Imposter Syndrome

Julianne Holmquist || Fall 2020

I watched Ted Talk on
P O W E R  P O S I N G
Make yourself B I G.
Think big. Big leaders
Have higher testosterone.
Fake it till it’s real, girlfriend!
Small leaders hunch and hug
Themselves and their cortisol

S

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When my brain gets cut open
They'll find a little cortisol factory.
My desires for a big life expand
Beyond my cranial confines.
Big life. Big future. Do I want
Adventure in the great wide
somewhere? And when my
Thoughts push against my skull walls
The cortisol factory workers
Punch their cards and get to work.
I sip my coffee for comfort.
Do I want unimaginable adventure?
What if being curled up in a
Cortisol pile is just the level
of stressed anonymity I desire?
I pull one knee
To my chest
Then the other.
Testosterone
Be damned.
I focus
My gaze
At the
Window
And fade
Into a
Smaller
Shrinking
Life
Form.
Just for now.
The factory workers
Close up shop.
I can’t help it that
I am already so much
Bigger than I can
Even fathom.