84. How to Conquer Imposter Syndrome with Zee Clarke, Author of Black People Breathe

How do you conquer feelings of self-doubt?

For this Women of Color Rise Podcast, I talk with Zee Clarke, a breathwork and resilience expert and the author of Black People Breathe. Trained in India, she is a Harvard MBA that went from leading teams at Fortune 500 companies to teaching powerful tools to improve our mental health and well-being in the workplace.

Zee shares a practical exercise called WEBAV to boost your confidence and conquer imposter syndrome when you experience self-doubt.

• W = Welcome. 

• The first step is to pause and welcome the voice of self-doubt. Rather than squash it, allow the voice to be there and listen to what the voice is saying.

• E = Evidence gathering. 

• Make a list that supports what your voice is saying, and make a list of evidence that disproves it. For Zee, she once had a job where each morning, she worried that she would get fired. She then made a list of evidence that supported this thought and another list that disproved it. Most of the time, the list that disproves it will be much longer because it’s all in our head.

• B = Breathwork. 

• When we are in our heads, we tend to go into fight or flight mode. Breathing can calm your anxiety and also boost your confidence and help you use your voice.

• A = Affirmations. 

• Affirmations are most effective when you use your name and say it in the present tense. So instead of, ‘I will be amazing,” I should say, “Analiza is amazing.” The more frequently we practice affirmations, the more we can rewire our neural pathways.

• V = Visualization. 

• Olympic athletes practice visualization because research shows that visualization and actually doing the action stimulates the same regions in the brain. This is true whether it’s work or outside of work. When we visualize, then that action becomes real for us in our subconscious, which then becomes real in our conscious mind when we actually do the thing. 

Get full show notes and more information here: https://analizawolf.com/ep-84-how-to-conquer-imposter-syndrome-with-zee-clarke-author-of-black-people-breathe