Memografía

Take heed of this, smart kids. But the title should really read, “Your high IQ can kill your life.” Like the article says, you breezed through school, always advancing automatically and effortlessly on that pre-defined track that somebody else put in place. You were praised, pat on the back, and given gold stars for “performing” in ways that just came naturally. You have crafted your whole identity as “smart person” and have equated that with success in life. (roll ominous foreshadowing music).

At the end of college, the moving sidewalk ends, the moving sidewalk you don’t realize you’re on. With little effort you move forward and collect rewards and you just assume that’s how it is for you because you’re smart. Your C student friends struggle and collect nothing and expect nothing. So when the sidewalk ends, you don’t see it coming. You’ve got your hand out, your ego pumped full of entitlement, and you think people are waiting there to snatch you up because you’re so special. Can you guess what’s coming next? That’s right, there’s nobody there. Nobody knows who you are and nobody cares. Nobody gives a crap about your grades and they can’t see the special gold star that rotates above your head like a power-up.

So you smile and wait and assume you’ll just breeze in to wherever you want to work and you’ll make 60k to start and everybody will beam and dote on you as the new prodigy/hotshot and stick you in a good office and let you unfurl your wings and shine and fix all of the things that their brains were too feeble to have seen without you.

Nope. Doesn’t work that way. As you sit there and wait, your C student friends, having never expected anything and having always had to work to keep their heads above water, hit the ground running. They started doing the work, because they’ve only ever gotten anything by working. And work is what employers need, not some smug knowitall. You always assumed the C students were going to live mediocre lives, but since they’re working from the start, you may find that they start vaulting past you, advancing, making more money, doing well. “How odd,” you’ll say, and you’ll chalk it up to random chance. “I may have started slowly, but I’m Gold Star Boy, I’ll rise just as soon as someone realizes how effortlessly brilliant I am. I really don’t deserve to be in this lowly position. Just look at me! Can they not see how much smarter I am that the rest of these boobs?” You still think you’re on the moving sidewalk that automatically advances you and rains praise and gold stars on you. And it may take you years to realize that you’re not moving forward and years more to figure out why.

So my best advice to you is to get humble now. It may be too late, but try to build an identity for yourself that’s more than just “smart person”. Let go of that, put it on the shelf for a bit, and try to explore and develop other parts of yourself. Your smarts aren’t going anywhere, but try to add things to it so that your identity becomes “person” or “well rounded person” if you need some adjectives.

And try to let go of the idea that you deserve anything because you’re smart, or that you’re better than anyone else because you’re smart. You don’t and you’re not. Your IQ will be an advantage if used in concert with other things, most notably plain old elbow grease and determination, but it’s not good enough by itself to win you success in life. Your C student friends will show you that you can be successful in life without smarts. You, however, will not be able to show them that you can be successful without hard work and determination. You may learn that one the hard way.

You only move forward under your own power once the moving sidewalk ends at graduation. You have to discover that you have legs and start exercising them. You’ll Bambi wobble at first and then you’ll get stronger. Now use those legs. But where do you go? Why is there no map? Nobody has laid out any predefined path for you like they did for your whole life up to this point. You build your own. Start both of these things on Day 1 of post-college life, earlier if you can. It’s scary at first, but liberating once you realize you can go anywhere and do anything.

It’s hard to grasp this until you’re out of your academic environment and in the world of independent adult life. But let this be a preview for you. Let it be a mental sticky note in your peripheral vision so that when it starts happening, you know what it is and what to do. Life’s hardest lessons are its best, but they come at a price. I’d rather you not waste years waiting around for gold stars and going nowhere. Adult life is a long and steady learning curve after a steep start, and that applies to anyone. You’ll have enough other lessons to learn without this one sidelining you for years. Or a decade. Or more.