Hello world, it’s been a while. I have been hard at work in my co-op placement at SNOLAB, which means a lot of underground shifts and coding work, both of which are tiring in unique ways. But I am still here, and still here for all of you. Rather than make this website seem overly performative by trying to constantly come out with new content, I wish to focus more on meanginful conversation, and post when I have something new to say. And well, here I am with something new to say.

I have talked about imposter syndrome before (see Imposter! ), and today I would like to introduce you to Imposter’s Syndrome sneaky cousin: Competence Amnesia. Imposter Syndrome lies to you, we are all aware of this. It makes you feel like you can’t do something or don’t deserve to be somewhere, either when trying something new or just in your general everyday environment. Competence Amnesia also lies to you, but in a much more insidious way because it lies to you about something you have already accomplished.

I don’t mean to say that it makes you forget what you have done. It doesn’t make you forget facts. But it does make you forget what you are capable of. And it can happen over and over. As an example, in this co-op placement I have been working on some simulation analysis and coding. I meet with my group weekly to talk about what I accomplished, and then what my next steps are for this project. So my week tends to look like an initial struggle with my code, running it, getting errors, debugging it, getting new errors… Then a breakthrough happens and I finally solve it! I feel great! I write up my analysis note and attend my weekly meeting. The PI’s (Principal Investigators) say “Good job! Now here’s what you need to do next…” And they move right on to the next step, whch involves new code and it’s like the cycle starts all over again. Struggle, errors, solve, celebrate, next step, etc… And each time I move on to the next step and begin the struggle phase all over, I find myself thinking “I have no idea what I’m doing…” Each and every time.

Your brain treats solved problems as “ordinary.” Try to think back to the last time you had to learn a difficult task in any new job you started, or school, or just in life. After a while it became just part of the day, right? Or think of a toddler learning to tie their shoes. For many adults, this can be done without even thinking about it. Competence amnesia occurs because yesterday’s accomplishments become today’s baseline. We forget that this was at one time an achievement we had to struggle to reach.

Competency is invisible from the inside. It’s really hard to notice it in ourselves because it’s something we experience continuously. I have a hard time seeing the incremental improvements in myself on a day-to-day basis. A high school student could come up to me and say: “Wow, you know so much about science!” Meanwhile, I look at my bosses and even graduate students and all I can think is “I have so much farther to go.” Both statements are true, but one is comparing my progress to the starting line, and one is comparing it to the finish line.

Competence amnesia is super common in academia because every new challenge basically resets the clock – we never get to a point where everything feels easy because success simply unlocks harder problems:

You can see how this might be a lifelong (or at least career-long) issue. The feeling of difficulty remains even though your capabilities are increasing. And so we tend to get overwhelmed and jump to the conclusion: “I can’t do this. I am not capable of this.“

But here’s the thing to try and remember, and it’s important enough that it is the title of this post: The Data Doesn’t Support This Conclusion. You could not have come as far as you have if you failed at everything that comes before it. You are capable, you are competent, you’ve simply leveled up. You know what might help? Actually collecting the data (or as I like to call it, keeping the receipts). This might mean things like keeping old notebooks, lab reports, transcripts, code repositories, conference talks, emails, things like this. And keeping these things isn’t about keeping trophies, it’s about keeping evidence. Evidence that you’ve solved hard things before, and that future you will probably solve hard things, too, because (as the data shows) you are capable of it. Not to mention these things are incredibly useful when you want to update your CV and write cover letters.

So I guess the main takeaway is that competence amnesia isn’t actually the failure to recognize what you’ve accomplished, but more about the tendency to normalize it. We become to accustomed to learning to carry difficult things that we forget they were ever heavy. So the next time you encounter a difficult task, and you have both Imposter Syndrome and Competence Amnesia clamouring to be heard in your brain, try to interrupt them. Interrupt the thought of “I am not capable of this” and instead ask yourself: “What does the evidence say?”