Giftedness - It’s Not All Intellectual

At DL, we explore the five dimensions of neurobiological complexity:  

• Sensory profile  

• Information processing  

• Communication preferences  

• Masking and burnout  

• Giftedness  

Today we’re going to discuss giftedness.   

Often when giftedness is discussed, many people automatically lean towards intellectual giftedness. And while this isn’t wrong, it isn’t the whole story. There are many different dimensions of giftedness, and the one I want to talk about on this occasion is emotional giftedness.   

What do I mean by emotional giftedness? Well, it might be easier to explore this through examples. Emotional giftedness might look or feel like...  

• Highly complex and deep emotional feeling and relational attachments  

• A deep understanding of a wide range of emotions that other people don’t seem to recognise, or connect to, or describe  

• Strong memory for feelings. You might not remember the fine details but you may recall how you felt, or even how other people felt, in that situation. That strong empathetic connection.   

• Expressing a high concern for others. Sometimes over and above yourself.  

• What about a heightened sense of right and wrong. Injustice. Hypocrisy.  

• An intense need to self-examine. Far more than you would examine someone else’s behaviours or responses  

If any of these resonate, you may find yourself becoming curious about emotional giftedness. And whether this is a trait within you, that subconsciously guides you through life.   

Often when it comes to our emotions, we are told to quash our normal feelings. Remember, all feelings are valid and have a purpose in our neurobiology. They are deeply primal, rooted in our bodies. Keeping us safe. Keeping us connected to our social group.   

In society, displaying certain emotions is seen as undesirable. And this is particularly true for some neurodivergent people who have this emotional giftedness. If you couple that with a dysregulated nervous system, we can often find ourselves being told we are too intense, too loud, too emotional. And that we need to tone ourselves down to ‘fit in’.   

But those strong emotional reactions have evolved for a reason. While we want our nervous systems to be in regulation, operating effectively, and not stuck in a state of fight, flight, freeze or fawn – or even collapse. We also should connect into our emotions and honour them. They are trying to tell us something. And can also be a source of motivation, strength, social connection.   

What I find troublesome in our society is that some emotions have been labelled as bad. And must be suppressed. But they only seem to be bad for certain groups of people: black people, women, neurodivergent people, people with low social status. For those groups, showing legitimate anger is often denounced. And we are told to reign it in.   

But what if we were to turn this on its head? Take anger for example. Anger is a strong emotion. And often driven by frustration, which can stem from a keen sense of justice. When enough people feel they are being treated unjustly, they stand together and make change happen.   

Imagine the impact we could all have if we were connecting into our emotional giftedness, and channelling it into social justice and change. We’d be a force to be reckoned with for sure.   

And actually, that is what has happened every time society has made these leaps forwards. Emotionally gifted people have leant into their gift, raised their voices, and made a difference.   

We will talk about other aspects of emotional giftedness another time, as this is a really interesting topic.

Did you find any of the emotionally giftedness explanations resonated? Or have any others to share? Leave us a comment.   

Interested in signing up for an assessment or looking at how we can help your organisation become more neuroinclusive? Drop us an email: hello@divergentlife.co.uk