Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Adult gifted brain function question/comment

My husband doesn't "get" how my brain works and I'm really wondering if anyone else has to deal with the things I do. He can't imagine thinking the way I do.

Basically my brain goes much faster than I could ever type or talk. I can actually think on several different tracks at once, basically simultaneous trains of thought that are actually perfectly intelligible to me. The thoughts aren't mixed together they are clearly separate tracks. It can actually gets rather annoying dealing with my brain working like this. I've found that a drink or two will dull it down and slow it down enough to drop back the speed and narrow it down to one thought concept at a time. I've also noticed that anxiety attacks drop it to one concept, but don't slow it down at all.

Anyone else notice anything like this?

Oh and we were talking about the fact that high IQ has a higher instance of age related mental/memory issues. DH said perhaps the candle that burns the brightest burns the shortest. I thought that was interesting...

I think there is some back and forth in commentary on high iq/emotional or mental issues, as to the higher incidence. It is debatable.
I think when a very high potential/high iq person does have emotional issues, the feelings can be so intense, the thoughts of things that can go wrong can get so detailed/deep, issues can be magnified, and perhaps escalate sooner than would normally occur.
Social isolation, and feelings of 'why am I here?' are issues that gt people often have to contend with more often and sooner in life than most others. We are currently helping my ds9 deal with some of this. Yesterday he said, 'but I still don't know what is the point of life.' I have varying levels of complex conversations with him on this question, but at bedtime, I just said, well you'll have another 80 or so years to ponder it.

I have not experienced the multi-track thinking you mention, sounds interesting. The 'different' things I notice about my brain (approx "eg") - being able to hold in my head what someone is saying for at least 15-20 seconds without hearing them, while I complete my own thoughts, and then pause to sort of 'hear' them while they are awaiting a reply (someone comes to my desk while I'm working and just starts talking without waiting for me to look up or acknowledge them). Visual memory, if I need to find something I see pictures of where I last saw it, that sort of thing. Extremely high logical reasoning ability, when the right sort of problem is presented, for instance data analysis issues, visual/spatial problems. None of these are strictly 'gt' except maybe the last.

And my husband doesn't understand my brain either. But then again, I don't get his.

I've only read that the opposite is true.

Hm. My mind is very, very quiet. I just know things; I don't really bother with conscious thought most of the time.

Anyway, I would highly recommend the Eides book, "The Mislabeled Child" for a comprehensive and fascinating look at how we think. We're all different.

Oh, had to add, after thinking about the 'so slow' thread... maybe this thing I think of as an 'ability' to hold off on listening to people is why my mom thought I was slow...

Well, I realized something a while back about my brain and how it works. I was trying to stop yelling at my DS so much, because he had started saying lots of things about how I yell too much and am not patient with him and I felt really bad about it. So it was in my consciousness to listen to myself and tone it down. I suddenly realized that I would tell him to go brush his teeth (for example), think about this, think about that, remember such and such, make a mental note to do something else, holler at him to go brush his teeth, think this, think that, go down another track, wonder what was taking him so long, yell at him to go brush his teeth, and it had only been about ten seconds since the first time I told him. The poor kid hadn't even had time for the first one to process through his brain, and I had already yelled twice more! And this is the kid who is GT--but while his brain is speedy in some ways, it is firmly entrenched on its track and does not turn easily. I had to consciously tell myself that just because I have thought about twelve things since the last time I told him something, that does not mean any appreciable time has passed in the real world!

Actually I am very good at prioritizing if I'm not having anxiety issues. It always helps if I keep running notes though. That's one aspect that drives me nuts. I'll be busy thinking of three other concepts and one track is just repeating "You need to get milk. Don't forget to get milk" over and over. Once I write it down that stops though! LOL

I am better at starting things than finishing them, but that's mainly because I tend to get bored or interested in a new concept. It's an actual choice on my part because I know I will get back to it eventually. When it comes to the different trains of thought it is more often an issue of one going over the day, one thinking about tomorrow, one working on my book and another contemplating something random like time as a concept. It's rarely an issue of different things that would require any kind of completion.

I'm not sure how I figure things out sometimes (like puzzles, codes, etc.) The answer just comes to me. Sometimes I figure things out in my sleep and wake up with the answer.

I know where things are in books that I've read. For example, if I remember a quote or passage that I want to look up, I remember how far through the book it was (not the page number, the thickness of the pages) where on the page it is located, the shape of the text, etc. I can usually find it quickly. This really came in handy for writing papers in college. I would write the whole paper in my mind and then type it out all at once, word for word. I would just stop to fill in the quotes. A real time-saver

When I understand something, I "see" how it all works, especially math and physics concepts or theorems.

That happens to me sometimes. I remember solving the Rubik's cube late one night when I was 16. I had no idea how I'd done it, and I had to do a complex move to solve it (I remembered what it was). I figured out an algorithm pretty quickly after that, but it was weird that I could just do that move and solve the thing all of a sudden.

It's the same for a few other of those types of puzzles, as well as cryptograms.

I had a good friend who could type his papers out like you, Cathy. Way cool.

Does anyone ever have an experience where you can just see a hidden object (say, in a Where's Waldo book)? My kids have one of these books and I picked it up one night and found every Waldo immediately. It was cool (I can't always do this at that level, but when that system is working at peak efficiency, it's great).

And here's a weird one for people who drive in heavy traffic frequently: I constantly seek patterns of traffic flow during periods of congestion. This isn't something I do consciously; it just happens. The result is that I get quite good at what I call surfing a traffic jam. I know when exactly when Lane 1 will be faster and when to get out of it and move to Lane 2 or 3 or whatever. I can tell how much better I'm moving by picking a big vehicle like a truck and seeing how far I get ahead of it (it usually disappears from view). Anyone else do that?

And no, my passengers don't have to scream "WATCH OUT!!" when this is going on.

Val

I do the same thing with crowds. I just slip right through annoys the people trying to keep up with me.