Imagine there was an accurate and fully comprehensive standardized test, which had a subtest for every imaginable skill that's useful in life: making friends, riding a bike, caring for a family, all of the intellectual traits associated with giftedness, etc.
Let's say you wanted to maximize your score, under the assumption this would help you to give more to the world and have a better life.
Which is the better strategy? Is it to lift up your weaknesses or to push your strengths even further?
After my DS7 was evaluated, I drew a bell curve (normal distribution) and explained it to him. I asked him where he thought he scored on his evaluations for math, reading, IQ, etc. For each, he pointed to a location on the chart. His answers were surprisingly accurate. He identified his IQ within a third of a standard deviation.
I then asked him where he thought he scored for making friends, behavior, riding a bike and some other life skills. Although we don't have any standardized scores, his answers were very close to where I would score him. He scored himself in the bottom quartile for all of these.
I asked whether it would make him happier to improve his strengths or his weaknesses. He said he'd rather improve his weaknesses.
Since then, I've found that it motivates him to think about where he's at on each of the curves and how he's improving. He knows he has strengths and he knows he has weaknesses. He no longer confuses them. I believe this confusion had led him to think he was bad overall. I think this is much of what causes anxiety and perfectionism in highly gifted children.
Having a profoundly gifted son has caused me to reflect deeply on myself and my own life. I was profoundly gifted as a child and my childhood was filled with depression and anxiety. As an adult, I continue to be tormented by every weakness -- and every mistake I make.
My son has leveled up and is proudly riding his bike. He's rapidly closing in on the mean of that curve and wants to take it further.
The experience has taught me a valuable lesson. It's well past time for me to separate my own weaknesses from my strengths, accept them and focus on improving them without embarassment or shame.
That isn't something that comes natural. It's easier for all of us to shy from our weaknesses and retreat to our strengths. When the delta is extremely large and the stakes are high, the impulse to do so is overwhelming and resisting it can create severe anxiety.
Because of this, it's important to focus on improving relative weaknesses in a safe and supportive environment where the stakes are low. A childhood with a loving family and good mentors is about the best environment one could hope for.
I wish you the best with your own children. I would love to hear stories of how they've learned to accept and overcome their own weaknesses.
