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

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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

Achievement / Vocation articles

High Ability articles

Stress articles

More about book Escape from Cubicle Nation in The Inner Entrepreneur post Pamela Slim on Excuses People Use To Stay at a Job.

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

To avoid being seen as too weird or different, and to fit in better with others, gifted children often learn to stifle or cover up their unusual cognitive and other abilities. As adults, many still follow a pattern of hiding.

When she began directing in the forties, Ida Lupino sometimes claimed not to know the best way to line up a shot or specify a line reading, explaining “Men hate bossy women. Sometimes I pretend to know less than I do.” [From my article Gifted Women: Identity and Expression.]

She was working in a more restrictive and even misogynistic era (the photo is Lupino directing a scene in her movie “Mother of a Champion,” 1951), but some research on contemporary gifted girls and women indicates they often suppress their advanced abilities.

But covering up, not acknowledging, or discounting our talents and abilities is not just something done by girls and women.

“Unfortunately most of us have little sense of our talents and strengths, much less the ability to build our lives around them,” Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton declare in their book Now, Discover Your Strengths.

“Instead, guided by our parents, by our teachers, by our managers, and by psychology’s fascination with pathology, we become experts in our weaknesses and spend our lives trying to repair these flaws, while our strengths lie dormant and neglected.”

Discounting or disparaging

We may even discount or disparage our exceptional perceptions, sensory processing and other aspects of giftedness as “flaws” – especially in the face of negative social reactions and ignorance on the part of medical professionals.

Sally M. Reis, Ph.D. “found that gifted girls do not want to be considered different from their friends and same-age peers. Indeed, a tendency exists for many females, regardless of age, to try to minimize their differences.

“For many gifted girls, however, the problem becomes more difficult as they become women and their talents and gifts set them apart from their peers and friends.”

But there is also a more insidious problem: “In addition to hiding abilities, some gifted and talented women begin to doubt that they really have abilities.”

From her article Internal barriers, personal issues, and decisions faced by gifted and talented females.

In some talent domains or fields, being different and exceptional is much more supported – such as entertainment. The photo is Anna Paquin, who won an Oscar at age 11 for The Piano. [From my post Anna Paquin and others on realizing multiple talents.]

Hiding is not limited to U.S. culture.

A recent article in the Gifted / talented news feed says “It is estimated that five per cent of the population below 14 years, or about 445,000 Malaysian children from all socio-economic strata and ethnicities, are likely to be gifted and talented.

“Raising a gifted child is not easy. ‘They do everything at the wrong time,’ says one parent. A gifted child told me that he likes doing things that others cannot do. But he does not like it when others tease him, call him names and won’t play chess with him any more.

“He is excited about astrophysics, but he is lonely in learning about it because other children are not as enthusiastic. Hence, he finds it hard to sustain social interactions. Afraid of being ridiculed, teased, resented or ostracised, he goes to great lengths to hide his giftedness.”

From Nurturing the gifted and talented, by SHARIFAH HAPSAH SHAHABUDIN, New Straits Times Mar 16 2009.

Back to the idea of gifted adults and hiding giftedness.

In her article Giftedness in the Workplace: Can the Bright Mind Thrive in Organizations?, Mary-Elaine Jacobsen (author of The Gifted Adult) points out, “Exceptional intellectual and creative abilities can lead to highly successful careers, sometimes in multiple fields… From time to time relatively unfettered bright minds alter the direction of their domain as a whole. Stories of eminent figures fascinate and inspire us.

[Photo: Barack Obama graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard Law School.]

“At the same time glorified images of illustriousness can imply that early in life those who are truly gifted know exactly what they are to do with their lives and pursue their rightful lifework unimpeded — all the way to the full realization of their potential and the rewards of eminence.”

She cautions, “However, the transition from full-time learner to full-time worker can be a bumpy road indeed, and can easily engender deep disappointment instead of the anticipated coming-of-age gratification.”

In her article Discovering the Gifted Ex-Child, Stephanie S. Tolan notes, “The experience of the gifted adult is the experience of an unusual consciousness, an extraordinary mind whose perceptions and judgments may be different enough to require an extraordinary courage.

“Large numbers of gifted adults, aware not only of their mental capacities but of the degree to which those capacities set them apart, understand this… Thinking independently may seem foolhardy or antisocial.”

Feeling frustrated, tied down

She adds, “But for the adult whose life circumstances do not readily provide an arena for the positive use of these abilities the result may be a feeling of frustration, lack of fulfillment, a nagging sense of being tied down, imprisoned, thwarted (Roeper, 1991; Smith, 1992).

“The middle management employee who has the ability to see and devise solutions to various company problems may be seriously frustrated in his job because a boss who lacks that ability does not allow the expression, much less the implementation of those solutions.”

She adds, “The suburban housewife, who has raised several children and worked as a volunteer for innumerable civic associations, may find herself restless, bored and frustrated when the children have left home. Social activities do not fill the void, nor does the sort of routine job she may be tempted to pursue to get herself out of the house.”

Another issue she brings up in her article Self-Knowledge, Self-Esteem and the Gifted Adult is self-identification: “Many gifted adults seem to know very little about their minds and how they differ from more ‘ordinary’ minds.  The result of this lack of self-knowledge is often low, sometimes cripplingly low self esteem.”

Tolan and others point out that it may require great courage, fortitude, and assertiveness to craft a life that allows and encourages the expression of exceptional abilities. But it is worth it.

As Barbara Sher puts it so poetically, “Every single one of us can do things that no one else can do – can love things that no one else can love. We are like violins. We can be used for doorstops, or we can make music. You know what to do.”

See Barbara Sher articles.

Also see the pages Self-limiting and Hiding / silencing abilities & talents.
~~

gifted adult books, gifted adult information, gifted adult personality, psychology of giftedness

“The natural trajectory of giftedness in childhood is not a six-figure salary, perfect happiness, and a guaranteed place in Who’s Who. It is the deepening of the personality, the strengthening of one’s value system, the creation of greater and greater challenges for oneself… becoming a better person and helping make this a better world.”

That quote by Dr. Linda Silverman, director of the Gifted Child Development Center, is a reminder that even for those who are gifted and talented, financial and social success, and making positive contributions, are not automatic or assured.

(The quote is from my article Reaching for Excellence: Gifted Students)

..

~ ~

What makes an ‘Outlier’?

Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point and Blink, describes in his new book Outliers: The Story of Success [audiobook format] some of the personal and social aspects of how people become outstanding, “outliers” on the upper end of intelligence, ability and achievement curves.

“To truly master any skill, Gladwell suggests, leaning on various pieces of research, requires about 10,000 concentrated hours. If you can get those hours in early, and be in a position to exploit them, then you are an outlier.”

That quote is from a Guardian newspaper article by Tim Adams, who further describes what Gladwell is saying about exceptional people.

“You might expect Outliers in this regard to be a handbook for the self-made man, a re-statement of the dream of American individualism; in fact it is the polar opposite of that,” Adams writes.

“Gladwell’s contention is not only that success is the result of a complicated mix of social advantages but also that the insistence that some individuals have extra-special gifts and talents, are geniuses in particular fields, or pull themselves up by their bootstraps, is incredibly destructive to society’s idea of itself.

“‘No one,’ he says, ‘not rock stars, not professional athletes, not software billionaires, and not even geniuses – ever makes it alone.’”

From The man who can’t stop thinking, by Tim Adams, guardian.co.uk.

Looking at the forest, not just the tall trees

On his site www.gladwell.com Gladwell comments, “If you go to the bookstore, you can find a hundred success manuals, or biographies of famous people, or self-help books that promise to outline the six keys to great achievement. (Or is it seven?)

“So we should be pretty sophisticated on the topic. What I came to realize in writing Outliers, though, is that we’ve been far too focused on the individual – on describing the characteristics and habits and personality traits of those who get furthest ahead in the world.

“And that’s the problem, because in order to understand the outlier I think you have to look around them – at their culture and community and family and generation. We’ve been looking at tall trees, and I think we should have been looking at the forest.”

In an excerpt of his book, Gladwell writes, “If you put together the stories of hockey players and the Beatles and Bill Joy and Bill Gates, I think we get a more complete picture of the path to success.

“Joy, Gates and the Beatles are all undeniably talented. Lennon and McCartney had a musical gift, of the sort that comes along once in a generation, and Joy, let us not forget, had a mind so quick that he could make up a complicated algorithm on the fly that left his professors in awe.

“A good part of that ‘talent’, however, was something other than an innate aptitude for music or maths. It was desire.

“The Beatles were willing to play for eight hours straight, seven days a week. Joy was willing to stay up all night programming. In either case, most of us would have gone home to bed.

“In other words, a key part of what it means to be talented is being able to practise for hours and hours – to the point where it is really hard to know where ‘natural ability’ stops and the simple willingness to work hard begins.”

Gladwell thinks it is often external events, including birth during “fortunate” periods of history, that nurture talent development.

“What is so striking about these success stories is that the outliers were the beneficiaries of some kind of unusual opportunity. Lucky breaks don’t seem like the exception with software billionaires, rock bands and star athletes; they seem like the rule.”

From A gift or hard graft?, The Guardian Nov 15 2008 – an extract from Outliers: The Story Of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell.

Abilities vs strengths

Related perspectives on how talents get developed are expressed by Rena F. Subotnik, Director of The EKR Center for GiftedEducation Policy.

She notes “All children and adults have strengths, but not everyone has abilities that could lead to outstanding performance or the development of great ideas in adulthood.

“Abilities are domain specific, that is, one can have abilities in music, chess, language, mathematics etc. Those abilities need to be developed through good instruction, through persistence on the part of the person with abilities, and support from some important people in the environment (peers, parents, or teachers).

“Another factor to keep in mind, is that many of these abilities are hard to detect. One reason is that many domains don’t get explored in school, so if you are potentially gifted in chess and never have access to a chess program, the gift is not likely to be developed.”

Rena F. Subotnik is one of the editors of the upcoming book The Development of Giftedness and Talent Across the Life Span, and notes, “Our book talks about at least two important variables that affect functioning.

[From online chat The Evolving Definition of Giftedness, November 19 2008 www.edweek-chat.org]

“One is ethnic minority status and how such status can be an advantage and disadvantage in talent development. Another is the psychosocial component. As individuals move into the ‘elite’ level in a domain, we can expect that they have mastered the content and skills of that domain.

“The things that differentiate them from others at that level is how creative they are with that information and how skillfully and passionately they communicate and relate to others. Social skills play a large role in successful expression of talent.”

outliers, gifted adults, gifted kids, gifted books, high aptitude personality

How does talent become passion?

“The presence of talent is not sufficient. Many people have more than one talent, and wonder what to do with them.”

Jane Piirto, Ph.D. continues in her book Talented Children and Adults, “What is the impetus, what is the reason, for one talent taking over and capturing the passion and commitment of the person who has the talent? A useful explanation comes from Socrates, who described the inspiration of the Muse… Carl Jung (1965) described the passion that engrosses; depth psychologist James Hillman described the presence of the daimon in creative lives.”

She considers this passion and inspiration “the thorn, because it bothers, it pricks, it causes obsession until it has its way, until the person with the talent begins to work on developing that talent.”

The idea of the daimonic has multiple meanings, “from befitting a demon and fiendish, to motivated by a spiritual force or genius and inspired. It can also mean (as a literary term) the unrest that exists in us all which forces us into the unknown, leading to self-destruction and/or self-discovery.” [From the Wikipedia page on the Daimonic.]

A calling from the daimonic

James Hillman talks about the importance of this “unrest” – and writes “We hunger for that… it’s only American psychology that hasn’t got that myth, the myth of calling, destiny. As I say, Mormons, West Africans, Buddhists, Hindus, Kabbalists all have that.

“The shamanistic cultures, the American Indian cultures all had this idea that you have a reason to be here. You are a unique creature and this is not just genetic, or where you are in your family, first son or third daughter, or something, all that kind of causal thinking drops away. I think it’s something people can feel as — I hate the word — empowering, but at least affirming.”

James Hillman is author of The Soul’s Code: In Search of Character and Calling.

Potential can overwhelm

But on the way to being affirming, the daimonic may be overwhelming, as Carl Gustav Jung commented:

“There was a daimon in me, and in the end its presence proved decisive. It overpowered me, and if I was at times ruthless it was because I was in the grip of the daimon… A creative person has little power over their own life. They are not free, but captive and driven by their daimon.” [paraphrased]

Psychologist Rollo May noted “the daimonic (unlike the demonic, which is merely destructive) is as much concerned with creativity as with negative reactions… constructiveness and destructiveness have the same source in human personality. The source is simply human potential.”

[From my interview with Stephen A. Diamond, PhD: The Psychology of Creativity.]

Gifted women and the lost daimon

Jean Houston thinks “Essence is neither a place nor a time, an insight or a state of mind. It is the deepest part of our nature, an actual presence that is innate and inborn. Sometimes it wears a personal face and a form and manifests as an image to our mind’s eye. When it does, some call it a daimon; others an angel. In its incorporeal form, still others think of it as the soul.” [From essay Of Butterflies and Essence - see the page nurturing talent 2.]

Dr. Houston also commented in our interview about blocking talent in high ability, gifted women: “Often what happens is that they do a lot of things very well, and their essential self, what I call the daimon, the essence of who and what they are, gets lost in the process… they lose their essential nature, and their entelechy.. the dynamic purposiveness in their life.”

The impersonal daimon

In his article Angels and Daimons, Patrick Harpur writes, “while the personal daimon is exactly that – personal – it is also always grounded in the impersonal and unknowable depths of the psyche. It is also, in other words, a manifestation of the Anima Mundi, or Soul of the World – as the case of Plotinus, the first and greatest of the Neoplatonic philosophers, makes clear.”

Patrick Harpur is author of Daimonic Reality: A Field Guide to the Otherworld.

Resisting society’s pull

Being inspired by a muse or daimon, to realize our talents has personal meaning and value of course – but also social.

An editorial review of the book The Undiscovered Self by Carl Jung says the author “argues that the future depends on our ability to resist society’s mass movements. Only by understanding our unconscious inner nature – ‘the undiscovered self’ – can we gain the self-knowledge that is antithetical to ideological fanaticism. But this requires facing the duality of the human psyche – the existence of good and evil in us all.”

[The image is from Spring: A Journal of Archetype and Culture, #70 Muses.]

~ ~

Related:

Articles by Jane Piirto
book: Talented Children and Adults: Their Development and Education, by Jane Piirto, Ph.D.
article: In Praise of Positive Obsessions, by Eric Maisel, PhD
page: Depth psychology
~~

daimonic inspiration, depth psychology, patrick harpur book, soul’s code book, creative obsession

Three types of perfectionists

In his article on the subject, Benedict Carey of The New York Times explores how there are, in fact, problems resulting from some kinds of striving for perfection.

He writes, “Some researchers divide perfectionists into three types, based on answers to standardized questionnaires: Self-oriented strivers who struggle to live up to their high standards and appear to be at risk of self-critical depression; outwardly focused zealots who expect perfection from others, often ruining relationships; and those desperate to live up to an ideal they’re convinced others expect of them, a risk factor for suicidal thinking and eating disorders.”

Some perfectionism is natural

Carey quotes Gordon L. Flett, a psychology professor at York University: “It’s natural for people to want to be perfect in a few things, say in their job – being a good editor or surgeon depends on not making mistakes. It’s when it generalizes to other areas of life, home life, appearance, hobbies, that you begin to see real problems.”

Cultural reinforcement

The article continues, “Unlike people given psychiatric labels, however, perfectionists neither battle stigma nor consider themselves to be somehow dysfunctional. On the contrary, said Alice Provost, an employee assistance counselor at the University of California, Davis, who recently ran group therapy for staff members struggling with perfectionist impulses. ‘They’re very proud of it,’ she said. ‘And the culture highly values and reinforces their attitudes.’”

Continued in Unhappy? Self-Critical? Maybe You’re Just a Perfectionist, By Benedict Carey.

Image from book: Perfecting Ourselves To Death: The Pursuit Of Excellence And The Perils Of Perfectionism, by Richard Winter.
~~

perfectionism and giftedness, perfectionist books, dealing with perfectionism, stiving for excellence

Giftedness often tied to achievement

So much categorizing people as gifted children or adults emphasizes having achieved significantly, having some distinction – high IQ or SAT scores, having a bestseller book or movie or being a sport superstar.

And with perfectionism and high levels of self criticism, many gifted and talented people feel they don’t make it.

Ellen Muth

Actor Ellen Muth, who starred as George (for Georgia) Lass in the tv series “Dead Like Me,” has admitted she had low self-esteem, like her character, and also said, “But I still feel like I haven’t accomplished anything.. like I haven’t made it anywhere, I haven’t done anything, and I’ll never get anywhere in life, and I’m going to be a failure my whole life. And I know in the rational part of my mind that it’s not true.”

Earlier in her life, at 14, Muth gained widespread acclaim for her portrayal of the young Selena in the film “Dolores Claiborne” and her starring role in the “The Young Girl & the Monsoon” earned her the AFI Los Angeles International Film Festival Best Actress Award in 1999. She is a member of MENSA.

Recognition doesn’t always accompany giftedness

It can help us develop a more accurate self concept as a high ability person to garner awards and acclaim, but most of us do not get much recognition.

Cheryl M. Ackerman, PhD notes in her article Gifted Adults, “It is important to remember that just because a person was not identified as gifted when they were in school, doesn’t mean she isn’t a gifted individual.

“In addition, something that may seem as benign as whether or not a person was identified as gifted can have significant effects on the development of his self-concept and self-esteem.

She adds, “While the fundamental characteristics of gifted adults are the same regardless of whether or not they were identified earlier in life, those who were not identified face the challenge of making sense of their gifted characteristics without the gifted label to guide them in any way.”

School testing isn’t measuring up

And there are other problems with labels in adulthood, and earlier in life as students.

Daniel Koretz, a professor of education at Harvard, agrees “We need accountability in education, and standardized tests give comparable information from different schools.”

But, he cautions, “tests don’t measure things like complex problem-solving ability, creativity, and persistence. High-stakes testing puts pressure on teachers to take shortcuts to raise scores and can give an illusion of progress.” [Parade magazine, Jan. 11 2009]

His book is Measuring Up: What Educational Testing Really Tells Us.

The image is from the book The Global Achievement Gap: Why Even Our Best Schools Don’t Teach the New Survival Skills Our Children Need–And What We Can Do About It, by Tony Wagner.

One of the people in the book When Gifted Kids Don’t Have All the Answers: How to Meet Their Social and Emotional Needs, by James R. Delisle, PhD et. al., is Christine, 15, who asked, “Why is giftedness linked to achievement — that is, what I can or cannot do — instead of what and how I feel?”

Who we are vs. what we do

As adults, we still are pressured to achieve.

Robert Maurer, PhD, in his article The Vision Thing notes, “Successful people are able to sustain their identity as separate from their profession and what’s happening to them. That’s particularly important in the arts, where what happens to you bears only faint correlation to your talent.”

Related article: Being gifted without the scores – by Nora Brahim.

More articles High Ability – gifted/talented.

~~~

gifted children book, gifted adult information, gifted adults, high ability

Genius: born or made

“The young Mozart’s prowess can be chalked up to practice, practice, practice. Compelled to practice three hours a day from age three on.. No wonder they thought he was a genius.” Malcolm Gladwell

How we think of talents in others and ourselves may have a profound effect on nurturing and realizing those abilities. Maybe “genius” or precocity is not some kind of inborn trait. Maybe talent can be sought – or suppressed.

[The photo is Tom Hulce as Mozart in Amadeus (1984), from the page Achievement / success.]

Carol S. Dweck, PhD, a Professor of Psychology at Stanford, thinks “our society tends to believe that geniuses are born, not made. And I wouldn’t dispute that there might be a strong innate component, but it’s just clear from the histories of so many geniuses that motivation is a key component.

Motivation is the key

“And when you sift through the literature on creative genius, the researchers agree that motivation is perhaps the number one component in the realization of genius.

“Many of our most illustrious geniuses in every field were people who were considered ordinary as children, and then just caught fire around their topic and achieved amazing things that we know about today-from Darwin, to Coleridge, to Cézanne. All of these people were not necessarily extraordinary children.”

From Interviews with Carol Dweck.

Adult geniuses as kids

In his article The Myth of Prodigy and Why it Matters, Eric Wargo notes one way “to look at precocity is of course to work backward — to look at adult geniuses and see what they were like as kids. A number of studies have taken this approach, Malcolm Gladwell [author of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without learning dThinking] said, and they find a similar pattern.

“A study of 200 highly accomplished adults found that just 34 percent had been considered in any way precocious as children. He also read a long list of historical geniuses who had been notably undistinguished as children — a list including Copernicus, Rembrandt, Bach, Newton, Beethoven, Kant, and Leonardo Da Vinci (“that famous code-maker”).

“None of [them] would have made it into Hunter College,” Gladwell observed.

Precociousness is no predictor of achievement

Wargo continues, “We think of precociousness as an early form of adult achievement, and, according to Gladwell, that concept is much of the problem. ‘What a gifted child is, in many ways, is a gifted learner. And what a gifted adult is, is a gifted doer. And those are quite separate domains of achievement.’

“To be a prodigy in music, for example, is to be a mimic, to reproduce what you hear from grown-up musicians. Yet only rarely, according to Gladwell, do child musical prodigies manage to make the necessary transition from mimicry to creating a style of their own.

“The ‘prodigy midlife crisis,’ as it has been called, proves fatal to all but a handful would-be Mozarts. ‘Precociousness, in other words, is not necessarily or always a prelude to adult achievement. Sometimes it’s just its own little discrete state.’

“Early acquisition of skills — which is often what we mean by precocity — may thus be a misleading indicator of later success, said Gladwell.

“’Sometimes we call a child precocious because they acquire a certain skill quickly, but that skill turns out to be something where speed of acquisition is not at all important… We don’t say that someone who learned to walk at four months is a better walker than the rest of us. It’s not really a meaningful category.’

“When we call a child ‘precocious,’ Gladwell said, ‘we have a very sloppy definition of what we mean. Generally what we mean is that a person has an unusual level of intellectual ability for their age.’

How do you get to Carnegie Hall?

“But adult success has to do with a lot more than that. ‘In our obsession with precociousness we are overstating the importance of being smart.’

“In this regard, Gladwell noted research by Carol Dweck and Martin Seligman indicating that different dimensions such as explanatory styles and attitudes and approaches to learning may have as much to do with learning ability as does innate intelligence.

“And when it comes to musicians, the strongest predictor of ability is the same mundane thing that gets you to Carnegie Hall: ‘Really what we mean… when we say that someone is “naturally gifted” is that they practice a lot, that they want to practice a lot, that they like to practice a lot.’

“So what about the ur-child-prodigy, Mozart? Famously, Mozart started to compose music at age four; by six, he is supposed to have traveled around Europe giving special performances with his father, Leopold. ‘He is of course the great poster child for precociousness,’ Gladwell said. ‘More Upper West Side adults have pointed to Mozart, I’m quite sure, as a justification for sending their kids to excruciating early music programs, than almost any other historical figure.’

The Mozart Myth

“Yet Gladwell deftly debunked the Mozart myth. ‘First of all, the music he composes at four isn’t any good,’ he stated bluntly. ‘They’re basically arrangements of works by other composers. And also, rather suspiciously, they’re written down by his father… And Leopold, it must be clear, is the 18th-century equivalent of a little league father.’

“But most importantly, the young Mozart’s prowess can be chalked up to practice, practice, practice. Compelled to practice three hours a day from age three on, by age six the young Wolfgang had logged an astonishing 3,500 hours — ‘three times more than anybody else in his peer group. No wonder they thought he was a genius.’

“So Mozart’s famous precociousness as a musician was not innate musical ability but rather his ability to work hard, and circumstances (i.e., his father) that pushed him to do so. ‘That is a very different definition of precociousness than I think the one that we generally deal with.’

Einstein

“A better poster child for what precociousness really entails, Gladwell hinted, may thus be the famous intellectual late-bloomer, Einstein. Gladwell cited a biographer’s description of the future physicist, who displayed no remarkable native intelligence as a child but whose success seems to have derived from certain habits and personality traits — curiosity, doggedness, determinedness — that are the less glamorous but perhaps more essential components of genius.”

From article The Myth of Prodigy and Why it Matters, by Eric Wargo, The Association for Psychological Science Observer, Aug 2006.
~~

motivating genius, identifying gifted children, learning differences, predicting giftedness

When it’s too easy

“Great accomplishment, and even what we call genius, is typically the result of years of passion and dedication and not something that flows naturally from a gift.”

In her article The Secret to Raising Smart Kids, Stanford Professor of Psychology Carol S. Dweck writes about children “who coast through the early grades under the dangerous notion that no-effort academic achievement defines them as smart or gifted.

“Such children hold an implicit belief that intelligence is innate and fixed, making striving to learn seem far less important than being (or looking) smart.

“This belief also makes them see challenges, mistakes and even the need to exert effort as threats to their ego rather than as opportunities to improve.

“And it causes them to lose confidence and motivation when the work is no longer easy for them.”

“Praising children’s innate abilities.. reinforces this mind-set, which can also prevent young athletes or people in the workforce and even marriages from living up to their potential.”

Teach a growth mind-set

“On the other hand,” she continues, “our studies show that teaching people to have a ‘growth mind-set,’ which encourages a focus on effort rather than on intelligence or talent, helps make them into high achievers in school and in life.

“People do differ in intelligence, talent and ability. And yet research is converging on the conclusion that great accomplishment, and even what we call genius, is typically the result of years of passion and dedication and not something that flows naturally from a gift.

“Mozart, Edison, Curie, Darwin and Cézanne were not simply born with talent; they cultivated it through tremendous and sustained effort.

“Similarly, hard work and discipline contribute much more to school achievement than IQ does.

Stay teachable and motivated

“Such lessons apply to almost every human endeavor. For instance, many young athletes value talent more than hard work and have consequently become unteachable.

“Similarly, many people accomplish little in their jobs without constant praise and encouragement to maintain their motivation.

“If we foster a growth mind-set in our homes and schools, however, we will give our children the tools to succeed in their pursuits and to become responsible employees and citizens.”

From The Secret to Raising Smart Kids, Scientific American Mind, Dec 2007.

Books by Carol S. Dweck, PhD :
The handbook of competence and motivation.
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.

Related article: How Not to Talk to Your Kids, by Po Bronson.

A related book: Your Own Worst Enemy: Breaking the Habit of Adult Underachievement, by Kenneth W. Christian, PhD.
~~

personal achievement books, raising gifted kids, gifted children book, motivating talent