u/michaelnovati replied ·
It's both imposter and imposter syndrome. I don't like the word imposter syndrome.
So let's use swimming as an analogy. You never swam as a kid but maybe you are a gifted swimmer and have the ideal body shape for swimming and you quickly become an Olympic level swimmer. You aren't an imposter if you perform at that level in a race. If you never swam and have no natural talent or gifts and want to be an Olympic swimmer, you might just not make it. Maybe you play the game, swim every waking second, focus solely on just ine specific type of swimming, go to obscure competitions to qualify and work the system to get into better races, but you don't have what's needed to swim at the best in the world level and you are going to face a constant uphill battle. You see others just make it and you wonder if you deserve to be there.
Well some people do have a shot and others don't.
SWE is similar. Some people have a natural inclination, past relevant experience. Some people really just don't have a shot.
In the former case, the person might have "imposter syndrome" and not have any confidence in their own abilities and need external validation and help to keep going. The later person doesn't have imposter syndrome, they might have no chance and being misled by people talking them they have imposter syndrome is irresponsible.
Hard thing is, you as a student don't know and rely on bootcamps to access you andil if your bootcamp isn't taking this responsibility seriously then you are in a tough spot.