Josephine Hughes (She/Her)
When I was about 9 or 10, in a primary school guest assembly, I put up my hand to answer the question, what countries make up the United Kingdom? Confidently, I listed them all, but included Ireland in my list only for the head teacher to shout no and bang the lectern.
I felt crestfallen, as if I’d let the whole school down. That feeling of public humiliation that so many of us have experienced can make us hesitate to put ourselves out there, even many years later.
Welcome to the Good Enough Counsellors Podcast. I’m Josephine Hughes and today the theme of the social media toolkit for November is Imposter Syndrome.
In the first part of the episode we’ll cover the issue of feeling not good enough to share on social media and then we’ll move on to think about how you can use awareness events for your social media posts in November. So how might the not good enough feeling manifest itself in relation to social media? I wonder, do any of these apply to you?
Reluctance to start a social media page because you don’t have anything to say? Doing a ton of research for a post and then not publishing it anyway?
Imagining that your peers will be critical of your post because you don’t know enough? Looking at others who post on social media and thinking I couldn’t possibly post on the same subject because they know so much more than me.
Imposter syndrome is that feeling of self doubt about your skills, intellect and accomplishments. You feel like you don’t belong. You downplay your success because after all, if you can do it, that means it’s not very challenging.
You admire your peers achievements and you’re able to see all of their accomplishments, but you minimise your own and are painfully aware of all your failings. Even though you’ve worked so hard to gain your qualification and also have a lot of experience in the school of life, you still feel like a fake.
The nature of counselling working with the complexities of individual human personalities means that you always feel like you have more to learn. As someone who’s sensitive and reflective, you’re very aware of missed opportunities within sessions and you may be quite self critical.
And in relation to social media, let’s just add in what the BACP call personal moral qualities, the values that you’ve developed as part of your training and commitment to clients. You care about being honest, sincere and respectful. The last thing you want to do is represent yourself as something you’re not.
But as I reflect on what I’ve just said, I feel a great deal of compassion towards you and in fact I Think you’re the perfect person to be sharing on social media?
Social media is unfortunately something that attracts armchair experts who don’t have any self doubt and spread all sorts of misinformation without a backward glance. Self doubt can be very healthy. It helps to keep you on your toes and it means you will double check what you say before you share it.
The world needs people like you to be sharing from your knowledge and experience.
And while you may feel that you don’t know enough, you do know a lot more than non counsellors about the problems that people face and why they may be happening. But what I think is really important to say is that you don’t have to know everything. We put ourselves under enormous pressure to be the expert.
That’s a terrible burden. For a start, even if you’re a professor of counselling, you’ll probably know a host of other professors who know more than you.
In fact, with every successful upward move in academia, you just join a new club where there are other people who’ve been there longer than you. So imposter syndrome survives that qualification.
I know that lots of you have doubts about having a niche because you think I’m not an expert in that field. But it’s not about being an expert, it’s about having an interest.
And on social media, you’re not being an expert, you’re simply contributing to the conversation. You’re adding your own understanding and knowledge from your perspective. And that’s why your contribution can be unique.
Because no one else has your personality, your experiences, or your way of viewing the world.
You just might be that person who unlocks something for someone else because you have a particular analogy or a way of explaining it that makes sense to them. You may be thinking, oh, everyone knows this, but often they don’t. And it’s your posts that they come across at just the right moment.
And when I say that, the question arises, why would you deny that to someone? Why would you hold yourself back from helping someone, hold yourself back from making a difference to someone’s life?
The answer, I think, is to do with fear. Fear of being rejected. When you’re on social media, you make yourself vulnerable. You’re vulnerable to other people’s views of you.
And alongside that is the intense shame that comes when you’ve made a mistake and believe that people will think less of you as a result.
So the result is that rather than expose yourself to the possibility of shame, you protect yourself by not posting at all, or posting what feels safe, rather than allowing yourself to express that innate Creativity that is within all of us. And because you’re not being you, you’re less relatable to people. There’s no doubt that by posting you are taking a risk.
And I think it’s inevitable that you will at some point receive some criticism, because you cannot control what other people think of you. They come to your content with their own views and they may well interpret what you say badly. No one is exempt from criticism.
For example, Mark Twain said of Jane Austen, every time I read Pride and Prejudice, I want to dig her up and beat her over the skull with her own shin bone. But Pride and Prejudice is one of my most favourite books ever. It takes all sorts.
I think it’s really important to focus on the people you want to help. The people who criticise you are not part of the community you’re creating on social media.
The people who are part of your community will be very forgiving towards your mistakes and, in fact, will welcome your imperfection. There’s tremendous leadership in showing up as you are, warts and all, because it gives others permission to fail too.
And it’s only by being willing to fail that growth happens. Mistakes are an integral part of learning. A book I read a few years ago is How To Fail by Elizabeth Day.
It’s Elizabeth’s personal journey and also that of her immensely successful podcast, How To Fail with Elizabeth Day, where she invites guests to share their failures. People love hearing these stories because, simply, we all fail. And it’s so reassuring to know that you’re not the only one.
And in fact, that’s the way to counter the shame. As Brenny Brown says, shame can’t survive being spoken. It thrives on secrecy, silence and judgment. So douse it with empathy.
I guarantee that if you’re shamed on social media and find someone empathic to share that shame with, you’ll come away feeling compassion towards yourself and your humanity. You’ll be able to acknowledge that you are only human and you’ll be able to pick yourself up and carry on.
In my recent live feed challenge, several of the participants questioned themselves after sharing. They looked at themselves on video and felt critical of the way they looked and sounded and what they’d said. This is called a vulnerability hangover.
It’s a very common way to feel when you’ve pushed yourself out of your comfort zone in terms of sharing yourself. And yet it’s this very vulnerability that makes you human and helps other people to relate to you.
You may think that you’re not good enough to share on social media, yet what people want is not some guru. They’re looking for someone relatable who will understand their problems. They don’t want perfect, they want real. So be brave.
And with that in mind, let’s turn to ideas about what you can post on social media in November.
But first, I’d like to let you know that from the 21st to the 25th of October, I’ll be running my make youe Profile Work training in the Therapy Growth Group. This is a program that helps you compose effective profiles for directories such as Psychology Today.
Part of the training is all about finding your niche, and I’m mentioning it today because having an awareness of who you’re trying to reach can help you find angles in what you want to talk about on social media. You could pick a random day, such as Stress awareness day on November 6th and approach it from the point of view of your niche.
For example stress in the workplace, stress for teachers, stress for parents, or minority stress. Think about the clients you’d like to serve and how stress applies to them.
If you’d like to work on your niche and take part in the make your profile work challenge in October, which is the last time I run it in 2024, just go along to WWW TherapyGrowth Group to join up. It’s £50 for a month subscription and there’s no minimum membership period. You can leave whenever you want.
Other possibilities for you to use with your niche in November are Anti Bullying week from the 11th and self care week from the 18th. With both of these weeks, think about how they apply to your niche. For example, say you have a niche for teachers.
You might approach Anti Bullying Week both from the viewpoint of the difficulties they may face in working with children in bullying situations or how they may have experienced bullying themselves. The same could apply to parents and people in the workplace. You could offer practical tips, e.g.
communication and assertiveness, but also reach out to your community and invite their ideas and experience. You don’t have to be the person who knows it all, you’re facilitating a conversation. There’s so much you could do around Self Care Week.
Bust the myth that self care is selfish or has to be done a certain way or treated like a chore. Share daily self care tips that are easy to incorporate into a routine.
Show a behind the scenes moment of your own self care, such as a photo, a video of your morning routine, or even something funny about how you don’t have to have a perfect self care routine that in itself will be relatable. You could discuss burnout, share self care resources or ask your community what they’ll be doing for self care.
November also marks Movember and Men’s Health Awareness Month. It’s also International Men’s day on the 19th. This means you could turn your focus towards male clients.
I think I could write a whole episode on ideas for this, but here’s just a few to get you going. How about tackling the subject of mental health stigma and how hard it is for men to admit their vulnerability?
What about emotions and the way men are expected to be strong and stoic? How can men find a version of masculinity that feels authentic to them?
What pressures do men face in society and how can this affect them, such as financial expectations, the role of fatherhood, body image and self esteem? Could you normalize therapy for men by using generalized examples of your male client work?
Or perhaps encourage men that in private practice they receive a highly confidential service and that means they’ll find space to be vulnerable? And while we’re on the theme of men, it’s White ribbon day on the 25th of November.
This is a day to encourage men to be allies in ending male violence against women, and the theme this year is it starts with men, with the emphasis on the me in men. You could tie this in with a discussion about healthy masculinity and how therapy can help men in addressing anger or trauma.
You may want to tackle the barriers that prevent men seeking therapy, such as shame or toxic masculinity, and show men that therapy is for them too.
And if you’re someone who works with women and domestic abuse, posts on White Ribbon day and the 16 days of action to End Domestic Violence will speak to them too. If you work with cancer patients and their families or with bereavement, November marks both Pancreatic and Lung Cancer Awareness Month.
This gives you an opportunity to focus on the impact of diagnosis, the treatment journey, palliative care and loss sudden loss in the case of pancreatic cancer.
Within the LBGTQ community, November includes Transgender Parent day on the 3rd, the Intersex Remembrance Day on the 8th, Transgender Day of Remembrance on the 20th and Transgender Awareness Week starting on the 13th. And to finish this section of the podcast on a light note, it’s also Thanksgiving day on Thursday 24th November.
UK therapists could use this to explore themes around gratitude and appreciation or, conversely, the family and its effects on mental health and why therapy may be necessary. You could also revisit this theme next month around Christmas.
I hope today’s episode of the Social media Toolkit has helped you to feel more confident about stepping out of your comfort zone and developing your voice on social media.
Remember, people are looking to social media to make connections, and it’s much easier to connect with someone who’s human than someone who’s perfect. Thanks for listening. Do come and join my Facebook community, Goodenough Counsellors.
And for more information about how I can help you develop your private practice, please Visit my website, JosephineHughes.com if you found this episode helpful, I’d love it if you could share it with a fellow therapist or leave a review on your podcast app. And in closing, I’d love to remind you that every single step you make gets you closer to your dream. I really believe you can do it.