What is the "Positive Disintegration" Experienced by the Gifted? ~It Contains Two Concepts~

Hello. I felt like a mutual follower asked me a question, so I decided to write a response article.

"Positive Disintegration" which contains two concepts

The concept of positive disintegration was
proposed by the psychiatrist Dabrowski.

In short, it refers to the
"process of personality disintegration and its reconstruction"
that the gifted experience, but

Dabrowski did not discuss it as
the concept of "giftedness,"
but rather as a theory of personality growth
that people with OE (Overexcitability: explosions of emotion, thought, etc.)
are prone to experiencing.

And the point that makes the theory of positive disintegration
difficult to understand and causes confusion
is that it has five stages
as stages of personality growth.

・There are 5 stages of personality growth.
・The personality disintegration and reconstruction
that one may experience when progressing through those stages.
These two concepts are mixed together.

First of all,
there are many theories of human development,
and the theory of positive disintegration is just
one such model.
Regarding developmental stages, it also has
correlations and similarities with other theories.

So why do the gifted
experience such an intense
process of personality growth as personality disintegration?

It is because, due to their high thinking ability,
・Personality growth progresses beyond their years.
・They are dominated by feelings of self-blame and self-punishment due to their introspective nature.

For example,
they may feel distressed by imagining
the "death" that awaits them or
the catastrophic future that society might face,
such as the problem of global warming.

Such topics
become easier to accept
if one has appropriate life experience, but

if you reach this stage when you are young and not prepared to accept it, it becomes painful, doesn't it?

Also, because they are mentally precocious,
they tend to stand out from those around them and become lonely.

If they cannot build healthy interpersonal relationships,
they lose the opportunity to interact with people who can correct
the self-blame, self-punishment, and "cognitive distortions"
that accompany their high thinking ability
and as a result,

they end up
charging down the "wrong path."

And then, they hit a dead end in life and
experience the process of breaking down and reconstructing their personality.

There are two points to the suffering of this process.

One is
falling into a desperate situation where you suffer from loneliness and hit a dead end in life.

The other is
that by finding the answer to escape that situation,
you end up starting your life over from scratch,
which is also a desperate situation.

One axis of the "Theory of Positive Disintegration"
describes the stages of personality growth,
but if one grows gradually,
no major problems occur.

In fact, it could even be said that
non-gifted people progress through these stages more easily.

Mental deadlocks that cause personality collapse,
or situations where one must reconstruct their personality and start over,
have an extremely high probability of
leading to a dropout due to mental illness.

Only by overcoming that
can one begin to demonstrate their own gifts
through creativity or relief activities.
is able to do so.

How can one overcome the desperate suffering of positive disintegration?

I have written about this in the following article.

Suffering from loneliness,
and not being accepted by others.

I believe the source of that suffering
is that you do not accept yourself.

You are dominated by how things 'should' be,
blaming yourself and others,
and causing yourself suffering,is what is happening.

By accepting and forgiving yourself,
the situation will change
so that you are accepted by others.

Once you are accepted by others
and are no longer lonely,
living becomes so much easier
that you might wonder what that suffering was all about.

This corresponds to about the fourth stage
of the personality growth stages in the theory of positive disintegration.

Now then,

how should one interact with someone suffering from positive disintegration?

I will write about this.

The greatest wish of someone suffering from positive disintegration
is to meet someone who understands them.

The difficulty lies in the risk
of them becoming dependent on you
if you show understanding.

To escape the suffering,
it is necessary to reconstruct one's personality by correcting cognitive distortions,
and

It is a very long and distant journey.

I believe that only those who have overcome the same suffering can understand and support that process.

Also, trying to correct cognitive distortions can make the other person feel as if they are being rejected.

For those who respond aggressively to people offering advice or who are at the stage of lashing out at society, the only option is to keep your distance and watch over them.

If you are going to give advice to such people, it might be good to introduce them to articles written within the gifted community on note.

I myself have written many articles about the suffering of the gifted and how to overcome it.

There are many reliable seniors and peers not just like me, but within note as well, so please introduce their articles.

It is impossible for one person to change another's cognition.
Sometimes the words of a third party resonate more than what 'you,' who are right in front of them, have to say.

When they realize that multiple 'trusted' people are saying the same thing, it becomes easier for them to accept advice.

In that sense, the current gifted community on note has become a very meaningful source of content.

Writing your thoughts into articles can be a salvation for someone you have yet to meet. Let's move forward together.

That is my wish. That is all for this time! See you again!