Page 16 - ASC Highlights Spring 24-25

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Faculty Mini

Interview Series

Beating Your Anxiety to Achieve Your Dreams: It Takes a Village

University is an exciting yet challenging period in one’s life.

For all, it signals intellectual fulfilment at the highest level, and a pathway to future success.

But, for some, it can be an intimating prospect.

Perhaps you’ve moved overseas for the first time to attend Abu Dhabi University. Perhaps, you’re the first
in your immediate family to take on tertiary education. Or, on the contrary, you may be the next in a long
line of academically accomplished family members.

No matter your origin story, we all can face immense pressure to measure up. This pressure, when reaching
breaking point, is a classic sign you may be facing the infamous “imposter syndrome.”

As someone who’s been in your shoes before, and then navigated two high pressure and extraverted
sectors in my career thus far — the media and academia — I can speak from experience when I say you
are not alone, nor crazy, if sometimes you are feeling overwhelmed with the pressure to succeed.

Recent research from the MENA region suggests that almost 90 per cent of students feel this anxiety
to some degree — 50 per cent to a moderately debilitating level — no matter students’ age, gender, or
background.

But despite the normality of anxiety and self-doubt, the good news is that success is not the distant,
impossible to reach oasis that you may be envisioning it to be.

This is especially true once you harness the power of the community around you at Abu Dhabi University.

Now, I would run out of hands if I counted the times, throughout my career, when I talked myself out of the
notion I deserved an opportunity, only to be pleasantly surprised.

And what was the true enemy, in my moments of self-doubt, you may be wondering?

Well, it wasn’t rejection from the outside world, as my anxiety was leading me to falsely fear.

Despite journalism being a career path one can pursue alone, independently researching and investigating
with your own mind and laptop as your only tools of choice, my greatest growth has come from the
mentorship moments shared with my first editors, and more recent freelance accomplishments working
hand in hand with colleagues.

It was the magic of minds working in tandem, and the beauty of shared belief in each other, that has
opened the door to more and more prestigious publications and opportunities, even when I was privately
doubtful and fearing rejection.

“Imposter syndrome” is natural when you are trying new things, but know that this feeling is the sign
that you are growing and, as long as you show up each day determined to earnestly try your best, great
advancements in your character and capabilities are around the corner.

Abu Dhabi University | ASC Highlights 24-25 Spring 24-25