my brain. But that’s also.
Imposter Syndrome as a Superpower | 0:11:07 – 0:13:10 (123 Seconds)
0:11:07 Jen Coken
Okay, I’m a former stand-up comedian. People know me like my brand because I am a very witty, funny person. But when I experience not belonging, that humor doesn’t always carry the day. But most of all, I became the person who got. I was in politics for 30 years while I was coaching, got other people elected, passed major legislation In the West, actually stopped 37 proposed coal-fired power plants from being built, started non-profits. None of those had anything to do with me as a human. It was all about causes and situations and I got very successful that way. But when it was me out front, or me attempting to market myself, or me attempting to give voice to even being still enough to hear my own thoughts, I consistently doubted and questioned myself. But it was on loudspeaker in 2019.
0:12:03 Bill De La Cruz
So that’s really interesting that in the larger scope of what you talk about, with the politics and causes, if I heard you right, there was no issue of confidence until you got into something that, oh, this is about me versus this is about the cause that I’m involved in. Then, as you said, the loudspeaker of doubt just grew and grew. Okay, I just want to make sure I’m tracking.
0:12:34 Jen Coken
No, I’m so glad that you made that point, and so this is why I say imposter syndrome is your superpower, or imposter phenomenon is your superpower, because we all have those moments, and when I work with people, and I’m particularly around imposter phenomenon, I take them on a 10-minute guided meditation to go back to that first experience of feeling like they failed. It usually comes down to I’m not good enough or I don’t belong in this community of people, which also then impacts how imposter phenomenon manifests.
The Power of Personal Responsibility | 0:18:53 – 0:20:24 (91 Seconds)
0:18:53 Jen Coken
I call that responsibility Choosing how you have an ability in the power to respond to any situation. How do you choose to show up?
0:19:04 Bill De La Cruz
Wow, that is a lot, and it’s interesting how that defining moment and the origination point I have the same Understanding that it’s all between birth and adolescence, which is that zero to twelve or thirteen that are those defining moments and and I think for me it was Related to my dad, when I wasn’t enough for him. I wasn’t like him enough and my brother was like him, and so he got more attention and more of this and I got all of these. You’re not good enough, you know, or you’re not doing what you should be doing, and so so I had to Not only become aware of that, I had to create a healing process for myself, because that helps when that phenomenon comes up, that I’m not enough, even to this day that I can Realize that. Oh yeah, I do have a choice. Now I’m at this defining moment and I can choose. Do I want to high you know to use your phrase hide out in the covers, or do I want to skulk away like I used to do? Yeah, or do I want to step up and even some of that stepping up.
Imposter Phenomenon and Personal Growth | 0:25:18 – 0:26:28 (70 Seconds)
0:25:18 Jen Coken
You know, I’ve been doing work for 40, almost 44 years. I started this journey when I was 15. I still have been days. I still like when, when, when will it all be done? It won’t. There’s one point where you will never experience imposter phenomenon again and that is when you’re dead, right and that’s what I tell people about all of these things.
0:25:45 Bill De La Cruz
It’s an imposter phenomenon or a stereotypes or biases or judgments. The moment you’re born and the moment you leave the planet and in between all of those times, it’ll be real. And and and it’s so interesting because I know even in my own life I’ve embellished my story right that, that movie script that, and when I first started I was the victim, of course.
0:26:12 Jen Coken
Yeah.
0:26:12 Bill De La Cruz
And then my movie script has changed and, to your point, when I got to, well, what are the facts? Then it was like that’s where the, the lessons were, or the growth is, and I won’t say has been, because, to your point, it’s a constant.
