By Mariana Ashley

Bill Bradley, retired NBA player, US Senator, and US presidential candidate, said “Ambition is the path to success. Persistence is the vehicle you arrive in.”

Any high-ability student knows the truth of this quote, as they have likely received accolades, awards, and praise for their efforts and ambitions.

But these students also know the darker side of ambition, the side known only by the few who walk that path and have seen its thorns and shadows.

The truth is that ambition, and the skill that it takes to pursue that ambition, often leaves people lonely, excluded, and alienated from everyday events.

> Continued: The Emotional Cost of High Ability in Young Adults, By Mariana Ashley

~~~

The ‘gifted’ label & the pressure to deliver

In his book “Your Own Worst Enemy..”, psychologist Kenneth W. Christian, PhD delineates some of the most prominent patterns of thinking and behavior he has found that may lead to undermining and underachievement as adults.

“Without explicit demands and support, being labeled ‘bright’ or ‘gifted’ is akin to being conferred an aristocratic lineage — a heritage that exists independently of what you do with it.

“The difference is that the labels ‘bright’ and ‘gifted’ come with implicit demands, and when appropriate explicit demands are lacking, the labels sit there like ticking bombs.

“On the one hand, these labels tell you that merely being bright or talented is enough, but on the other hand, the longer you go being praised for talent alone, the more anxious you become about the time when you will be required to deliver.”

Hanging on to a limiting self-concept

Another aspect is how our identity and self concept informs personal development:

“We can be particularly resistant to change when it threatens to alter what we believe about ourselves. In his 1948 book, The Theory of Self-Consistency, Prescott Lecky argues that people prefer retaining a consistent view of who they are to changing that view, even if the change would be positive.

“As we have seen, the idea of who you are resides at the center of your sense of reality. It is part of the glue that holds your reality together.

“You believe that if you know anything, you know yourself. And you feel you know the way you behave and what is possible for you. …

Choosing new actions

“The problem is not, has never been, and never will be, who you are. The problem is always what you choose to do.”

He describes how “Self Limiting High Potential Persons.. etch enduring pathways over time by repeating their characteristic self-defeating methods… this tendency can evolve into a general self-limiting style…

“Certain actions you have taken habitually have short-circuited your success. Change begins with noticing your ability to choose new actions and then acting.”

[Some of these self-limiting patterns are described on the page Self-limiting.]

Self development – A thrilling odyssey

Christian says “Pulling back from your potential, at the most fundamental level, is a kind of abdication, an abandoment of your own best interests.

“Achieving self-development, on the other hand, is not only life’s central mission — it can also be the most thrilling odyssey there is.”

From the book: Your Own Worst Enemy: Breaking the Habit of Adult Underachievement – by Kenneth W. Christian, PhD.

Striving for achievement – an interview with Kenneth Christian, by Douglas Eby.

Video: Break out and Achieve Your Potential

Get free access to Ultimate Success Blueprint training videos by Kenneth W. Christian, Ph.D.

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Lower photo from article: How do beliefs produce “driven,” compulsive behavior, By Morty Lefkoe. – “Why are so many of us “driven” compulsively to seek or do things that frequently aren’t in our own best self-interest?”

~ ~

Kenneth Christian, adult underachievement, adult development books, gifted adult development

Brendon Burchard

In their article What Is Brendon Burchard’s Experts Academy?, Drs. Phillip and Jane Mountrose note, “Many gifted individuals have expertise to share and this may include you.

“The issue is how to make your expertise into a profitable business. Experts Academy with Brendon Burchard solves this problem. His goal is to turn you into a generously paid expert.

“As we all know, there are a lot of things we didn’t learn in the classroom. The educational system misses areas that are essential for success in life and in business. And millions of men and women are seeking the help of experts who can take them where they want to be in their personal and professional lives.

“You might imagine that this is where Brendon Burchard’s Experts Academy comes in. Maybe you never thought of yourself as a highly skilled expert before. But your life experience is your expertise.”

From Inner Entrepreneur post Publish your expertise to help other people.

Victoria Cowie

British schoolgirl Victoria Cowie recently scored 162 on the adult admission tests for Mensa, which places her above the scores thought to have been achieved by Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking and Bill Gates.

Her father cites one example showing how uncommon she is: “When she was just three years old we were sitting in a cafe and she turned around and said ‘you can’t feed the swans here’ and we asked her how she knew that. She had read it on the door of the cafe, but the letters were backwards. We knew then that she had something special.”

[From news story Shropshire youngster brighter than Einstein.]

Another article says Cowie, age 11, has commented, ‘It’s quite daunting to be compared to great minds, but it feels good also to be thought of as that clever.

‘I really enjoy puzzles and working things out and I think I’ll go on to study sciences, especially biology, when I’m older. I do theatre workshops and loads of sports like swimming and I really enjoy creative subjects.’

She also plays the piano, cello and saxophone as well as the recorder.

‘My favourite subject is biology and I want to be a vet when I’m older because I love animals and I don’t mind blood and things like that.’

Nicole Kidman

The same news story reports some other notable IQ scores:
Sigmund Freud – 156
Arnold Schwarzenegger – 135
Madonna – 140
Quentin Tarantino – 160
Hillary Clinton – 140
Bill Clinton – 135
Nicole Kidman – 132
[Also see my page: Nicole Kidman - a brief annotated profile.]

Victoria’s mother said, ‘We’ve never pushed her or put pressure on her – we’re definitely not pushy parents. Victoria does what she wants to do and we just give her the option. I just wish she’d tidy her room more.’

From article: More intelligent than Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking… the schoolgirl, 11, with an IQ of 162, By Claire Ellicott, Daily Mail.

I wish the best for Victoria Cowie and other gifted, high ability children and adults, but many authors and researchers warn about serious impediments in the way of expressing their exceptional talents.

Not fulfilling promises of advanced potential

In another British article, Why gifted children are just as likely to fail in life, Colin Fernandez reports that “In one of the most extensive studies carried out, research found that out of 210 gifted children followed into later life, only three per cent were found to fulfil their early promise.

“Professor Joan Freeman, said that of 210 children in her study, ‘maybe only half a dozen might have been what we might consider conventionally successful. At the age of six or seven, the gifted child has potential for amazing things, but many of them are caught in situations where their potentials is handicapped.’

“Professor Freeman tracked the development of children who had exceptional ability in fields such as maths, art or music from 1974 to the present day. Many of those who failed to excel did so because the ‘gifted’ children were treated and in some cases robbed of their childhood, the study found. In some cases pushy parents put the children under too much pressure, or they were separated from their peer group, so they ended up having few friends…”

Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting

The article continues, “Professor Freeman is keen to emphasise that ‘the gifted’ are no more emotionally fragile than anyone else – and may even have ‘greater emotional strength.’

“But she said that ‘being gifted means being better able to deal with things intellectually but not always emotionally.’

“She adds: ‘I want to stress that the gifted are normal people. But they face special challenges, especially unreal expectations, notably being seen as strange and unhappy.

“Others such as parents and teachers, can feel threatened by them and react with put-downs. What they need is acceptance for who they are, appropriate opportunities to develop their potential and reliable moral support.’”

Joan Freeman is Founding President of the European Council for High Ability, and author of the book Gifted Lives: What Happens when Gifted Children Grow Up.

See a link to Joan Freeman’s article “Giftedness in the Long Term” in my post Gifted adult development: Janitor or mathematician – adult achievement, or not.

One story of successful growing-up

Deborah Ruf, PhD an international authority in gifted assessment and guidance for the gifted, writes about some of these challenges in her article about her son: One Profoundly Gifted Kid’s — Now Grown Up — Story.

For example, she writes that “learned underachievement can happen to any child who enters school and spends a considerable amount of time waiting for the other children to learn what she already knows. The gifted child figures out how to use that waiting time, and it’s usually not on academics.

“When the school work does eventually become challenging, the gifted child often suffers greatly because she hasn’t had the opportunity to learn to take mistakes in stride, or how to study effectively, or how to budget her time when it actually requires some attention to what is being presented in school.

“A big problem with all of this is that the schools often don’t address the needs of gifted children until 3rd grade or beyond.”

Deborah Ruf

She also addresses other issues, and concludes, “If we had forced Charlie to fit into school, to stay in classes that weren’t working for him and with people who didn’t ‘get’ him or even like him, he would not have developed the interpersonal skills that led him to friendships, a happy marriage, and a sense of connection and belonging that he clearly has now.

“The best compliment I have ever gotten about Charlie is, ‘He seems so normal!’ And that’s exactly we want for our children, isn’t it?”

Dr. Ruf is co-author of the book Successfully Parenting the Gifted Child and author of Losing Our Minds: Gifted Children Left Behind.

See the Ruf Estimates of Levels of Gifted Online Assessment on her site.

Also see more articles on Gifted children and teens.

By Deborah Ruf, Ph.D.

How can we better encourage and reinforce the most entrepreneurial and talented among us?

We can start by changing the ways we set up schools and the ways we address the very different learning abilities and needs of the students in them.

The well-known “achievement gap” refers to the difference in the average academic performance between our highest and lowest achieving population groups.

Closing that gap has led us to focus our attention on students who are struggling with fundamental achievement.

As little progress is made to close these gaps, it seems we refuse to explore anything beyond external influences as probable causes for our failures.

We rarely speak of individual differences in ability. I recently attended a symposium where speakers repeatedly reminded us that “just because we don’t like what the research is telling us does not mean it is bad research.”

I believe our most worrisome achievement gap should be the performance gap we see within each individual rather than those between any groups of people.

Our society benefits from the support and nurturance of our brightest minds, and here’s what the research tells us: A person’s intellectual profile, capacity to learn within different domains—along with certain differences in personality, gender, exposure to opportunities, and luck—is not greatly responsive to outside influences to change it.

Twin and adoption studies, as well as Head Start and any number of other early intervention programs, indicate consistently that the brain is like a muscle that can be exercised to perform at its own best level, but when the workouts stop, that muscle strength returns to where it was before.

The spread of human intellectual ability is vast across all populations. By the time children are about seven years old and in first grade, the typical same-aged mixed-ability public school classroom already has 12 grade equivalencies of achievement in it.

There is no way to make all people intellectually the same any more than there is a way to make everybody the same sex or the same height.

Every individual should be challenged to grow intellectually, and we’re now generally ignoring those individuals with the highest potential.

The United States has one of the widest intellectual ability ranges in the world because our diverse economy has attracted people from all over the world.

Populations of other countries actually have different ability averages and ranges, different strengths and weaknesses.

For whatever reason (and there are many) only about ten percent of the U.S. population is intellectually capable of professional-level achievement, no matter how hard we push and support everyone else.

We will continue this discussion in my next blog entry.
Originally written for the Center for the American Experience, August 2010, http://www.americanexperiment.org/.

From blog post The Other Achievement Gap, Part 1, by Deborah Ruf, Ph.D.

> To see Part 2, visit the blog section of her site TalentIgniter.

[Added photo: United States Academic Decathlon, 2010 Nationals award recipients, First Place: El Camino Real High School, California - from Decathlon site www.usad.org]

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Author: Deborah L. Ruf, Ph.D.
High Intelligence Specialist

“I founded Educational Options to provide accurate information regarding intelligence, what it is, where it comes from, and how our family, school, relationship and workplace environments either nurture or stifle its expression.

“When someone is highly intelligent – different from the majority in thoughts, expression, and interest – the wrong environment can lead to confusion, sadness, and underachievement. My continuing purpose is to open the eyes and awareness of adults in ways that will benefit them and the children under their care.”

Deborah Ruf is also the founder of TalentIgniter, and is an international authority in gifted assessment, test interpretation, and guidance for the gifted. Having been a parent, teacher and administrator in elementary through graduate education, she writes and speaks about school issues and social and emotional adjustment of gifted children.

She is co-author of the book Successfully Parenting the Gifted Child and author of Losing Our Minds: Gifted Children Left Behind.

See the Ruf Estimates of Levels of Gifted Online Assessment on her site.

~~

Article published here courtesy of the author.

> Also see more articles by Deborah L. Ruf on gifted children, teens and adults.

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By Willem Kuipers – From a section of his book “Enjoying the Gift of Being Uncommon.”

One of the greatest obstacles to the recognition of extra intelligent people is the mysterious qualities and extreme rarity that many people (including parents) associate with “uncommon intelligence.”

Often it is either a kind of child-prodigy–assumption, like Mozart, or a comparison with other long-gone icons like Einstein and Madame Curie.

The people that technically can live up to those expectations are indeed very, very rare.

Perhaps 0.00003% of the population, 1 in 3.5 million, like the customary statistical benchmark for somebody who is officially called “profoundly gifted.”

But the group we want to discuss amounts to something like 2% of the population, that is, 1 in 50.

Perhaps it amounts even up to 5% of the population, that is 1 in 20, if one would take the entire variety of multiple intelligences into account.

Still rare – when considered within the specific domain of intelligence involved – but more common than most people are used expecting.

However, the higher the degree of Xi [extra intelligence], the better the characteristics of Xi will be recognizable.

All this means that many people will actually know one or more persons who are an XIP [eXtra Intelligent or Intense Person], without them being famous, notorious, or even conspicuous.

However, often they are not recognized as XIPs. They lack these assumed mysterious “Einstein qualities,” like the majority of XIPs. …

In every million people, one may expect at the least 20,000 XIPs.

They may work for all kinds of organizations, they may be volunteers, or even without a regular job.

They may be TV-presenters, writers, all kinds of competent artisans, civil servants or entrepreneurs, politicians, sports people, marketers, architects, scientists, secretaries, or even janitors.

Their performance may be excellent, average, or far below average. XIPs may or may not be high achievers.

Continued in Superhuman or Extra Intelligent?

Willem Kuipers is author of the book Enjoying the Gift of Being Uncommon: Extra Intelligent, Intense, and Effective.

Is IQ relevant?

High ability in children is typically evaluated by cognitive performance. That may be convenient for schools and college entrance gatekeepers, but is IQ relevant for adults as a measure of potential contribution – or life satisfaction?

Certainly there are job performance and achievement measures such as Academy Awards, Nobel Prizes and MacArthur fellowships, but most high ability adults will not produce work that will be acknowledged in those ways.

The unsung

Some people do not gain significant recognition for being exceptional during their lifetime, such as poet Emily Dickinson [1830-1886].

Marylou Kelly Streznewski [author of Gifted Grownups] notes “Her story is well known: the seven poems published in a minor magazine as a favor by a friend; the fifteen-hundred brilliant compositions tied in ribboned packets, filling the drawers in her house at her death. No eminence there.

“Surely Dickinson was, in her nature, a gifted person unrecognized in her lifetime. Now that Dickinson and Whitman are acknowledged to be the two major innovators in the creation of American poetry, her eminence is undeniable.”

[From article Unrecognized Giftedness: The Frustrating Case of the Gifted Adult.]

In our article The Inner Process of Giftedness, by Mary Rocamora and myself, we note that “Many gifted adults were never identified as such, and many more were impaired by both psychological and circumstantial factors, including gender, race, and cultural background. These issues affect self-actualization at many levels.”

Is achievement important?

In her post Finding treasure for Stray Brains, Sunfell quotes from the article Discovering the Gifted Ex-Child, by Stephanie S. Tolan about defining high ability: “Many in gifted education now view giftedness even in childhood as definable by achievement rather than potential…” Tolan goes on to note that a focus on “talent” rather than “giftedness” – “though it recognizes an internal reality (a talent that one individual has while another does not) – in actuality expands the achievement/product orientation.”

Sunfell comments, “This emphasis leaves a lot of brilliant, insightful, intelligent people out in the cold. Sure, I can write- it’s an itch I have to scratch. It is possible that I could get money and fame from writing. But I have other abilities that I value more highly- intangible gifts that cannot be monetized or made into a ‘product’ and sold. I process things radically differently than the average person.”

Blocked by self-criticism

Counselor Mary Rocamora comments in her article Counseling Issues with Recognized and Unrecognized Gifted Adults about being blocked from realizing a creative product: “Clients who are passionately engaged with their talent but are constantly separated from the creative experience by relentless self-criticism, self-doubt, and feelings of inferiority often suffer from another type of block. It is often accompanied by depression and the periodic shutting down of their spontaneous creative impulses.”

She quotes a client who is a “veteran actress, dancer-choreographer, singer-songwriter, and artist” about the process: “the older I got and the more proficient I became in the professional creative world of entertaining, the more my own parental eye became a judgmental eye.

“Less focus was directed toward the joy and experimentation of the creative process and more focus was placed on the outcome, the product… By focusing on the ‘goal’ I was missing out on the journey. Without that journey there was no joy.”

A need to create – as Sunfell says of writing as “an itch I have to scratch” – can be energizing and joyful, but also remain hidden and unrecognized – or when recognized, compulsive or addictive.

Creativity coach and therapist Eric Maisel, PhD talks about the virtues of that quality in his article In Praise of Positive Obsessions.

Perfectionism

Perfectionism, sophisticated self-criticism and other qualities that may be associated with high ability can also hamper creative expression.

In her article Why I Don’t Write, Cat Robson mentions some of those topics, as well as more “mundane” issues like fibromyalgia and carpal tunnel syndrome. Robson does in fact write, and has garnered two major awards from the Santa Barbara Writers Conference.

Being multitalented

Multitalented creative people also have the challenge of choosing what channels to explore and use to produce something, if they want to.

Painter and art instructor Kimberly Brooks, in her Huffington Post article First Person Artist, writes, “For many years, I earned a living as a writer or designer and kept my artwork to myself and a few close friends. When I was doing this, I felt as though I was walking around with my hand covering one eye, seeing in two dimensions and half-blind.”

She adds, “I used to view individual creativity like a milkshake and that it just depended upon which straw you stuck in there to suck it out. So, whether you wrote, painted, or played the saxophone, it would all come out expressing ‘you.’ But it’s not that simple. Everyone possesses the artistic instinct and lives on a spectrum in his ability to express it.”
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dealing with self sabotage, high aptitude personality, gifted adult information, creative passion

Article by Cathy Goodwin

“James is so restless and energetic. I wonder if he’s hyperactive.”

“Nancy seems to be all over the place. She’s got a dozen projects going at once!”

“Harley does things so fast! He put up a website in two weeks.”

“Marlene is so intense. She needs to lighten up.”

While it’s possible that James is hyperactive, Nancy is scattered, Harley skates on thin ice and Marlene is depressed, it’s also possible that each of these people wears the label, “gifted adult,” often unaware.

Gifted children often lose interest in school because they’re bored.

They don’t always get top grades because they think in unconventional patterns.

Gifted adults can be misunderstood. Those who read books like Jacobsen’s The Gifted Adult often feel relieved: “Finally, someone understands where I’m coming from!”

Gifted adults often face unique career challenges. Job environments rarely reward creativity, a hallmark of the gifted, and frequently punish anyone who threatens to color outside the lines.

Corporations often resemble football games, where players are rewarded for being in position to receive the ball everyone wins by executing the coach’s play.

Gifted people function better when their game resembles playground basketball, where you can scramble and make plays as you go.

And when gifted adults seek career guidance, they must filter feedback they receive from friends and consultants who are not familiar with their situation.

* “Whoa! You’re trying to be a jack-of-all trades and you’ll end up a master of none.”

* “Wow! I’ve never seen anyone move as fast as you do. I’m sure you’re going to be a success.”

* “You’re going too fast! Slow down or you’ll fail.”

* “Focus on one thing at a time.”

* “Boy, you’re catching on fast! You must be well-suited to this field.”

If you’re gifted, you probably already have some idea that you’re “different.”

Read a few books and articles. Browse websites.

Understanding how you operate can help you avoid, “Why is this happening” questions and reach success on your own terms.

About The Author

Cathy Goodwin, Ph.D., coaches midlife professionals for the First Inning of their Second Career: business, retirement, new career moving, or enjoying more of what you have.

Free report: 5 Reasons Most Career Change Fails (and how to write your own success story):
http://www.cathygoodwin.com/subscribe.html

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Cathy_Goodwin

~~~~~

Related article: Giftedness in the work environment.

gifted adults, gifted adult information, gifted adult personality, psychology of giftedness, high ability, high aptitude

Backgrounds and practical recommendations

By Noks Nauta, Sieuwke Ronner

This article was published in Dutch in Tijdschriftvoor Bedrijfs-en Verzekeringsgeneeskunde (Journal for Occupational Health- and Insurance Physicians), TBV 16, no. 11 (Nov. 2008): 396-399. Publisher: Bohn Stafleu Van Loghum, Houten, The Netherlands. The editor agreed with translation and publication on this website.

Key words: GIFTEDNESS, CHARACTERISTICS, FAVOURABLE AND UNFAVOURABLE ENVIRONMENTS

In November 2002, an article was published in this journal entitled Gifted individuals at work.1

Up until then, little had been published on the subject of giftedness and work, even outside the Netherlands. The article thus provoked many responses.

What particularly caught people’s attention was the table presenting side by side two perceptions of problems encountered by the gifted in fitting in with their environment: one from the perspective of the gifted employee and one from that of his/her environment.

On various occasions, we heard that both employee and employer literally acknowledged ALL the points!

Additionally, many occupational health physicians were able to better recognise gifted individuals by using this table, thereby enabling them to provide more effective guidance.

As a source of information and as an aid to recognition, the article continues to prove its worth.

In the last six years, increasing attention has been focused on this subject, for example for gifted children in education. One result of this is that some parents come to discover that they too are gifted.

And with the founding of various think tanks and the attention being paid to retaining special talents for industry, the subject is now on the political agenda.

However, until fairly recently, many misconceptions existed concerning what giftedness actually is. Additionally, the image of gifted individuals was not always a positive one.

That is why in 2006/2007 a so-called Delphi study was conducted into the characteristics of giftedness.2

In this article, we will discuss briefly the results of this study, with the emphasis on the relation between the gifted individual and the work environment.

We will then provide a number of practical tips for the occupational health- and insurance physician, based on the current state of knowledge and experiences.

We will also briefly discuss the guidance offered by psychologists and other professionals. And finally, we will describe what the gifted individuals can do for themselves.

Central points

• Occupational health- and insurance physicians can recognise gifted employees based on a number of the characteristics

• Knowledge of the interaction between a favourable or unfavourable work environment and the gifted employee is of great importance if a clear problem analysis and effective guidance is to be achieved.

GIFTEDNESS AND ITS CHARACTERISTICS

In practice, various definitions of giftedness exist, a fact which has not made the communication concerning giftedness any easier. Differences in insights were often linked to the question of whether the diagnosis of gifted referred only to the IQ (the top 2% of the scores in a valid IQ test) or whether the person being assessed was required to achieve high-level performances.

In other words, is it possible for someone with no educational qualifications, and who has not produced any tangible achievements (e.g. playing the violin exceptionally well), or who does not occupy a good social position, to still be called gifted?

For this reason, in the Netherlands throughout the year 2006/2007, a national consensus trajectory was carried out regarding what a group of experts (people who are themselves gifted and who also work with the gifted, including psychologists, coaches and career coaches, occupational health physicians, and a psychiatrist), precisely consider to be giftedness .

Use was made of the Delphi method and the result of this study is an existential model from which the following picture of commonly shared characteristics can be distilled:

A gifted individual is a quick and clever thinker, who is able to deal with complex matters. Autonomous, curious and passionate. A sensitive and emotionally rich person, living intensely. He or she enjoys being creative.

In the above-mentioned study, attention was paid to the naming of the specific characteristics of gifted individuals who are in balance.

When the gifted individual is in a situation in which he or she is not able to effectively deal with his or her characteristics, skewed growth may occur, leaning in the direction of an exaggeration or collapse.

It is possible for gifted individuals to make a contribution to work processes through their characteristics (their talents), provided that their talents and their contributions are also seen to be positive, and provided that they do not grow skewed, through, among other things, insufficient appreciation or non-professional guidance.

We’re talking here about an ideal typical character. The gifted individual doesn’t exist (just as the American or the European doesn’t exist), and gifted individuals also differ amongst themselves.

A gifted individual will possess quite a few of all the characteristics mentioned in this model, but need not possess all characteristics in equal amounts, or possess an extreme number of them, according to Kooijman.2

The model is not intended to be used as a measure or for making diagnoses.

The following characteristics are the most eye-catching from the list:

• highly intelligent (thinking);
• autonomous (being);
• many-faceted emotional life (feeling);
• passionate and curious (wanting);
• highly sensitive (perceiving);
• creation-directed (doing);
• sparkling original, quick, intense and complex (interplay)

A more detailed description of this collection of characteristics and a diagrammatic representation can be found in chapters 4 and 5 of Kooijman et al.2

The value of this collection of characteristics will need to be demonstrated in practice, says Kooijman.2

She explains that the model is primarily intended for the gifted individuals themselves to help them develop a more balanced self-image and to identify their own potential, pitfalls and learning points.

Additionally, the model can be used outside the group of gifted individuals, for example for occupational health professionals and coaches and/or career coaches.

And it may be used for PR purposes to rectify the occasionally one-dimensional (and often negative) image of gifted individuals.

ORGANISATIONS IN WHICH THE GIFTED FUNCTION WELL

With their creative talents, gifted individuals can make a useful contribution to innovations within organisations.

In the article Gifted employees, key to innovation , we suggest that gifted individuals possess many more creative possibilities than the averagely gifted person.

To make use of their innovative ideas and to implement them, however, an effective interaction between gifted individuals and their work environment is essential.4

In Table 1 we show why gifted individuals are able to contribute effectively to innovation.

Table 1 – How do gifted individuals contribute to innovation?

• The gifted individual can easily identify the relationships between goals, missions and assignments.

• The gifted individual has the ability to focus intensely on the content. Arguments based on content are key. Habits, traditions and social pressure are quickly spotted. If these seem to be in conflict with the content, they are discarded as being irrelevant.

• Thinking out of the box is second nature to them.

• Switching between one’s own professional area and other disciplines is no problem at all.

• The opinion of a formal authority does not weigh any heavier than the opinion of another party.

• Information from others is checked against one s own experience or against other information.

• The gifted individual has a high degree of commitment and passion.

• Existing protocols, structures and approaches are only followed if they appear to be effective and are well-founded. A customized solution is sought for each individual situation, often when this has not been requested. ‘Standard problems’ are also approached in this way.

Favourable environmental factors that are required for making use of these contributions are listed in Table 2. The favourable characteristics listed in table 2 correspond strongly with the task culture and person culture, while the unfavourable characteristics correspond with the role culture or power culture from Harrison’s typologies of organisational culture.5

Table 2 Favourable and unfavourable organisational characteristics for the gifted

Favourable organisational characteristics

• flexibility
• little hierarchy
• few procedures (only if they are useful)
• the development and needs of employees are of importance
• room for productive conflicts
• power and influence can be acquired through expertise, dedication and success (or, at most, through personality, expertise and outstanding performances).

Unfavourable organisational characteristics

• procedures determine the work
• power and influence are predominantly dependent on your position
• the development and needs of employees are of little importance
• conflicts are avoided

THE ROLE OF OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH- AND INSURANCE PHYSICIANS

Occupational health- and insurance physicians appear on the scene only when an imbalance has resulted in sickness symptoms becoming evident.

We often see stress arise as an expression of problems experienced by the gifted individual in adjusting to his or her work environment. That may have something to do with the nature of the work: the work might be too routine, or offer too little of a challenge.

In that case, the gifted employee will typically be located in a situation where he or she will be unable to make optimal use of his or her talents.

But a contributory factor may also be the relations at work. Some managers might feel threatened, or colleagues might consider the gifted individual to be a know-it-all .

Problems encountered in fitting in with the environment can be identified if a physician realises that in many work situations there is a huge difference between the IQ of the gifted individual and that of the other employees.

Gifted individuals are able to think more quickly, can analyse well, understand complex situations, and therefore they will appear at the frontline relatively quickly.

Additionally, their areas of interests can diverge strongly from others, as can their type of humour.

At the same time, it is useful to realise that many gifted individuals have felt that they were different from a young age and therefore feel isolated more quickly than the average classmate or colleague.

Some will also have been bullied due to their being different .

If being gifted plays a role in the occurrence of health complaints and incapacity to work, it is important that this is acknowledged at an early stage.

An employee with innovative ideas may have fallen into the pitfall of nagging or knowing it all and as a result may have come into conflict with colleagues or superiors.

By acknowledging this mechanism, in which a talent has become a pitfall, the occupational physician can contribute to raising awareness in both the gifted individual and his/her superior.

A few clarifying or coaching talks can often work wonders, in our experience! On the internet you can find various articles and different portals in this area, such as (in Dutch) www.hoogbegaafd-en-werk.nl and www.hoogbegaafd.startpagina.nl.

Some websites where you can find information on gifted adults in English:

http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/index.htm

http://www.sengifted.org/

http://www.kreimeier-smith.de/giftedadults.htm

When the employee suffers from serious complaints or if the problematic situation is of a persistent nature, a referral to a psychologist or a psychotherapist may be useful. Gifted individuals feel more comfortable with practitioners that are familiar with giftedness as well as having an affinity with it.

PRACTICAL TIPS

We will now summarize a number of issues that are of importance for the practice of occupational- and insurance physicians.

How can giftedness be recognised? If an employee arrives at your consulting room how do you recognise the above-mentioned characteristics of giftedness?

We will specify a few here, including in brackets the corresponding term from the Delphi study:2

• wide interest in all kinds of fields (curious and passionate);
• sensitive for, for example, noise at work (highly sensitive);
• can speak passionately about a subject that interests him or her, starts speaking more quickly, the eyes light up, makes agitated gestures (passionate);
• quick analyses of the work situation: that’s how it works (highly intelligent);
• focused primarily on the content of the work (highly intelligent);
• wants to work in his/her own way (autonomous);
• wants to see a lot of variety in the work (creation-directed);
• produces unorthodox solutions that are not generally accepted (sparkling original).

Focus points for the problem analysis

• Gifted individuals suffer relatively often from stress and burn-out. Factors that can be of influence here are the nature of the work (sufficient challenge), the degree of autonomy and the defining of borders. Gifted employees are especially passionate and have the tendency to insufficiently specify their own limits.

• Bullying, or other forms of aggression: because a gifted individual does not fit the requirements of the average employee. As a result, fear/anxiety disorders may arise.

• Depressive feelings often start at an early age. Gifted individuals can therefore more easily feel lonely and isolated.

• Fear of failure as a result of setting the bar high and the tendency to perfectionism.

• The gifted individual can come across as having ADHD. The combination of giftedness and ADHD is not uncommon.

• Gifted individuals have a high sensitivity for odours and sounds. They more quickly experience certain circumstances as being a hindrance.

THE ROLE OF PSYCHOLOGISTS AND OTHER PRACTITIONERS

The theme of gifted adults in the work situation has hardly been an issue for the professional group of psychologists up till now.

Although the number of preconceptions about giftedness is on the decrease, it would appear that many psychologists are still insufficiently aware of the characteristics, talents and pitfalls of gifted individuals, and the interaction between these characteristics and the work situation.

Additionally, the focus remains strongly on the individual, with little involvement on the part of the employer. The content of the work and the mutual relations can however be just as obstructive for the functioning of the gifted employee.

This demands more deliberation between the various professionals themselves, the employer and the gifted employee. We therefore recommend setting up the plan of approach in joint discussion with the employer, employee and occupational health physician (in collaboration with other relevant professionals).

Agreements concerning the guidance and the expected results of a re-integration trajectory are then specified and registered. These are evaluated at the end of the guidance period.

THE GIFTED INDIVIDUAL TAKING THE INITIATIVE

To achieve an effective collaboration between work environment and the gifted employee, the gifted individual must obviously take action himself/herself.

In the book Unguided missiles on course, working and living with giftedness , the authors provide a number of tips based on their experiences in guiding gifted individuals in their work.6

The book describes eleven examples of gifted adults in search of their own path, after having been blown off course in their work and/or their private lives. The most important focus point is to keep the balance of the many talents of being gifted and to make these talents visible in connection with the work environment.

To achieve this, it is important that gifted employees are aware of:

• their talents and the effects of these talents on the environment;

• their motivations and passions;

• their specific pitfalls, which are strongly related to being gifted;

• other ways of dealing with their talents and passion;

• other ways of communication to demonstrate their talents to their environment;

• a work environment in which their talents are given the place they deserve. For gifted individuals, a workspace offering the freedom to explore and fostering creativity is favourable for them to be able to display their talents.

If there is no positive interaction between the gifted employee and the work environment, a moment can arise when the balance between talents and pitfalls is disturbed. Occasionally, the gifted employee succeeds in re-establishing the connection with himself/herself and the work environment all on their own, and sometimes professional help is required.

CONCLUSION

Although more attention is now being paid to gifted employees, there is still not much known about specific characteristics of giftedness and its significance for the work situation. Gifted individuals can be exceptionally useful for companies and organisations, provided that their talents are acknowledged and made use of.

If the gifted employee is in danger of missing the boat, we make a plea for focussing attention particularly on the specific talents of the gifted individual and how this can be effectively made use of in the work situation.

We observe that there is a tendency for the problem to be individualised or medicalised. The interaction between the organisation and the gifted employee deserves more attention, in our opinion.

LITERATURE

1. Nauta N, Corten F. Hoogbegaafden aan het werk. (Gifted adults in work.) Tijdschr Bedrijfs Verzekeringsgeneeskd (Journal for Occupational Health- and Insurance Physicians) 2002; 10(11): 332-335. This article is available in both Dutch and Polish versions from the first author.

2. Kooijman-van Thiel MBGM (red). Hoogbegaafd. Dat zie je zó! Over zelfbeeld en imago van hoogbegaafden. (Highly Gifted. Obvious? On Identity and Image of Gifted Persons) Ede: OYA Productions, 2008, ISBN 978 90 9023526 4.

3. Mary-Elaine Jacobsen. The gifted adult. Ballantine Books, 2000, ISBN 0 345 43492 7.

4. Corten FGP, Nauta AP, Ronner S. The highly intelligent and innovation. Key to innovation? Academic paper for HRD conference Amsterdam, October 2006. See websites www.werkenwaarde.nl, www.noksnauta.nl and www.meriones.nl.

5. Geffen G van. Mensalen and the organisation culture types of Harrison. Article in Mensaberichten 2000.

6. Noks Nauta and Sieuwke Ronner. Unguided missiles on course. Working and living with giftedness. Harcourt Book Publishers, June 2007. ISBN 978 90 26517990.

AUTHOR INFO

Ms Noks Nauta is an occupational health physician and a psychologist. She works as a freelance trainer and teacher, amongst others, in the field of the gifted. www.noksnauta.nl.

Ms Sieuwke Ronner is a clinical psychologist and organisational expert. She supervises change trajectories in companies, gives training courses and coaches gifted individuals. www.meriones.nl.

CORRESPONDENCE ADDRESS – Email: info@noksnauta.nl.

TRANSLATOR – Translation from Dutch into English by Kumar Jamdagni (Language Matters, Zwolle)
Translation date 9 October 2009

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Additions by High Ability site author Douglas Eby :

Article published here with kind permission of author Noks Nauta.

Related book: Making Work Work for the Highly Sensitive Person, by Barrie Jaeger

Related site: Highly Sensitive

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gifted adults, gifted adult information, gifted adult personality, psychology of giftedness, high ability, high aptitude, gifted adults and work

In a very real sense, everyone may be called “underachieving” regardless of whether they are gifted or not. One short definition is “Performance below potential.”

But high ability and giftedness are much more than advanced potential, high scores and notable achievements. What really matters in talking about underachievement is the inner experience of “falling short of potential” – how that impacts our identity, esteem, life satisfaction and mental health.

Many of us are “naturally” self-critical, and not fulfilling more of the wide range of talents we have can be yet another source of fuel for calling ourselves deficient.

Video: Gifted Underachievement – Jerald Grobman, M.D.

This video is an excerpt from the 90 Minute Webinar Presentation by SENG (Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted) “Understanding and Treating Anxiety, Depression, Bipolar Disorder and Underachievement in Gifted Children, Adolescents and Young Adults” – presented by Jerald Grobman, M.D.

From the SENG Webinar Program info page: “Anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder and underachievement are common concerns of gifted children, adolescents and young adults and their parents.”

See related articles at his site Psychotherapy Services for the Gifted.

In one of those articles: Underachievement in Exceptionally Gifted Adolescents and Young Adults: A Psychiatrist’s View, Dr. Grobman writes, “By mid-adolescence, these exceptionally gifted young people had begun to seriously and consistently undermine their gifted development. Each limited how he or she used his or her potential strengths and began to act in other very self-destructive ways.”

Whose standards?

Dr. Grobman comes across as very helpful and sympathetic about his gifted patients – but many health professionals may be uninformed about gifted characteristics and challenges, and may tend to pathologize some behaviors. Cutting, for example, is often considered a disorder. But it can be a temporary self-medication maneuver. Angelina Jolie said of her self-cutting, “It was a release of some kind.”

In her post Underachievement and the Gifted Adult, Elisa writes, “Not working to your potential.  How often have many gifted adults encountered that phrase in their life?  How often do gifted adults say that to themselves?

“I think the problem with that phrase is how ‘working to your potential’ or ‘living up to your potential’ is generally understood in narrow terms.

“As a child it means getting exceptional grades.  As an adult it means earning a lot of money and/or eminence in your profession…. ‘‘Performance below expectation’ – who’s expectation?  And how do we understand ‘performance’?”

Good questions. But another issue is self-limiting behavior patterns.

In his book Your Own Worst Enemy: Breaking the Habit of Adult Underachievement, Kenneth W. Christian, PhD defines how “Self Limiting High Potential Persons etch enduring pathways over time by repeating their characteristic self-defeating methods.”

For example, one pattern is “Sleepers. The style most often seen in people from families or communities without models or traditions of high achievement. Sleepers lack accurate information about themselves, the extent of their talent, and ways to express it.”

Read more of his patterns on the page Self-limiting.

adult underachievement, gifted adult personality, psychology of giftedness, high ability, high aptitude