Over the years, I have worked closely with many Buddhist meditation practitioners and authors, some of whom have been clients, and my own practice has grown alongside those relationships. Being surrounded by people with such deep experience can be inspiring, but it can also quietly raise the bar to where you think you should be in your ability to overcome life’s difficulties.
One of my most humbling moments came during a trip to the emergency room related to complications from my autoimmune disease. I was in excruciating pain when one of my close friends, who also practices a long meditation practice, jokingly asked me, “Are you able to overcome your pain?”
We both laughed. The joke came about because another friend of mine, physician and meditation teacher Dr. Christian Wolff, is a colleague and former client who has written about Working with chronic pain through mindfulness In her book Overcome your pain.
I remember telling her at one point, almost defensively, that I meditate every day. I had this quiet competitive edge about it. I didn’t want to miss a day, even in the hospital. Missing a day felt like a failure.
I remember telling her at one point, almost defensively, that I meditate every day. I had this quiet competitive edge about it. I didn’t want to miss a day, even in the hospital. Missing a day felt like a failure. In hindsight, this belief seems a bit ridiculous, but at the time it carried real weight.
At that moment, I couldn’t get over my pain.
My response was immediate: “No. I can’t. I want painkillers.”
Even as I said that, a small part of me felt inadequate. I felt like a fraud. If I spent years around mindfulness practitioners and teachings about skillfully dealing with pain, shouldn’t I be better at this?
Health challenges have given me many moments like this, moments where I doubted my ability to overcome difficulties the way I thought I should.
What I didn’t understand at the time was that practice doesn’t always appear in the precise moment of distress. Sometimes this shows up in how we deal with the experience afterwards.
Christiane later offered a perspective that changed something for me.
“Angela, if you’re not meditating when you walk into the hospital, that doesn’t make you a failure. Your practice so far has prepared you to navigate these moments. That’s what this practice is for,” she said.
“Angela, if you’re not meditating when you walk into the hospital, that doesn’t make you a failure. Your practice so far has prepared you to navigate these moments. That’s what this practice is for,” she said.
It was a simple, but important, reminder. I realized how quickly I turned a moment of human weakness into a judgment about whether I was doing the practice “well enough.”
Around the same time, I was helping a menopausal telehealth company develop educational content and share mindfulness practices for women navigating perimenopause and menopause. I’ve had no problem guiding others through meditation or creating resources that help people access the practice.
However, on a personal level, I sometimes found it difficult to apply the same consistency to my own life.
This tension, between helping others achieve mindfulness and questioning my own ability to embody it, was incredibly revealing. It showed me how quickly self-judgment can creep in, and how easy it is to hold myself to impossible standards. Most importantly, it helped me see where I still had work to do, on and off the pad.
Label the experience
As the months passed, I became more curious about what might be going on beneath the surface of my experience. I understood the stress and anxiety associated with my health challenges. These have been a part of my life for years. But this seemed deeper.
I began to question my beliefs about how I was supposed to deal with difficulty. I clearly had an idea of what this should look and feel like, especially for someone with as much mental experience as I had. After more than 15 years in this field, I subconsciously decided that I shouldn’t suffer at all.
I began to question my beliefs about how I was supposed to deal with difficulty. I clearly had an idea of what this should look and feel like, especially for someone with as much mental experience as I had. After more than 15 years in this field, I subconsciously decided that I shouldn’t suffer at all.
Psychologists have a term for a similar pattern in professional life. The imposter phenomenon, the first to describe it Pauline Clance and Susan Eames In 1978, this refers to the persistent feeling that we fall short of the role we are supposed to play, even when there is sufficient evidence that we belong.
While this concept is often discussed in professional settings, a similar dynamic can arise in reflective practice.
Experienced practitioners are still human. We can be overwhelmed by daily stressors like everyone else, and often times, the mind is quick to judge that experience. My voice tends to sound like, If you were truly a mindfulness practitioner, you wouldn’t feel this way.
In those moments, the mind takes a very human experience and reframes it as failure. You are a fraud.
Part of what makes this so difficult is that we start looking for evidence to support this belief, convincing ourselves that we are failing at something we were never meant to be good at.
Part of what makes this so difficult is that we start looking for evidence to support this belief, convincing ourselves that we are failing at something we were never meant to be good at.
What about stress?
Being alive in these times is an experience Constant stress levels. It doesn’t take much, from watching the news, scrolling through the headlines, or juggling daily responsibilities, to feel the weight of political turmoil, global uncertainty, financial stress, social division, and personal stress.
The nervous system absorbs all of this.
So How we organize ourselves In the midst of this? What does this have to do with mental imposter syndrome?
Research into the physiology of stress It appears that when the brain perceives a threat, the body goes into survival mode. Heart rate increases, breathing changes, and attention to potential danger narrows.
In these states of activation, it can be very difficult to access the awareness we have worked so hard to cultivate. This can create a confusing internal signal: If I have these tools, why can’t I use them now?
For mindfulness practitioners, this can easily be misinterpreted as a failure to practice.
But the nervous system does not shut down at these moments. It responds exactly as it was designed.
This misunderstanding is where self-doubt can quietly take hold.
Clear vision
One of the most widely cited ideas by psychiatrist Carl Jung is: “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it destiny.”
As mindfulness practice deepens, awareness expands. We become more in tune with our inner landscape, our thoughts, our emotions, and our reactions. As a result, we often begin to notice the interaction more clearly than we did before. What may seem like a decline may actually be an increase in awareness.
As mindfulness practice deepens, awareness expands. We become more in tune with our inner landscape, our thoughts, our emotions, and our reactions.
As a result, we often begin to notice the interaction more clearly than we did before.
What may seem like a decline may actually be an increase in awareness.
You may notice that you have reacted in situations where in the past you might have reacted automatically without realizing it. Now, there’s a pause. recognition. The moment you see what’s happening.
This transition can be uncomfortable, not because something is wrong, but because something has been revealed.
research The study of mindfulness suggests that the practice strengthens meta-awareness, our ability to monitor our mental and emotional states.
The reactions themselves may not be new.
What’s new is our ability to see them.
Expectations and shame here!
Most of us carry an internal narrative, quietly projecting expectations onto our daily lives. In mindfulness practice, this often takes the form of what we think we should feel when we sit.
calm. sick. poise. Thankful.
We tend to measure success by the existence of these states, while ignoring the full range of human emotions, fear, anger, sadness, and uncertainty, that make up an equal part of our experience.
We tend to measure success by the existence of these states, while ignoring the full range of human emotions, fear, anger, sadness, and uncertainty, that make up an equal part of our experience.
When our lived reality does not match those internal expectations, shame can arise.
During the months leading up to menopause, I found myself navigating unfamiliar sensations in my body. It seems like many of my tools are gone. I felt reactive, scared, and unsure about what was happening.
The conversation that followed was harsh:
You should handle this better.
Who are you to guide others if you can’t manage this yourself?
Instead of just noticing the tension, I added another layer: autonomy.
Sometimes, the concepts of mindfulness itself can become a form of stress. Psychotherapist John Wellwood He described this dynamic as “spiritual bypass,” using spiritual thoughts to avoid or bypass difficult emotional truths.
In practice, this can manifest in subtle ways, but the result is often the same. We begin to feel guilty or ashamed about what we are going through.
Dealing with dysregulation
Our ideas about mindfulness can sometimes work against us. If we think that this practice should keep us calm and less reactive at all times, we are setting ourselves up for disappointment.
Mindfulness is not about performing calm.
Mindfulness is not about performing calm.
As Allen Ginsberg once said, the task is simply to “notice what you notice.”
When we develop awareness, we begin to see our reactions as they arise. You may have noticed that you are excited in the conversation. Maybe you pause instead of responding immediately. You may realize, even afterward, that you are exhausted.
These moments are important.
Mindfulness meets us exactly where we are.
It does not require that we reach a certain state.
It asks us to face whatever situation we’re in with more awareness and, when possible, with more kindness.
Research on self-compassion It is suggested that responding to difficult emotions with care rather than criticism supports emotional resilience and regulation.
When we approach our experience in this way, the narrative of failure begins to soften.
Anyone who has spent time meditating knows that feelings will always arise. What changes is not the presence of emotion, but our relationship to it.
Instead of asking, Why am I still reacting like this?
We may ask:
What is happening in the body now?
What is this reaction trying to tell me?
These questions reopen the possibility of practice, even in the midst of difficulty.
Anyone who has spent time meditating knows that feelings will always arise. What changes is not the presence of emotion, but our relationship to it.
Moments of interaction do not deprive us of this practice.
They remind us why we practice. Consciousness is not something we master. It’s something we come back to again and again.
