3 ms·

I definitely agree with perfectionism being used as an excuse. But how do people use "I was considered gifted as a child" to provide a similar excuse? Are they

• rramadass 3y ago
  They are implying that because they were already told they were "gifted/special" when young (IMO this is wrong encouragement of self-esteem which causes them to lose touch with Reality) the world owes them the same consideration when grown-up and they face failures i.e. the failure is not their fault. One thing i see on HN/Reddit/etc. forums is that people nowadays are not willing to admit their failures/mistakes but eager to use excuses like a) I am a Perfectionist b) I was a "gifted" child c) Everything was easy for me when i was young and i did well d) I have Asperger's/Autism/ADD/ADHD/etc. Other than in rare cases none of the above excuses hold water. We are all of "comparable" Intelligence (bell curve, two std. deviations and all that) with enormous potential if we learn from our mistakes and put forth effort to do better next time. The insidiousness of the above excuses is that it saps our very motivation to do something better and change the status-quo but falsely cocoons our "ego" thus making us lose touch with Reality and destroying our own lives.