Driving through Millcreek as the Wasatch mountains turned pink under a setting sun, I rehearsed in my mind a conversation with a friend, someone most people would say is a highly successful person. From the outside, he looked well-to-do, respected, and the kind of person who seems to have life figured out. What most people didn't know was how long he had struggled with feelings of imposter syndrome. This time, the conversation was different. His words were, “I no longer feel like a fraud. Most of my professional life, I felt like an imposter. Like, I didn't fit into the Silicon Slopes. Everyone was doing so much better than I was. At $200,000, I felt like I wasn't big enough. Funny enough, at $12,000,000, I still felt like I was too small.”
“I don’t feel that way now. I don't worry anymore if people find out who I really am or how much my company makes because I feel comfortable in my own skin regardless. I love who I am, independent of what the company is doing. I no longer feel like an imposter.” He had done the work to move past the counterfeit emotions and step into true emotional authenticity.
The Center for Creative Leadership conducted an extensive study, finding that emotional intelligence is the number one indicator of success in business, relationships, and life, far above a college degree, wealth, or business acumen. Highly emotionally intelligent people have the strongest connections with friends, family, and coworkers, and have the most grit to push through challenging problems at work and at home.
One of the great barriers to emotional intelligence is Imposter Syndrome (also called Fitting In). It doesn’t care what zip code you live in, Millcreek or otherwise. It doesn't care what you do for work, how big your company is, or what success you've seen. Nothing is enough for imposter syndrome. It will haunt you from the core of your soul. And it's not just a childhood problem. Most adults I work with feel this, too. In fact, according to one study, 84% of entrepreneurs feel some degree of imposter syndrome. It's such an important topic that I dedicated an entire chapter to it in my first book, The Entrepreneur's Paradox.
So, how do we develop emotional intelligence and move past the counterfeit feelings holding us back? One of the best ways is to understand which emotions are authentic and which are counterfeit. Growing up, we all learned opposite emotions. For example, love don't hate, show humility, not pride, be kind, not mean. But, it's the sneaky emotions that have a stronger hold on us because most of us don't recognize when the con is going on.
The Counterfeit Emotions framework shows that every emotion that serves us and takes us where we want to go has a counterfeit (except for peace, which stands alone). These counterfeit emotions look, act, and even feel like the authentic emotion, but they create destructive cycles of disconnection in our lives. Most of us do not get stuck because we are weak. We get stuck because we are talented enough to run a convincing emotional con on ourselves. The crazy thing is that we often don't even understand when we are caught in the spinning cycles of the counterfeits. Take, for example, Kind vs. Nice.
Nice is one of the best counterfeiters. Nice counterfeits Kind so well. We use the words interchangeably. Santa teaches us he won't bring us presents unless we're on the ‘nice list.’ Thumper, Bambi's best friend, preached, “If you can't say nuttin’nice then don't say nuttin’at all.” Truth be told. Nice is nothing more than a mask, a defense mechanism to avoid conflict. Nice can be cowardly, manipulative, and even dishonest. Kind is brave, honest, direct, and loving. Nice destroys business. Recent studies show that total losses from nice culture exceed $1.2 trillion in the U.S. alone.
Counterfeit emotions, like nice, make an empty promise of control. “Put on a smile and use compliments, and you will not have to deal with conflict.” They promise control over contention, rejection, insecurity, vulnerability, failure, and pain, but they never deliver. They just keep you spinning in the same cycles time after time. So, how do we get out of the emotional counterfeits and into the authentic? Ask these four questions about what you’re feeling:
- Connection - Does it connect me?(with self, others, God, and truth)
- Direction - Does it take me where I want to go or does it just spin?
- Motivation - Is it motivated by love and surrender or fear and control?
- Valuation - Does it value me AND you as priceless?
These four simple criteria become our compass to finding peace, purpose, and presence. Relationships that you may have once thought were irreparable become as strong as iron and we find there is no need for numbing or escapism because the counterfeits are no longer part of our lives. Want to elevate business and relationships? Take off the counterfeit mask, get real, and step into genuine emotional authenticity.
Curtis Morley, is an entrepreneur, wrote the Wall Street Journal Best selling book, The Entrepreneur's Paradox. He was in the middle of writing his second book when one of his closest friends passed away. This changed everything for Curtis. He dedicated his life to helping people break free from Counterfeit Emotions and live in Authenticity. https://www.counterfeitemotions.com/
"... emotional intelligence is the number one indicator of success in business, relationships, and life, far above a college degree, wealth, or business acumen."