Gifted: Now what?
Giftedness should be a gift, but for many adults and children who are gifted, it is sometimes a curse. After all, you notice a distinct difference between yourself and those who are not gifted, and that can sometimes be difficult. So how can you best deal with your own giftedness despite the feeling that challenges are (or seem to be) quickly resolved and the difference between you and those around you? In this blog, I discuss being gifted and what this can mean for you
Characteristics giftedness
Someone who is gifted often has a higher than average intelligence. In the Netherlands the average IQ is 100 points, in people with giftedness the IQ is at least 130 points, when determined with an IQ test[1]. In many studies, scientists are already looking at people with an IQ higher than 120 points[2].
Research shows that when gifted individuals take a test, the different parts of their brains communicate more effectively with one another than in people with a more average IQ. In addition, gifted individuals literally need fewer thoughts to solve a creative problem[3].
So skipping steps on the math test can be quite normal if you are gifted.
Then, when you explain your reasoning to people of lower intelligence than you, sometimes those people can't follow you, because you are skipping certain lines of thought that they do need to come to the same conclusion as you (provided you are gifted).
People with giftedness are also more likely to have hobbies in which they challenge themselves physically or mentally. Especially in older age, mental challenges are more often seen as leisure activities[4].
In addition, people who are gifted are more often playful which causes them to have more innovative behavior, use more intrinsic motivation to do something, and they are more often sloppy[5].
In the end, Einstein's agency was also chaos for everyone but him.
Gifted child
Having a gifted child is often something that you, as a parent, are initially incredibly proud of. Your child is smart and therefore has a better chance of having a successful life. You are already getting great future fantasies for your child.
Still, giftedness can be difficult for your child, studies show the following challenges your child may face.
Find Friends
Gifted children often have friends who are older than themselves. Often feel that they do not have enough friends and that being smart makes them less likely to make friends[6].
Because of this belief, they may also pretend to be less intelligent than they actually are, which in turn slows down their personal development.
Boredom
As a gifted child, you may get bored at school because assignments are quick to master and then you have to wait for your classmates to master everything else. Boredom while waiting may cause them to become restless or develop other behavioral problems.
Issues in giftedness
A difficult childhood due to giftedness can lead to a challenging life as an adult. For example, people with very low IQs and those with very high IQs are more likely to be hospitalized for bipolar disorder. This is according to a Swedish study of men. The researchers also note that men with high levels of technical and verbal intelligence are particularly affected by this[7].
If you are gifted, you also have a higher risk of depression in adulthood—around age50 —and you often have more trouble sleeping[8].
In addition, Alzheimer's is detected late because you can still appear quite normal. In fact, a reduced IQ with a high IQ can still come across as above average, which is why Alzheimer's is detected late in people with giftedness[9]. Researchers also indicate that there should be separate tests for Alzheimer's for gifted people.
Hypnosis to make gifted life easier
Because giftedness can cause problems in childhood, you may also suffer in your adult life from certain beliefs formed in childhood.
For example, you may feel that you are too smart to make good social contacts for your free time. Because you may be irritated by people around you who just don't understand you, you may also experience feelings of loneliness.
Regression to remove blockages
To find out what’s holding you back from seeking out and interacting with people on your own level, a hypnosis expert can help you through regression. Through regression, you go back to the moment when your subconscious decided that you’re too smart to make friends at your own level and to deserve or attract people around you who understand you without making you feel like you’re constantly explaining things to them—talking until you’re blue in the face.
These may be moments in your childhood because that is the period when beliefs about how the world works and how you function in it arise. Because you don't have the knowledge as a child that you have now as an adult, these beliefs may not yet be true. By evaluating them now as an adult, you can find out that something very simple is holding you back from meeting people you can talk to.
New suggestions for action
Making your life easier can be done in several ways. For example, you can see if there is a way to interact with more people of your level. Where can you find those people who also have a higher than average IQ? How to make sure you make contact. In that case, hypnotic suggestions can help, such as:
"You can always join a chess club," he says.
"If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything."
"You can sign up for dating for higher-ups."
"You can sign up for DeMensa, an association for the gifted," he said.
Besides wanting to deal with people at your own level, you can look at the problem very differently. To make your life easier, it is also good to focus precisely on what is going well. Of course there are many people who are less smart than you if you are lucky enough to have a high IQ and that can be incredibly annoying, but you can help many people precisely because of this high IQ. Isn't that wonderful?
If the people you like to provide advice to now don't want to take it, there are many other ways to help people.
If you have done a difficult study, such as econometrics or law, you can volunteer to help people with the knowledge you have gained. There are always people who have been a little less savvy with money, for example, who could use your help with math to set up a monthly budget. There are people who don't know where the line of propriety lies and when the law even says the neighbor or someone else around them has gone too far.
Find a volunteer organization where you can use your knowledge to help people and you'll feel a lot better because your knowledge will have a lot more meaning.
Finding it difficult to take a step to volunteer? Then a hypnosis expert can help you with a guided visualization. That way, you can better imagine volunteer work that utilizes your IQ.
A guided visualization can then go as follows:
"You signed up to volunteer to help people with math problems. Now the time has come to help someone doing VWO find the challenge. You go to the scholar and have brought from the volunteer association the fun more difficult assignments. The papers crunch in your bag. Upon arrival, you meet and shake hands with the people you will be helping. You introduce yourself and ask how things are going. If you notice someone is struggling with something you can help with you open up and that's how you get into conversation. It feels good to inspire people and to be able to really help people with your talents."
This is just an example of a guided visualization. Depending on your beliefs and issues, a hypnosis expert may give you a different visualization.
High intelligence is a gift, but can sometimes feel like a curse in that relatively few people have this good fortune. You may feel that communication always goes awry, and it can be frustrating to have people around you who don't believe you when you're just really right.
Hypnosis can help you let go and instead look at your high IQ in a positive light.
Would you like to learn more about how hypnosis works and help yourself or others? Then come to the hypnosis workshop or sign up for one of our training courses.
[1] https://www.123test.nl/hoogbegaafdheid/
[2] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13854040500477498
[3] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289600000374
[4] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0937445960070108
[5] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2466/pr0.1993.72.3.1023
[6] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02783198509552929?journalCode=uror20
[7] https://www.nature.com/articles/mp201226
[8] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289616300356
[9] https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/39663796/Use_of_IQ-adjusted_norms_to_predict_prog20151103-11589-nsl9iz.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A&Expires=1554213484&Signature=BVS4tsT8KK08ddSBYU4MDPm3eOs%3D&response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DUse_of_IQ-Adjusted_Norms_to_Predict_Prog.pdf