1. Do any/many of you have OEs?
Yes. I am frequently told not to think/care/plan/worry/do/feel/empathize so much, but I don’t want to be less...I want others to be more, or for them to at least meet me half way.
Exactly. It's a source of constant frustration for me to see others and how far they fall short of their potential, be it emotional/relational/professional/ethical, etc. I just want to shake them and say, "I don't have to dilute myself just because you choose not to reach your potential." Mediocrity and apathy aren't the objective base on which reality rests. *shudders*
So yes, commiseration.
The lack of positive feedback and accurate social mirroring also makes it that much harder to respect my own thoughts, perceptions or instincts, which I mostly keep to myself.
The time dimension makes it hard, too. (This is why I initiated the MBTI thread-- "NT" types are long-range thinkers, and I'm curious to see if they're over-represented in our population.) So many people are so myopic and don't see the forest for the trees. It's hard to communicate meaningfully, and feel connected to a common vision, when one side of the debate is looking at a drastically truncated time horizon.
God, no. I’m dying. I have always felt like a caged cheetah at work, despite changing jobs every 2-3 years, always in the pursuit of the ever-elusive challenge/stimulation.
Most work is totally stifling in its format. The idea of doing the same set of activities or thinking from the same perspective is so tiring. It seems many of us here are attracted to career paths that, ex ante, look like they provide variety (several here on this thread picked law, I opted for management consulting). Maybe that's the biggest lie our children face in choosing a canned career path--it entails a more limited scope of work than many gifted adults truly crave absent becoming entrepreneurs or mavericks in their field.
I chose management consulting because the larger firms seemingly provided a wide variety of engagements and required a steep learning curve at project outset. To some extent this is true, but systems-based thinkers quickly find the general model in the individual cases, and it's easy to feel like you're part of a white collar sausage factory pumping out the same boilerplate to every client. (Shhh! Trade secret!) Ugh. It's the same faceless corporate monotony in every client, just with different window dressing. I mean, how much am I really capable of caring about a 3 per cent aggregate cost saving in a company that has no appreciable impact on anything real to any person's life?
My ex was a lawyer, and I have many friends and family in law (mostly corporate), and they almost universally express similar frustrations to yours unless they get to take on cause-related issues close to their hearts or tackle novel legislation.
I am also realizing that I can’t spend my whole career waiting for employers to mentor me (“I pay you, isn’t that enough?”), promote me, wake up to what I could do for them and take appropriate advantage of my potential. I have a long history of resenting my bosses for having such ridiculously low expectations of me and failing to appreciate my abilities, but I'm learning that that's my problem, not theirs, even if they're at fault.
This!!! I also struggle with the corporate mentality of having to pay one's dues before achieving seniority, and attribute a lot of gifted adults checking out of their careers to management and incentive systems that poorly measure and reward divergent thought. I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that we've all banged our heads against the wall of a less competent boss (or boss's boss, etc.) who we had objectively demonstrated we could out-perform early in our careers, but who we had to continue to answer to. It's maddening! Then we see our poor children in classrooms with mindless drone teachers who enforce equality because of a misplaced belief that "equal = fair", and it's obvious that is the early stage version of what we're experiencing.
On a second note, I think this aspect of lacking professional mentorship is particularly troubling for young gifted females. When I started my first professional job, I was 10-15 years younger than my peers, and constantly had to battle the image of being a young bimbo because I was attractive and young. There was one particularly egregious example where a senior exec made a comment about my invitation to participate on a news panel being based on my aesthetic, to which I replied that the invitation was extended to me sight-unseen and my physique was of little interest to people interested in X issue, for which I was a published and well-respected researcher. Again, I have a strong suspicion that most of the women here have had similar experiences.
3. Do you ever feel a bit odd?
Every minute of the work day. My coworkers, who by conventional measures are more successful than me—more happy, cheerful, content, confident and popular—often strike me as so vacuous and superficial that I have to filter and bite my tongue constantly. They seem to accept most things at face value--don’t question things or appreciate irony, and take any sort of critical thought as negativity. On the plus side, they are so far to one extreme that they make me proud to be a nerd. I’d rather be unhappy and unpopular than have a pleasantly shallow existence.
My ex used to make similar observations all the time; that there's an optimal IQ range for self-delusion that shallow achievement = happiness. Couldn't agree more.
I also have to constantly dial back my standards and expectations. It feels like there’s a standard formula or adjustment I need to apply to my approach to most things to avoid scaring people off or making them uncomfortable. And yet, I still often fail to scale back far enough. On my first day back at work this week, I was called out in a meeting for accurately and appropriately using the word “subsumed” (“Is that really a word, or did you just make that up?”), bringing the entire discussion to an awkward, embarrassing halt. Sigh.
Ugh, yes! The "what does that word mean" in a professional setting is maddening! I had one partner I worked for previously ask me why I spoke the way I do, to which I answered, "I assume I'm speaking with an intelligent audience." Snarky, maybe, but if I'm extending someone the courtesy of using my brain, it's because I believe theirs can handle it. Maybe they could just try. I also get the "can you talk slower" request frequently, with the desired pace of some audiences being g l a c i a l. It feels like a Chandler Bing moment from Friends when he shouts at Joey, "Get there faster!!"
Now, I don't mind different abilities and paces. But when people actively complain and expect to be accommodated for laziness, that's on them, not me.
4. Do you share all of your thoughts with anyone?
I am now!
I also relate to almost everything posted above, especially the compulsive drive toward self-improvement and learning. Great thread!
SO glad you've shared! Your ideas were insightful and proved to be great catalysts for my unintended-but-extensive soapbox rant.
So thank you for that!
