Julie Smith

Machines made this, mistakes and all...

[00:00:00] Chris: Hello and welcome to the Imposter Syndrome Network Podcast where everyone belongs, especially if you think you don't. My name is Chris Grundman and unfortunately Zoe was waylaid by an afterschool activity with her daughter, so we will have to charge ahead without her today. 

[00:00:24] Chris: This is the Julie Smith episode, and it's going to be just a little bit different. Julie is a senior research physicist in the Space Vehicles Directorate at the Air Force Research Laboratory on Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico. 

[00:00:41] Chris: Hey, Julie, welcome. Uh, would you mind introducing yourself a bit further to the Imposter Syndrome Network? 

[00:00:46] Julie: Hi, thanks. Uh, yeah, so like you said, I'm Julie Smith.

[00:00:50] Julie: I work for the Air Force Research Laboratory. I've, I've worked there since 2008, so I'm coming up on my 15 year anniversary. I work on satellite communication development and I love it. I live in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I've lived here since about 2004. Um, I am originally from Indiana, a small town in Indiana called Terre Haute.

[00:01:13] Julie: And after, after high school and a small stint of college at Indiana State University there, for those who who know, you know La Larry Bird is well known over there. I moved out to Colorado. I got my bachelor's degree in physics, and then I did a year of grad school in South Carolina before I ended up here in New Mexico and I got my master's degree at the University of New Mexico in physics.

[00:01:42] Julie: And went to work right away at uh, the Air Force. And then for some crazy reason, I decided to actually go back to school a few years ago, 10 years after I had graduated to finish up and get my PhD in electrical engineering. So, wow. Very cool. Still, I'm still working on that. It's slow going because there's just not enough hours in the day, but.

[00:02:03] Chris: I hear you on that for sure.

[00:02:06] Chris: And I think, uh, it's also obvious at this point that you don't really work in digital infrastructure or kind of classic it, which is where we usually focus our attention on the show. So folks may be wondering why you're here. Uh, in addition to being brilliant, you were recently featured in an IEEE magazine article about overcoming imposterism.

[00:02:25] Chris: And that article actually references a talk you gave at a women in engineering conference that was titled Removing the Mask, living with Imposter Syndrome. All of this is clearly fascinating to Zoe and myself, but it poses the question, I think what prompted you to stand up and talk about this?

[00:02:42] Julie: Yeah, so that actually started about five or six years ago.

[00:02:46] Julie: I, there's a whole long story to this. So I was invited to give a presentation at a different women in engineering, women in Science and Engineering, WiSE, a conference back in, I think, I don't know, 2017, somewhere around that timeframe. And, you know, those conferences, they, they wanna know more about you.

[00:03:05] Julie: They wanna know about your career, they wanna know, you know, things like that. It's less about. It's less technology driven, which is what I'm used to, right? I'm, I'm a physicist, so 99.9% of the briefs that I give. Are technically technical, right? And, uh, they, they, uh, focus on the technology that I develop and, and things like that.

[00:03:25] Julie: So I had asked my mentor, who at the time was the chief scientist of the air combat command. I said, you know, I was invited to give this briefing, but you know, I don't know what to talk about. They gave me an hour. And I was freaking out and I told her, I said, I don't really have anything to talk about. My career has not been that exciting.

[00:03:44] Julie: Like, I got a degree, I got a job. Here I am. I, I don't think I'm worthy of this. And I actually wrote that to her in an email. I have that email in my briefings because in that one little paragraph to her, I just completely discredited my entire career. Not important, nothing of interest, you know? And she wrote back and she was like, Are you crazy?

[00:04:08] Julie: You've done all kinds of stuff. She, you know, she went on in the email to talk about all of the accomplishments that I've actually made and she said, you have a ton to talk about. And I think, you know, your story would resonate a lot with people. So I thought about it for a second and the years when I first started at the research lab, I felt out of place because, um, I only had a master's degree and you know, almost everyone around me has PhDs.

[00:04:33] Julie: Um, I'm a woman in a male dominated field and I just, I felt like I didn't belong. So my mother had always told me, you know, yes, you belong. 'cause I talk to her every day. Yes, she belonged. Yes, this, that, and I'm like, well, but you're my mom. You're supposed to say that kind of stuff, right? So one day she actually sent me an article on imposter syndrome.

[00:04:52] Julie: She said, this is what you have. That was the title of the email. This is what you have. I'm like, ma, I don't have imposter syndrome. I am an imposter. I don't belong here. So that's where it sort of all stemmed. And after, after my mentor replied back to me, uh, and I read her email, and then I went back and read my email.

[00:05:15] Julie: I said, I'm doing it again. I'm doing it again. And that's when I decided to start talking about. Imposter syndrome. So I did a bunch of res, well, I did research on it previously, but I did a bunch of research on it. I put together the presentation, um, and I went and gave it, and it, it, it was very resonating.

[00:05:34] Julie: Like it's, it's a very personal brief. The brief that I give is not a, I mean, it's a little bit of this is what imposter syndrome is, blah, blah, blah, but it's more personal and it's more how my story is and how I've dealt with it. And how it relates to me, and I think, I don't know, it resonates a lot with people.

[00:05:55] Julie: So after that, I've been asked to give it multiple times since then. 

[00:05:59] Chris: Yeah. Yeah. I bet it, it is something that seems to be a, a, a touchstone and I'm not sure, you know, maybe it's been slowly growing. Like I, I, I feel like lately there's been a lot more folks talking about it. It's gotten a lot more light or, or press.

[00:06:13] Chris: I mean, the term was coined I think all maybe, maybe all the way back in the sixties. I mean, probably, I guess I should know that. But. 

[00:06:18] Julie: Yeah, it was, so it was actually back in, I think, yeah, 1978 by two clinical psychologists, Pauline Clance and Suzanne Eames. They, they worked for years, uh, at, and actually plants made a, made a career out of studying imposter syndrome.

[00:06:35] Julie: She actually even has the test. So there's a test that you can take, okay, to see if you exhibit the traits of imposter syndrome. And she came up with that test. And, you know, they're, they're basic questions like, um, actually I have it here. I can read, you know, I've often succeeded on a test or a task, even though I was afraid I would not do well before I undertook the task.

[00:06:58] Julie: You, you write that, you give it a a score. I can give the impression that I'm more competent than I really am. You know, when I've succeeded at something and received recognition from my accomplishments, I have doubts that I can keep repeating that success. Hmm. And that's actually a big part of the imposter syndrome.

[00:07:14] Julie: There's a cycle called the imposter syndrome cycle. You know, you get assigned a task, you panic about the task. Usually there's two routes. Imposters take, you can procrastinate, procrastinate, procrastinate, and then you, you. Frantically do something at the very end, still end up doing well on it, or you like just over-prepared, overdo it work day and night, and then you get done.

[00:07:38] Julie: You feel relief, you get praise. That's bad. We can talk about that later if you want. Praising someone with imposter syndrome is not, is not great. And then you get assigned another task because you did well, and the cycle starts all over again. So it's a, it's actually a well-documented, uh, cycle that, that we go through.

[00:07:57] Chris: Yeah, it's very interesting. And then, you know, in your research, did you find any, I mean, is there, is there really, is there good evidence of how widespread this is? I mean, to me it feels almost, you, you know, I was gonna say unanimous, but almost everyone it feels like, but I, but I don't think that's totally true.

[00:08:13] Julie: So, yeah, it's, it's actually more widespread than you think. So, um, you know, I, I've seen the number, I think like 80% or something of high, what they call high achievers. So, you know, people with secondary degrees or I, I, I don't know what their definition of high achievers, but, you know, high achievers, male and female, exhibit some traits of impostor syndrome.

[00:08:36] Julie: The level of extremity, uh, or how extreme it is, varies. And usually it's worse than females, than it is in males. But males do exhibit some of the, some of the characteristics, but a lot of people, a lot of people do, and I think they feel like it's just normal that you know, well, I don't, I don't know how to do this or that guy's smarter than me, or, you know, things like that.

[00:08:59] Julie: But the study has shown that a very high percentage of of people feel this way at some point in their career. 

[00:09:05] Chris: Yeah, that makes sense. And especially like you said, I mean among engineers, architects, you know, folks who work in technology or in any kind of, I guess, technical field. Right? I'm, I assume that this is also for like accountants and lawyers and doctors and, you know, anything that requires kind of that high level of knowledge working with your mind every day, it feels like that's where it's gonna gonna live the most.

[00:09:25] Julie: Yeah. And it's not even technical field, several. You know, famous people have come out as having feelings of imposter. Maya Angel, the famous poet Laureate, she was quoted saying, I have written 11 books, but each time I think Uhoh, they're gonna find out that I've run a game on everyone and they're gonna find me out.

[00:09:47] Julie: So Maya Angelou, Einstein, Einstein of all people said The exaggerated esteem, which my life work is held, makes me ill at ease. I feel compelled to think of myself as an, as an involuntary swindler Einstein. Yeah, swindler. So, wow. The Facebook of c e o says that she, she feels like a fraud when she wakes up in the morning.

[00:10:13] Julie: There's a lot of actresses and actors that have come out and said the same thing. Natalie Portman, who is, I mean, everybody knows Natalie Portman, right? She's educated. Um, she questions her own worthiness. So it's not, I mean, it's, it's a lot of people, right? It's, it's not uncommon. And that's, I think that's what's important to, to, to note, right?

[00:10:32] Julie: Yeah. And I talk about this in my briefings is that you're, you're not alone, right? And you think you are because. And that's why I title my talk what it is, removing the mask. Because you do feel like you get up every day and put a mask on and go be somebody that, that you think you're not right. And it, it can be crippling, it can be debilitating.

[00:10:53] Julie: I think that's why it's important to talk about it and open up about it, because if it gets bad enough, it can cause severe anxiety, it can cause depression, it can cause you to lose, to lose interest in your work. So it can have debilitating side effects, and obviously that's what we want to avoid. So I think talking about it and getting folks to realize that again, you're, you're not alone.

[00:11:18] Julie: Um, But yeah, it's important that people feel like they're not alone. Right. Because like I said, it can be, it can be debilitating. 

[00:11:25] Chris: Absolutely. Yeah. I've been lucky in that my, you know, my imposter feelings, um, have never, well, I. Yeah. Never been debilitating and, and very rarely been, you know, even harmful, I would say.

[00:11:37] Chris: But definitely, you know, it's been there and almost ever present for a long time, and I did think I was alone. And when I, not that many years ago, finally talked to other people who kind of described the same feelings. Uh, it was really kind of a breakthrough moment for me, which is also, you know, obviously the genesis of this podcast and why, like, talking about this publicly and sharing these stories is, is really important to me.

[00:11:57] Julie: It is, and, and I've, I've noticed that when I, when I give the briefings, right, I. People come up toe me afterwards and they're like me, just told my life.

[00:12:10] Julie: I don't know. It's very resonating. It's very powerful. Um, it can be very emotional. Mm-hmm. I rarely get through my imposter syndrome briefing without like getting a little ec clipped because it's very personal and I see people in the audience resonating. Yeah. At my talk, a young girl came up afterwards in tears crying because of like, this, this was, this was her, and it made me cry and we're all crying.

[00:12:37] Julie: So, you know, I, I think it's important to get the word out there and the whole, you're not alone thing. I don't know if you've ever, if you've ever Googled, but I have a whole slide in my, in my presentation about little graphics that show what an imposter feels like versus what reality is. And, you know, it's, it's.

[00:12:59] Julie: What, what I think others know, which is everything and what I know, and it's a little bitty.in a, you know, in a, in a big circle. In reality, what it really is, is everybody knows a little bit about certain things, right. It's not that everybody else knows everything. 

[00:13:15] Chris: Right. Right. And it's tough, right? Because I mean, that, that, you know, yeah.

[00:13:19] Chris: That perspective I think is, is really important. I've seen. Some similar graphics or, or kind of, you know, allegory stories about this where you know, you know, you know everything. About yourself. Um, or at least close to it. There's probably some things you can hide from yourself, but in general you kind of, you know, you know all of your flaws, all your weaknesses, everything.

[00:13:37] Chris: And generally other people you only see the things that they're promoting or doing well, or, you know, you notice when they, when they say something smart or, and they're gonna talk about things they know about or they're gonna do things they know. And so that's all you see of that side, right? 

[00:13:49] Julie: Right. And that's why things like social media, Can be, you know, not, not great, right?

[00:13:54] Julie: Because people don't post the bad stuff on social media, right? People are always posting the good on social media and you know, especially like in the fitness in industry, I'm a, I'm a big part of the fitness industry and you only see what those influencers there's want you see? Yeah. And I think it. I, and I think everybody agrees with this, right?

[00:14:16] Julie: That it's, it's not, it's not real, right? The internet is curated. It's not real. Yeah. So, yeah, you, you can't, you can't take what you see. And that's, and that's what's hard too, because. You know, when you're, especially again with the high achievers, when you're surrounded by people who are like extremely smart mm-hmm.

[00:14:34] Julie: And, you know, know a lot about their field, it's hard to not feel like you don't know what you're doing. Right. But there's no reason why anyone should think that you should know at all, just because I have a degree of physics. Doesn't mean that I understand every single bit of every physics thing ever.

[00:14:53] Julie: Right, right, right. It's, it's unrealistic. And I think that's one of the things that imposter people with imposter syndrome have. It's, it's these unrealistic expectations of themselves. And, um, when they can't meet those expectations, that's when you know things. Things start getting crazy. You know, my, I laugh, my husband points this out to me all the time that, you know, I set goals that are so far out of reach and then I get mad in a day when I met them, right?

[00:15:25] Julie: And he's like, what whatcha doing? And, and folks within Impost syndrome do this in, in all aspects of their lives. Not just, not just their work, they do it in their personal lives too. And again, it's a common thing I think, but they don't realize that they're doing it, number one, and that other people out also doing it and you know, just chill out, calm down.

[00:15:45] Julie: You are good at what you do. Yeah. You, you can't just because you failed or didn't make a time limit or whatever, didn't do so well. Or it's not even that you didn't do so well. Most of the time imposters do fine. Yeah, they do great, but they don't think they did. Right.

[00:16:03] Julie: They think that the praise they are getting is fake. They think that like they're actually being lied to, you know? My family always tells me, oh Julie, you know you can do it. You've done it before you, you do. You do such good work, you can do it. When in reality they don't know what I do. Right. Right. They dunno how to do it, what I do. Yeah. So their opinion is discredited.

[00:16:24] Julie: Mm-hmm. Sorry for family members who might be listen, but they don't, you know, they don't understand my job, so how can they tell me, oh yeah, Julie, you can go do that. I dunno. It's rough sometimes. 

[00:16:35] Chris: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So, you know, and all this resonates with me quite a bit. I mean, you know, I, I think I may have said this on the show before, but you know, for me it started really young.

[00:16:45] Chris: These, these unrealistic expectations you're talking about. Right. I remember being a kid, my parents were really good about telling me I was smart, which I think was, was positive and, and helped me in my life in general. But it also may have been the beginnings of this, where, you know, I was like, okay, I'm, I'm supposed to be smart.

[00:16:59] Chris: And so, you know, I saw a kid who was 14 years old who got accepted to Harvard, and I'm like, well, I didn't do that, so maybe I'm not smart. Right. Or, you know, even I, I saw, you know, reading history that Alexander the Great had conquered the known world by like, I think 28, maybe it be 25. And I was like, that's not, like, that's not on my roadmap here, so obviously I'm failing.

[00:17:19] Julie: Right. And they, they talk about that. So CL plants and ames, they talk about how family upbringing can bring on characteristics of imposter syndrome later in life. You know? The childhood conditioning nurture versus nature. Um, and a big one is competition with siblings. Right. Um, if you have siblings, especially ones that might be doing better in school or doing better in sports, or whatever the case may be, right.

[00:17:47] Julie: How that's dealt with in the, in the home has shown, you know, later, later in life. And then, you know, they have those perfectionist parents, especially when it comes to sports. Oh, sure. You know, I know a lot of parents that are very competitive through their children. Unreal with dis unrealistic ideals of performance.

[00:18:06] Julie: So, um, yeah. Yeah. And then there's also the criticism with the intention of motivating that. Yeah. Oh yeah. You know, I don't know how damaging all that is. I don't have kids. I'm just gonna put that out there. I don't, I don't have kids. I have four legged creatures and my, and my robot sore much more resilient to.

[00:18:26] Julie: So I don't know, but, uh, this is just what the, what the research has said. 

[00:18:30] Chris: It makes sense. So I guess I kind of have a two part question here, um, in kind of, you know, maybe finally realizing that you have imposter syndrome when you're not an imposter, right? The opposite of what you said to your mom. Um, and, and kind of coming to that realization and, and digging into this research in depth.

[00:18:45] Chris: Has that helped you deal with your imposter syndrome? And, and if so, you know, do you have techniques, methods? I mean, what are you doing to, to live with this? Or is it just accept it? I don't know. 

[00:18:57] Julie: Well, so unfortunately it's kind of a daily battle. I battle with it every day. I, I know, I know that I have feelings of imposter syndrome.

[00:19:05] Julie: I know that I'm likely better than I think I am. I know this because I've done the research. All of the science is right there in my face. Yeah. And I know. But it's still, I, I go to a lot of conferences and workshops and things like that. I'm usually, again, surrounded by 80 to 90% men. I don't know, it just, it's hard to, to overcome it every single day.

[00:19:26] Julie: It's still, it still creeps up. One of the things that I tell folks is I do have, you know, again, in the briefings that I give recommendations to supervisors and things like that for how they can handle, um, if they see that, that someone that they, they work with. Are, you know, sort of showing characteristics of imposter syndrome, but for yourself, the thing that helped me the most was to mentor, and the reason that that helped me the most was because, you know, if you go and work with, you know, I, in my case I with kids, my husband and I built this Wally robot that we have.

[00:20:05] Julie: He's a fully functioning robot. We take him out, we do STEM outreach with him. Um, and he's amazing, right? And we built him from scratch. So when I go talk to these kids about robotics and engineering, they are not looking at me like, why is she here? She doesn't know what she's talking about, right? I can't.

[00:20:25] Julie: I can't give anybody else credit for building Wally. So a lot of the times, you know, folks with imposter syndrome give credit to every other reason under the sun, except that I, I did it right. But with with Wally, I can't do that because I did do it. My husband and I did build, build him. It wasn't luck, it wasn't timing, it wasn't somebody talked to a friend and got me the job.

[00:20:48] Julie: It wasn't anything like that. Right. And I, those kids are just wide-eyed, ready to learn, absorbing what I say. And they love the robot. They hug him, they run up to him, they, you know, they wanna be a part of it. And we've been doing Wally for probably eight years now. And that has helped me tremendously because again, they're not judging me.

[00:21:13] Julie: They're not, you know, they're kids, right.

[00:21:17] Julie: So, I think if you can get yourself into a situation where you feel like you're helping somebody else, whether it be in science and technology, or whether it be in, in, in, out, in your community or whatever it is. Um, I think that that can really help show you that. You know, you are doing good things. You are a good person.

[00:21:40] Julie: There's nothing wrong with you. Yeah. Right. So that's, that's what helped me a lot. 

[00:21:46] Chris: That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. That, that, that's, that's a really cool perspective and on both pieces. Right. Kind of one side, you know, having this thing that you've created that. You know, you can't not take the credit for, but then also sharing that and, and, and seeing the reactions, the genuine reactions from, and I, I'm guessing that, you know, having to be kids is probably even, especially well because they have less of the filters that adults have.

[00:22:08] Chris: Adults don't. At least, certainly American adults don't tend to get really excited about things, or at least they don't show you if they are, um, or a little bit jaded, it seems like more cynical or something. Um, so yeah, so, so, so being able to share something like that with kids where you're, you're just gonna see them light up.

[00:22:22] Chris: Um, I, I can imagine that that's really rewarding and, and definitely helpful. 

[00:22:26] Julie: It is, it is. And I, I really enjoy doing it. Um, and I think that it's, like I said, it's, it's helped me a ton. Yeah. Um, just getting out there and, and like I said, I don't have kids, so. Being able to contribute to the community and especially, uh, for me, it's especially seeing young girls.

[00:22:45] Julie: Become interested in science and engineering because of a robot that they saw in an expo. Yeah. I think is is really rewarding. Yeah, for sure. And it has definitely helped me to, I don't, I dunno that you ever overcome completely imposter syndrome. I mean, like I said, a ton of people feel this way. I think you just have to go at it day by day and, and, and realize that you do have worth, you're doing what you should be doing.

[00:23:10] Julie: You're doing fine. Yeah. You know, nobody's fired me yet. It's, you know, it's Right. Just stop over analyzing. Right. And I know it's easier said than done, and I think, uh, 

[00:23:21] Chris: of course, yeah. Like you said, it's, it's a, it's a constant, um, work. It's constant effort. 

[00:23:25] Julie: It is, it is. And I think, you know, sometimes I don't know if, if anyone's read like the Dao of Poo or whatever, but if you could take a more relaxed approach to it, that helps as well.

[00:23:37] Julie: You know, the whole. There's no sense in worrying because worrying gets you nowhere. I I, and again, it's all easier said than certain, but I think the big thing is just don't overanalyze it. Realize that you're not alone. No one is gonna just, you know, continuously give you praise, give you more work to do if you're doing a crappy job.

[00:23:53] Julie: Right. Right. Like, just accept it and, you know, move on. 

[00:23:56] Chris: Yeah. We had another guest who said something like that, you know, this idea of, that almost like believe or trust these people around you a little bit more, which again, easier said than done, but if someone's brought you into an interview, um, it's because they probably want to hire you.

[00:24:10] Chris: Or if, if someone gives you a job, it's because they believe you can do the job. Uh, if they give you a promotion, if they, yeah. Like you said, give you praise, give you another task. I mean, take that at face value. There. There's a, you know, they don't have to do that. 

[00:24:20] Julie: Right. And the, the praise part, I talked, I brought this up a little bit earlier.

[00:24:24] Julie: The praise part is actually really hard for people with imposter syndrome because it's, especially at the, the research lab. So the Air Force really believes in, in rewarding people for what they do. So we have a, we have awards there. I mean, we have awards all the time. There's quarterly awards, there's yearly awards, there's, there's national awards, there's all these awards, and there's award ceremonies associated with several of these.

[00:24:50] Julie: And they're actually, you know, you go to a director's call or whatever, and they call you up on stage, they hand you a plaque, they shake your hand, you know, the director or colonel, whoever, it's shakes your hand. You know, they take a picture. It's a, it's an ordeal. Yeah. Which makes it worse, right? Because people with imposter syndrome don't feel like they deserve it.

[00:25:07] Julie: The fact that you're praising them in such an open style and publicly just makes it so much worse. Right. The level of anxiety that that imparts on the person because we don't feel like we deserve it. Here we are being praised in front of all of our peers. Yeah. When we don't deserve it. You gotta walk up there on stage.

[00:25:27] Julie: You gotta get it's, it's a little, it's a little rough. Yeah. And that's what I tell supervisors, a lot of times the supervisors will go overboard with, with the praise. Right. Because they think that that's what the person needs when actually that. That's counterproductive. 

[00:25:40] Chris: Yeah. Well, and there's almost like this, you know, kind of tacit rule, uh, among management, which is like, you know, correct and private and praise in public, which isn't as simple as that to, you know, to your point. 

[00:25:51] Julie: Right?

[00:25:52] Julie: Yeah. I mean, the Air Force wanting to reward their people for good work, I think is great. Yeah. I think has good, you know, it's good for morale. Um, it's just that the folks that do really suffer from the imposter, unnerving. I'm sure, but it's still, it's still good, right? 

[00:26:11] Chris: Yeah, absolutely. Um, well that's about all the time we have for today, Julie.

[00:26:17] Chris: Thanks. We have, I think, uh, Wally's Facebook page, so we'll, we'll have that in the show notes. Is there any other, you know, projects or causes or, or any of this that you'd like to kind of highlight for the listeners for the imposter syndrome network? 

[00:26:28] Julie: Um, I think just, you know, for the folks who can join the professional societies, especially the women, so there's a lot of women professional societies, whether it be women in engineering or women in it, or, you know, whatever you're interested in.

[00:26:40] Julie: Mm-hmm. And reaching out to those folks is always something that I recommend that helps you get around like-minded people. So if, if you have the ability to do that, I, I would recommend it. Most of those professional societies do, you know, have member fees and things like that. Sure. So you do have to pay a fee, but they do have a lot of networking and a lot of gatherings and, and conferences and workshops and all these kinds of things that can help you.

[00:27:04] Julie: Um, like I said, get, get with like-minded people. 

[00:27:07] Chris: Yeah. Awesome. And, and, and share these stories with each other, I think, which is maybe, maybe one of the most fundamental ways to, to kind of help and move past it. Absolutely. Awesome. Uh, Julie, thank you so much for joining us and sharing your story with the Imposter Syndrome Network.

[00:27:19] Chris: And yeah, thank you to all of our listeners for your time, your attention, and your support. If you found this episode insightful or interesting, please consider paying it forward by letting others know about this show and the great guests we have on. 

[00:27:31] Chris: Before we totally close out. Julie, I, I do have kind of one more question.

[00:27:36] Chris: Um, you know, knowing everything you know now, if you could go back or, or maybe even just like open a portal to give yourself some advice when you were first starting your career, what would that be? What would you, you know, maybe not, what would you change, but what would you tell yourself to, to maybe set yourself for even more success?

[00:27:51] Julie: I would tell myself that mine all started in grad school. I would tell myself that it's not live or die. Right. Just relax a little bit. Stop over analyzing everything and what you're doing here is not life or death. Chill out. You know, calm down a little bit and realize that the people around you really are there to help you, not hurt you.

[00:28:14] Chris: Awesome. That is excellent advice and a great place to leave the show. So thanks again and we will be back next week.