Is it really about explaining why they're not more successful? Personally being "burnt out" was more of a realization that I don't even want that kind of success, I just want to get as far away from the way my life was in highschool as possible.

Oh I made it, I make more than a lot of my peers in highschool, not all of them, but I make a good wage. But I fucking hate the dev industry man. I was unemployed for 3 months and I got so much done. Agile methodology sucks the soul out of me, I don't have anything left for my personal projects. It's micromanagement incarnate. Oh you had two bad dev cycles in a row? Guess it's time for a PIP. Oh you had to step away for an errand a few times this dev cycle? Let's not make it a habit, even though all your work is done. Oh you have mutiple 2 hour meetings to attend and we still label you as having full capacity meaning you have to figure out how to do 8 days of dev work in almost half that time. I'm so fucking tired of it.

My gifted program (late 90s) literally consisted of:

• playing Oregon Trail
• playing Carmen Sandiego
• making a puzzle
• making and presenting an invention ~
• drawing pretty designs with a compass without knowing the actual math behind it ~
• making a didgeridoo and a rain stick

~ these classes were literally in a closet which was a part time “gifted” room.

What I wished they’d taught:

• how to study
• how to manage your time
• how and why to set goals for yourself
• how to start new habits
• how to be persistent

...yeah jocks getting life-changing injuries in their school years is actually pretty comparable to "gifted kids" getting traumatized by this shithole version of America

not funny ha-ha so much as what the fuck is wrong with americans, why are they like this to their kids

I was gifted enough to eventually figure out I was a dumb ass.

Not to cope with this but for me it was more that I was smart enough as a kid to coast through school without putting in any effort, not paying attention in class, not taking notes, not revising and often not even doing homework and just getting good marks on exams from knowing things already or just applying some logic to the questions and because the school system only cares about getting as many kids as possible a passing grade, the school didn't care and just left people like me to our own devices and focused all the resources on the kids that were failing. Then when I got to A levels/ uni, where things suddenly got way more difficult, I just hadn't developed and of the skills to actually learn stuff like that and I floundered (and I'm sure having ADHD didn't help).

So for me at least it was less about burnout and more about my "natural smarts" only taking me so far and the school system failing me (and me also failing myself)

Meh...

I was successful in science/engineering for about 25 years before I burned out. I did make it, I'm just tired.

What do you mean I can't get by with the bare minimum effort anymore? That's all I really learned! That was my real gift!

Yeah, my "gift" was undiagnosed ADHD which has made life absolutely miserable to navigate once I left the extremely structured environment of school.

Be burned out is more like trying to run a life long marathon at 125%, it works find in the start but at some point the body needs to recover.

There's a lot of comments in here addressing the social skill reduction, as if those kids in gifted programs (hello, fellow former gifted kids) didn't still socialize with their peers in just about every other aspect.

Even the kids in 'charter school programs' here were just separated from a group of 400 to a group of 50 or so kids for half or so of the day and then the rest of the stuff they attended classes with the other 350 kids. Even if they were completely separated off, they still have peers (admittedly, also 'gifted' peers).

Ignoring that portion, and you've still got the fact that you MUST challenge a child while developing. If I didn't get put in the 'gifted' track, I'd have goofed off even more and paid even less attention. NONE of my peers had their parents doing their homework (like some commentera have put), we just finally had homework we couldn't do on our own on the bus ride home. If you don't challenge a child's mind, they can't grow. And people who think every kid learns at the same pace, and that learning slower than the pace your brain can handle has no negative side effects, have no idea what they're talking about and should look into child development as a focus of psychology and come back to this comment thread.

In my case the "gift" was undiagnosed neurodivergence and that seems to be the case for a lot of people.

Obviously yeah, my injury is addiction. Any further questions

No doubt. No doubt in my mind... I bet I could do a book report right over them mountains!

I wasn't told I was gifted, though I was told I was "Smart but undisciplined/lazy" by my dad all the time. Who seemed more angry that I was undisciplined than proud that I was smart.

Turns out I am just autistic. And while I'm smart about random but highly specific things I had (and arguably still have) no attention or patience for stuff outside my hyper fixations.

Also I interview terribly. Every job search has taken ages, but once I get a job I always end up making my bosses very happy with my performance.

I have a fairly middle of the road job for where I live miraculously but that's probably because the lady who hired me was very pregnant and on her way out to maternity leave and wanted to be done looking for a new admin assistant. I'm definitely underemployed though.

Ouch that's a lot of damage.

THANK YOU. You were over-praised by well intentioned but misguided educators.

Either you are called lazy for being chill despite knowing how much potential you could show to please yourself and others, or you could be pushing yourself to burnout and despair to please yourself and others.

Having a high intelligence level shouldn't mean you owe anybody to 'make it big', regardless of what that means.

In 2010, Kim denied the idea of being a "failed genius." "I'm trying to tell people that I'm happy the way I am. But why do people have to call my happiness a failure?" He added, "Some think that high IQ people can be omnipotent, but that's not true. Look at me, I don't have musical talent nor do I excel at sports. [...] Society shouldn't judge anyone with unilateral standards – everyone has different learning levels, hopes, talents and dreams and we should respect that".

I never burned out. I developed hobbies and found I enjoyed more physical work.

Its nice to have a narrative for yourself.