New Year, Same You...Only Stronger
This month we explore how to draw on the experience, skills, resources, and supports you already have in your life to be an even stronger and more sure Gifted Guide in 2024.
Hello Gifted Guides!
We’re so glad you’re here!
How are you doing?
No, really. Take a breath. How are you feeling in your body right now? Under all the layers of your to-do list, how are you feeling right now?
If you’re feeling stressed or overwhelmed or just plumb tired, you’re not alone. The start of the new year has a lot of fanfare, optimism, and promise. Now, some of that shine may be dulling. A few weeks ago, there was a lot of messaging floating around talking about “New Year, New You!”—a lot of promises that if you just did this or followed that program or were influenced by the right product, life would get a lot easier—that you would be a better you.
Better.
That’s a tricky word.
Better by whose standard? And how much should we care about that standard?
When it comes to guiding a gifted or twice-exceptional (2e) child, you’ve probably heard lots of advice on how to make things “better”—whether that be related to school fit, school advocacy, big emotions, talent development, executive functioning skills, the list could go on and on.
Often, parents are told that if they can just fix this situation or this behavior, things will be better. So, they advocate hard and maybe they get a grade skip or their child finally buys into box breathing and is able to self-regulate a little bit more. And for a while, the grade acceleration or self-regulating technique works, but then, something else comes up, and the situation needs more advocacy, and things aren’t “better.” They’re just different.
What then?
What happens when you follow all the advice—and maybe you kind of do start to create a “New You” (or new school situation, new coping mechanism, new bedtime routine, etc.)—and then, things don't actually change in a sustained way, as you had hoped.
Do you double down and try again? And again? And again? Afterall, the advice said this would work. And this is advice you trust. You spent time reading and researching before you tried it. So, if it’s not working, you must have missed something. Right?
Wrong. (We bet you saw that coming...)
But what do you do?
After a while, you probably become hesitant to jump all in on a new strategy or solution. If everything else you tried didn’t work, why would this?
Maybe you’re just built differently. Your kid just isn’t like other kids, and what works for others doesn’t work for you and your family. Why would you trust someone else’s advice? Especially if you’re not even always all that sure how much you trust yourself. What do you do then?
That’s what we’ll talk about in this issue of Guiding Gifted.
A lot of times, advice is presented in a vacuum. It is often offered free of the complexities and nuances of your day-to-day life. Advice is often handed out from a “best case scenario” perspective. In this way, it positions the advice-giver as an authority or an expert. It supposes that the advice-giver is knowledgeable in a way that you aren’t and suggests that you should automatically defer to them.
We’d like to offer a shift in this positionality.
Expert advice and opinions are important and many times crucial. No one person can know all things and be an expert in everything. We need to draw on the advice and experience of experts. Still, this advice or expertise should not entirely negate your own knowledge and experience.
What do we mean by this?
For example, if a doctor says you need surgery, you’d probably (and rightfully) take that very seriously. However, you probably don’t view that doctor’s assessment in a vacuum. You’re also relying on your own knowledge and experience—knowledge about your own health and your relationship with this doctor, experience of your own symptoms and any other course of treatment you’ve tried previous to this. Maybe, depending on the situation, you even get a second opinion. You are gathering more information, adding to your knowledge and experience. Then, you make a decision.
Even in this example, where there is a clear expert, you are still taking in their advice and considering it through the lens of your knowledge and experience.
The same is true when you're advocating for or guiding a gifted or 2e student. There are many expert voices within the worlds of gifted and neurodivergent education and parenting. There are many strategies and resources. But it can be hard to find the solution that fits you and your student.
When faced with all these expert voices and strategies, maybe your first reaction is that you need to change—or your child needs to change—to fit the solution. If everyone else seems to be using this strategy successfully, maybe you just need to adapt to it as well? Right?
Still wrong. (Bet you saw this one coming too!)
Here at Guiding Gifted, we believe strongly in the in the idea of “take what you need, and leave the rest.” In our work with gifted and 2e children and their families, the Davidson Institute has found time and time again that if you’ve met one gifted student, you’ve met exactly one gifted student. That is, what works for one gifted student or family, might not work for another. And that’s ok.
Instead of worrying about working toward a “New You,” we’d like to challenge and encourage you to take a “New Year, Same You, Stronger You” approach to your advocacy work in 2024.
By focusing on where you are right this moment, and the resources and supports you’ve already curated in your life, you are likely able to continue building your advocacy work in a way that is more responsive to the realities of your life and the gifted child you’re working to guide.
At the Davidson Institute, we see gifted and 2e advocacy as an ongoing practice. Whatever your role in the life of a gifted or 2e student—that role includes advocacy. By virtue of being a parent, educator, clinician, mentor, etc., you are advocating for the gifted person in your life. You would not be in this role if you did not want to support your gifted child and help create a world where they are able to be their curious, wonderful self. You want to see them grow and thrive, and you are working in whatever your role in their life is to help make that a reality. As such, you probably have much more experience advocating for gifted and 2e children than you realize.
All your knowledge and experience advocating for the gifted student in your life does not need to be overturned because the calendar switched from 2023 to 2024. All the challenges you were grappling with in 2023 are probably still here. And the effects of all the work you did and progress you made in 2023 are here too.
Now is the time to build on that work and progress. You don’t need to start from scratch.
From our perspective, advocacy is not:
Crisis management
Short-term
Reactionary
Something that can be handled by one person
A sporadic practice you take up only when backed into a corner
School-specific
Lonely
Fear-based
The product of a scarcity-based mindset
Instead, we like to consider that advocacy is:
A habit
A muscle that grows stronger with use
Proactive
A strategic practice that takes place over time
A process that involves multiple people
Is a necessary extension of parenting, educating, or otherwise supporting a neurodiverse child
A way to help your child navigate the world safely
Community-based
Strengths-based
The product of an abundance-based mindset
By drawing on the resources and supports you already have, you can continue building your advocacy toolbox and advocacy muscles over time. We’re here to help you on that journey.
So, what can you do now to build on the advocacy skills and resources you already have?
Here are a few ideas for you to consider. Remember: Take what you need, and leave the rest. Customize and modify these suggestions in the ways that work for you and your gifted child.
Reflect: Take some time to look back at all the progress you’ve made in supporting your gifted student. Maybe you’re thinking about just the last year, maybe you’re thinking back to your child’s gifted identification or when you first started your role as a guide to a gifted child. Maybe it makes sense to you to journal about your reflection. Maybe you do your best thinking during your commute or while you’re drying dishes. Regardless of when or how you do it, just take some time to think about where you started and where you are now. What has changed? What do you still want to change?
Reassess: Thinking about what has changed and what you still want to change, reassessing will help you consider what adjustment you want to make about your present situation to accommodate such change. What parts of the change you’d like to see in 2024 will be easy to implement? Which parts might take more time and/or effort?
Reprioritize: Thinking about the changes you want to make and the time and effort they will take, what rises to the top of your Advocacy To-Do List and what settles at the bottom?
Not so fast! Not everything can be at the top of the list! No. It really can’t. If everything is a priority, nothing is a priority. Pick 1 or 2 changes you’d like to see in 2024, and let those live at the top of your list for now. As the year progresses, you can always reprioritize again as needed.
Regroup: Now that you have reprioritized, it’s time to regroup. Take stock of your resources. Some questions to ask as you consider your resources are:
Who are the trusted people in your community you can ask to help support you as you work toward your 2024 advocacy goals?
Who out of your friends, family, colleagues, and others in the gifted and 2e community can you brainstorm with about next steps?
What strategies that you already have in place can help you achieve this goal?
What strategies might need to be adjusted?
Have you already done the research you need for this goal?
Is there more research you want to do?
Can someone from your support circle (friends, family, colleagues, others in the gifted/2e community) help you do this research or find the resource you need? As part of your community, never hesitate to check out our Resource Library as you move along your advocacy journey.
Reach out: Once you’ve regrouped and taken inventory of the resources and supports already in your life, you can start reaching out to those in your support circle and the broader community to start getting help and taking steps toward your goal.
Reinvest: Once you start reaching out to others and start taking steps toward your goal, you might start feeling uncertain or overwhelmed. That’s ok. True growth and learning are uncomfortable processes, and the core of advocacy is continued growth and learning. If you’re feeling uncertain, that means you are being reflective and care deeply about the work you’re doing. When you are unsure or feel out of your depth, take some time to reinvest in yourself. As we’ve discussed throughout this newsletter, you have more experience and knowledge as a guide for gifted students than you may realize. Reinvest in yourself by going back through these steps: Reflect, Reassess, Reprioritize, Regroup, Reach out.
These steps will bring you back into community with your support circle and will help you to move forward in your advocacy work. When you are unsure of yourself, lean on those who are sure of you and can help you to see all the good work you are doing and the progress you’re making. We’re right here!
Below are a few resources our team has found helpful as we reinvest in a “Same You, Stronger You” mentality:
Laziness Does Not Exist by Devon Price, Ph.D. (You can also check out Dr. Price’s newsletter here.)
How We Show Up by Mia Birdsong
Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski, PhD, and Amelia Nagoski, DMA
Permission to Feel by Marc Brackett, Ph.D.
While these books are available from many retailers, all book links above go to Bookshop.org and are affiliate links which means your purchase also supports the Davidson Institute's mission and continuing work to support profoundly gifted students and their families.
We know that the work of guiding and supporting a gifted or 2e child is not for the faint of heart. We’re here to support you as you work to guide and support the gifted and 2e students in your life.
Thanks for reading and subscribing. If you’re like even more curated resources from the Davidson Institute, click here. To learn more about our Young Scholars program, consider attending our next virtual Young Scholars Application Q&A on February 5 at 4 pm (Pacific).
We’ll see you next month. Stay well, Gifted Guides!