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Comment by IshKebab | Hacker News Reader

I think it's pretty frustrating being an outlier in any dimension. Your specific needs are always ignored. Being smart is no different. At least when I was in school they were always like "eh he'll do fine, let's concentrate on the borderline dunces".

When you leave school you can find your level a lot easier - go to a university and get a job where other people are at the same skill level. At least that's what made me happier after leaving school - I didn't have to mix with stupid arseholes.

It wasn't until I had kids and was suddenly thrown into a roughly random selection of 30 people that I remembered just how few of the general population I have anything remotely in common with. School sucks.

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That's one of the only real downsides of apparent intelligence that I've seen: people in positions which exist to be supportive tend to assume you don't actually need their help.

Which, comparatively, might be true. But just because someone else needs more help doesn't mean it wouldn't be welcome.

Parents, teachers, advisors, supervisors, they just let you figure it out because they know you can, and they need to focus on those who can't. I had a career coach once tell me I didn't need to worry about finding a job, smart people always find work.

If you've never needed to ask for help before, this can really cause problems when you finally do.

> I didn't need to worry about finding a job, smart people always find work.

People don't like to hire people who are smarter than them. They want to hire people who are obedient and competent.

If you are too smart, the government will probably put you in prison, if you challenge the status quo and are not obedient.

Sure, McDonald's probably doesn't want a hyper-intelligent fry cook. But in almost any intellectual line of work, there is a high-impact, high-ceiling place for truly intelligent people - as long as they also have sufficient work ethic and social skills to back it up. (social skills optional if the other two are high enough). And they will never struggle to find a job.

I think there's a gap between "hyper-intelligent" people like you describe here and people who are just intelligent enough that nobody thought they needed help.

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