The grand unifying theory of Me
My journey through adult giftedness. Part 2.
Being assessed as gifted is the start of a long process or, if you will, the end of the beginning. There are many chapters to follow in one’s giftedness story and, at least in my case, it proceeds in fits and starts.
This article continues my journey through learning about, understanding, and integrating giftedness as an adult. I highly recommend reading the first part from October 2016 if you have not done so already. (In January 2017, I wrote a separate article regarding attitudes towards giftedness itself. You will learn about me from it as well.)
This journey is based on a 7-stage process of discovering adult giftedness as described by Jennifer Harvey Sallin. These stages are:
- Denial
- Excitement
- Anger
- Bargaining / depression / panic
- Acceptance
- Rebuilding
- Creativity
When we left off, I was bouncing back and forth between step 5 (acceptance), step 6 (rebuilding), and step 7 (creativity). A year after being diagnosed as gifted, and eight months after my first article covered my experience with steps 1–4, I am still bouncing back and forth between the three.
We checked off stage 4 as “done”
Step 4 in the journey was about “bargaining, depression, and panic” relative to giftedness and I thought that I had cleared that hurdle. In fact, I felt that I was fully accepting of the giftedness diagnosis; it was both helping to explain my life experience and to give some meaning to it. It also provided me with a modicum of hope about the future.
In January of this year I wrote about how I wanted to come to terms with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and bipolar disorder (Type I). The latter diagnosis came on the heels of suddenly losing my mother to cancer, while I was still digesting the enormity of the giftedness news.
Stage 5 — Acceptance
Step 5 in the journey is described by Ms Sallin as, “Ok, this is how I am. How am I going to use it to my advantage?”. While I firmly believe that I have accepted giftedness, I am unable to articulate how I will use it to my advantage.
I felt confident and intelligent enough in late February to consider applying for law school or a PhD in political science just for the mental stimulation (or as I said then, to quote the great Austin Powers, “for shits and giggles”), but six months later feels like a lifetime ago and I can hardly imagine doing so now.
I can go for days or weeks at a time without feeling particularly intelligent. (In the short term, I am trading everyday stability in exchange for what is often mind-numbing work.) As a result, I get depressed — as much as one can while being heavily medicated — armed with the knowledge of all that could be and just isn’t.
On the advice of my therapist, I took up mind mapping both as a means of gathering my thoughts and of compensating for my inability to achieve mindfulness, something I have tried recently with no success. The ‘why’ it doesn’t work is apparently related to attachment theory and my personality type. (The inability to achieve mindfulness also means that I have one less tool to deal with the insomnia and related anxiety that has affected me since the Christmas holidays, in spite of medication.)
I came up with the following as part of that effort. It shows the different things on my plate as well as the different means available to me for addressing them.
For each of them, I ask the following questions.
- What does “acceptance” mean in this particular case?
- What do I keep/leverage?
- What can I change?
- What do I accept that I can never change?
With the graphic — a mental representation of all the work that I have to do in the coming months and years — in hand, I set myself to work on the different components that make up “me”.
Stage 6 — Rebuilding
Step 6 is defined by Ms Sallin as, “I’m doing the work to rebuild myself based on who I am.”
To manage my expectations, as well as to put things into perspective, I came up with the following graphic showing: 1) where I am at today, and 2) where IQ testing suggests that I could be. In theory, if I had been identified as gifted at a young age, I would have been shunted on to a different learning track and would most likely be thriving, making the most of my gift. This may have potentially spared me from the low self-esteem and lack of self-confidence that I have experienced for all of my adult life.
In addition, if I had known about bipolar disorder in my early 20s, I would most likely have been able to stop the spiral downward — the dip in the “Actual” line corresponds to the second time that I was expelled from university for poor marks — the result of extreme highs and extreme lows, the latter associated with constant, regular job loss. (The Actual line from my mid–20s until now should be much jerkier than it is. The trend line hides a lot of ups and downs.)
My potential future state, which I refer to as a “Reset”, lies somewhere in between my theoretical potential and my actual experience.
The reality is that knowing you can do more now — but have not — and could have done more with the right conditions — but did not — is saddening but, like the start line of a marathon that has recently come into view, is also extremely motivating, encouraging me to go out and do more. Given the proper encouragements, including cognitive behavioural therapy, that motivation can and should win out over the ingrained bad habits, putting me into what I hope is a virtuous cycle of achievements, confidence, trying new things, etc. (These would allow me to project and execute on the steeper curve labelled “Reset”.)
I think of it as something akin to “escape velocity”, the phenomenon by which a spacecraft can initially escape the earth’s gravitation pull and later move from a given orbit to a higher one.
I imagine both the initial “escape” and the subsequent movement as processes that can be consciously achieved and repeated. Concretely, this means that I believe that I can eventually go from a model of life happening to me towards one where I happen to life. This would be on my terms, but in a manner consistent with my values, a good portion of which flow from giftedness (e.g., empathy, strong sense of social justice, etc.).
In practice, each day sees me essentially proposing a new version of myself — though not fully in line with what I have called my Minimum Viable Me — and testing it to see what works, what I should carry over from one day to the next, and what I should change.
It still feels too much like I am in a reactive, survival-like mode, as opposed to a thriving, proactive MVP of Me. So I have tried to focus my efforts on those things that I could theoretically “control”, meaning that they were within my abilities, and I have worked to secure quick wins wherever possible, to drive a semblance of momentum.
My work in this regard is affected by efforts to secure gainful employment or income of some sort. I started this effort about nine months ago, at no small cost in mental effort, which has taken away from my ability to process and integrate giftedness into my worldview as much as I would like.
Rebuilding my professional life
In December of 2016, I began my return to the workforce as a management consultant, working on a part-time basis, with a single client. The work that I was asked to do largely consisted of things that I had done before, so there was limited opportunity to grow professionally. (Though I did, in fact, learn much on one particular project and I am glad that I had the opportunity to do so.)
Since this odyssey had started with a burnout, I needed to be able to do the little things right before I could even consider taking advantage of giftedness. My motivation as I dipped my toes ever so gently back into working life was the importance of being able to make — and to meet — commitments. I needed to prove to myself that I could still do as much. (For those fortunate to have never suffered a burnout, the inability to keep commitments — when you feel like you are attempting to run through water with a gorilla on your back — is one of the first signs that things are no longer going well. Each day feels like you are slipping up on things that used to come easily.)
In March of 2017, as I added additional customers and my working hours increased to where I hit break-even, and the commensurate financial stresses began to dissipate, I contracted for a space in a co-working facility called WeWork. This dedicated workspace has provided me with a semblance of a daily ’routine’ which I so dearly need. The ability to make a financial commitment was borne of the belief that I was on the right track. I have since been relatively successful in making and keeping commitments, and I have received — and renewed — orders from my customers in that regard.
Rebuilding my personal life
Three weeks ago I took what is the next step in this testing of me: I went out for drinks with an acquaintance and a bunch of new people that I have never met before. Over the past 12 months, I have had almost no social interactions outside of a group of other gifted adults, my customers, my therapist, my two doctors, my extended family, and a handful of other runners or cyclists.
Recently, as part of homework from my therapist, I set myself the goal of meeting other people in a social context. I immediately reached out to 2 acquaintances via Facebook. The first person responded by proposing that I join him and some friends for happy hour drinks.
I was anxious at the idea of interacting with other people in general, let alone perfect strangers, and I had to work up the nerve to show up at the meeting place. What should I say? How should I act? What past aspects of me — so many of them are intense (known as overexcitabilities in the jargon) — should I keep?
Historically when meeting new people, I tend to be too intense, often overwhelming them. My interactions with new people usually take one of two paths. First, as a result of my potholed career path, I have historically felt the need to establish my credentials, spewing forth with too many details about me, leaving little room for discussion. Alternatively, I have been told that my accumulated knowledge, my ability to talk knowingly about pretty much everything, is intimidating and, as a result, people believe that there is no opportunity for further conversation with me. As a result, I usually end up just as alone as I was before meeting the person. Faced with possible and probable deception, I have tended to avoid situations such as cocktails or happy hour events where I can meet new people. (It is just easier like that.)
In the end, the evening went quite well. I took the time to listen for the first hour or so. When it was my turn to speak about myself, I took things slowly; I was very conscious of every thing that I said and when I said it. Overall, it went pretty well, and I don’t feel that I overwhelmed anyone. In fact, two of the people I met later asked me to become friends on Facebook.
Stage 7 — Creativity
Finally, Ms Sallin defines the last step in the journey as, “What else can I create from my unique self?”.
Personality tests such as Myers-Briggs and career assessment tools such as CareerBuilder confirm that I am creative, so the type of work that I do does play to my strengths. I recently took the Gallup StrengthsFinder evaluation, and it said I had the following characteristics (with excerpts) from the test:
Ideation: You are fascinated by ideas. What is an idea? An idea is a concept, the best explanation of the most events. You are delighted when you discover beneath the complex surface an elegantly simple concept to explain why things are the way they are. An idea is a connection. Yours is the kind of mind that is always looking for connections, and so you are intrigued when seemingly disparate phenomena can be linked by an obscure connection.
Learner: You love to learn. The subject matter that interests you most will be determined by your other themes and experiences, but whatever the subject, you will always be drawn to the process of learning. The process, more than the content or the result, is especially exciting for you. You are energized by the steady and deliberate journey from ignorance to competence. The thrill of the first few facts, the early efforts to recite or practice what you have learned, the growing confidence of a skill mastered — this is the process that entices you.
Individualization: Your Individualization theme leads you to be intrigued by the unique qualities of each person. You are impatient with generalizations or “types” because you don’t want to obscure what is special and distinct about each person. Instead, you focus on the differences between individuals. You instinctively observe each person’s style, each person’s motivation, how each thinks, and how each builds relationships.
(I also scored for Activator and Responsibility.)
It sounds pretty much like me. My desire to return to school lines up pretty well with this as well.
I learn therefore I am.
To be honest, Stage 7 is where I am at right now, though I am not sure if “stuck” is the right term or not. I am not advancing as quickly as I would like and we can call it whatever we like.
Figuring out Stage 7 is tied in with the escape velocity concept mentioned above. What does that new orbit look like? How will I recognise it when I get there? If I am not able to change orbits, I run the risk of continued depression and general dissatisfaction with life.
Two months ago, faced with the inability to corral my thoughts into this article, and some general creative frustrations, I purchased big box of LEGO, followed by a LEGO MINDSTORMS robotics kit.
I figured that using my hands would allow me to unleash some creative ideas but also calm me too. (I have been wired and strung out for the last 12–18 months.)
With MINDSTORMS and my iPad, I am learning computational thinking as well as how to program. I took my time to build the robot, living the present moment. If it’s possible to meditate while assembling LEGO, then I found how.
Thanks to a great series of articles called baseCS here on Medium, I am also learning a number of basic concepts from computer science. At Khan Academy, I have been learning about information theory and algorithms.
I’ll have to come back to Stage 7 in a separate article, a part 3 of this series. Who knows where I’ll be then? Maybe back in school, maybe a mobile application …
Thanks for reading and accompanying me on this journey.
