Imposter Syndrome and Belonging at Carleton
Will talks about his mental health struggles and how he overcame them
Will talks about his mental health struggles and how he overcame them
Some context
So, a few of you might be asking yourself “What is imposter syndrome?” Good question. To put it simply, it is the feeling that you are a fraud. To zoom in on me, that getting into Carleton was a mistake. That I’m not good enough, both as an academic and as a human being. My high school was tiny, graduating class of 47 tiny, and I never had actual grades during all of my school experience. So I did the smart thing, I told myself that it was okay to not get perfect grades, that the friends I met on my first day would grow, that I would grow, and that we might grow apart. But as both happened, I found myself slipping. It didn’t bother me initially, but as I failed to maintain my mostly unrealistic expectations, I started doing worse in school, and my personal life suffered. I know my downward spiral isn’t unique, which is why I’m here. The likelihood that someone out there reading this might come to feel like this is high, and I want that person or people to know that they’re not alone, and that eventually they’ll be okay too. While I still do struggle with self-esteem sometimes, I fully believe the worst of it is behind me. But how did I get there?
Do the little hard things
If there’s any theme to this article, this is probably it: the little hard things matter the most. It means joining your roommate for breakfast one day at “the breakfast club” to meet new people (I can feel the eye-rolls from here) and having the time of my life with a bunch of people I had never met before. They met in LDC every morning, and I lived at the other end of campus, but I still got up to head over at 7:30 at least three times a week. Over the summer, a few of us are on campus and have been the foundation for a group that cooks a big dinner together every Friday. They’ve been my rock, and I’m committed to going every day next year to make up for all the time I wish I spent with them.
Another little hard thing? Going on an adventure. I’ll go over my study abroad experience more in-depth, but that term was easily the best term I’ve had as a Carleton student, and the ability to figure out what I wanted to do with my free time, as well as spend time with some people who I “knew”, but got to truly know well over our time living together in an apartment, cooking, going out to pubs, and exploring the cities. Since I was abroad over the summer, I had to take the winter term off and continued my wanderlust by going on my first solo hike to Grandfather Mountain in the Appalachians. That reinvigorated my love for the outdoors, and I have made it a point ever since to travel around Minnesota, and have made great memories doing so. Once you find what brings you joy, finding people you enjoy doing those things with is a lot easier, trust me.
What about academics?
Academically, it truly does come down to finding what you love, and taking advantage of the fact that our professors are incredibly available. We don’t have to declare our major for two years for a reason, I recommend reading Yahnee’s blog about changing majors, and how much it helped her. Take the time to engage in different departments and interact with the professors outside of class. Those relationships have been incredibly fulfilling to me, and I wish I had started building them sooner in my career here.
Where does that leave me?
Reflecting on life before I started making the intentional choices to work towards my happiness here is embarrassing sometimes, which leaves me with my final point of advice: it is okay to struggle, to do a stupid thing. We’re barely adults navigating a scary world, and some are far from home. It might not seem like it, but you’ll be alright. My boss has a saying on her desk “Everything will be okay in the end. If it isn’t okay, it’s just not the end”. I’ve been trying to remind myself of that every day. As someone who can now see the end of his college career, I can happily say I’m starting to feel like everything might be okay in the end after all.
Will’s (he/him/his) favorite thing about Carleton is the amount of open space the campus has, as it is a good reprieve from stress. He has seen the movie The Princess Bride at least 20 times, and can recite large portions of it! Outside of the classroom, Will is a member of CHOP, one of Carleton’s D3 ultimate frisbee teams, is one of the Student Department Assistants of the Education Studies Department, and is an active member of Board Game Club.