The Impostor Syndrome Files

25/03/2024

Hi Everyone! Thank you so much for supporting the Impostor Syndrome Files podcast! Please note that this page will be shut down on April 26th. All posts will now be made on my business page here: https://www.facebook.com/Kmeninger. I hope to see you all there!

Making it easier to be human at work.

21/03/2024

How do you think about power in your workplace? Power is such an abstract concept that it’s hard to put your finger on. But we all know when power is empowering or disenfranchising. And when the power dynamics aren’t designed to empower, everyone loses. This week, I talk with Dr. Tanji Reed Marshall, an educator and consultant who has done fascinating work on power. Here we chat about the importance of mindfully building or re-building your power structure to foster greater equity and empowerment and, in return, improve results and boost your bottom line.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/transforming-power-dynamics

20/03/2024

What a great way to capture worry and anxiety. If only we channeled those imaginative powers more productively, what might be possible?

14/03/2024

We live in a society that overemphasizes getting back up again. If you experience grief or trauma, you may be given a pep talk, told how strong you are, or otherwise encouraged to put the past behind you. But our minds and bodies don’t work that way. Our symptoms might be physical, emotional, mental or more and we might not even realize they’re connected to the traumatic event. If we don’t take the time to process our experience, we will carry the burden indefinitely. This week, I’m talking with Nichole Lee, a trauma-informed life coach, about her experience with trauma after losing her mother and how she supports others in healing from their own experiences.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/our-stories-are-collectively-created

13/03/2024

Powerful choice! If you're honest with yourself, which choice have you made?

07/03/2024

Are you tolerating work that’s just okay? Have you internalized the idea that work sucks and that it’s normal to not like your job? Are you making things harder than they need to be? If you answered yes to these questions, you’re not alone. This week, I talk with Elena Pastore, a leadership and career coach, about how to think differently about how we manage our careers. We explore actionable steps you can take to feel more empowered and less attached to situations that aren’t working for you so that you can be wildly in love with your life.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/be-wildly-in-love-with-your-life

06/03/2024

What's on the other side of your fear?

29/02/2024

How do you define confidence? Too often, we think of confidence as a belief in how amazing we are and an absence of self-doubt. But if we define confidence in this way, we’ll never achieve it because it’s not realistic. This week, I talk with Zeina Habib, an embodied coach, trainer and project manager, about how to strengthen our confidence. She offers practical tips for how to tune into your body’s sensations so that you can better understand your emotions and more confidently show up at work.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmenigner.com/redefining-confidence

28/02/2024

This is a really important reminder if you're thinking about making a change. If you want to make a change, do the work to ensure that you're not taking the problem with you.

22/02/2024

Do you ever feel like something is missing from your career but you just can’t put your finger on it? Or maybe you know exactly what’s not working for you. Maybe you’re struggling with burnout or overwhelm or the constant need to prove yourself. When we feel this way, it’s often a sign that we’ve given our power to someone else. This week, I’m talking with Melani Dziire, a fellow leadership coach, about how to set guardrails so that we’re in control of our own careers and lives.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/what-are-your-guardrails

21/02/2024

You weren't born with the vast experience and education that you have today. You earned it through your resourcefulness and grit.

Whatever scary step lies ahead is simply an extension of the powerful journey you're already on. Trust yourself. You wouldn't be here if you couldn't do it.

15/02/2024

How often do you find yourself comparing yourself to others and feeling like you don’t measure up? Or, more specifically, how often are you comparing your step 1 to someone else’s step 10? It’s human nature to do this. But when we do so, we’re not able to appreciate what we uniquely bring to the world. This week, I talk with Juan Taveras, a DEI consultant, about his perspectives on DEI in this moment. We also talk about the individual responsibility and opportunity each of us has for doing our own DEI work. And, finally, we take a look at how Juan has navigated his own impostor syndrome as a new entrepreneur.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/there-is-only-one-me

08/02/2024

How well do you know yourself? That may sound like a funny question but, if you’re like most people, the answer is probably, “Not very well.” Self-awareness is hard work. It requires time we might think we don’t have, it might mean facing some truths that scare us, but self-awareness is critical to our self-trust and self-empowerment. This week, I talk with Zovig Garboushian, a fellow executive coach, about the ways in which self-awareness unlocks our power and puts us back in charge of our own lives.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/we-are-in-charge/

07/02/2024

Let's stop comparing ourselves to others and start focusing on conquering our own self-doubt.

01/02/2024

Do you know the difference between your feelings and your intuition? I struggled with this for a long time, which often reinforced my anxiety because I thought my fears were actually my intuition talking. This week, I’m talking with Joanna Armstrong, an emotional relief expert, about how to better understand and manage our feelings. We also talk about how our feelings generally reflect the rules of society whereas our intuition helps us define our own paths.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/don-t-believe-your-feelings/

31/01/2024

I've often struggled with the need to be perfect immediately. As a child, I quit so many things because I wasn't perfect on day one. This quote is a great reminder that it takes time to get past our fears, learn how to do something and get a true sense of whether we actually like it.

25/01/2024

Do you constantly feel the need to prove yourself at work? And, if so, do you worry that what you’re doing is not enough? This insidious way of thinking is pervasive in the workplace, particularly among women and members of marginalized groups. But what if you get to decide what’s enough? This week, I’m talking with Jamie Lee, a fellow executive coach who helps women who hate office politics get promoted. She and I explore how the context in which we operate primes us to experience impostor syndrome. And she shares some powerful steps you can take to manage anxiety and show up more confidently.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/who-decides-what-is-enough

24/01/2024

The most liberating realization I've ever had is that people don't think about us nearly as often as we think they do. Stop worrying about what others think. Chances are, they're only thinking of themselves.

18/01/2024

When you’re doing something scary, or experiencing self-doubt, what’s the story you tell yourself? Too often, our story is one of disempowerment – I don’t belong here, or I’m not good enough. There’s been a huge mistake. But what happens when we change the story? This week, I’m talking with my friend and colleague Jodi Flynn, CEO and founder of Women Taking the Lead. Here we talk about the impact of our stories and what we can do to adopt more empowered mindsets. We also talk about the importance of consistently stretching and expanding our comfort bubbles so that they don’t shrink and suffocate us.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/changing-your-story

17/01/2024

Such an important reminder that someone else's feedback only tells you about what they value and what it takes to make them happy. You get to decide whether that feedback aligns with your values and whether you want to act on it.

11/01/2024

Are you living your life or managing your career on other people’s terms? Too often, we prioritize other people’s needs over our own. And while this might work temporarily, it never ends well. This week, I talk with Jen Schwytzer, life coach and founder of Kindfulness Coaching about her journey from social worker in a hospital setting to coaching others to manage stress and overwhelm. Jen shares how putting herself last led to burnout and loss of love for the work she did and how changing her career empowered her to prioritize herself and her family. We also explore steps you can take to start putting yourself first, even if it feels scary and uncomfortable to do so.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/be-kind-to-yourself/

10/01/2024

Powerful reflection.

04/01/2024

How do you change something about yourself that’s deeply rooted? These are the hardest changes to make because our patterns are so fixed. If we don’t take consistent action, we’ll easily fall back into our old ways of doing things. This week, I talk with Paul Zolman, who shares how growing up in a family of abuse taught him to be a very angry person. Ultimately, however, he decided that he didn’t want to be angry anymore and found a way to shift from anger to love. Here Paul shares how understanding and applying love languages helped him to retrain his brain to see the good in everyone.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/shifting-from-anger-to-love/

03/01/2024

Avoiding what we fear only strengthens its power. Facing our fears allows us to recognize that we are so much stronger than we thought we were.

21/12/2023

How is it possible that so many of us have so much to offer but we struggle with constant self-doubt, while others toot their own horns with very flimsy evidence to support their greatness? This week, I talk with Annie Margarita Yang, finance guru and author of the book The 5-Day Job Search. Here she shares her journey with impostor syndrome as she launched a career in accounting with no formal training. Over the years, Annie has come to believe in her own greatness by closing the gap between her competence and confidence. She also shares practical strategies to help you build your confidence, including embracing courage, which always comes first.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/closing-the-gap-between-confidence-competence/

20/12/2023

It's human nature to focus on the negative. That's how our brains detect and minimize threats. But we owe it to ourselves to balance our awareness of our "weaknesses" with an unapologetic embrace of our strengths. There is nothing shameful about owning your unique combination of skills, talents and strengths. In doing so, you maximize your ability to be of service to yourself and others.

15/12/2023

Has working in a high-stress, high-intensity work environment led you to engage in a suffering contest with those around you? Are you competing to become the one with the least amount of sleep and the greatest level of overwork? If so, you're not alone. My guest this week, Gary Simonds, is a retired neurosurgeon who describes his own journey with medical training as a suffering contest. We also explore practices we can all use to shift away from unnecessary stress and suffering and increase our self-compassion, self-care and overall sense of empowerment.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/harfvesting-uplifts/

07/12/2023

The pace of change in today’s world can feel dizzying. The last few years, in particular, have been destabilizing in so many ways. Change, especially change that’s imposed upon us, can make us anxious and undermine our sense of security. That’s why staying connected to what’s unchanging for us is so important. This week, I talk with Dana Shamas, an executive leadership and wellness coach, about the power of leaning into our purpose to navigate uncertainty and stay confident during times of change.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/connecting-to-our-purpose-in-times-of-change/..

06/12/2023

Many of us focus so much of our energy on trying to please everyone, sometimes at the expense of our own core values. Rather than try to please everyone, let's focus on honoring our own needs and values while simultaneously respecting the needs and values of those around us. But recognize that there will always be toxic people whose needs and values are not worthy of our respect.

30/11/2023

How do you know if you're on the path that's right for you? As humans, we're very resilient. We're also willing to tolerate a lot of stress and frustration to protect our comfort zones. Because of this, we have a tendency to stay on the wrong path a lot longer than necessary. But what if we ask ourselves deeper questions about what we want from our lives? This week, I talk with Tony Martignetti, a fellow leadership coach, about the self-discovery process that led down a powerful new path. We also explore practical, yet powerful steps you can take to find the right path for you.

Listen to the full episode -
https://www.kimmeninger.com/finding-sparks-of-inspiration/