NEUROTIC IMPOSTORS: FEELING LIKE A FAKE 99live up to others ’ expectations and catastrophe will follow. We are
reminded of Winnicott ’ s (1975) description of people who develop a
‘ false self, ’ an attempt to hide and protect the inner core of their per-
sonality, an outcome of adaptive failure resulting in a deceptive false
identity.
In describing the internal experiences of incompetence and phoni-
ness among impostors, Gediman (1985) has suggested a continuum
ranging from ‘ the psychopathic impostor who may assume a false iden-
tity for conscious and deliberate purposes of deception, through a het-
erogeneous variety of individuals who are vulnerable to a shaky identity
sense ’ (p. 912). The ‘ neurotic ’ group seems to fi nd it exceedingly hard
to accept their own talents and achievements.
What creates imposturous feelings?
One of the tasks of childhood is to complete the separation - individuation
process, when ‘ the infant ’ s primary narcissism, the belief in his own and
in his parent ’ s omnipotence ... gradually recede(s), that is to say, it must
be replaced by autonomous functioning ’ (Mahler, Pine, and Bergman,
1975 , p. 226). Individuals who feel like impostors have usually experi-
enced problems concerning the separation - individuation process,
although to a much lesser extent than real impostors. Nevertheless, true
separation has not been accomplished. These people never feel truly
independent and lack a cohesive sense of self. Their achievements and
capabilities are experienced as phony and hollow and cause guilt, fear,
and stress. They view themselves as frauds (Clance and Imes, 1978 ;
Clance, 1985 ). They make an incredible effort to prove these internal
voices wrong.
My clinical interviews with CEOs and other high - level executives
suggest that specifi c family structures can be breeding grounds for feel-
ings of imposture. Certain kinds of dysfunctional families — particularly
those in which parents have overinvested in achievement and where
often human warmth is lacking — tend to produce children who are
prone to neurotic imposture. Individuals who have been raised in this
kind of environment seem to believe that their parents will notice them
only when they excel. As time goes on, these people often turn into
insecure overachievers.
Such people are unusually sensitive to experiences of rejection,
excessively afraid of social failure and suffer from lingering dependency
needs. It is as if they have incorporated the disproportionate expectations
of their parents but never properly ‘ metabolized ’ t he m. I n m a n y i n s t a nc e s ,