One of psychiatrist Dr. Shefali Batra’s patients felt inadequate and fake, despite her accomplishments as a teacher and as a parent to two thriving school-going children. “She mentioned that she was occasionally upset and angry that she’s overworked and that she really didn’t want to spend so much time caring for the kids on the house,” Batra recalls. “These thoughts aroused guilt, which subsequently made her believe that she wasn’t good enough.”

The feeling that you don’t deserve something or that you aren’t good enough to be successful — even when you have worked hard for it — has been experienced by many. According to some studies, a staggering 70 per cent of people worldwide internalise a fear of being exposed as a fraud despite ample external evidence of their competence. Experts call it the ‘imposter syndrome’. Even well-known and successful personalities like attorney and former US first lady Michelle Obama and Academy Award-winning actor Tom Hanks expressed that they have experienced self-doubt.