This thought is hard.
When you believe it, it makes you question everything.
"Did I get into the wrong career?"
"Maybe I shouldn't speak up?"
"What if I can't do it?"
"What if I fail miserably?"
Research shows that while gender differences in general intelligence are negligible, women tend to perceive themselves as less intelligent than men (Weisberg et. al, 2011) .
This may be related to female humility, and not wanting to be seen as arrogant or dominating.
It becomes a habitual way of thinking to keep us safe and socially acceptable.
The thought is there because it's trying to warn us that there's something we don't know. Which in and of itself is fine. It's not a problem to not know something. It's great! We can learn the things we don't know.
But believing the thought without evaluating it keeps us fearful. Overwhelmed. Isolated.
It keeps us small. We don't raise our hand to ask the question we need to ask because we're afraid people will realize we don't know what we're doing. And if we do timidly ask a question and get ignored or dismissed, we don't ask it again in another way, or again to another person, until we get to the truth. Until we get what we came for.
We don't take on new tasks. We don't seek to practice the very thing we're afraid of, and instead try to avoid it. We don't look for new opportunities.
We don't collaborate. We don't ask others how they do it, or share a problem we're having because we think we should have all the answers.
We don't ask for feedback. We're terrified to hear it.
The thought takes away our freedom. It keeps us stuck in negative thought spirals that we aren't sure how to get out of. We think about it at home, it keeps us up at night, it leads to numbing through sleeping in, late-night Netflix or overeating.
Here's the good news: this gap between women and men's perceived intelligence closes as women age.
Meaning that as women age, they have more confidence in their intelligence.
Great! But you don't have time to wait for that.
Imagine what it'd be like to start believing in your intelligence NOW.
You would feel safe to ask more questions, and be determined to get the answers.
You would look at the things you need to work on, and actively seek out projects and tasks that would help you improve.
You would know what your strengths were, what you loved doing, what energizes you, what value you provide, and look for opportunities to do more of that.
You would leave work at work and not be ruminate on it or worry about it when you were at home.
You would feel happier about your chosen profession (and have more confidence in that fact that you'd be successful no matter what profession you chose).
You would start thinking more about your future and what you could achieve 3, 5, 10 years from now.
You would go for bigger and better jobs or promotions.
You would know that failure is part of the learning process and not take it personally.
You would feel confident in your intelligence and ability to figure things out, WITHOUT being arrogant or dominant. You would be collaborating, asking questions, and have better self-awareness over what you do/don't know. If you didn't know how to do something you wanted to, you'd feel like it was perfectly within your control to learn how.
Can you imagine what that would be like and how it would impact you over the short and long term?
In 6-months the people around you would notice a total shift in how you show up.
In 3-years, you would be in a totally different league.
In 5-years, you would create a different world all together.
I know how to help you create that. It's possible for you.
Let's schedule a call so you never have to worry you're not smart enough again.
