Many people who use the phrase mean “lie about your credentials and hope you don’t get caught until you are too enmeshed to easily replace.” On the one hand its unfortunate that those people have been rather successful but on the other hand it seems like a capitalism problem and the enmeshed incompetence and fraud is just another part of the collapse capitalists have made for themselves. It does suck for the non fakers existing under capitalism but it is kinda fitting that incompetence would weave its way through the system.

I remember the moment where I chose to “fake it till I made it” and it was exactly in those terms.

I used to have serious self esteem issues. I was extremely bullied in school. I thought I was ugly and weird. I had major guilt complexes because of my evangelical upbringing. I was small and weedy for my age, I wore big hoodies and baggy clothes and didn’t like people looking at my face. Friends and family always told me I was good looking but I assumed they were being patronizing.

I also remember few years later the moment I realized I had “made it” and that I should probably dial down the faking it because at a certain point over confidence is as off putting as low self esteem.

What I meant by “If you don’t tell yourself that you are capable of doing something you will never be capable of it.” is that if you “know” you cannot do something you will not give it your best and more likely not even make an attempt because you will see it as wasted effort. Its the opposite of “you can do anything you put your mind to” its “You cant do anything unless you try to do it.”

A kid learning to ride a bike doesn’t need to get into mental gymnastics about telling themself they’re a good bike rider in order to do it, they just need to get a feel for it until it starts building in their muscle memory.

A kid needs to think that riding a bike is possible not that they are good. I was bad at learning to ride a bike. I could ride a bike just fine but I couldn’t believe I was capable of doing it.

I could ride when my dad was pretending to hold the seat. (I could “fake it”) He’d let go and run beside me for 100m telling me he was still holding on. Then he’d stop and I’d ride alone fro 100m but the second I noticed that he wasn’t running beside me, I crashed because I was so convinced that I couldn’t ride a bike. He’d tell me I had been riding by myself but I was so hurt that “he let me crash” I wouldn’t hear it. My self doubt would force me to disbelieve the reality that I had ridden on my own. I don’t know how he eventually broke through but eventually he convinced me I had “made it.”