I faked it, and now I made it

It was a random Thursday, and I was with my coworkers at the pub that’s right outside the office, probably 30 meters away. We were mainly people-watching, seeing how much money they were dropping at the slot machines or how long they would sit at the bar playing video poker without standing up.

We arrived at the topic of books. Turns out we mainly read books about self-improvement. The sales guy was reading about prospecting and improving business efficiency. The marketing guy talked about The Slight Edge by Jeff Olson and how it changed his life in college. I talked about my two favorites, Supercommunicators by Charles Duhigg and How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

Whenever I mention those two books, I always feel obligated to tell people that I’ve been tricking them this whole time. I’m awkward and introverted, and I rehearse what I want to say in my head 10 times before pulling up to the drive-through window. I think about how dumb I sound or how cringe my outfit is when I’m out in public.

“I’m actually awkward and introverted,” I confess to my coworkers, finally, after months and months of knowing them.

“Huh? No you’re not,” the marketing guy says.

“Yeah, you’re like a really cool guy,” the sales guy says.

I expected this reaction, only because I had deployed the brainwashing psy-op tactics from the books onto them. I successfully projected myself as someone who is more outgoing and sociable than I really am.

They had fallen for my trap, and now I must admit to them my elaborate master plan. I couldn’t let them think I was this exaggerated character forever.

“I just did whatever those books said to do. If you talked to me 5 years ago, you would’ve seen a completely different me,” I explain. I know I’m really not that confident or personable.

“I think you’re pretty confident and personable,” says Sales. Marketing adds, “Yeah, you’re not awkward, dude.”

Drat! My genuine and heartfelt confession about my true nature wasn’t enough to convince them.

“And I think it’s great that you’re trying to improve yourself at your age. It didn’t take me ’til 40 to start doing that stuff,” Sales continues. “Obviously, it’s been working out for you, man.”

“What’s the main thing you learned from the books?” he asks.

I instantly know how to answer.

“Fake it ’til you make it.”

It really is that simple

At this point in the conversation, I realized that I didn’t really think this about myself for a while now. I don’t know when I stopped thinking I was bad at socializing; I just know that I used to.

I think I inadvertently rewired my internal voice.

What’s missing from this piece of age-old advice is that the transition from faking it to making it is invisible.

My internal voice had changed without me noticing it. I feel like my mindset about conversation and connection made a complete 180 to what it was 5 years ago. That is no small feat, especially for a weird nerd like myself.

How often do you completely change something that’s so essential to your identity?

When you fake being someone, you are essentially practicing a set of actions and behaviors that that someone does. If you want to fake being a pro juggler, you juggle. If you want to fake being smart, you do things that make you seem smart.

Turns out that doing things to appear skilled in something is the same as practicing to become skilled at it.

If you never took this advice because you feel it celebrates being inauthentic and untruthful, then you’re looking at it the wrong way. You’re taking on brand new actions and behaviors, ones you’ve never done before. Of course it’s going to feel wrong. Of course it’s not who you are.

Faking it until you make it is about diving head first and fully immersing yourself into a completely new version of you. I know, it’s hard and cringe and embarrassing and strange. I know, we already got past that part in high school. And I know, even as an adult, it’s scary to do things we’re not used to.

But the cool part about this life is we can reinvent ourselves anytime we want! And it really doesn’t take much to do so. Pretend for long enough, and before you know it, you will have faked it ’til you made it.