Why Smart Kids Are The Loneliest

When we are young kids, we tend to look at the world in a one-dimensional way. So if I'm a kid, I would say: I like trucks or I like Spider-Man. And if you're a one-dimensional kid, you develop a one-dimensional identity. 🤔 Think back to your own school days. What were people known for? There were jocks, nerds, the cool kids, teacher's pets, etc. The sense of identity is very one-dimensional. And what happens is that some of us will adopt the mantle of the smart kid. People will constantly say "You're so smart" and you start to develop the identity of a smart kid.

When people tell you that you're smart, they aren't actually referring to your IQ or anything like that. What people actually equate with smartness is effortless success. When all the other kids are sweating and trying hard, you're waltzing through the work, and it's easy for you, because you're smart. When other people have to study for tests, you don't have to, because you're smart. You don't have to work hard for the success to come.

If kids get the idea that intelligence = effortless success, then that results in a narrowing of possibilities and identities. This is because the smart kid now feels that they can't do something that requires effort. If they do something that requires effort, that makes them feel dumb because it isn't effortless success. Smart kids get to a point where they can't waltz in and easily get top of the class. Then that messes with their sense of identity. "If I struggle with this, does that mean I'm not smart?".

Doing things that are hard feel like a threat to their identities. So they stop doing things that require effort. And while this impresses people when they're young, when they start to grow up, they move away from other activities. This leads to the kid not wanting to try new things, and not really expanding beyond being the "smart kid". Their life gets narrowed down to that one piece of themselves that says "I'm smart enough, right?".

As a smart kid, it feels like you're sometimes stuck. You're not able to do things other kids can because they aren't burdened with being the smart kid. The other kids are allowed to practice, do poorly, and improve. But for a smart kid, that isn't an option. Effortless success, remember? As you get older, your raw intelligence can't take you much further. You'll start doing more difficult tasks that require more effort, and that's threatening to your identity.

As people grow up, their identities grow with them. They begin to have multi-dimensional identities, where they excel in many different things. For example, someone could say: "I'm a basketball player, and I love to play Roblox with my friends after school. I'm 5'11" and I go to church on Sundays." This could be a normal person who is satisfied with themselves. On the other hand, a smart kid isn't able to have a multi-dimensional identity. They don't explore other activities and, therefore, end up with a perpetual one-dimensional identity. That "I'm smart" is the only thing they have left.

If you aren't multi-dimensional, and just smart, then you end up not putting yourself in places that threaten your one-dimensional identity. So that means not doing things that really challenge you. This results in a loss of hobbies, exposures, and eventually leads to social isolation. What happens is that you end up not taking opportunities to socialize. For example, let's say you chose to not join the soccer team, become an athlete, join a club. As a smart kid, you choose to not do these social activities and that leads to social isolation and lack of social confidence.

As smart kids lose their opportunities to socialize, it becomes a problem. The smart kid sees this problem as something to be solved with their intelligence. Meanwhile, their empathic circuits in their brain are getting rusty and shutting down. The smart kid ends up leaning more and more into their intelligence and using it as a substitute for emotional interactions.

Smart kids end up running hundreds of calculations for social interactions. They use their intelligence to compensate for lack of empathy. The problem is that using your intelligence like this is extremely energy-intensive. It's also not very sustainable. Social activity now feels like a chore, something that is cognitively exhausting. In some cases, the smart kid may diagnose themselves as an introvert because they feel that social activity is draining. The difference here is that it is cognitively draining. You are constantly running your brain on overtime while engaging with people.

As the smart kid's social skills start to degrade, they become increasingly lonely. Then their intelligence, ego, and identity step in, and the kid develops defensive arrogance. As the kid gets lonelier, they believe that they are just a "quiet genius" and cannot interact with normal humans. They believe that they're so smart that they can't interact with anyone else because everyone else is "dumb." So, the smart kid feels very reluctant to engage and connect with others. This defensive arrogance also comes with a corresponding low self-esteem.

As the smart kid progressively uses logic to try to "puff themselves up", they neglect their emotional side more and more.

How can we fix this?

1. Get rid of the 'smart kid' title.

2. Catch the smart kid ego in the act and suppress it.

3. Feel okay with taking time to learn new things, and feel okay with not always feeling like you're super smart and know everything.

4. Work on your emotions - Interact with people to feel less lonely (Start small by giving people hugs whenever you can.

Smart kids may adapt to problems by using their intelligence, but that's not reliable. Instead, they should interact with others simply starting with touch. Human contact is a great way to develop empathy and other emotional parts of yourself.