Why is self improvement SO taxing?

[Glowflake]

I have below average IQ, developmental delay & depression. I try to compensate or entertain the delusion that I will "grow out" of these deficits by studying something, attempting to learn a language, working out & talking to strangers to improve social skills or to overcome anxiety. It all feels in vain, and thesd attempts don't last very long because the task feels so laborious that it feels so taxing to stay consistent. I'll never grow out of this, I'm 21 years old, a crappy human with crappy genetics and I will become a middle aged man trapped on disability income who still lives at home

 

[Gracey]

I wonder if staying perfectly consistent is something computers do?

If your attempts aren't lasting very long, maybe you're getting bored or aren't breaking the bigger task down into smaller, achievable sections.

Are you attempting self improvement because it's something you want?

Or are you choosing to improve because someone else wants you to?
Or maybe you believe you'll be accepted if you learn all of that stuff?

"...Crappy human with crappy genetics"...?
Big, bold statement.
Where's your evidence?

 

[stewdog80]

First of all, you NEED to accept who you are. You should never compare yourself to other people. My uncle is a dimwit and he works for a big tech company in the bay area. You should ALWAYS be learning something. That is our reason for being alive. I know very well that you think that nobody can empathize with your thoughts and feelings but you haven't found the right people yet.

 

[Suzanne]

Who says you have below IQ? From your post alone, I sense the opposite. Your typing is well formated. Correct spacing etc.

My husband is an nt and struggles too. He feels he lacks in many areas.

 

[Pats]

There will be days you're successful and days when you're not and that's fine. That is every person on the planet. You do sound intelligent and I think it's intelligence that makes us want to improve on things. Try to focus on things that make you happy and do the things that make you happy. Contentment is more important than perfection. If you're trying to do things that just that just don't fit or suit you, it's always going to be awkward. What do you enjoy and what makes you feel good about yourself? Focus on these things. You sound more together than you think.

 

[HidinginPlainSight]

I have below average IQ,

Obviously I do not know you personally or what you aptitude may top out at, but I just wanted to make the point that what you may of scored on an IQ test does not set this in stone.

There are many factors that can go into scoring well or scoring poorly on an IQ test and most of them have very little to do with aptitude.

One major fallacy people seem to buy into and repeat is that you can't study for an IQ test. This is nonsense. You certainly can study and train for an IQ test and thereby work at increasing your score. Get used to the type of questions they ask and get into the mode of thinking that will help answer these types of questions.

Then there is the time aspect of the test. Go into the test with a plan. For example, if you have a weakness with anagrams, don't waste time on them. You are bound to encounter a few, just count the letters and think of a few words, if none of them fit, move on. Some will get stuck on this sort of question for a long time and thereby score lower simply by the perceived processing time it adds to the other questions. Even when eventually coming to the correct answer. If you're good at anagrams think of another sort of question which may drain time. Processing speed is marked heavily but not evenly distributed. In other words, you could be losing points on stuff you are good for the wrong reasons.

Then you can move to the main reason that people score low on an IQ test: They think they're going to score low on the IQ test. Following the above method could raise your confidence before the test and get rid of the feeling of being overwhelmed by unfamiliar questions. The test really isn't overly complicated.

There are aspects of the test which can be challenging regardless of the approach and not just anyone can study to score above 130. However, if you go in without any preparation you will score near the bottom of your range and risk taking this on as part of your identity.

The IQ test is sort of a fun curiosity, however it should never become part of a person's identity or set a limitation on what they think they can learn. In fact, many questions on the test can be answered correctly simply by feeding a curiosity for general knowledge. This has nothing to do with aptitude.

So if you have taken the test and think the score speaks for itself, think about how you felt during the test that day. Think about just how engaged your mind was on the actual test and not the self doubt in regards to the result.

 

[shysnail]

When you're learning new things, it can definitely feel like you're not making progress, but when a fruit tree grows, the last thing it produces is the fruit. It sounds like the issue isn't your intelligence, but feelings of discouragement. You've learned English well, so there is no reason why you couldn't learn another language.

Let me tell you a tale of all the languages I've attempted to learn: Spanish, French, Gaelic, Esperanto, Korean, Mandarin, Japanese, Danish. You know what languages I currently speak? English.

I think you're assigning something to yourself as a fixed trait of yourself, an inability to learn, that is much more rooted in your feelings around learning than any objective truth. It also sounds like you're doing a lot at once. If you're spreading your energy over lots of different activities, your progress in each one is going to be slower and ultimately you will become more discouraged. I think you should work out one thing you would most like to work on right now, then put your energy into that.

 

[GadAbout]

a crappy human with crappy genetics

I can agree with the part about crappy genetics because I have crappy genetics too, but I don't agree that makes you a crappy human. I have known people with severe birth defects who are good humans. Please try to think of them, when you condemn yourself, and you may view yourself a little more kindly.

 

[TinyTownFamily]

I wouldn't get too down on yourself just yet. Your post was well composed and coherent, that puts you a step ahead of a lot of people.


In my 20's I flunked out of college and later lost the only good job I ever had after I got injured, and then lost my longtime girlfriend to a more able-bodied person, and then flunked out of a second college.

In my 30's I buried myself in EverQuest and then World of Warcraft until I got banned. That was another 10-years down the drain.


I didn't accomplish a damn thing until I was about 40, and now at 45 I am fairly happy in life, and I deal pretty well with bumps in the road now. I found someone, got married, and we have 3 kids...the first had colic and I just about lost my sanity...one is a quiet little fellow with autism...and one is a sweet little peach...and I put a lot of thought and effort into raising and teaching them well. We have a little YouTube channel that we have fun with and we are getting ready for summer break.

On my scale at least, you have a lot of time to work on figuring out life, hang in there!

 

[tducey]

Don't give up, always challenge yourself to be more than what you are. I know things aren't always easy but by trying you can achieve a lot, good luck.

 

[stewdog80]

I understand where you are coming from. I am considered by everyone in my family and people that know me to be a sub human. A yardstick that measures the bounds of mediocrity. Anything that I achieve in life will be met with, "wow, he did that?" like it is a miracle I accomplished anything. I was given a high IQ as a child and I consider myself to be a parrot. Talking in perfect diction with a large vocabulary, but do I understand any of it? NO! It is like a bad dream I can't wake up from. Everything I do, everyone else will say, what a jackass, or what a retard, because, I don't understand what is socially acceptable to post on facebook. Now, dumb crap I posted back in 2011 has been immortalized forever on the internet for all that know my full name to see!

 

[AloneNotLonely]

Hey, a middle aged man with crappy genetics here

Hard work is taxing because it's hard work. If it was easy, everyone would do it. Why doesn't everyone speak 5 languages? Because learning a language is hard, especially the first one. Why isn't everyone lean and muscular? Because working out and eating proper is hard. I can tell you that if you do it every day you will eventually get used to it. A great method is to force yourself to do each of these things for 10 minutes when you don't feel like it. Usually 10 minutes turns into the full hour, and you have no excuse for not committing 10 minutes, everyone has at least 10 minutes each day.

That doesn't mean that you shouldn't accept your limitations. I have muscular dystrophy, so I will never be lean and muscular. That doesn't mean I should stop eating properly and training, but it does mean I need to adjust my expectations for what my hard work will achieve.

If you have below average IQ, then you should look at what is possible for you. Below 85 you will have to make the best of your life on benefits, for instance. Otherwise you could work but it would be something that is possible with sub 100 IQ. It varies depending on where you fall, and automation might cause problems with that later in your life. Society is increasing in complexity and the IQ needed to just find a job at the bottom is constantly rising. IQ is one of the most important factors in predetermining the quality of your life. There's no need to pretend it's any different, but I am of the opinion that you need to make the best of your life despite the hand you were dealt. I just won't tell you to "Just do it!" because I know it isn't possible and I think it's far more cruel to tell someone they can do something that they can't. In the end it is something you had no choice in, you were born the way you are. I think being a person of worth is more about how you play the hand you were dealt with than the hand you were dealt itself. For instance the difference between a master poker player and an intermediate one is not so much in how they play AA, but in how they play hands like 47o since the vast majority of the hands will be "junk" rather than big pairs. Totally off-topic but I thought it was an interesting connection

Of course... be sure to actually take a few more IQ tests. Particularly a pure matrices test, but after you get out of depression. I know for a fact that depression can lower your IQ test results by a very large amount. Easily 30 points. You cannot take a test and rely on the results when depressed. Either way, if you took it before officially being depressed then I would still do a few more tests, the results can vary. Obviously don't "Train" for them because that will skew results as well, and lying to yourself won't fix the underlying problem with low IQ.

Hard work will pay off, but if you are trying to learn extremely difficult things such as astronomy then you are wasting your time with low IQ. Someone with an IQ of 120 would struggle mightily with the more difficult sciences (although still be able to succeed), and those are already in the upper echelons of IQ. I would suggest starting simple (but something you find interesting) and see where you go "I can't do this" and you will have found your limit. Chemistry is usually a good beginning, since it's basicly the "base" science on which all other science is based (as well as used in all other science). Mathematics is next, but you don't want to start with advanced calculus. Start simple and work your way up. Eventually you will find what you like and throw everything else out anyway. All I care about nowadays is statistics and probability. Everything else is a waste of my time (I am extremely lazy).