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Comment by rwallace | Hacker News Reader

> This isn’t an impostor syndrome.

Sure it is. Impostor syndrome is defined as the state of affairs where your emotional assessment of your competence is lower than your actual competence. The definition does not depend on which aspect of the task is being discussed. "I can't write code" (when you can) and "I'm too slow" (when the people who appear faster, are doing it by just sweeping bugs under the carpet) are both impostor syndrome.

I will add that by the sound of things, the reason you have impostor syndrome is because your previous bosses have been bullies, sadists and sociopaths who successfully accomplished their goal of damaging your morale for their own pleasure. This is sadly not a rare state of affairs, but it's not universal either. Never be reluctant to look for another job if your boss is an asshole.

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Such bold conclusions from 900 words and a single perspective. Isn't it possible that the author is, in fact, not good at the job?

People who are bad at their jobs usually fall into two categories:

a) people who lack the insight to realize it, and thus don't work to fix it b) people who realize it but don't care (for various reasons, some valid some not)

If you're agonizing over your job competence and trying to improve but feel you aren't succeeding, then it's vastly more likely that either your job specification is impossible, or you're setting unreasonable personal goals around your job.

I'm really bad at basketball. I have to insight to realize this, and I tried to get better. I really cared about getting better. But at the end of the day, I am not athletic. Sure, I can devote time and energy to improving my basketball skills, but I will never achieve anything beyond 'mediocre'.

There's also a chicken and the egg issue here; perhaps the author really does not enjoy coding and thus is not willing to put in the effort to improve?

>I'm really bad at basketball. I have to insight to realize this, and I tried to get better. I really cared about getting better. But at the end of the day, I am not athletic. Sure, I can devote time and energy to improving my basketball skills, but I will never achieve anything beyond 'mediocre'.

None of that is in question, but let me ask you this: are you a professional basketballer?

I'm not a professional chef, read into that as you will.

No, I am not a professional basketball player. I can't even compete in a neighborhood pickup game. That is the point; I lack the raw material to be a professional athlete. It's very possible to be bad at something AND know that you're bad at AND not be able to reach the proficiency to perform the task at a professional level.

But, at the risk of pointing out the bleeding obvious to those who seem to be struggling with reading as well as basketball, it would then not be your job.

Okay, let's use another example. I waited tables in high school. I was very bad. I knew I was bad, but I worked hard to improve. Still, even after a few years of experience a random person who had never had a job before could walk in and get better tips than me. My boss wouldn't fire me because I showed up for shifts, but I was generally a very poor waiter. Eventually I got smart and stopped waiting tables, and the world became a better place.

It's very possible to be bad at something AND know that you're bad at it AND not be able to reach the proficiency to perform the task at a professional level.

Also, it's pretty clear that I can read. If you are going to insult me, it's better to insult my comprehension or argumentation. However, I would argue that it's generally better to just not insult other people.

> It's very possible to be bad at something AND know that you're bad at it AND not be able to reach the proficiency to perform the task at a professional level.

You forgot to add "AND still be employed in that capacity."

c) people who don't have what it takes to do the job well (be it physically, intellectually, emotionally, etc...)

All sorts of things are possible from this post as from any other that one isn't in a position to personally verify. It's possible that the entire post was created by Mossad as an experiment in memetic warfare; not that that's likely, but I can't disprove it. Thus, as usual, my response has the implied precondition 'if things are substantially as the post suggests they are'.

Is self doubt ever about being bad at something?

Sure, sometimes it is. When I doubt my career skills, I can (usually, eventually) recognize it as insecurity / impostor syndrome / whatever.

When I doubt my dancing skills, it's a rational evaluation.

It sounds like what you're doing is accurately assessing your lack of dancing skills, not doubting your dancing ability. A hallmark of self-doubt is the nagging unknown, a questioning, a debate that goes on in one's head as to the real truth of the matter. I'd bet such a debate doesn't exist about your dancing given the rational part you mentioned. If it's actually a correct, accepted, rational evaluation, then what you have is self-fact: I can't dance well; rather than self-doubt: I'm not sure if I can dance well. The rational evaluation part eliminates the doubt once it's accepted, as you've arrived at a rock-solid conclusion.

Yes, unless you believe that a) nobody is ever bad at anything, or b) nobody bad at something ever notices.

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