Hey guys, Jake again. In case you don't remember me I made a post about a year and a half ago called "Read Thoroughly and Answer Honestly" (if you feel like digging it up).

I am now a college sophomore at x-university (above average state school) and I guess maturity has given me a new perspective on a lot of things.

First of all, I read over my old post and I noticed the language was very colorful and conveyed a kind of desperation. That was then, when I was a frustrated high school student still weighed down by the four lousy years before. I think I can safely say that I was being melodramatic and every qualitative description I made in that post was pretty exaggerated.

Qualifier out of the way, I can move onto my new takes on things.

Since I graduated I've started reading up on Executive Function. I know it serves as the brain's manager, regulating learning and reasoning, etc. I also know it's affected in almost every kind of learning disability. Although I still do not fit any distinct diagnosis and my difficulties are very slight, I can't help but think that the problems I do have suggest my executive isn't functioning smoothly.

To start, my memory is very inconsistent. Even as I write this and make an effort to recall information to support my argument, I am having limited success. Some things I can recall perfectly even though I never payed attention while hearing/seeing them and others, even if I am completely aware of them, escape my memory just moments after I experience them.

This memory problem doesn't pertain only to bits of info like facts, sounds, pictures, etc. but to whole processes. The other day I was out eating lunch with my girlfriend and I was stressed about a problem we were having. When it came time to pay for the meal, I tried to sign the check before I even gave them my credit card. The sudden disappearance of basic skills like this, even though I was stressed, is very disturbing to me.

Altogether my observations about my recall have begun to answer some of my questions about my school performance. I believe I often forgot how to solve problems in math/science classes that came naturally to me before I had to answer them in class/on tests, etc. In foreign languages I could sometimes remember large lists of words and acquire grammar intuitively, but other times I wouldn't remember anything I learned. In both these examples, I would apply reasonably consistent effort but my retention was drastically different.

Another problem I have is an inconsistent flexibility when it comes to problem solving. Some days I am able to procure wonderful ways of dealing with what life/school dishes at me but on others I am clobbered by it. I feel like I am only able to look at problems from a few angles, preventing me from even running into the mindset that might offer the solution. This pertains to school, every day activities, and even video games. The term my research uses is "mental set", which I believe is the paradigm necessary to reach a solution to a problem.Speaking along those lines, I use a very limited number of mental sets and have difficulty making new ones, leading to inefficient solutions, or none at all.

Together, these two problems wreck havoc on my ability to quickly learn new material, an almost universal sign of "giftedness". Specifically, I might not be able to recall the background knowledge prerequisite for the new concept being taught, or if I do, be able to see the "master plan" in which the ideas will fit together. Countless times I will revisit a topic I spent much time on and had difficulty understanding, and without any effort on my part it will just "click". I cannot control when or if the "click" will happen at all, leading to massive frustration.

I believe I wrote my IQ test score in last post I made, but just to remind you all I scored a 137 FS with a 132 VIQ and 135 PIQ, and I think superior processing speed and above average working memory. My lowest score was a 10 on digit span and I had some 12's and 13's on things like similarities, the block thing(lol), and the thing putting events in order. Everything else was 14+ and I hit the ceiling on 2 parts I believe.

With this new perspective, I believe my lower scores(which actually arent low at all)can be explained by the two factors discussed above. My performance on the timed tasks was most likely slowed by an inability to change appropriate mental sets quickly enough even though I scored like a 16 on coding.(which supports my theory about quickly changing mental sets) This also appeared as a rigidity when it came to categorizing things(similarities). Obviously I was not lucky enough to have a "good brain day" for my test and my memory was crap.

All in all, my success is basically reduced to my luck of having a day where I am both flexible and good with recall.It took me all 4 years of high school to come to terms with this fact, but I am ready to take it on now.

Once again, I would simply like insights on what I have written, maybe you will catch an issue my tunnel-vision has kept from me. =p

If anybody here knows a lot about neurofeedback, would you be kind enough to tell me if it has a chance of helping me with these problems?

Thanks so much,

Jake