You Better Believe It

So I noticed the date this past Sunday. It has been a YEAR since I graduated from college and I absolutely cannot believe it. I’m an adult! (Yep, read that sentence just like you SNL-lovers all read it.)

That feels wrong. It feels wrong to say that I’m an adult because I honestly have no idea how to change the oil in my car. I feel like that’s something adults should be able to do, and I don’t know how to do it. I feel like a 14-year-old trying to fly under the radar and hope nobody notices that I’m playing hooky from 7th period only to send me back from whence I came. I usually feel like a complete imposter in this adult world post-graduation.

 Last week, however, I had someone at work pay me the compliment that they were surprised that I was 23. They thought that I acted more like a “27-year-old or something”, not a newbie right out of the gate. I have to say, I took a moment to note the statement. It’s not everday you feel like that at work in your first year of teaching. And during that one small moment of satisfaction it dawned on me how I’ve managed to stay afloat in the adult world. The secret lies in these six words:

Fake it ‘til you make it.

 You’ve heard it before, but it is the single most helpful phrase to shake off those I’m-an-inadequate-fresh-piece-of-meat-who-has-no-clue-how-to-function-in-the-real-world blues. It’s kind of been my mantra since August 1st, when I, who had no business educating in the neediest of school districts in the country, was in charge of the 2nd-grade-fates of 23 children. I had never been in an education class, let alone did I know what a 7-year-old even looked like. I didn’t know what “best practices” were for teaching and I had no freaking CLUE what RTI or IEP or PLC meant. But if I could give any advice to fresh graduates or young adults who feel like they’re in over their heads in the working world, I’m telling you to just go ahead and fake it.

Start telling yourself that you are competent, successful, and independent, and you will start to become those things. The famous George Costanza once said, “It’s not a lie if you believe it,” and to be honest I’m starting to think there’s more wisdom there than I initially thought.

Believe all the things you want to believe about yourself. Need to go to church alone for the first time? Just believe that that’s what normal people do and march right up that aisle with Starbucks in tow. Have no clue what the educational term your advisor just used in an email actually means? Google it and reply as if you knew all along. Need to navigate a weird new city with psycho drivers? Simply believe you can merge with the best of them, check the mirrors often, hang on tight, and go to town up that freeway. Afraid to walk up the steps to your apartment by yourself? Believe you are a badass girl, check up and down the street, ready the keys between your knuckles just in case, and get inside without a sweat. Not sure what is going on at work? Believe that you are one of the most competent people in the room and present yourself that way. Stay engaged, take notes, dress more professionally than you should, participate when you can at staff meetings, and be a positive energy in the room – don’t be the new girl cowering shyly in the corner. This sounds so silly; it’s an odd idea to take extra care to go at the everyday things of life with an intentional gusto, but it works. It starts to rub off on your subconscious and you start to actually become a brave, smart, independent person.

My best days of teaching are those days when I believe I’m a good teacher. My best experiences with behavior management are when I make it clear to my kids that I am an adult who will not back down.

My most fun social gatherings with new friends happen when I believe I’m a fun person whom people will like.

 My most successful days of grad school are those when I believe I’m an energetic person after a long day of teaching, ready to learn something cool and new. They’re the days when I’m highlighting, note-taking, raising my hand, and forcing myself to nod my head.

 If you go through the motions of a confident person, you start to be that confident person. The more adults I meet in this work world, the more I realize we’re all the insecure 22-year-olds at heart; it’s not just you and me. This year I’ve seen 56-year-old professors get completely flustered in front of a classroom only to have everyone take a 20 minute break, I’ve seen school leaders break down into tears because of stress from district pressures, and I’ve seen coworkers say how they feel left out of the social scene at work. We’re all fighting feelings of inadequacy. Some people have just mastered the art of believing that they can. And so they can.

Believe me, for every one day I feel like an actual adult, there are seven others where I feel like a complete loser. I recently just wrote about the necessity to be real about your struggles and your difficult days. You need not always be an impenetrable wall of confident thinking and optimism. I just have found that, when put in sink-or-swim scenarios (and I can quite confidently say that was my scenario this past year), turn to confidence before you turn to cowardice.

This year has taught me that when they throw you in the pool before you learn how to tread water, tell yourself to swim, no, COMMAND yourself to swim, and you WILL. 

 Just don’t tell anyone you still need your rubber-ducky-arm-floaties to do it.