AMONG US…

“Now for our last speaker, we have a world-renowned speaker as well as an author of 15 bestsellers. She is also a world-class scientist with groundbreaking research in nuclear physics. She owns a YouTube channel where she talks about faith, love and relationships. She is a lover of God and has helped many youths become lovers of God through her ministry. She is a wife of one and mother to two lovely children, with a standing ovation, please welcome on stage Dr Pearl Oluwajobi.”

I’m jolted back to life by the sound of clapping all over the auditorium. I see the program host smiling expectantly at me from the podium, and that’s when it dawns on me that she must have finished her introduction. Blushing a bit out of embarrassment, I quickly glanced around to ensure no one noticed my quick journey to ‘LA LA land’ and then proceeded to the podium. The crowd goes on for some time, cheering me on before they finally simmer down, and I’m able to speak.

I haven’t even been speaking for up to two minutes when suddenly…

“STOP, STOP HER, SHE ISN’T WHO SHE SAYS SHE IS, SHE’S AN IMPOSTER!”

”Oh my God, I have finally been caught”, I thought to myself as I looked at the security personnel trying to stop the woman who was frantically screaming with her dishevelled hair and red eyes in the middle of the auditorium. Nemesis had caught up with me. Staring at the crowd and seeing the look on people’s faces, I knew at that moment that there was no going back.

*****

There’s a popular phrase in the game “Among us…”. It goes thus: “there’s an imposter among us” or something along those lines. That’s how I have felt for most of my life. I never felt that whatever I did was enough. I never celebrated any victory because, as far as I was concerned, it was just good luck.

When I clinched the first position in class during my school days, and people called me smart or intelligent, I chuckled inwardly because I felt it was only a matter of time before someone overtook me. I had met smarter people and conditioned myself to believe that it meant I wasn’t smart. This started as early as primary school and worsened as I moved to high school.

I was a nerd in high school, and as we know, high school doesn’t favour the socially awkward. Because I badly wanted to climb the social ladder, I joined many clubs in a bid to get approval from people who, in retrospect, I wasn’t going to have anything to do with after graduation.

Gradually, I succeeded. I found a sport I was semi-decent in. I did well in the debating club as well as the Jets club. I was popular in our student fellowship, amongst my teachers and other junior students. I was also made a school prefect. My set mates looked up to me, but all that wasn’t enough cause I still believed something was missing.

In university, I had everything going on for me, as people often said. I had the brain, the looks, the composure; I was ‘perfect’ or at least close to it. However, this persistent voice inside me kept reminding me of the fraud I was. It started with the little things like having a conversation with someone, and as the conversation continued, the dread deepened. I had thoughts like: “you are aware you aren’t funny, and this person is laughing just to be polite”, or “what do you think you know? what exactly are you saying?”

Then it went on to even more Important things. I was in the choreography department in my fellowship on campus, and each time we ministered, people would come to tell us how powerful the ministration was. All I could focus on were the steps I missed in the dance.

My craft was also affected. I was a makeup artist on campus as a side hustle. Whenever I completed a job, I would immediately spot all the imperfections. Woe betide me if someone didn’t compliment it, I always concluded that I had done rubbish. “Pearl, you know it’s only a matter of time before people stop patronizing you because they can see your work isn’t professional”. “You shouldn’t be doing this”. That voice went on and on; I couldn’t get it out of my head.

My walk with God wasn’t exempted either. “You claim you love God yet worship is ongoing and people are shedding tears, yet you remain dry-eyed”. “Prayer mama, you are leading prayers when you haven’t prayed for up to an hour this past week”. “You usually spend 2 hours studying the Bible and yesterday you spent just 30 minutes; What are you coming to teach people? You are a joke.”

I started doubting myself. I felt everyone else was perfect, while I was an imposter. I was trying to be what I wasn’t.

This vicious cycle continued. I had given myself such high standards to live up to and had put everyone else on a high pedestal. I was trying so hard to earn God’s love through my works, and when my service to Him didn’t match my standard, I felt God was disappointed in me. I was trying so hard to be good at everything I did, but because of this voice, I only saw the bad in everything I did. There was a time I considered people’s opinions about me. But as I heeded more to the voice, I ceased to care. Whatever people said didn’t matter as much as what I thought of myself, except they criticized me.

One day, I woke up with a word in my spirit and went to check it out. This happened a day after we prayed in church against ineffectiveness. The word or phrase was “imposter syndrome”. The Holy Spirit and I started peeling layers of my life. I trusted Him and always asked questions. He showed me that disregarding the opinion of others about myself, except mine, was a dangerous place to be in.

“Isn’t that what is being preached now in the world? Don’t mind what people say about you, think only of yourself?” I asked.

He replied, “In the world, yes. But as my child, no. Who you are should always stem from My opinion of you, and not yours”. That was the turning point for me. My identity is not based on the world or me but on what God has said about me. it’s His Word that matters.

In Romans 9:20, the Bible says, “can the creation say to its creator, why have you made me like this?” That’s how absurd it sounds when you claim an identity God hasn’t given you. God made you for a reason, and unlike humans who are prone to making mistakes, He doesn’t make mistakes. So I realized I’m here on earth for a reason— a purpose, for which God has made me unique.

Another thing He taught me is that I’m fully known by Him. He knows all my capabilities and shortcomings. If He says I can do something, then I can do it, whether I believe it or not. There’s a saying that no one knows you more than you know yourself. That is false because God knows you more than you know yourself.

I am loved unconditionally. His love for me was never and will never be based on what I did or can do (1 John 4:19). We don’t need to earn His love, and we can’t even if we tried. We don’t deserve it, yet He loves us. I can’t express it in words but know this; you aren’t working to earn His love. It’s a gift from Him to you.

He says He doesn’t see you as unworthy, undeserving, or filthy. Rather, you are and will remain the apple of His eye. He has a picture of you on His palm. His eyes never leave you, He watches over you, and most importantly, He doesn’t care about your opinion of whether you feel loved or not, He loves you. (Romans 8: 38-39)

All I have done and doing is for Him to say well done at the end of it all. So I’m learning that when He allows me to carry out an assignment, whether in church, in my place of work, in my family or any place, He gave it to me because He knows I can do it and I’m the best person for the job. It hasn’t been an easy ride getting here, but by the grace of God, I am who I am, and I’m glad that is based on who He says I am.

For the second time that day, I was jolted back to reality by the sound of clapping all over the auditorium. I looked at the people’s faces and once again was humbled by the opportunity God had given me.

You are probably wondering about the woman in the crowd. Well, that woman and the voice in my head are the same, a fragment of my imagination and one of the devil’s lies. Back then, they would have thrown me off, but now they fuel me on.

The devil doesn’t bother lying, except he wants to deceive you and stop you from seeing the reality or truth. Whenever I hear that voice, I remember to listen for the voice of He that really matters, and He is always there cheering me on.