A devastating report is emerging from the catch-up coffee you’re currently attending with your childhood friend, Rima Singh. The 24-year-old systems engineer just admitted to being insecure, which sucks because she’s clearly so much better than you.
Uh oh! Does this mean you should be even more insecure?
“I feel like I’m just not doing enough,” your friend said right to your goddamn face, even though she’s already the youngest employee at her company and was named one of Time Magazine’s “100 People Changing Our Idea of How Good a Person Can Be.”
“It’s hard to be confident when I’m clearly failing in a big way,” she continued, which was particularly insensitive considering you’re failing in a much bigger, more noticeable way. Sources confirm your eye twitched when she first said this.
“What are you talking about?” you countered. “You have a stable job, a clear career path, and such a rich social life!” Upon further reflection, you realized this doubled as a checklist of things you do not have and probably shouldn’t expect to have any time in the next five years.
“Yeah, but what have I really done that’s substantive?” she continued, twisting the knife. This was tough to hear because you’ve been keeping up with every substantive achievement she’s made over the past ten years. Clearly, graduating from Stanford and turning down a lucrative position at an unethical software company in favor of a more lucrative position at an ethical firm that generates clean energy is not “substantive.”
Sources report you visibly shuddered as you thought about how she would describe your own achievements, or rather “achievement” – training your dog to hold a cigarette in his mouth the right way.
“Wait, if she feels bad, what does that make me?” you thought to yourself. Rima then pointed out that you actually said this out loud, another addition to a laundry list of instances where your big mouth has gotten you in trouble.
“Sorry, I didn’t even ask if you had the bandwidth to listen to ruminations on my own lack of self-worth,” she said, at which point you realized, fuck – she’s more emotionally intelligent than you, too. While googling “ruminations” under the table, you assured her it was no problem.
“Hey, it’s impossible to see all the progress you’ve made from where you stand, but you’re doing great!” you said dumbly, idiotically even.
At press time, Rima admitted she was probably just experiencing imposter syndrome. Luckily, you’ve never had to deal with that, as you’ve never been put in a lofty position. A win is a win, baby!
