| Hello! |
[30 Nov 2009|12:18am] |
I just found this community & wanted to introduce myself. I'm 31 years old, and while I was in an "enhanced learning program" when I was in elementary school, I've only recently discovered and started researching the concept of being a gifted adult. My goal with my research is to increase my self-acceptance and hopefully, learn to work with these personality traits, rather than against them.
One quick question: what other online forums/communities exist for gifted adults?
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| Clever fools: Why a high IQ doesn't mean you're smart |
[07 Nov 2009|01:18pm] |
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Clever fools: Why a high IQ doesn't mean you're smart
02 November 2009 by Michael Bond Editorial: A rational alternative to testing IQ IS GEORGE W. BUSH stupid? It's a question that occupied a good many minds of all political persuasions during his turbulent eight-year presidency. The strict answer is no. Bush's IQ score is estimated to be above 120, which suggests an intelligence in the top 10 per cent of the population. But this, surely, does not tell the whole story. Even those sympathetic to the former president have acknowledged that as a thinker and decision-maker he is not all there. Even his loyal speechwriter David Frum called him glib, incurious and "as a result ill-informed". The political pundit and former Republican congressman Joe Scarborough accused him of lacking intellectual depth, claiming that compared with other US presidents whose intellect had been questioned, Bush junior was "in a league by himself". Bush himself has described his thinking style as "not very analytical".
Read more at www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427321.000-clever-fools-why-a-high-iq-doesnt-mean-youre-smart.html
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| a small question.. |
[30 Sep 2009|05:04pm] |
I'm joining just to post this, I hope I'm not being a disturbance but it looks like the right community for a question I've had in mind, but would prefer to remain anonymous in asking.
Often I would read some piece about gifted people and feel it is profoundly unfair. I don't believe you have to be gifted for high-level intellectual pursuits. I felt uncomfortable in the presence of other gifted people and felt they were holding me back -- as a human being. I'm not underachieving per se, but I also never was a good student (my achievements lie elsewhere -- something being mandatory was, to me, an obvious reason not to do it). I don't feel I belong among gifted people and this is my main problem. I like intellectual pursuits, but so do many of my non-gifted fellow grad students. Getting things on the first go was fun, but it was mostly fun because it meant I could teach so much to people and learn so much from them. I never minded tutoring, in fact, it was the only activity making school less of a tiring, dreadful walk to death.
Is there something wrong with me ? Have you all always identified with gifted people ? Do you think it changes as one grows up and grows old ? I feel bad because I know how it is to be treated as different and I feel I am doing just that in believing 'gifted people groups' are just for blowhards to pat themselves on the back. I know I am the one being unfair, yet I can't help but think it's discriminatory to make intellect the privilege of a few. I'm not consumed by wanting success, or by my own world (I'm a biologist though.. so my own world and the real world overlap a lot). I'm rather normal, socially, compared to the children they show on TV; if you don't see my birthdate, you won't know something's off. Everyone seems so different, and it makes me feel like I should be that way too, since we share some number on an arbitrary scale.
Can you explain that ? Really, I would just like to read that someone's felt the same way at a time.
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[10 Aug 2009|05:28pm] |
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As there were so many response to my previous post I thought i would thank everyone who replied in another post.
You explainations have helped clarify what I'm feeling and that i shouldn't try to change, hopefully over time i will become more comfortable with other people, I'm better than i used to be however still far from most.
I really appreciated being able to get information from real people rather than just reading a scientific report, which can sometimes feel like they are generalising, as even i know that intelligence differs over every spectrum.
Thank you all, i was not expecting such a large response considering that no body had posted in months.
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| Alienation |
[09 Aug 2009|11:59pm] |
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I'm not quite an adult, I'm 17, but my question is probably better to be asked of people older than me.
I've known almost all my life that i'm gifted, my parents had me tested when i was very young to get a scholarship.
My query is about relationships with others. I feel that i can never get close to others, i tend to have friends only for a few years, and even then i don't really mourn their loss. I was in a university play when i was 12 and only knew the cast for two weeks and i felt more pain when i had to say goodbye to them. I have been, briefly, in a romantic relationship but found that i couldn't give up the trust that comes with being with someone so from there on in i refused any other offer.
I feel that being this socially awkward is not normal, even if i am a teenager, i don't enjoy anything of parties if there are over 5 people i don't know or like. I find that drinking gets me depressed so refusing to drink alienates me more from my peers, I'm closer to my mother than most of my friends which is awkward at school for she is a teacher, thankfully i'm not in her class. People tend to see me as a loner for in most of my classes i have no friends.
I guess I'm asking is this just the progression of being gifted and as i get older things well even out and i'll be able to talk to people or is it nothing to do with my giftedness, and therefore should be looking for help from others.
Please any personal stories or explainations would help me so much, this has been on my mind for almost 6 months.
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| Gifted student needs stimulation |
[16 May 2009|07:28am] |
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http://www.uexpress.com/dearabby/?uc_full_date=20090516
Shows you that tutoring other students is NOT a substitute for proper intellectual stimulation.
Shows you that dumbing yourself down in order to fit in does NOT work in the short term or long run. And this also goes for women dumbing themselves down in order to not scare men off.
Gifted does NOT equal perfect home life/perfect behavior/Stepford/any of that. Many gifted people do not fit in for reasons like these.
And this is more proof that while everybody has potential and talent, NOT everybody is gifted and/or can handle higher level academic work.
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[29 Aug 2008|10:46am] |
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I don't know if anyone saw a piece on one of the educational channels recently - Discovery Health or Science or something like that - about this highly gifted 6 year old pianist. It was interesting seeing how passionate and talented he was at such a young age, but I also felt that by focusing a program on giftedness on one adorable, incredibly well adjusted little boy they made it seem like we're all these cuddly little prodigies who just need to be allowed to obsessively practice what we're good at and we'll all save the world. It was really one sided towards those who know their talent from a young age and are singularly focused on it, rather than what I would think is the more common route of having to spend a lot of time seeking the right path (with a substantial number never finding it). They also had some "expert" on giftedness talking about how all gifted kids need to be pushed towards their talent or something like that - either way it was a comment that completely rubbed me the wrong way. Does anyone else find that many "experts" on giftedness seem to come from a very outsider perspective? Then these people are consultants for these programs that aim to "explain" us but really just seize on one interesting example that doesn't necessarily generalize at all. I feel like most people would prefer to marvel at these examples than confront the fact that gifted education is often underfunded in favor of special education and what that says about our educational priorities in this country.
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| giftedness |
[25 Aug 2008|08:46pm] |
I read a book called Misdiagnosis: Gifted Children and Adults and Bipolar, AD/HD, and other disorders. It says that giftedness can mimic things that are considered disorders. Gifted people often have a wide variety of interests, can hyperconcentrate on one task, criticize themselves, and can even have some socialization problems because they are different. Because of that many gifted people are misdiagnosed with mental or behavioral problems. I found that book to be interesting.
It is true that many gifted people are "twice exceptional". They are gifted and have a learning disability or disorder. Yet if giftedness can mimic some of these, the lines may be blurred.
I know that as a child I was an outsider. I was reading encyclopedias when I was 7 years old--for fun. I wrote my own stories and poems. People could have said I was crazy or something because I wasn't close to my peers.
Now as an adult my mind doesn't shut off. I am a light sleeper. I don't sit still. I have had trouble with employment because of my multitasking and lack of focus. I do wonder sometimes if I do have ADHD or Bipolar II disorder (mixed state). Yet I do know that maybe giftedness could be my "problem". I have taken various online IQ tests and I have gotten 125-145 for scores. I know those are above average and IQ isn't entirely measureable.
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| !! |
[12 Jun 2008|12:22pm] |
Copy this, email it to all your friends, have them email it to their friends, etc.
Then in a couple of weeks gas prices should go down.
Just by way of following the logic for the huge increase in gas prices (50%)
The reason for the increase is cited as oil shortage due to the war with Iraq using so much oil.
The reason cited for the war has been found to be incorrect, if not an outright lie.
The person citing the reasons for the war is in all likelihood a puppet of people in the military-industrial complex, such as the people heavily invested in Halliburton (the oil company), such as Rupert Murdoch, who owns a huge quantity of shares in American Fidelity, which owns a huge quantity of shares in Halliburton http://www.halliburton.com/
May it be noted here that Rupert Murdoch in one way or another owns most of the news media.
The entity profiting most from the war with Iraq *AND* the increased gas prices is, of course, Halliburton. 600 billion dollars worth of taxpayer money.
In my view another case of the rich robbing the poor so that the rich may *own* the world.
National security is not and never was the objective. Vice President C was, before becoming VP, the CEO (Chief Executive Officer; guy in charge) of Halliburton. The only perceivable objective was the enrichment of Halliburton shareholders and making the military-industrial complex (about whom President Eisenhower warned us) even more powerful and feared throughout the world (i.e. Iran)
WHY the American public is not aware of this is incomprehensible. A short internet search of major shareholders of Halliburton and American Fidelity reveals it quite plainly. Therefore I am only citing knowledge which is already public.
The chain of logic is irrefutable: Serious conflict of interest. The murder of innumerable people for the enrichment of the already rich.
I once again repeat: "The government is supposed to be for *THE PEOPLE,* (the majority of whom are either middle-class or poor) not the minority rich. Capish? To recapitulate: We The People are being shafted.
But I honestly think that no one cares enough to do anything about it, and/or is too scared to do so. After all, the "King of the Hill" is rather tremendously large, and capable of killing whom he will.
I will likely not be available hereafter for comment, and this journal may soon no longer be in existence. Ciaou
∞
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0507-01.htm
"Prescott Bush was a director of Dresser Industries, which is now part of Halliburton. Former United States president George H. W. Bush worked for Dresser Industries in several positions from 1948–1951, before he founded Zapata Corporation.":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halliburton
"Halliburton is the largest oil-and-gas services company in the world and it is also one of the most controversial corporations in the United States.
The company has been the number one financial beneficiary of the invasion of Iraq, raking in some $18 billion in contracts to rebuild the country’s oil industry and service US troops.":
http://www.democracynow.org/2004/5/17/the_halliburton_agenda_the_politics_of
http://www.amazon.com/Halliburton-Agenda-Politics-Oil-Money/dp/0471638609
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/23/business/halli.php
http://www.ifg.org/reports/WTO-energy-services.htm
"This intriguing book shows readers where Halliburton has been doing business and with whom-topping the list so far are Iran, Iraq, and Libya. It also reveals how this juggernaut of a corporation has engaged in a cycle of profits that begins by selling products and services to potential terrorist states, contracting with the federal government during times of war against those states, then gaining valuable rebuilding contracts to help repair those states. It will also show how a Halliburton subsidiary, Kellogg Brown & Root, has become an indispensable part of the U.S. military, so much so that the two are indistinguishable at times.":
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=62-0471638609-0
(Is this guy still alive?)
This in The New Yorker
“There is not a reason on earth to sell gasoline at the price they did,” Youssef Ibrahim, the managing director of the Strategic Energy Investment Group, a consulting firm in Dubai, said. “Halliburton and their Kuwaiti partners made out like bandits.” A well-informed Kuwaiti source called the prices charged by Altanmia “absurd,” and said that Halliburton’s arrangement to buy Kuwaiti oil through a middleman, rather than directly from the government, was “highly irregular.”:
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/02/16/040216fa_fact
The above information is not secret. Just plug in "halliburton oil" in Google. There are 274,000 results.:
http://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&channel=s&hl=en&q=halliburton+oil&btnG=Google+Search
I can no longer afford to drive my car to work, a distance of 25 miles one-way. I need a motorbike or an electric bicycle.
Truck drivers in Spain are striking because of high gas prices. The price of *everything* is going up as a result. So we can't afford to buy *anything*. Are you yourself not disturbed?
If not, you must be rich.
I have posted the above as an alternative to calling the administration some very bad words. We are quite tired of being "shafted," if you get my drift. And this by our own government.
Tags: murder
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| personality type |
[23 May 2008|11:43pm] |
I'm an INTP, enneagram type 5w4 sp/sx/so.
What's yours?
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| New gifted forum |
[08 Apr 2008|03:20pm] |
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My Gifted Life is a fairly new forum started by a former member of the SENG forum which has shut down. I think this might be the forum that I've been looking for--for how many years? It has a broad roster of topics already and is open to more. I've always thought that format has a lot to do with whether discussions flourish or not. As much as i like LJ, it's really not suited for finding and continuing discussion threads. There are plenty of us out there, but the fact that this community is usually more dead than alive seems to prove my point. My Gifted Life
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| Bertie -(no spoilers) |
[27 Mar 2008|11:36pm] |
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I'm wondering if anyone else really enjoys the character Bertie from the 44 Scotland Street series written by Alexander McCall Smith. Bertie is so easy for me to relate to. I can readily recall as a child being this mix of naive and precocious. It's validating to have a gifted character developed so richly and be presented as delightful. I can remember finding the actions of adults rather bizarre at times. They sometimes seemed to miss the obvious, which was very confusing. Actually, I still don't know whether what is obvious to me is as obvious to others. I so often feel that to explain something would be to talk down to someone only to find that, yes, I really do need to explain it. It's satisfying that these kind of experiences are so well captured in Bertie.
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[06 Mar 2008|02:13pm] |
Hi,
I was a gifted kid and now I'm all grown up (at least on the outside), married to a bright man with different intelligences than mine (I'm very visual/verbal and he's very mathematical/spatial).
We're raising a daughter who has inherited some of each of our strengths (she's very verbal but also mathematical as well).
I'm trying to get her into the gifted program in our school district. The cutoffs for our school district are (imho) absurdly high: You have to score at the 97th percentile or higher of the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) for the grade level above yours...just to be permitted to take the COGAT!
Anyway, not to brag (oh who am I kidding) but my kid scored quite well. She aced the reading portion but came in juuuuust under the wire for the math. So no COGAT for her...though we are permitted to appeal. (and you better believe we are going to...)
For those of you who are parents: Is your school district so limiting? Have you been in a similar situation? Have you had success in getting the rulings appealed? If so, what arguments worked for you?
Thanks!
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[04 Mar 2008|04:04pm] |
So out of boredom I took a reading speed test. I have always known I read obnoxiously fast and can visually scan quite quickly (i.e. looking for a certain word in a long list). I took a few different tests and they put my words per minute in the 500-550 range with 90% accuracy for recalling content. Apparently this is twice the normal rate and I am part of the 1% of the population that reads that fast with a comprehension rate that high.
Woo hoo, I'm smart, right? Nah.
Now, I can't say this didn't help me when studying in school. It certainly explains why I was able to consistently get As even in the really hard classes where people claimed it was "impossible" to do well. For them, maybe it was, and maybe it was indeed unfair to expect average or bright students to be speed readers. I guess I always figured they just weren't putting in the same amount of time I was, but maybe they were putting in that much or more and still doing mediocre. I guess I can understand how that would be frustrating.
In the workplace, this means that I work much faster than expected since most of my job is reading emails, articles, pricing charts, etc. Which means I get stuff done insanely fast. Which then means I spend a lot of time bored and trying to amuse myself. I would ask for more work, but I'm not sure that there *is* more work. Everyone I work with is more educated than me and does highly specialized stuff, to the point where training me would be a hindrance to their productivity. And I don't want to force them to make up busywork for me when I am fully capable of doing that myself.
I mean, you know it's bad when your Ph.D. boss asks you to summarize a long chain of emails for him because he knows you can do it faster than him. I guess the skill comes in handy sometimes. Like once a week if I'm lucky.
I feel like someone who can do a really neat parlor trick. It's amusing and notable maybe, but what is it really worth? Anyone else feel this way about their "gifts" sometimes?
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| On a lighter vein - any not-awful movies? |
[02 Mar 2008|08:09pm] |
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It snowed like mad here today so we decided to just stay in and watch a movie. I had "Casino", which was good, but depressing. I started thinking about it and realized that in many of the movies I've seen lately, the bright characters are also really awful people. Their ethics - if they can even be called that - are not anything I can personally identify with, and they end up in really horrid situations, mostly of their own doing. The movies are good, and entertaining, and interesting, but really depressing.
So I wanted to ask if anybody has seen and can recommend any movies, either new ones or things available on VHS or DVD, that show high-functioning characters doing GOOD works instead of provoking nastiness and evil.
I mean, maybe our society is set up to make the nasty characters the most interesting ones, but then what does that say about us? I enjoy movies and would really like watching things where bright and talented people use those talents to do well, instead of messing other people's lives up for a change.
Thanks.
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