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Gifted about the dark side of their abilities: “I was a little idiot”
Life as a child prodigy also brings difficulties
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Gifted children are seen as something special at school. Later they often find that their special skills also have disadvantages – in professional life, but also in social and emotional terms.
The intellectual achievements that some perform in childhood seem incredible to mere mortals. Gifted people have abilities in certain areas that make them far superior to others. However, this also puts them in a situation that is often difficult for outsiders to understand.
In a Reddit thread, various gifted people talked about how their special abilities have affected their lives – and especially about the downside. Because those who have enjoyed a special position in school and family often have to laboriously learn to find their way around in life later.
Gifted people have to get used to working life
Many children with extraordinary abilities tend to feel that they are underutilized in the classroom. Learning is easy for them and little effort is required. That can take revenge later, says a user: “I had a terrible attitude to work because I was taught at school that I am smarter than others and that I don’t have to work so hard.” But this can not only become problematic in professional life. Even studying often requires more work. “At university, I fail most exams on the first try because I’ve never really learned how to learn,” says one gifted student.
It is also difficult to organize yourself when everything has practically worked by itself for a long time, reports someone on Reddit: “I used to just have everything in my head. Now there are so many things going on that it is impossible to remember everything . ”
“I was always the youngest”
But many experience the consequences for their own social life and personality even more drastically. For example, some are critical of the practice that gifted students skip classes at school. As a result, they lacked the time to develop emotionally and socially during their school career. As a result, social skills often lag behind educational levels. Relationships with friends also suffer when students often change classes. “Intellectually, I was far superior to all my friends, emotionally and socially, but not. I was always the youngest. When my friends could drive a car, I wasn’t allowed to do that. When they were allowed to see certain films, I couldn’t,” describes one User his experiences.
What is striking is the number of reports in which highly gifted people tell how dependent they have made themselves on their achievements as a person – and on the expectations that resulted from their special talent. For example from parents and teachers: “I always felt an immense pressure from my family not to waste the gift I was born with,” reports one user. “There is extraordinary pressure to reaffirm previous performance. If you let up just a little, it has an immediate impact on your status,” writes someone else.
Many people find themselves on average after leaving school
In terms of self-worth, many gifted people have to define themselves differently in the course of their lives. At some point, grades are no longer the measure of all things. “Now that I’m not going to school anymore, I realize how much my self-worth depended on my grades,” someone admits. Surely this also leads to the fact that gifted people sometimes behave arrogantly and arrogantly. “I took pride in my intellectual abilities and looked down on a lot of my friends. Now I understand that I was a little idiot even if I pretended to be nice.”
But not everyone who was among the best in school is really one of the most outstanding in their field in the larger context. Many top students found that they were rather average at university or at work – often a painful realization. “Everyone in my course was once ‘the smart kid’,” writes someone who had this experience. “Some people have trouble getting used to an environment where they are just considered normal.”
Source: Reddit