The Gifted Adult Quotes

“Gifted people cannot escape a sense of calling, a mandate to put their abilities to the test of time and constructive purpose. This is the true legacy of giftedness, the sense of responsibility to leave something valuable behind.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Capacity for keen observation • Exceptional ability to predict and foresee problems and trends • Special problem-solving resources; extraordinary tolerance for ambiguity; fascination with dichotomous puzzles • Preference for original thinking and creative solutions • Excitability, enthusiasm, expressiveness, and renewable energy • Heightened sensitivity, intense emotion, and compassion • Playful attitude and childlike sense of wonder throughout life • Extra perceptivity, powerful intuition, persistent curiosity, potential for deep insight, early spiritual experiences • Ability to learn rapidly, concentrate for long periods of time, comprehend readily, and retain what is learned; development of more than one area of expertise • Exceptional verbal ability; love of subtleties of written and spoken words, new information, theory, and discussion • Tendency to set own standards and evaluate own efforts • Unusual sense of humor, not always understood by others • Experience of feeling inherently different or odd • History of being misunderstood and undersupported • Deep concerns about universal issues and nature, and reverence for the interconnectedness of all things • Powerful sense of justice and intolerance for unfairness • Strong sense of independence and willingness to challenge authority • Awareness of an inner force that “pulls” for meaning, fulfillment, and excellence • Feelings of urgency about personal destiny and a yearning at a spiritual level for answers to existential puzzles”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“we also discover that much of our most potent creative energy arises from the flames of past injustices and inhibited creative efforts.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Too many people fail to answer opportunity’s knock at the door because they have to finish some preconceived plan.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“The complete answer is not in these pages, but there’s enough to get you started, Mary. You’re bright, sensitive, intense, and driven. That’s who you are,”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“They realize they are intense, complex, and driven, but they have been taught that their strong personalities are perceived as excessive, too different from the norm, and consequently wrong. In a culture that often equates different with wrong, it’s inevitable that gifted adults point a critical finger”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“To fully express the true self is at best a calculated risk.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“The idiosyncrasies of giftedness are rarely seen as “different = interesting,” but instead are deemed “different = wrong.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Most gifted adults were socialized in a way that encouraged them to dismiss such deep inquiry. Finding answers to their most profound existential speculations is a task that requires immeasurable courage and fortitude.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“their intellectual and emotional intensities, are mistaken for something else; hence there are mistaken identities by the millions. Instead of being viewed as exceptionally aware, insightful, and responsive, gifted people naturally exhibit traits that are considered excessive.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Unless we understand how it really works and find a a way to express it, giftedness can become a heavy burden.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“For them, health, or well-being, is more than getting by, existing, or making do. Knowing thyself means puzzling out how identity and fulfillment, meaning and destiny, are inextricably linked.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Seeing and acknowledging how gifted assets can get out of control and become liabilities is possibly the most significant step in the quest to complete healing. Consequently we must deal with the shadow side of giftedness—our false-self reactions to people and situations when our primary wounds are reopened—or when our unmanaged assets turn against us in the form of disorderly conduct.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“A long time ago American teacher, philosopher, and reformer John Dewey had a nagging suspicion that IQ might get out of hand: “The intelligence-testing business reminds me of the way they used to weigh hogs in Texas. They would get a long plank, put it over a cross-bar, and somehow tie the hog on one end of the plank. They’d search all around till they found a stone that would balance the weight of the hog and they’d put that on the other end of the plank. Then they’d guess the weight of the stone.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“When I kick back in mental meandering I'm taking a break; the outside world and my inside agitation don't get to me. I can get lost in my own thoughts. I suppose sometimes that means I seem aloof or rude. And I know I need to watch out for that. But the truth is that I need that source of satisfaction, or at least something like it. Ten minutes in the park gazing at the ripples in the pond are worth their weight in gold. My fantasies ad fascination with the little things make the humdrum parts of life richer, and more exciting, more touchable. ItMs my built-in well of serenity, standing back from the details of everyday life to regain my sense of balance, to reconnect with the steady frequency of life itself.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Far too many of the existing programs for gifted children cater only to high achievers who fit the conventional model of education. Those with high potential who cannot redesign themselves to walk the fine line of the traditional educational system’s requirements are at a loss. As one might imagine, an ill-conceived education can easily destroy self-esteem and motivation in any student, gifted or otherwise, though the gifted person most often blames him- or herself to a greater degree for a perceived failure to measure up. In every case of lack of attention and resources, the budding Everyday Genius is left holding the bag, a bag full of holes that drains away the likelihood of self-fulfillment and success.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Does advanced ability deserve the same investment of time, money, and attention as disability?”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“In many ways, commonplace ratings such as “normal/abnormal” and “acceptable/unacceptable” hamper the gifted person who requires not either/or dichotomies but an accepting,”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“because often the counterpart to high potential is feeling trapped and unsure while not knowing why.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“focused on interpersonal relationships between bright, strong-willed adults”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“On the other hand, John is the perfect example of exaggerated Intensity, Complexity, and Drive. His high energy posed a threat to others when he dominated conversations, used words as weapons, and posed potentially embarrassing questions. John was as raw and overstimulated as they come, a provocateur who openly defied authority and ducked responsibility for his choices. In addition to the umbrella traits of Intensity, Complexity, and Drive, Ann, John, and other gifted adults have a penchant for what I call Complex Thinking as well as sensory and emotional sensitivity, deep empathy, excitability, perceptivity, and goal-oriented motivation.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“gifted children perceive the world in fundamentally different ways”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“When it´s bad I feel like I´ve been hit by an anvil, shattered like cartoon characters but without the instant recovery. That´s the deep pit where I feel all lost and alone. But when it´s good, it´s as if all my nerve endings are deliciously electrified; I´m on fire inside and swept off my feet by the passion and energy that washes over me. That´s the pinnacle where I am truly alive”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“it is the desire of the gifted person to live authentically and not suppress the First Nature traits that produce what some consider aberrant behavior.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“we are all driven by the urge to meet our needs. What if one of our most fundamental needs is to have things be just so?”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“My intuitive, feeling mind and my logical mind work in concert.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Likewise, these unidentified geniuses wrestle with self-doubt despite their confident and accomplished facade.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Regrettably, we live in a society that has become habituated to the quick-fix solutions that are implied in pathologizing labels such as “depression,” “anxiety,” “bad marriage,” “bad job.” At times, of course, these classifications are useful, at least for diagnostic purposes.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius

“Destructive complexes are often permitted to grow to a size where they can attack the soul and hold it hostage.”
― Mary-Elaine Jacobsen, The Gifted Adult: A Revolutionary Guide for Liberating Everyday Genius