This is a great thread
I think the thing I struggle with most as a gifted adult is STILL asynchrony. I am relatively young compared to the other mums at dd's school, my friendship group and compared to my work peers (between 10 -20 years younger). I still find myself being shocked at people's immaturity and poor decision making, their lack of personal insight and so on. Sometimes I feel so old as I listen to other people and like Val, I often can't understand how they miss where they are going wrong. Yet on the other hand there are many things that I'm interested in that are age appropriate for me (going to see bands, pop culture, particular kinds of humor etc), and which they are well and truely done with.
I have started to get involved in local business groups and I'm feeling pretty good. I'm still in my 20's and when I take part in things like this, I'm typically the youngest one there. The business leaders (or the people trying to be), seem to mostly be in their 40s-50s, with people on either side of that, too. They treat me as an equal. My age doesn't matter. It is such a relief after dealing with an entire lifetime of not being taken seriously because of my age.
I'm also enjoying it because I seemed to suck at social stuff for most of my life, but I feel like I'm getting better. I'm actively making the effort to get better. Learning how to network and "get along" is sort of a fun game for me. Learning when to talk and when not to is also a useful skill. I can be persuasive, friendly, outgoing, and get along with the group when I want to. The truth is that I was capable of this
all along, but I lacked the patience and maturity to do it. I never saw any benefit to doing it, either.
I'm reading Exceptionally Gifted Children by Miraca Gross and there is a quote in here - "The highly intelligent child must learn to suffer fools gladly - not sneeringly, not angrily, not despairingly, not weepingly - but gladly if personal development is to proceed successfully in the world as it is." (- Hollingworth p 189)
You know... it is very true. I am hanging around educated folks these days and I genuinely like talking with them. So that does make things easier. My husband can get along with absolutely anyone, though. He knows how to bring himself to the other person's level. I can't do that yet (or I don't always want to.) He thinks this is a fault in me and he may be correct.
