The Drama of the Gifted Child

Imagine living a life wherein unless it reached its full potential, you would die disgusted by its existence.

I’ve put so much of my life on hold, patiently waiting for all of the things I’ll never have. My greatest enemy isn’t one but many: each and every one of my limitations.

At a party some time ago, someone told me that I should have made a romantic gesture to a woman I appeared to have a connection with, asserting that she was as good as it was going to get for me. The old me would’ve been livid, but a watered-down, or more maybe enlightened, form actually felt grateful. She was beautiful and kind. What more could I have asked for? But, as with so much else, she was a reflection of everything I could never be. And, in a way, I hated her because of it.

Many of my patients, like me, struggle to accept the ceiling of who they’ll ever be. Their potential, in their minds, is wrapped up in infinite possibility. They could do and be whatever and whomever. And rejection amounts to a reminder of hidden truths. Always passively and even actively waiting, providing rejections on a silver platter, more so than they received. And all for what?

What has perfectionism, or even seeming perfect, ever done for anyone? Perfection rarely produces lasting joy and yet, many of us continue to envy those who seem to have it. To the disordered mind, perfection symbolizes escape and evasion, a final resting place from all of our debilitating sorrows. The faster we become, the closer we are to that final checkpoint, informing us that we almost made it. And beyond it lies unadulterated freedom, stripping us of all forms of censure, in addition to our personal failures. In essence, it’s a Gatsbyesque form of heaven, barricading us from the past.

Psychoanalyst Nancy McWilliams writes, “Narcissistically structured people may use a whole range of defenses, but the ones they depend on most fundamentally are idealization and devaluation… This grandiosity may be felt internally, or it may be projected. There is a constant “ranking” process that narcissistic people use to address any issue that faces them: Who is the “best” doctor? What is the “finest” preschool? Where is the “most rigorous” training? Realistic advantages and disadvantages may be completely overridden by concerns about comparative prestige.” Here, the implication is that the apparent best may be deceptive, as we tend to overvalue and undervalue the wrong things based on a short-sighted and distorted lens. The wiseman mentioned above wanted me to know that the person standing next to me would likely make me happy, but only if I discontinued stumbling over myself.

Narcissism, in a nutshell, is an inability to adequately care for oneself. As doing what’s best for oneself isn’t synonymous with having and/or being the best.

Nancy goes on to write: “In therapy, they may have the ego-syntonic expectation that the point of undergoing treatment is to perfect the self rather than to understand it and to find more effective ways of handling its needs.” The belief being that only being beautiful, brilliant, and exceptionally capable will make me happy; so, I’ve decided to pay you to help me get there. I still dislike so much of myself. I’m not too fond of my appearance. I don’t love the fact that my brain can’t seem to process psychological research well, let alone allow me to conduct it. But, at the very least, I’m glad I know that limiting these limitations will only redirect my mind to others. For the quest for self-love is just another drug, providing short-term and ever-slippery pleasure, whereas the goal, if we’re healthy, should be to focus less on self and more so on others (yes, your needs are still important).

Anyone who’s ever been labeled gifted or exceptional tends to spend his or her life attempting to live up to that silly label. If I’m that, then I should be able to have this. And if I can’t have this, that must mean I’m not that after all. Our limitations, like a broken mirror, reflect back to us the reality that we aren’t special, but we’ve somehow confused that with being unimportant. Only the best will matter to the crowds, but you will always matter to those who love you. Being important to others is better than being more important than them.