

Ask HN: How do you deal with inferiority complex? - septerr

Specifically to do with skills in programming&#x2F;designing. I haven&#x27;t had chance to work much with frontend development and when I see people create beautiful apps&#x2F;sites, I feel pretty inferior!
======
vijucat
Assuming that it's not just the usual case that you are just starting off, and
they have been doing it for years, maybe even decades, assuming that it's a
fair apples to apples comparison, and that they actually are superior, do
yourself a favour and don't listen to the other advice about it being a
"syndrome" (impostor syndrome or otherwise) or some "principle" : own that
feeling. Try saying, "Damn, these people are good. And I'm nowhere close to
them, not even in the same league".

Trust me : acknowledging reality is so, so therapeutic and relaxing that it is
a strength by itself. Your anxious mind, previously beset with envy, will
suddenly calm down and _be able_ to move on. You will be able to take a deep
breath. And then the magic happens : there is an immediate and concentrated
focus on the current moment, the reality of being who you are, wherever you
are, accepted by every cell of your body. You are _so aware_ of the present
moment. In this calm state of assessment, you are already beyond your past
feelings of weakness and...and what happens depends, but for me, most of the
time, I end up being able to figure out where I can excel and be happy. I am
able to ask the Real Questions.

While this may sound like a motivational seminar or even a religious one, the
reason why it is so generic is that I cannot know what happens after you
accept that they are better. I cannot know what exact magic happens. But
avoiding the feelings, suppression, is where the problems lie. With
psychological suppression, the anxiety never ends. With psychological
integration, calmness and health prevail.

Us engineers are really bad at this stuff (low EQ), hence so many answers fit
the template of avoidance and suppression or worse, false motivation : "you
can do it! keep trying!". How do these people know you can? Maybe you suck.
You need not conclude that, but you should consider that. May reality be with
you!

~~~
thenomad
That's advice that is useful in some circumstances and very dangerous in
others.

People DO underestimate their own abilities, and it can be very damaging to
their careers and lives.

For example, I have a friend who genuinely has world-class skills in a couple
of areas, but spends most of his self-talk time telling himself that he's not
as good as anyone else at those things. That's done significant harm to his
health, livelihood and happiness.

Telling him, as you seem to be, to just accept all those false beliefs about
his inadequacy isn't going to help even a little bit.

Having said that: you do make a very valuable point. If the other people
really _are_ better than you, then it's far more valuable to acknowledge that.
But it's very important to be sure you're right in your estimation of your own
skill before coming to that conclusion.

Whilst it make be the case for you personally that you never underrate your
own skills, that's far from universal.

~~~
vijucat
I have to agree with you. I remember being depressed when I was younger and it
really did cloud my judgement; I could not assess situations objectively and
was beating myself up unnecessarily.

OP, please tread with caution regarding my advice.

~~~
septerr
Thanks both to you and thenomad for your replies.

vijucat, your answer reminds me of Eckhart Tolle[1]. I have a tendency towards
depression. And among other things I have listened to Eckhart in past to deal
with it. And he helped me greatly. I feel like you are right. Intuitively I
feel I need to simply acknowledge that these folks are better than me at this
thing and I should admire their skill without envy. I feel like it will be a
great weight off of me when I am able to do that. And I understand what you
mean by you don't know what would follow after that. I have found that in
situations where I have stopped fighting 'what is', things have turned out
such that the cause of my struggle was removed. 'What is' became 'what I
wanted'. Maybe this is what will happen again. I do feel I have the ability to
master this frontend development but comparison with others has become a
debilitating factor. In any case, I have decided to make my goal #1 to become
able to acknowledge others' achievements and skill without pangs of envy.

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Eckhart-
Tolle/e/B001H6GZ5K](http://www.amazon.com/Eckhart-Tolle/e/B001H6GZ5K)

EDIT: added link to Eckhart Tolle.

------
wturner
Your strengths and weaknesses have curves, troughs, peaks and spaghetti
complexity. Personally I completely accept that I'm pretty mediocre as a
"developer", but honestly I don't really care because I don't personally
consider myself a developer, I just look at myself as someone who simply likes
to explore, learn and play with web based technologies. This way I don't get
sucked into the pigeon hole psychology of the professional world. If someone
else wants to look at me in that light that's fine , but I keep an invisible
boundary between myself and that kind of thing. I also like to occasionally
and inadvertently ask inane questions at stackoverflow which get down voted at
machine gun intervals. It's good for the 'soul'.

I have a mentor that has been programming since the 70's , I once lived in a
place where an extremely smart Belgian software engineer was staying who
helped me while programming, and I currently met a really smart engineer near
where I live who has been gradually throwing me suggestions coupled with some
pseudo mentorship. All of these people are very smart,very empathetic and
willing to share. Being around people like that in my view is absolutely
needed for your sanity.

You've probably seen this video. It's the one where Google attempts to explain
what a web browser is to random people on the street. Watch it if you haven't.
It will lend perspective.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4MwTvtyrUQ](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4MwTvtyrUQ)

Ok that's all.

------
CmonDev
"programming/designing" \- double talented people are extremely rare, so it's
probably a team - one less reason to feel inferior. Also web front-end
programming sucks in comparison with server side, HTML will never be any close
to perfection due to compatibility - no code satisfaction, client-side
frameworks change every week, JavaScript is shit etc.

~~~
septerr
The 'no code satisfaction' aspect of web frontend development has been an
issue for me whenever I have tried my hand at it. The chaotic, un-organized
nature of the code drives me a little crazy.

But at the same time it increases my admiration for the people who can handle
such chaos and be cool about it.

------
juhanima
Not being happy with what you have accomplished so far is a sign of greatness.
Once you feel you have achieved enough, you become complacent. Do not feel
inferior. As long as you feel there is room for improvement, you will keep
improving. Only when you start thinking you know it all it's time to get
worried.

------
3minus1
Work with people who know more than you, be humble, and ask questions.

~~~
septerr
I do try to do that. I have wondered if it some type of psychological problem
I have that I want to be good at everything and thus am always feeling
inferior. My brain is filled with all these ideas that I want to execute but I
want them all to be executed in a polished manner and I want to do it all! Not
gonna happen. I need to learn to delegate to experts and not feel inferior.

~~~
kkantz
The reason we have teams and build organizations is because no one is great at
everything. The skill comes in knowing how to accentuate your strengths and
mitigate your weaknesses. The best mitigation is to attract people who are far
more talented than you in those areas. Then as you start to lead the skill
comes in knowing how to accentuate your team's strengths and mitigate their
weaknesses. This will often come through outsourcing, strategic partners or
acquisition.

------
deeviant
For me, I turn it into motivation. I check out the code that dazzled me with
it's brilliance, I go through every line, stop to understand everything, then
I ask questions. After that I normally create a home brew project that
incorporates the lessons learns and drives them home, and, sometimes,
improving on them.

Obviously not quite from a design perspective, but it may still be useful.

------
bluerail
You shouldn't have to.. Just be sure that not everyone knows everything.. If
they are good at frontend development and create eye catching site, let them
be., What I could do is they can't (probably they can if with learning and
practice, but not as much as I devote myself into)..

Simply : Doctors won't write program, Programmers won't perform a cesarean..

------
chops
It sounds to me, based also on your replies so far, that you just have a case
of impostor syndrome (and possibly some Dunning-Kruger thrown in there). Just
power through it - we all get it too. Just keep making things that you're
proud of, or that others find useful, and you be fine. We can't all be experts
in everything, and even the experts are noobs at somethings.

------
TotalEclipse
Once you've worked with enough programmers, you'll realise that many
programmers don't actually know how to... well, program.

The great websites / open-source projects you see regularly are really just
the tall poppies.

------
loumf
If by design, you mean what it looks like: You + themeforest == nice looking
front-end for your site.

But, worry more about Design meaning "how it works", trade-offs, and what job
the end user is trying to get done.

~~~
septerr
You are right design is not just frontend. And the design of a good codebase
is a whole another neuroses for me :) Here, I did mean 'how things look'.

(The longer I have been programming, the more difficult it has for me to work
with the enterprise software I work with. I dislike the architecture, the
hodge-podge way of doing things. I used to be able to 'enjoy' the
complications. Now I abhor it.)

------
known
Sounds like
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle)

------
staunch
Those people did a lot of work to gain that level of skill. You could probably
be as good if you really worked at it too.

------
daSn0wie
it's impossible to know everything and do everything. stop comparing yourself
to other people and start focusing on what YOU need to accomplish and what YOU
can control, which is yourself. If you see something amazing, look at it and
learn from it.

be inspired instead of intimidated.

