fake it till one makes it

English

Alternative forms

• fake it until one makes it

Verb

fake it till one makes it (third-person singular simple present fakes it till one makes it, present participle faking it till one makes it, simple past and past participle faked it till one made it)

1. (psychology) To pretend to be a certain way until one becomes that way.
   • 2015, 9:32 from the start, in Lauren Greenfield, director, Magic City (documentary):

     It gave me a chance to be able to see certain things that I like, and I was like, I just had to find my way, what I was good at in life so I could get those things. I just had to um… fake it till I make it.

   • 2019 May 31, Edward Helmore, “'Fake it until you make it': the strange case of New York's socialite scammer”, in The Guardian‎^[1]:

     He framed her crimes as “chutzpah” and “moxie”, arguing that the accepted rule of New York’s elite social scene was “fake it until you make it”. He also blamed the influence of social media-obsessed culture.

   • 2021 August 30, Erin Griffith, Erin Woo, quoting Alex Gibney, “Schemer or Naïf? Elizabeth Holmes Is Going to Trial.”, in The New York Times‎^[2], →ISSN:

     So many other people fake it till they make it, but that never justifies not bringing charges when someone has committed fraud.

Usage notes

• Most commonly found in the form fake it till you make it.
• The term is often said to describe improvements of confidence and self-esteem, but can be used to describe other applications as well; chiefly, as talking out one's ass in lieu of occupational competence.

See also

• go along to get along
• placebo effect
• self-fulfilling prophecy

Further reading

• fake it till you make it on Wikipedia.Wikipedia