The Emotionally Troubled Gem

A gifted individual is startling, just when you think you’ve comprehended their persona, they pull another brand new face and throw you into confusion. Expression of giftedness is a journey full of surprises; geniuses are the most unpredictable humans. This is partly because of their intense character traits (strengths and weaknesses alike), which give them extreme and rare personalities. No wonder most of them feel misunderstood by others; actually it’s not just a feeling, people misunderstand them. But the weirdest surprise is, sometimes they too don’t understand themselves. (Trouble!)

Another aspect of giftedness that elicits confusion is asynchronous (unbalanced) development. Yes, unbalanced (mental, emotional, physical) development is a trouble most geniuses have to deal with up to some point in their life or worse still in their entire lifetime in the absence of nurturance. For instance, you may find some gifted individuals who have very advanced cognitive/mental abilities whereas their emotional intelligence is below par. Such individuals may be endowed with deep insight or high perception ability i.e. they easily grasp complex concepts, connect unrelated ideas, interpret non-verbal cues etc. – strong indicators of high cognitive ability. However, due to their strong right or wrong convictions coupled with their brutal honesty, may point out embarrassing truths or correct someone at the wrong place or time – a sign of poor emotional skills. In such a case, people around them may fail to reconcile their sharp cognitive abilities with their dull emotional intelligence and instead interpret their bluntness for meanness.

Asynchronous development may be noted in different areas and varies from one case to the other. Some record poor cognitive abilities (gifted but learning disabled), others may have slowed physical development, others may experience poor emotional development etc. Due to the confusion elicited by the unpredictability of giftedness, the general population has not been able to fully understand and accommodate giftedness. More often gifted individuals struggle with rejection and segregation for their conspicuous uniqueness.   

A genius carries a heavy baggage – the knowledge that they’re different from everybody else and their inability to fit in wears heavily on them. If you add rejection to that baggage, you end up with a weird emotional wreck. Unfortunately, emotional wellbeing is very fragile – emotions are not like body muscles which grow and build up after subjection to strenuous activities, emotional health is quite the opposite. The more a person gets roughed up emotionally the more their emotional health gets worse. This may compromise all-round development in many gifted individuals. Those already struggling with asynchronous development may even get worse.

To promote emotional wellbeing of a gifted individual, an understanding and nurturing environment is required. Gifted individuals need acceptance and patience. Parents and teachers of gifted children need to have background knowledge and understanding of giftedness - What it means to be gifted, what character traits depict a person is gifted, what are some of the challenges they’re likely to face due to their condition etc. In a nutshell, guardians need to understand strengths and weaknesses of giftedness. This knowledge will enlighten and empower them to create conducive environment for nurturing the child’s gifts. (I've published a number of articles on this subject under the label 'Giftedness'. Read through the articles for background knowledge on giftedness. In case you suspect your child or student is gifted, read and research wide. There are plenty of useful resources out there to help you nurture and harness their potential.)

However, if a gifted individual finds himself/herself stuck in a non-understanding environment, he/she can embark on self-therapy to attain emotional well-being. This can be achieved in two steps.

1. Self-awareness – seek to understand the unique characteristics and challenges of giftedness. This will help you appreciate your strengths and weaknesses and give you an understanding of why you think and behave the way you do. You need to find comfort in your own skin.
2. Grow a thick skin so as to survive naive expectations and frustrations of the people around you. You’re different and so long as those around you don’t understand why you’re different, they’ll exert pressure on your emotions through insensitive remarks and inappropriate treatment. Lord over your emotions by making a deliberate decision to ignore their offenses. Embrace tolerance and avoid arrogance. Benefits of tolerance are long-term.

Quite a good number of gifted individuals brought up in non-understanding environment can put down a thousand-page lamentation on how they feel emotionally harassed. It’s unfortunate that some of them seek solace in drugs and other self-destructive activities; though it hardly helps. Society needs to not only accommodate these gems but to open up platforms for them to channel their untapped potential. They may fail to meet your standards of what a normal person ought to think and behave like but they’re normal in their unique form. I said they’re gems: – Polish them up, sit back and watch; you’ll be awed.