How can I stop being a "faker", as you call it? I, and probably some other HNers, are often pretty critical or take things people say more literally than they meant often, rather than giving them the benefit of the doubt with a more liberal interpretation.

    1) Find something fundamental to be secure in.
    2) Just stop being a faker.
    3) Get busy doing the real thing.

The first is the most important. One of the professors I admired greatly would always give your idea his best effort, because he knew that the mathematics would eventually cause it to blow up if it wasn't correct. Find first principles that you can take as iron clad, then always build off of those with honesty and humility. There was never a reason for him to grasp at straws to fabricate a straw man. He knew there were solid theories he could work from and test as hard as he could. He also never had a reason to pretend something was more solid than he actually knew it to be.

That's all well and fine for hard sciences, I guess, but the same goes for most of the softer disciplines as well. History is often your friend. Find the historical precedents and examine them honestly.

EDIT: Another thing you can do, if you haven't already, is read this: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_M...