The Impositor Syndrome and a labour of love
So here I am again. Fate handed me life like I always wanted it on a silver platter, about three levels of self confidence too high, and just like I always do, I didn't even pause to think but grabbed the chance and jumped up. Now I hang onto the silver platter for dear life and try not to move at all, lest I fall down again, maybe even lower than the levels I had fought myself onto last year.
No, I was not prepared at all to nonchalantely accept a mini position at our university, and yes, I am shocked into panic and pumped full of adrenalin each time my former teachers come into this room that I share with four others, and ask for cookies or try to do smalltalk in Japanese.
I don't speak Japanese, by the way. Not really.
No, I can't believe at all that my beautiful gay soulmate from Chicago would still be interested in me. I completely missed his birthday, by the way.
And no, I have no idea how this happened, in our Bed&Breakfast in London:
Her name ist Jessica d'Este, and she is an oldschool bohemian lady, with long grey hair, a large hat collection and a warm, sharp voice. Her english had an American accent but the lilt of her Italian ancestry. She is a known British poet, though not very well-known, and her poems, that she leaves on her guests beds, called to me, made me smile and say out loud "Yes!".
So the very first evening I went to the common/breakfast room of her Bed&Breakfast, where she and her partner James were talking, and gave them the expensive chocolates that bear our family name as a hosts gift. I was pretty proud of myself that I had thought of this gesture, and apparently James, with his deep, resonant voice and his widely flung presence, is a chocolate fan. He instantly took both bars and went off to hide them. Jessica laughed at him, oh, always so much love between them. And we got to talk.
Five minutes later she says, I kid you not, and oh god how hard that is to write down:
"I know I just met someone that will play a major role in my life."
And: "You know, someone has to step into my footsteps, especially regarding this!" and a wide move of her hand include the Bed&Breakfast and her whole life, projects like "'Bringing art to life', in two senses of this, you understand, right?"
And I have shaking, icecold hands, while she waves this dream of a life right in front of my nose like this, and I say: "God, stop, you're making me fall in love!" And she laughs, short, sharp, warm and not loud at all.
Of course I took a look at the german translation of her book, when she asked me to. Took me three evenings, sitting on her cozy striped couch in this room, in which only all the echoes of lived moments made everything real, because it looked so much like a movie set. Henni was always already in bed then, exhausted by late puberty, a barely mastered foreign language and so much to see, so much to do.
So I sat there, and no panic came to me, instead this feeling of rightness, of belonging and silent satisfaction. Not a powerful feeling. I had to listen very hard to recognize it, and just for a moment I was so astonished, thinking I felt too little for such a beautiful moment, until I suddenly understood.
I knew this effect. I've had this before.
It was like her coming back home to me, filling the hole in my life that had her shape, and suddenly there was a lack of harsh missing. Contentment.
It was like meeting Glenn, and feeling two souls bump into each other and click, just like that. It was so self-evident. It just was, and worked, and was fun and nice and not very remarkable... until he flew away, and the silent hurt of missing started.
And so I sat there and thought that yes, things that fit us, that were just meant to be, they click and then you don't think too much about them anymore.
It's weeks later now, and I am running against a wall again. Just because something was meant to be doesn't mean at all that we were born prepared for it. I didn't mail Glenn now for quite some time, and the longer it takes, the harder it seems to be. I didn't find any time yet to do some translation work for Jessica, although I promised her to write as soon as possible.
And at work I hide behind a smile and a voice that none of my friends would recognize: muted, nonmusical, drap and light grey.
I am standing still again, watching chances hold up and not fall apart from my neglect - apparently they are too big to crumble that easily.
But I am running out of time. I need to grow able to stand tall on a silver platter, three levels up from where I see myself right now. I can feel it all under my fingertips, but right now I am not quite reaching out to this life.
I am looking at holes, to try and measure their width and weight. I will not see the value of these gifts when they have clicked into their place again. And it feels so important to keep a sharp eye on them.
Normally I would have written an entry about London asap (and believe me, I tried) in which I would have tried to form the experience into something more like literature, to distance myself from it, to be able to look at it from above, which would have helped a lot with evaluating it.
I just couldn't. At first I thought that might have been because of recent events, in which different people have told me how intimidating my entries are, and how unintentionally hurtful in their self-assuredness and literaricy. But I explained then that those entries are most of all for myself, to remind me of things. I don't write "And I deserve this!" or "This was meant to be!" because I really feel it. I write it *so that I may* feel it. And they understood and so all was right again.
So no, this was not the origin of the blockade in my head.
It's just this: The moment I write this down is the moment I stipulate it. Make it part of my story, let it all click into my soul, bond with my life.
And this seems to be my strategy for encounters with really big chances: If they feel like they belong to me, I close my eyes and jump. And while my eyes are closed or as long as there are enough distractions, everything feels, well, ordinary. And then I open them up again, look around and suddenly find myself way too high up for my self esteem, so I cower and cling and stop and try to breathe shallowly. I hide and waste my time and don't tell anybody too much about anything. Feeling like an intruder, faker, impositor.
She said: "You need to come back here, as soon as you can."
She said: "So you are a researcher at your university?"
She said: "This place attracts a special kind of people."
She said: "I knew you would get the meaning of this."
She told her friends, when Henni and I had already left the hotel lounge and she thought I couldn't hear her anymore: "She studied biology for a spell, like me! And, listen, this is SO interesting, she lives in Cologne, right, and she and her friends share this flat..."
She said: "I won't tell you who did the original translation yet, just look through it, if you would?" and later: "Can you believe that she teaches German at Harvard? And she was born in Germany..." and "Yeah, she just didn't get this at all."
Time and time again she replied: "EXACTLY!", throwing up her arms and smiling at me happily with tightly closed lips and sparkling dark eyes.
She said regarding my working on her poems: "This is a labour of love", saying my name with this funny american accent. And the morning of the day we returned to Germany, she gave me books and scripts and unpublished poems and detailed instructions and when I followed her around, grinning and being packed with literature like a mule, she said it again:
"Oh, this is a labour of love!"
And I said: "Yes."
My Japanese might be abysmal, I might go too far sometimes, and I might play shy and timid as long as I am terrified like this, but
I am not an impositor.
I really am this bright. I really do love language and "the fortunate surprise of a necessary poetry".
I did not cheat to get these chances, I did not lie to keep those older friendships, I did not fake anything to meet these people.
I just acted like I knew no fear.
I need to let got of the brink, stop looking down at the alarming height I have conquered in just one jump, I need to stand up, turn away from the latest step and start looking around on my current level, maybe even dare to look up for the next one in a while.
Translating Jessicas poems, combing through Dad's texts and alphas collisions, glueing advice and shiny stickers into the promise of eternal sisterly love, listening to her reading to me, listening to me reading to her, brushing out the winter fur of my boycat, sharing a laugh with S., both of us happily trusting and overjoyed that the other one is happy too, sharing a run with P., talking breathlessly the whole time, sharing a shibboleth like "bzuh!", learning, compiling, writing it all down...
This is a labour of love.
No, I was not prepared at all to nonchalantely accept a mini position at our university, and yes, I am shocked into panic and pumped full of adrenalin each time my former teachers come into this room that I share with four others, and ask for cookies or try to do smalltalk in Japanese.
I don't speak Japanese, by the way. Not really.
No, I can't believe at all that my beautiful gay soulmate from Chicago would still be interested in me. I completely missed his birthday, by the way.
And no, I have no idea how this happened, in our Bed&Breakfast in London:
Her name ist Jessica d'Este, and she is an oldschool bohemian lady, with long grey hair, a large hat collection and a warm, sharp voice. Her english had an American accent but the lilt of her Italian ancestry. She is a known British poet, though not very well-known, and her poems, that she leaves on her guests beds, called to me, made me smile and say out loud "Yes!".
So the very first evening I went to the common/breakfast room of her Bed&Breakfast, where she and her partner James were talking, and gave them the expensive chocolates that bear our family name as a hosts gift. I was pretty proud of myself that I had thought of this gesture, and apparently James, with his deep, resonant voice and his widely flung presence, is a chocolate fan. He instantly took both bars and went off to hide them. Jessica laughed at him, oh, always so much love between them. And we got to talk.
Five minutes later she says, I kid you not, and oh god how hard that is to write down:
"I know I just met someone that will play a major role in my life."
And: "You know, someone has to step into my footsteps, especially regarding this!" and a wide move of her hand include the Bed&Breakfast and her whole life, projects like "'Bringing art to life', in two senses of this, you understand, right?"
And I have shaking, icecold hands, while she waves this dream of a life right in front of my nose like this, and I say: "God, stop, you're making me fall in love!" And she laughs, short, sharp, warm and not loud at all.
Of course I took a look at the german translation of her book, when she asked me to. Took me three evenings, sitting on her cozy striped couch in this room, in which only all the echoes of lived moments made everything real, because it looked so much like a movie set. Henni was always already in bed then, exhausted by late puberty, a barely mastered foreign language and so much to see, so much to do.
So I sat there, and no panic came to me, instead this feeling of rightness, of belonging and silent satisfaction. Not a powerful feeling. I had to listen very hard to recognize it, and just for a moment I was so astonished, thinking I felt too little for such a beautiful moment, until I suddenly understood.
I knew this effect. I've had this before.
It was like her coming back home to me, filling the hole in my life that had her shape, and suddenly there was a lack of harsh missing. Contentment.
It was like meeting Glenn, and feeling two souls bump into each other and click, just like that. It was so self-evident. It just was, and worked, and was fun and nice and not very remarkable... until he flew away, and the silent hurt of missing started.
And so I sat there and thought that yes, things that fit us, that were just meant to be, they click and then you don't think too much about them anymore.
It's weeks later now, and I am running against a wall again. Just because something was meant to be doesn't mean at all that we were born prepared for it. I didn't mail Glenn now for quite some time, and the longer it takes, the harder it seems to be. I didn't find any time yet to do some translation work for Jessica, although I promised her to write as soon as possible.
And at work I hide behind a smile and a voice that none of my friends would recognize: muted, nonmusical, drap and light grey.
I am standing still again, watching chances hold up and not fall apart from my neglect - apparently they are too big to crumble that easily.
But I am running out of time. I need to grow able to stand tall on a silver platter, three levels up from where I see myself right now. I can feel it all under my fingertips, but right now I am not quite reaching out to this life.
I am looking at holes, to try and measure their width and weight. I will not see the value of these gifts when they have clicked into their place again. And it feels so important to keep a sharp eye on them.
Normally I would have written an entry about London asap (and believe me, I tried) in which I would have tried to form the experience into something more like literature, to distance myself from it, to be able to look at it from above, which would have helped a lot with evaluating it.
I just couldn't. At first I thought that might have been because of recent events, in which different people have told me how intimidating my entries are, and how unintentionally hurtful in their self-assuredness and literaricy. But I explained then that those entries are most of all for myself, to remind me of things. I don't write "And I deserve this!" or "This was meant to be!" because I really feel it. I write it *so that I may* feel it. And they understood and so all was right again.
So no, this was not the origin of the blockade in my head.
It's just this: The moment I write this down is the moment I stipulate it. Make it part of my story, let it all click into my soul, bond with my life.
And this seems to be my strategy for encounters with really big chances: If they feel like they belong to me, I close my eyes and jump. And while my eyes are closed or as long as there are enough distractions, everything feels, well, ordinary. And then I open them up again, look around and suddenly find myself way too high up for my self esteem, so I cower and cling and stop and try to breathe shallowly. I hide and waste my time and don't tell anybody too much about anything. Feeling like an intruder, faker, impositor.
She said: "You need to come back here, as soon as you can."
She said: "So you are a researcher at your university?"
She said: "This place attracts a special kind of people."
She said: "I knew you would get the meaning of this."
She told her friends, when Henni and I had already left the hotel lounge and she thought I couldn't hear her anymore: "She studied biology for a spell, like me! And, listen, this is SO interesting, she lives in Cologne, right, and she and her friends share this flat..."
She said: "I won't tell you who did the original translation yet, just look through it, if you would?" and later: "Can you believe that she teaches German at Harvard? And she was born in Germany..." and "Yeah, she just didn't get this at all."
Time and time again she replied: "EXACTLY!", throwing up her arms and smiling at me happily with tightly closed lips and sparkling dark eyes.
She said regarding my working on her poems: "This is a labour of love", saying my name with this funny american accent. And the morning of the day we returned to Germany, she gave me books and scripts and unpublished poems and detailed instructions and when I followed her around, grinning and being packed with literature like a mule, she said it again:
"Oh, this is a labour of love!"
And I said: "Yes."
My Japanese might be abysmal, I might go too far sometimes, and I might play shy and timid as long as I am terrified like this, but
I am not an impositor.
I really am this bright. I really do love language and "the fortunate surprise of a necessary poetry".
I did not cheat to get these chances, I did not lie to keep those older friendships, I did not fake anything to meet these people.
I just acted like I knew no fear.
I need to let got of the brink, stop looking down at the alarming height I have conquered in just one jump, I need to stand up, turn away from the latest step and start looking around on my current level, maybe even dare to look up for the next one in a while.
Translating Jessicas poems, combing through Dad's texts and alphas collisions, glueing advice and shiny stickers into the promise of eternal sisterly love, listening to her reading to me, listening to me reading to her, brushing out the winter fur of my boycat, sharing a laugh with S., both of us happily trusting and overjoyed that the other one is happy too, sharing a run with P., talking breathlessly the whole time, sharing a shibboleth like "bzuh!", learning, compiling, writing it all down...
This is a labour of love.