A self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction or expectation that causes itself to become true because people act in ways influenced by the expectation.
A simple example of this is a parent telling their child "You're going to stop that right now" with a look like they mean it. The kid probably wasn't going to stop, until told by the parent that they would. The parent conveyed their belief, which the child took seriously, and then agreed to "Okay, I'll stop". There's an implicit threat, of course, and the reason the kid is expected to stop is "Because you don't want to find out what would happen if you didn't", but that is effected through the belief. The parent whining "Stop it! Stop it!" conveys their expectation that the kid won't actually stop. The kid takes this seriously too, and doesn't stop. Obviously the consequences can't be sufficient to change my behavior, or mommy would be able to expect me to stop. True self fulfilling prophecies are intention dressed up in different language.
An impostor-fulfilling prophecy is a prophecy that fulfills not itself but an impostor of itself. An impostor which, when convincing, closes the loop through ignorance and creates the appearance of a self fulfilling prophecy.
A simple example of this is an athlete believing they "can't win", failing to give it their all because it's futile anyway, and losing as a result. "See! Prediction validated!", says the athlete. "Self fulfilling prophecy!" says the slightly more wise. "Can't win" isn't the same statement as "Didn't win", notices the careful observer.
This is structurally identical to hypnotic "challenge suggestions". Stuff like "You cannot remember your name" or "Your hand is stuck to the table". It turns out that simply remarking "Of course, you can stop imagining whenever you like" undoes the suggestion. Because it was never true, just imagined.
The experience of hypnotic amnesia is compelling. The experience itself, is real. The interpretation of "I cannot remember" is subtly wrong, in a way that closes the loop with ignorance.
What is actually going on is that expectation of remembering is blocked. You watch the hypnotist prove right on surprising suggestion after suggestion, and you start to expect that the next thing will prove true as well. "It's on the tip of your tongue, yet the harder you try the more impossible it becomes. What was your name? It's gone". Well shit, mommy the hypnotist sure expects me to not remember my name, he must have good reason. No matter how hard I try it's just not going to work. At this point, how do you expect to remember your name? When "I will remember my name" is unreachable, the intent to remember is unreachable. It's not that you can't remember. It's that you cannot try to remember. Remembering itself is something you could do, if you'd just try.
The trick is to notice the gap in the ring — the ignorance on which the appearance of this self fulfilling prophecy is built.
So long as you perceive a self fulfilling prophecy, there is no way out other than deliberate delusion. X will happen because I believe X will happen. I believe X will happen, so X will happen. So Y won't happen, so I can't believe Y won't happen, so Y won't happen. So long as you're smart enough to see the problem with deliberate delusion, you dissolve the new belief before it can "click" into the more desirable stable state.
The way out is to notice the other delusion. The idea that "didn't" means "can't". You didn't win. You didn't remember your name. You didn't try, either. "Trying" means genuinely expecting success. "Trying and failing" means holding this expectation in the face of reality signaling otherwise. Name amnesia feels like lacking a lever to pull. "Can't win" feels like lacking a lever to pull. This is not pulling the lever.
The moment you notice that you haven't pulled the lever, you notice that you haven't actually tried to succeed at whatever the thing — remembering your name, winning the soccer game, whatever.
The moment you notice that you haven't tried, you get to notice that you don't know what would happen, if you did.
You get to notice, maybe you can.
Maybe your sense of impossibility is wrong.
And this opens up the way out of the impostor-fulfilling prophecy.
It feels impossible. It might be.
What happens anyway?
You can find out.
Sometimes you will find "yeah, I guess I really couldn't".
Other times, you notice "Huh, I guess I should have tried before declaring impossibility".
Either you're doing it intentionally, because it is a thing you can will. In that case, go ahead and self fulfill your way to getting a cup of water, or losing the game if you're paid to take a dive or whatever.
Or you're not doing it intentionally, and it feels like you can't will the outcome. In this case, find the gap. The "self-fulfilling prophecy" isn't. It's an impostor.
There's a gap, waiting to be found.