Saturday 25 February 2012

What being Gifted means to me (II)

I have talked to my wife about my view on being gifted. (See my previous Blog: http://tinyurl.com/87qa7eq) She is a valuable resource for me because she herself is equally gifted and does not have any ADD/ ADHD like symptoms. Quite valuable to learn how she handles stuff I have got problems with.

Taking the holistic view & taking responsibility
First off my wife does not take the holistic view. She does see the total but she makes a clear cut between her own responsibilities and other's. Can you believe it? I have a lot more trouble letting go.

I can not go into the details of my parents' divorce (when I was twelve) and my father's alcoholism for fear of toughing on the private lives of others. Suffice it to say that, being the eldest, a lot of responsibility fell onto me. My parents actively urged me to take responsibility over my siblings, and later(around age twenty) I had to take responsibility over my father.
What does this have to do with intelligence? You might ask? I always thought a lot. Knowing something is wrong forces you to do something about it in my opinion. The more you understand, the greater the responsibility. Clearly my wife sees things differently.

Being stubborn
This problem my wife recognises. To our mind a lot of people act like lemmings, running en mass into the sea without thinking where they are going. My wife does not think this hampers communication (although she did quit working for a boss because she could not stand working for someone more stupid than she).

Not being able to understand "where other people are at"
I always assumed it was meant that everyone worked to the best of their abilities and, if those abilities fall short, it is up to the rest of the team to fill in the gaps. My wife sees things in whole different perspective: people have their jobs to do and the rest is more or less irrelevant. Again she is very clear on the difference between things that are her responsibility en those that are not.

All in all my view on intelligence has changed by talking to my wife. I will probably need mine to unlearn  feeling responsible. How that works and t what extent I can use my giftedness to get there I will sort out tomorrow.

Brandon

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