
I was also a gifted kid and I think it’s complicated bc not everyone had equal access to those opportunities - I see it more of something I’m grateful for than proud of. It’s easy to test into those programs as a kid and harder to actualize that potential as an adult. I’m more proud of what I did with the opportunity than the fact that I received it.
eh, no disrespect towards you in particular OP, but I think most people tend to reflexively side-eye others who embrace the idea that they as individuals are inherently superior to the majority of the population in some fashion. and I think that reflex makes sense imo that sense of superiority is especially silly in the context of someone who’s already a grown adult yet continues to stake their ego on having been perceived as especially intelligent or academically-advanced in childhood
As a “gifted kid” who skipped two grades, my self esteem is shit because I feel like I could’ve skipped three. Even if, by an objective metric, you’re gifted, some of us just don’t know how to be good at things, so the standards just get higher and higher until, naturally, you slip, then it feels like the world is crumbling down
maybe a way to work around that though would be to talk about having grown up “in the gifted program” rather than “as a gifted kid”? different implications. not trying to be sarcastic or anything like that in suggesting as much, that’s just how I personally think of it when I talk about my academic history