48 pages • 1 hour read
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Many people have experienced a situation in which they feel like they don’t belong and haven’t earned the right to be in a certain space. This is called “impostor syndrome,” which Cuddy defines as “the deep and sometimes paralyzing belief that we have been given something we didn’t earn and don’t deserve and that at some point we’ll be exposed” (88). Psychologist Pauline Rose Clance noticed this in her own life, and then in the lives of her students, who discounted the hard work that they had done to enter their academic programs. She decided to study this phenomenon, collaborating with psychologist Suzanne Imes to publish a 1978 paper on impostor phenomenon. At first, they thought, that the phenomenon primarily affects high-achieving women, but later found that “women and men were experiencing impostorism to an equal degree” (92). It also affects people across all demographics at a rate of around 65% (95).
While there are many contributing factors to impostor syndrome, a fear of failure seems to be the most prevalent factor. Even people who have won awards and are clearly a success suffer from impostorism, including famous and prolific writer Neil Gaiman. He describes fearing that one day someone official would knock on his door and tell him that writing isn’t a real job and that he needs to put on a suit and get a traditional job. Cuddy writes: “Impostorism undercuts our ability to feel good about the things we do well, particularly when we are being compensated for them” (98).
The feeling of being an impostor can lead us to attribute our accomplishments to outside forces instead of our own efforts. We distance ourselves from our success and don’t allow ourselves to take advantage of support that could help us succeed more easily. Cuddy explains: “While we’re agonizing over what we imagine other people are thinking, we aren’t listening as they tell us what they really do think. The impostor experience stops us from reacting in the moment—it keeps us from responding to the world as it truly exists” (101).
“Self-monitoring,” or the negative cycle where our self-criticism prevents us from doing our best work, takes us out of ourselves and prevents us from being fully present and successful as we could be otherwise (101-02).
Cuddy explains that she is writing about this topic from personal experience. She considered quitting an academic program rather than give an intimidating presentation, but with the support of her advisor, she gave the talk. Over time and with more experience, Cuddy realized she could do it: “I’m not a fake. I’m not going to be found out” (104). Working with a student who was experiencing impostor syndrome helped her to see that she had worked her way out of it.
Amanda Palmer, musician, author, and wife to Neil Gaiman, gave a commencement speech in which she mentions the “fraud police.” Everyone in the audience put up their hands to indicate that they related to the experience of feeling fraudulent. Cuddy notes that we feel alone in our experience of impostorism, but that it is a very common human experience. The shame and reluctance to talk about it leads to its continuation. Cuddy concludes: “Many of us will probably never completely shed our fears of being fraudulent. We’ll just work them out as they come, one by one” (108).
Some people experience a “personal powerlessness” which happens when a life change occurs. One perceives a loss of power and therefore a loss of confidence. Cuddy ties this experiential observation with social psychology with the help of terminology developed by American professor Dacher Keltner and his colleagues. They describe the “approach system” and the “inhibition system” (111). The approach system is activated by a sense of power and leads to an awareness of opportunities over threats. Social pressures feel reduced. On the other hand, the inhibition system activates when people feel a loss of power, and results in a tendency to focus on threats and feel anxious. When we are focused on the positive, we’re more likely to take action and move in a positive direction. The opposite occurs when we focus on the negative. Cuddy writes: “When we feel powerless, we cannot be present. In a way, presence is power—a special kind of power that we confer on ourselves” (112).
Cuddy describes two types of power: social power and personal power. Social power enables a person to influence the behavior of others and has to be earned. Its defining characteristic is that it has control over others. Personal power, in contrast, is the individual’s freedom from the social power of others. She explains: “In short, social power is power over—the capacity to control others’ states and behaviors. Personal power is power to—the ability to control our own states and behaviors” (113). It is best to have some of both types of power in your life, but personal power is necessary to achieve presence.
These power states fluctuate and can influence each other. Someone can have social power without personal power, leaving them feeling uncomfortable in their position. It’s also possible to have great personal power until an influence from someone else’s social power calls into question what you believe about yourself. Cuddy cites the experience of a young financier who advises CEOs but feels a lack of personal power due to his relative youth, and a brilliant student who loses his confidence after failing to be accepted into his top-choice colleges. Cuddy concludes that “whether we feel powerful or powerless has huge consequences in our lives” (115). Our feelings of personal power can be easily influenced by recalling a time in our lives when we felt particularly powerful and confident, leading to future behaviors that turn into more success. The opposite is also true. Ruminating on past failures can beget additional failure and powerlessness.
Feeling powerless impairs our executive functioning skills—skills that we most need access to in times of anxiety or stress. We lose working memory capacity and other critical abilities just at the time that these abilities are most vitally needed. In two studies that Cuddy cites, participants performed more poorly on challenging brain tasks after feelings of powerlessness were introduced. In addition, anxiety can lead to difficulty seeing things from the point of view of others. Cuddy explains: “The link between anxiety and self-absorption is bidirectional; they cause each other. In a review of more than two hundred studies, researchers concluded that the more self-focused we are, the more anxious—and also the more depressed and generally negative—we become” (121).
Cuddy describes the “spotlight effect,” which is when you feel like everyone is paying attention to you and what you are doing, when in reality, people are distracted and mostly focused on themselves (122). We tend to overestimate the amount of attention people are paying to us. We are all the center of our own universe and tend to think that others are as focused on us as we are. Post-event processing is another activity that we spend more time in after an interaction when we’re feeling powerless, according to Cuddy. She says that we continue to ruminate about interactions that we have had for more time when we feel like we have less personal power.
Cuddy works to discount negative stereotypes that we have about power. Power can help us be more resistant to judgment, stress, and shame. It can also improve our ability to understand and forgive others. She explains that power also “improve[s] our ability to make good decisions under complex conditions” (128). We can be more creative and more independent when power fuels our confidence. Power can bring us closer to the state of presence by uniting our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. With power comes a feeling of control over our lives and a better ability to perform the tasks we need to do because we have the confidence that we can handle them.
Cuddy discusses the interaction between power and research with hormones. She begins by cautioning that “behavioral scientists probably know more about how thoughts and feelings affect behavior than they do about how hormones relate to behavior” (134). Testosterone is the hormone that is associated with dominant behavior in humans and with people who rise to the top. Another hormone, cortisol, is a stress response. People with power have lower levels of cortisol, which seems to stem from their ability to control their circumstances. Once again Cuddy cautions us, “it’s difficult to know whether power is a cure for anxiety or whether calm, confident people—the ones who possess ample personal power—just naturally ascend to leadership positions” (136).
Being “in our heads,” such as when ruminating anxiously about whether we belong (impostor syndrome) or if people are watching us (spotlight effect), prevents us from accessing our authentic selves. The focus is on our thoughts and anxiety, a disconnection from our physical bodies that prevents us from being truly present. The lack of mind-body connection takes away our personal power.
We can achieve personal empowerment if we reconnect with our physical selves. Cuddy suggests that individuals have control over the amount of personal power they can access. By the same token: “Powerlessness and the anxiety that results from it undermine what psychologists call executive functions—high-order cognitive tools such as reasoning, task flexibility, and attention control, all of which are critical to coping well in challenging situations” (119). Being unable to access personal power makes it difficult to function in situations that call on our faculties to be in place.
Physical expressions of anxiety or power in the body take the form of cortisol and testosterone levels respectively. This demonstrates that feelings of power or powerlessness go beyond our feelings—they can actually influence hormone levels. This shows how closely related the mind and body are.
Cuddy again uses a personal story to humanize a concept. She uses the story of one of the researchers, Pauline, to illustrate imposterism and to help the reader understand its universality. Pauline first experienced the phenomenon as a student and decided to study it formally when seeing the same issue crop up for her advisees. Cuddy argues that researchers struggle with many of the same issues that readers do—they are merely trying to answer questions that have arisen from their personal experiences, much like Cuddy’s accident led to her ultimately wanting to investigate the concept of presence.
Chapter 5 takes a deep dive into the concept of power: What it is, what it isn’t, and how do both feelings of power and powerlessness influence our minds and body. Once again, Cuddy argues that the mind influences the body, as feelings of power are reflected in the hormone levels of test subjects during experiments.
Plus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features:
Books About Leadership
View Collection
Business & Economics
View Collection
Challenging Authority
View Collection
Fear
View Collection
New York Times Best Sellers
View Collection
Philosophy, Logic, & Ethics
View Collection
Power
View Collection
Psychology
View Collection
Science & Nature
View Collection
Self-Help Books
View Collection
The Best of "Best Book" Lists
View Collection