• Question: Have you ever thought about giving up on achieving your dream at a certain point of your life because of self doubt?for example, maybe you thought you weren't good enough.

    Asked by anon-232915 to Adam, Alin, Anna, Rebecca, Sammie, Varun on 19 Nov 2019.
    • Photo: Samantha Firth

      Samantha Firth answered on 19 Nov 2019:

      Sometimes, it’s really hard to believe in yourself – especially when you have a setback or you don’t succeed at something you worked really hard for. It always helps me to remember that there are always going to be ups and downs in life and in your career and, when i look back on the opportunities I might have missed, the jobs i didn’t get or the tests i didn’t pass, I think ‘well hey, I wouldn’t be where i am today if those things didn’t happen!’ – and i love where i am and what i do 🙂 It’s so much easier said than done but do your best to believe in yourself! I recently went to a talk by Professor Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell (one of the most important astrophysicists alive!) – and even she said when she got into university she thought they must have made a mistake – she said she just decided to work really hard and keep her head down until they realised she was let in by error! Of course, she got in because she was amazing and went on to make some of the most astonishing discoveries but the point is that even the most incredible people suffer from feeling like they’re not good enough! Believe in what you can achieve and you will do it 🙂

    • Photo: Rebecca Shaw

      Rebecca Shaw answered on 19 Nov 2019:

      All. The. Time. !!

      I’ve only recently been told about the imposter syndrome and I found it fascinating to know that loads of other people felt the same way I did! This just describes the feeling that you don’t think you belong somewhere, that you got there by mistake and you aren’t really good enough to do the things you are trying to do.
      It’s kinda reassuring to know though, like Sammie says, even the smartest most incredible people have doubted themselves. If you can try to believe in yourself, who knows what you might achieve!

    • Photo: Varun Ramaswamy

      Varun Ramaswamy answered on 19 Nov 2019:

      Like Sammie and Rebecca said, we have ALL been there. We all know what it is like to think that we aren’t good enough because we keep getting things wrong and it feels like we are horrible at something and will never make it where we want to be!
      BUT we all realised that now we know exactly how to do something in the BEST way possible…because we know exactly what could go wrong, so we know better than everybody else about what we shouldn’t do.

      So remember that always- it might hurt a lot and it might bring you down to your knees. But get back win your feet because all that pain has made you more perfect than anyone else!

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