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I'm someone who didn't have a traditionally dysfunctional home life and wasn't driven enough to be labelled a "prodigy", but I was good enough at chess, piano a

I'm someone who didn't have a traditionally dysfunctional home life and wasn't driven enough to be labelled a "prodigy", but I was good enough at chess, piano and math as a child to meet plenty of prodigies at those subjects in various settings. What you've said rings true across all of those fields, and I've always suspected it generalizes much further. I've sat across children at chess tournaments and piano competitions that seemed driven to a pathological degree without having all that much interest in the subject itself. At the time I found it disconcerting without having any idea as to the causes, so I just assumed I wasn't good enough at the subject. In retrospect, and with the benefit of hindsight (knowing I don't care to pursue a career in any of those subjects), I'm glad I didn't take it as seriously as others did.

mindgam3 8y ago
"I've always suspected it generalizes much further." I think it does. At one point a light bulb went off when I realized that all of these scholastic talent competitions were basically the intellectual version of childhood beauty pageants. Ultimately I see the whole scene as a cycle - kids from overachiever/dysfunctional backgrounds who grow up, have kids of their own, and then (usually unwittingly) use their own kids as props to help them cope with their own unresolved issues and insecurities. The closest thing I have to a general takeaway is: don't use your kids as props to deal with your issues. But of course the parents who have enough self awareness to acknowledge their issues aren't the ones who are pushing their kids to an unhealthy degree.