Keeping it real is making it

“Fake it till you make it” is a common piece of advice that served me for a long time, especially when I was younger in my career, suffering from imposter syndrome, wanting to achieve more but unsure of myself.

Years ago, I asked T how she thought I could be get promoted to a partner at the firm. She responded with a version of “Dress for the job you want, not the job you have.” She said, “Forget the promotion. Just act like a partner. Show up to the office like a partner. Lead like a partner. Make the actual promotion a no-brainer, administrative step, because you’ll already be one.” That sparked something in me. I set my mind toward doing that, and it worked. It worked then, and for several other career-related achievement cycles afterward.

Today, I’m in the midst of a life transition, a path towards something different than the one I’ve already travelled. So I’m looking around and questioning everything-the stories, the tools, the feelings, the systems, the beliefs, and the advice that got me here. And I want to throw most of it out of the window. What got me here won’t get me there.

That’s why I’m discarding “fake it till you make it.” Because faking it got me farther from myself than I liked, and now I need to come back. These days, making it seems like the very opposite of faking it.

So, while “fake it till you make it” served Past Me, “keep it real and you’ve made it” is for Now Me.

To be clear, I don’t think either are bad pieces of advice. I just think it depends on where you are. I suppose I’ve come to the same conclusion Glennon did when tasked with sharing her best advice:

There is nothing that I can think of that I could say is correct and true all the time. […] There are things like principles that have guided me well through certain periods of my life and then are completely untrue in the next part of my life.

There’s a lot of advice out there in the world, some of it truly great, and none of it is true all the time for everyone. Pick, choose, and revise what’s right for you.