Fake It Till You Make It

FAKE IT TILL YOU MAKE IT

The popular saying “Fake it till you make it” has been the practice of 90% of individuals. 

Despite being in a lot of pain, people still maintain a positive attitude in the face of adversity. Where is the originality, after all? This manner of living has become the norm for a large number of people – emotions like fear, rage, disgust, and sadness are not expressed. People are silent about how they feel about certain situations in the name of happiness and perfect existence.

There is an adage that goes, ‘When you act as if you feel a certain way, you feel that same way.’ A happy creative life might be frightening because you’re taking big risks, chasing big ideas, and exposing your vulnerable side when you venture outside your comfort zone. Perhaps, once we’ve learned and practiced the process of “faking it until you make it,” our brain will instinctively read the issue as less serious, indicating that there may be another way to look at things.

But, wait a minute, can fake it till you make it have its positive result when used rightly? When used in situations when you are scared to take a huge step. Is ‘fake it till you make it’ a winning strategy, one that pushes you through your fear? Perhaps, the more we think positively in the face of adversity, the more we will begin to unlearn detrimental attitudes that have been holding us back from going forward and replacing them with concepts that serve us.

I recently began my MBA program, and it has been tough for me. Imagine putting aside all academic concerns for a while and just getting started again on a full-time basis. Imagine not having prior knowledge of a wide range of topics such as data analytics, accounting, and business problem analysis (Problem?? I thought we ran away from problems and not looked for them). These are things I normally would have paid someone to do and now I find myself ‘getting my hands dirty’ I get overwhelmed in class thinking about how I don’t seem to get it. Other students respond to the questions before giving others time to process them. My facial expressions sometimes reveal how disoriented I am in such a situation. After class, I see a lot of students asking questions about the class, and I realize that I wasn’t the only one who was confused – others were simply better at composing themselves and making it appear as if they were following when, in fact, they weren’t.

To be honest, this is just me stepping outside of my comfort zone. Sometimes I just want to scream and say, “I’m not doing this anymore,” but then I smile as though my mental health is unaffected. In any case, I evaluated the number of people who have completed MBAs without having any prior experience, the number of people who are still pursuing MBAs without having any prior experience, and what I hope to learn from this long and arduous road, and I’ve concluded that this experience is invaluable, so every day, I’ll wake up, breathe, and convince myself that everything will be alright and to take it one day at a time.