Have you ever felt like you don’t belong? Like your friends or colleagues are going to discover you’re a fraud, and you don’t actually deserve your job and accomplishments? Sometimes you think about others as they are achieving so much and compare yourself to them.

Most of us have experienced this at some point in our lives and even I suffered personally. And if you feel the same then probably you're suffering from imposter syndrome.

What is Imposter Syndrome?

Impostor syndrome—the idea that you’ve only succeeded due to luck, and not because of your talent or qualifications—was first identified in 1978 by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes.

It’s that stomach-plunging fear that you’ll be revealed as a fraud who has no idea what they’re doing.
It's normal to get it and there is no harm in accepting that and one can easily come out of it.
It's common among high-achievers and people with perfectionist tendencies.

Some tips to deal and get rid of imposter syndrome

• Know the signs We often overlook the signs of imposter syndrome that we came across in our day-to-day lives. But recognizing these steps is the first step in coping with imposter syndrome.

Some of them are:

• You feel like you "got lucky" when you actually prepared well and worked hard.
• You find it hard to accept praise.
• You apologize for yourself when you didn't actually do something wrong.
• You hold yourself to incredibly -- sometimes impossibly -- high standards.
• You find the fear of failure paralyzing.
• You avoid expressing confidence because you think people will see it as overcompensating or obnoxious.
• You're convinced you're not enough.

And once you know then help yourself to get away from it!!

• Break the silence: When you came to know about it, don't feel shy and shame to talk about it. Discuss with your close ones, with your family, friends, colleagues to whomsoever you are comfortable with it. Talk about it.
• Accentuate the positive: The good news is being a perfectionist means you care deeply about the quality of your work. The key is to continue to strive for excellence when it matters most, but don’t persevere over routine tasks and forgive yourself when the inevitable mistake happens.
• Develop a healthy response to failure and mistake making: Henry Ford once said, "Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently". Instead of beating yourself up for falling short, do what players on the losing sports team do and glean the learning value from the loss, and move on reminding yourself, “I’ll get ’em next time.”
• Right the rules: If you’ve been operating under misguided rules like, “I should always know the answer,” or “Never ask for help” start asserting your rights. Recognize that you have just as much right as the next person to be wrong, have an off-day, or ask for assistance.
• Visualize success: Do what professional athletes do. Spend time beforehand picturing yourself making a successful presentation or calmly posing your question in class. It sure beats picturing impending disaster and will help with performance-related stress.
• Reward yourself: Break the cycle of continually seeking, and then dismissing validation outside of yourself by learning to pat yourself on the back.

In today’s workplaces, where all kinds of different people with distinct experiences, perspectives, and expectations are asked to collaborate, the bottom line with imposter syndrome is this: Everyone’s in the same boat. Nobody’s an imposter.

Confronted with that simple fact, all that’s left is to engage with your work and apply who you already are.

That’s always enough.