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Gifted Adults | Giftedness | Life Purpose
Books You Likely Read as a “Gifted Kid” in the 80s and 90s
Which ones do you remember?
If there’s one thing that I’d say most neurodivergent gifted individuals share, it’s a unique need to deeply understand the question about what they’re going to do with their life. Because it’s not just a matter of our interests or passions, because we find these easily. It’s not just a matter of “do what you’re good at,” since we’ve likely got a handful of that, too. It’s more about what it means to have a “life purpose,” because we are, perhaps more than most, acutely aware of the desire not to “waste” all the potential that we were so clearly given.
Making the decision to take one path over another one has consequences; we all know that, and we all face that. But it’s as if there’s an added responsibility to answering this when you’re gifted and you’ve already got talents in some very different areas. “It would be wrong to let my French slide,” I’ve said to myself on many occasions (because I love the language, I love translating, and how it enables me to think). Or “isn’t it pretty weird that I’m not doing anything with the obvious talent in visual art that I was born with? Wouldn’t that be low-hanging fruit? Isn’t it a waste?”
