You can be talented, called, and experienced and still feel like an imposter the moment you’re asked to speak up. That split-second fear of being exposed is exactly what we unpack with Kurt Bush, an ordained minister and leadership coach who knows what it’s like to hover over “submit” and wonder if this is the day everyone finds out you don’t belong.
We trace imposter syndrome back to the beliefs our nervous system learned in childhood, including the quiet “little-t” moments that teach us we are only safe when we perform. Kurt shares how seminary and early pastoral leadership triggered his fear around smarter people at the table, and how coaching helped him move from intellectual insight to real change. The turning point is practical: small steps, repeated over time, until your lived experience finally matches the truth that you are wanted, welcome, and capable.
Then we zoom out to authenticity and purpose. We talk about faith and identity, why transformation is participation with God rather than white-knuckle willpower, and how asking “What’s actually true?” can cut through the inner critic. You’ll also hear how Kurt’s team coaches groups to build courageous spaces through guided reflection, plus a free 10-day online guided solitude experience designed to help you notice what’s happening inside and reclaim clarity.
If imposter syndrome has you exhausted, you don’t have to keep living that way. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs it, and leave a review to help more listeners find the show.
To connect with or work with Kurt and his team, visit brimstonecoachinggroup.com
To download a free chapter of host Sylvia Worsham’s bestselling book, In Faith, I Thrive: Finding Joy Through God’s Masterplan, purchase any of her products, or book a call with her, visit her website at www.sylviaworsham.com
Transcript:
If you’ve ever struggled with fear, doubt, or worry, and wondering what your true purpose was all about, then this podcast is for you. In this show, your host, Sylvia Warsham, will interview elite experts and ordinary people that have created extraordinary lives. So here’s your host, Sylvia Warsham.
Hey Lightbringers, it’s Sylvia Warsham. Welcome to Release That Reveal Purpose. And today is Kurt Bush. He’s going to be sharing amazing proposal wisdom as it pertains to imposter syndrome. Now, how many of us, and I know I’m guilty of this, have felt like we are imposters. Like what we do, we are not capable, or we’re not equipped with, or it’s not the right time. All these things are lies. Let me just be very clear that we believe them as our truth because this is something that developed long ago when we were little kids. We experienced things and our mind, in an effort to protect us, developed these patterns of behaving. It formed attachments to feelings that we felt in the moment of that experience. And it also attached itself to beliefs. And a lot of what imposter syndrome is is belief that I’m not enough unless when I read his biography, I thought he’s someone I want to bring on the podcast. And I want him to outline how he addressed imposter syndrome. What work did he do? Because he did work with a coach for a while. So without further ado, Kurt, thank you so much for joining us on Release Tower Review Purpose.
Yeah, thanks, Sylvia. Thanks for having me. Really glad to be here.
It’s amazing to have you and really honor us, if you will, with that amazing story of transformation you have to share and why imposter syndrome is such an important topic for you to discuss on these podcasts. Why authenticity is also a second topic that you wish to discuss. And, you know, what did Pain teach you?
Yeah, that’s a good question. I mean, Sylvie, I would affirm and say I agree wholeheartedly with everything you said about past experiences forming our adulthood, our future. I mean, I would say that I can look back and see moments in my first formation, whether that’s elementary, middle school, high school age, where I learned certain things were dangerous and certain things were risky. And if I did certain things or didn’t do certain things, I was going to be made fun of or laughed at. And those turned into little T traumas that informed how I showed up as an adult because our nervous systems, our bodies don’t just let them go. They develop these ways of protecting and they just carry on until we replace them. So I yeah, I agree wholeheartedly with everything you said. So I think where that came up for me is I went to seminary late in life. I was working in a manufacturing career. I did some recruiting for a large manufacturing plant. Uh, I did some production supervision as well. I loved it. And then I went to seminary later in life. I I went into seminary without a bachelor’s degree. Uh there’s a program that I was allowed into, had to jump through some hoops to get in to get my MDiv uh without a bachelor’s degree. So I walked in like unprepared, completely unprepared. I had no idea how to write a master’s level paper, no idea how to like be around a professor in a master’s program, no, no idea. And and that was where I first like realized something is unsustainable here. I remember writing a paper and I would go to submit it online. I would uh hover over the submit button, just just afraid that this might be the paper where the professors or the dean or whoever finds out I don’t belong. Like this might just be the paper. And can I submit it? Like, can I can I put myself in this position where I might be found out? And and I did submit the paper. I did graduate, had a great experience. Uh, but that didn’t go away after seminary. That just kept going. That persisted into my first pastoral role, and even into the second one for a little bit, uh, where I’d find myself sitting at a table with people I thought would be smarter than me, I thought were smarter than me, and I was scared. I was scared to speak up, I was scared to give an opinion. Uh, and it’s just not sustainable. You said, I don’t remember if this is before you hit record or not, but there’s a moment where the pain of continuing is greater than the pain of changing. And for me, those scales shifted. I had a good coach, I had a good counselor, I had some good friends that helped me sort of identify some things. But yeah, I mean, that scale of pain of continuing a pain of go, it was just unsustainable for me.
Pain has a really interesting way of teaching us, and God comes into that pain. That’s when we sometimes feel he has abandoned us when in fact he’s right there next to us, waiting for us to invite him into the mix, into the mess, into the chaos of the lies in our head. You mentioned you were working with a therapist and a coach. What was the belief at the root of that imposter syndrome for you?
Yeah, this is a good question. Yeah, for me
it was fear. So the exact setting where this showed itself the most was uh I live in a small community that has a small Christian college in it. And at once a week, myself and the rest of the pastoral staff would meet, sometimes with professors, you know, New Testament professors, Old Testament, scholars, all these sort of people. Uh, we would occasionally meet with them to talk about like the text we were going to preach on the coming week. And I would find myself around that table and I would look around and I would just fear it was fear that that if I spoke up, if I shared what I was seeing in the text or what I felt was important, the fear was that they would find me out that I don’t belong. I didn’t feel like I belonged. And I felt like if I did, uh if I spoke up, they would say, Hey, actually, you know what, we don’t want you around this table. And I so badly wanted to be around the table, you know? Uh, but the it was a fear that they would change their mind and say, Oh, you know what, second thought, I think we’re gonna ask you to step away.
You know, it comes from your childhood. So did you ever find out, like, did the therapist or coach ever dive into that space?
Can you share a bit of that so that the listeners can feel like they can relate?
Yeah, sure. And I share, I’ll share this. Uh, there’s a longer story and a lot more work, right? I don’t mean to sound flippant about this. It took a long time. Uh, but yeah, I I can trace that back to a conversation that I had with someone who uh who said to me, after getting a good grade on a test, I remember that the exact comment was, look, see how good you could be if you would try every time. I was just like, I didn’t have to try as a student. I had a good memory. I wasn’t really learning anything, but I could get really good grades. And at some point that starts to slip, right, for every kid. And I was getting not so great grades. And then I got a good grade and the comment of see, look how good you could be if you tried. And what I learned in that moment, what my nervous system learned was that I’m I’m not good enough. Like, like I was trying. I didn’t know how to try any different. So this, like, see, look how good you could be, reinforced that I’m not good enough. Uh, I’m not good enough the way I am. I have to do something extra to be good enough. Now, you know, obviously the person who said this cared for me deeply, uh, had no malicious intent. Like, this is how little T trauma works no malicious intent. And and nor did adult Kurt have the same threat that was real in middle school. But but again, our nervous systems don’t know the difference, right?
And for those listening, little T means little trauma, just to and that’s a
term that psychologists, therapists use. Coaches don’t use that because we don’t really deal with trauma. That’s more of a therapist arena. And uh I say that very specifically because we’re both coaches and we’re both very ethical people, but not everybody is. And some people want to dive into trauma and they’re not qualified or certified to deal with trauma, and it can be very dangerous for the people. So for those listening, if you have what they call big T, and that means, you know, divorces and heavy, heavy stuff like sexual abuse and you lost a child, for example, those are very particular scenarios that are a little bit beyond our certifications as coaches. So I do want to give that difference between therapists. But I do know that imposter syndrome can persist despite being aware. Like once we become aware, I think the bigger struggle is to reframe those thoughts, reframe the habits of those thoughts. How did you
start doing that? Baby steps and give us some tips that you gained along your journey.
Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate the way you put that. I mean, what’s true is like none of these things, imposter syndrome or an inner critic, like none of these things are simply solved by an intellectual understanding, right? If it were, we would all just be solved. Like we would all fix those parts of ourselves that they’re not healthy. So I believe that that it really is about getting into action. Like intellectual knowledge is one thing, but then how do I get into action to sort of cement that that intellectual knowledge? So I had a good coach who helped me take a really small step, especially in that meeting that I just mentioned. He helped me take a small step and say, hey, how about how about next week? You know, metaphorically next week, how about you just say one thing, you know? Instead of saying completely everything that you want to say, say one thing in a sort of half step outside of your comfort zone. Like take a half step outside of your comfort zone. Uh, don’t even take a whole step, take a half step out and see what happens. Uh and and then I tried that on for a little while with a coach. And then eventually, let’s take a whole step out. And then what happened is over time, what I saw to match my intellectual knowledge was that in fact, nobody asked me to leave the table. In fact, everybody around the table wanted me there and welcomed my input and welcomed my opinions. But that, I mean, again, that’s a that’s a month-long, months-long journey to try a little bit on, to, to, to be safe, to try a little bit more on, uh, and and then to get our to get my lived experience to match my intellectual knowledge.
Yeah, I’m in total agreement with that from the psychological perspective. What I want to introduce now is a spiritual perspective. Now, you went to seminary, so this is like up your alley. This is something that we can sit there and do it. Like you said, it took you months. From the spiritual perspective, when we turn to God and we start to believe in who we are in Him, the shifts is different, I believe, than when we’re doing it on our own power, on our own understanding. Would you agree?
I think on some level, I would agree. I had this theology that we’re invited to participate with God in what God is doing with us, right? This is why we’re coaches, that God doesn’t simply act upon us, that we are given the joy of being participants in our own transformation, that I get to be a part of my own transformation, just like God is a part. God is the author, I am a participant. So so I think it in that sense, I I still I still think there’s a level of like participation that’s Oh no, no, there is participation.
What I’m saying is that when you just because the thing is this, like I’ll give you an example, a personal example. My husband would be someone that says, Well, if you wouldn’t have done that, we wouldn’t have had the conflict in the first place, right? Well, you can try to do it via willpower, like you need to do it, and if you don’t do it, you don’t love me kind of idea. Okay. So when you break it up a little bit, you can try to do it via willpower, your own strength. It’s gonna take you a little longer, right? To do that. When you invite him, though, when you’re co-collaborating with Christ, and that whole part of abide in me as I abide in you, you’re not gonna be able to produce fruit without me, right? The vine and the branches working together, right? The whole scripture in John. So from that perspective, I see willpower very differently now because what I believe, like what is it? Who do I believe I am? If I believe the word of God, which is telling me that he’s giving me a spirit not of timidness, but of confidence, which is what we lack in imposter syndrome, right? And he’s giving us a spirit of power, love, and self-discipline, he’s already gifting us that. We just have to start believing that, right? And in believing that, then we start taking the baby steps of action that you’re talking about, of like, okay, let’s reframe that thought. What is the thought? Let’s take it captive, let’s name it, right? And then what is the refrain thought and what does scripture have to say about who we are in this particular circumstance? Is there any evidence in our present moment that provides the evidence to the lie that we’re believing? That the imposter identity is believing. And and if you can’t even prove it in your present moment, then it starts to have less power over you, right? Because you start to see the truth of the lie, right? Now you start, no, that’s a lie. That’s just something that happened to me when I was seven. But that’s not who I am now at 51. And then the transformation actually starts to occur at a much rapper rate because you’re not doing it alone. You’re doing it in collaboration with the maker of the universe that sees you, that understands you, that knows your motivations, that knows your heart, that knows all the wounds that are informing you. Sometimes we don’t even see that because we haven’t discovered the neural pathway that is informing that voice in our head, right? Until we work with a therapist or we work with a coach that is like, hey, why do you believe that? I love that person that told me, but why would I accept it as my truth for how many years did you accept it as your truth, Kurt?
Decades.
Decades, right? Once it falls by the side, now you have freedom to move in the direction of that identity that God is calling you to be, to step into that purpose. So it sounds like you are in
purpose, right? What are you doing now to address imposter syndrome? Is it just coaching that you’re doing? Are you speaking?
Um, so yeah, that’s a good question. Yeah, I’m part of a two-person coaching group, right? We coach leaders of all kinds. We say a leader is just anybody who has somebody following them. So, you know, a leader could be a stay-at-home mom or dad, could be an aunt, an uncle. I mean, literally everybody leads something. We we do a lot of work with people to help kind of uncover where those beliefs lie and why those beliefs are present. Certainly, I think you’re right. There is something about the things that we believe. And if we believe that that we are created for shalom, we would say we’re created for shalom, that God creates all of us for right relationships with God, ourselves, others, and all of creation. Uh, that that if that is our purpose, then then we get to see a little bit of that. God invites us into a little bit of that here and there. And if if we believe that, then certainly that there is a basis for this work uh that we do with people. We we don’t work exclusively with Christians. I’m an ordained minister. My partner is also an ordained minister, uh, but we we don’t do explicitly Christian coaching. We also work with groups. Uh, we get to see groups function in ways uh that are dysfunctional today, and then we help them kind of step into ways that they can be a little more authentic with each other, a little more authentic with themselves, um, and step into a little more healthy way of being. So, yeah, we do a lot of individual work. We do a lot of work with groups to help them kind of get clear on what’s the fear and what’s true. You know, I I think that question of what’s true is a really helpful question for for me as an individual, but I think it’s helpful for our clients too. What’s actually true?
I love how you work with groups, and I don’t just work with Christian, you know, people coming to me and my coaching. God put in my heart to meet them exactly where they’re at. And not everybody’s in the same space that you are and I are in. We meet them how Christ met them, one-on-one with their language, with their fears of like, let’s address the fears first. Let’s address what’s really getting in your way so that I can you can be free, you know, from that. So can you share with us a success story of a group that you and your partner worked on that you’re really proud to share? And why?
Yeah.
So so groups, groups are probably less about imposter syndrome, just because you know it it’s it’s much harder to be open as a team, right? That’s a level of vulnerability that’s pretty unheard of. Uh, we got to work with a church not that long ago, a church staff. And and what we found is there’s just there was a lot of underlying confusion about how they were going to show up together. Uh that there was a lot of confusion of how safe the space was going to be, of how how courageous they wanted the space to be. You know, we we don’t think about only safe spaces, we think about courageous spaces that we are all invited to be a little courageous because wherever humans are, Sylvia, there’s a risk. So we we got to work with this church, and and honestly, we spent two days helping them answer the question, how do you want to be together? Um, like that, that is one of our favorite questions that we get to ask is how do you want to be together? And then what do you what steps do you want to take? And and they were able to name that that they wanted to be more vulnerable with each other, that they wanted to be more uh receptive to vulnerability, they wanted to be more safe with each other. Um, and you know, we we we don’t often get to see the the year after or the two years after, but it was so much fun. It is so much fun to see this one church say, hey, you know what, we want to open up a little bit more. Uh we we’re willing to uh take some steps to create more safety, and we’re willing to take more steps to be courageous. And we just like that one stands out to me. I love it. I wish I could tell you more details, uh, but that one stands out to me for sure.
I appreciate the anonymity and the integrity to keep their name from the public knowing, but it’s amazing to see how you were able to work in a group setting at a church. What do you think God is calling you to do in the in the next level up, if you will?
Yeah, that’s a good question. Fortunately, there’s a lot of this work to be done. So I think our vision is uh transformation. And our vision is that people, well, when I use the word authenticity, let me say this. When we when I use the word authenticity, I mean that that people, if they’re being authentic, living authentically, leading authentically, they are taking steps to be more aligned with who and how they want to be, or in a Christian setting, I would say who they think they’re created and designed to be by God. Uh that authenticity is making those things more aligned with our lived experience. We we are getting to do more and more of that work. Uh, you know, I think that’s the the work our heart beats for. It’s it’s one thing to kind of mediate in team settings, but but it’s another to actually like get into the space where we can say, okay, let’s get really clear on who and how you want to be. Again, whether that’s a faith-based question or just a here’s who I am at work, here’s who I want to be, how do I bridge that gap? Like that’s that’s what our heart beats for. Um, and that’s the work that gets us out of bed every day.
That’s awesome. Do you have like team building exercises that you incorporate in these group settings? Like, do you have several programs? Is it one?
Yeah, good question. It it’s all tailored to the organization. We don’t believe, though, that a one size fits all is going to work. Uh, here’s what I will say one key component that is the same in every single program we do with an organization is the practice of reflection. We just believe so deeply in the practice of reflection. And we believe so deeply that most adults, if given a time to reflect, uh a guided time, we create these guided reflection worksheets, uh, guided reflection questions. If we can help adults see what’s so right in front of them, we think most adults will make a decision. Do I like that or do I not like that? Do I want that to keep going or do I want to let that go? Most adults, once you see something, you can’t unsee it. You can choose not to do anything with it, but you can’t unsee it. Uh, so everything we do, every experience we do with a group includes some intentional guided reflection. We think that is just invaluable and we cannot separate it from the work that we’re trying to do.
I love that. You know, the law of reflection is something John Maxwell talks a lot about in one of his books, The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth, of personal growth. And I incorporated the law of reflection a lot initially when when you become a coach, it is like a prerequisite almost, you know, the pausing for presence bit. Because we have a tendency to rush through life doing. And the groups get caught up in the mission sometimes and they forget to pause and reflect and invite God into the mix. And when you invite God into the mix, then he allows you to spiritually see what you need to see in that circumstance that you likely couldn’t have seen, like a blind spot of sorts. And that’s where the law of reflection can really help us, like to pause every day or at the end of our day to see what did we learn today? Was there anything good and bad situations that we encountered today? What could we have done differently that would have moved the needle forward? Um, was there something we missed that he wants us to see? That’s a great practice. And I commend you and your and your team for guiding the groups to do this. Any last words of encouragement, Kurt, that you want to leave the listeners with uh or any groups that are out there listening? And how can we reach you if we wanted to work with you?
Yeah. So I think the last word I always like to say is I mean, our practice, uh, we believe self-compassion is such an important part of this work. Uh, and so I say this with the utmost compassion and gentleness, but I remember feeling like imposter syndrome and sort of white knuckling life and leadership was like like this is just normal. This is what everybody feels. This is how what it means to be an adult, or this is what it means to be a leader, or whatever it is. I I actually don’t think that’s true. And I maybe want to leave the last word to say if a listener is feeling exhausted or frustrated or overwhelmed by imposter syndrome, it doesn’t have to be that way. It does not have to continue to be unsustainable. There are other ways to live and to lead that are more full and whole and more aligned with who God intends us uh to be uh with shalom in mind. Um yeah, as far as how to find us, our website is brimstonecoaching group.com. Our coaching group is called the Brimstone Coaching Group, not fire and brimstone. I always like to, like for a Christian audience, it always stirs up something. Let me just say real quick, uh brimstone is a species of butterfly. And butterflies are, as you know, the only transform living creatures in the world. And the brimstone butterfly in particular is the longest living butterfly, or at least lives the longest as a butterfly. So we we want to capture that in the name, not hellfire and brimstone. So brimstone coachinggroup.com. There’s a way to book some time with either myself or Chris, my coaching partner, free of charge, no obligation to see if our philosophy matches where someone is feeling stuck. But maybe what I would want to say is we have a 10-day online guided sort of solitude experience that’s completely free, absolutely free, no, no fixing, no calls to action. We’re not trying to bait anybody. It really is an invitation to give 10 days to notice what’s going on internally in us. It’s 100% free. They can find that on the websites.
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I love how giving you are, because that’s how God asks us to be. You know, we give from the overflow of what he gives us, right? And these gifts that were given, that he gave Kurt and I are not ours to keep. It’s ours to give away, just like he gave away his wisdom while he was here on earth. I love that. Thank you so much for offering that on the podcast live. And for the listeners who release that reveal purpose, remember Matthew 5.14 to be the light, be the light, step into that light with confidence. You have an amazing purpose, an amazing calling to fulfill. You are his child. He doesn’t create anything that doesn’t match up. You’re fearfully and wonderfully made. And despite the lies that you’ve been listening to for possibly decades, realize that number one, you are a daughter, you are a son of a king. The enemy will want to keep you in that darkness, in that imposter way of thinking. Remember and remind yourselves he was already kicked out of heaven. You, however, are a co-werror with Christ. You are seated at the table, you have a place at the table just because you’re a child of his and you have the power within you to step into your calling with the self-discipline that he’s already gifted you with and with a spirit of confidence. Do so. Do it like Kurt has done it, do it like I have done it. If we can do it, so can you. Have a wonderful and blessed rest of your week. Bye now.
So that’s it for today’s episode of Release Doubt Reveal Purpose. Head on over iTunes or wherever you listen and subscribe to the show. One lucky listener every single week who posts a review on iTunes. We’ll win a chance to Grand Prize drawing to win a $25,000 private VIP day with Sylvia Worsham herself. Be sure to head on over to sylviaworsham.com and pick up a free copy of Sylvia’s gift and join us on the next episode.