One of the most useless things we can say to someone with imposter feelings may be “You have earned this”.
We can talk with a client about imposter feelings for months. In my experience, their change begins when they can stay in their shame state with us until it passes.
Here is what I actually do.
I slow the client down, so they can feel their body as they talk.
I watch for their arousal rising. When it does: feet on the floor. Feel the chair beneath you. Use your breath, 3 in and 6 out.
When shame arrives, the same procedure, and I add tender encouragement.
“Just allow yourself to feel all of that.”
“Just allow and accept all of that.”
“See if you can stay with it.”
“Don’t try to change it.”
“Use your breath to help you tolerate the discomfort.”
Eventually it subsides and stops.
Nothing has been disputed, reframed or reassured. The client has stayed in their shame state, co-regulated by another person, until it ended.
Tolerated being seen at what feels like their very worst. And survived.
Over successive sessions the peaks come down and the durations shorten. I gradually reduce my facilitative moves. They begin to notice it, pause, feel, breathe, and move on when it reduces. Without me saying anything.
Then they arrive reporting that they did this between sessions.
I am making myself redundant at this task.
Tolerance comes first. Then a second question opens: “How has it been, telling me that?”
And after that I do something many of us were trained not to do. I tell them what I actually see, having now seen them ‘at their very worst’.
Carl Rogers did it on film in 1965. Having declined Gloria’s requests for answers again and again, he met her exposed moment with neither reflection nor reassurance: “You look to me like a pretty nice daughter.”
A verdict has to land on the person and not on the disclosure. “You have earned this” only grades the performance again. A verdict has to be true. And it must not have been asked for, because a verdict that has been requested works as reassurance.
The conditions matter more than the procedure.
Pacing belongs to the client. If they flood or go distant, we stop and ground.
“You are safely supported” is not a comfort for every body. Watch what it does.
We can only lend what we have. If their shame is unbearable for us, we will rescue them from it, and they learn that it was unbearable.
With severe trauma, this needs specific training and care. Coaches in particular need to know where their remit ends.
A useful question for supervision: “When shame arrived, whose discomfort were you regulating?”
This is a clinical observation from my own practice, not a research finding, and I have not measured it. As far as I know, nobody has compared offering a verdict with offering a reflection at moments of shame.
The free worksheet that goes with this is The Morning After Good News, which includes a page of reflective questions for therapists, coaches and supervisors.
What do you do in the first minute shame arrives?