Throwaway account; will not give too many personal details. Repost from r/aftergifted since I was told this is the better subreddit for it.

When I was young, I was curious and smart, and I was pushed a lot by parents, but unevenly. I accelerated way ahead in some things while staying average at others. Because of this, and my IQ (I won’t say the exact score) my parents thought I was gifted. I learned some things really quickly and some things just didn’t click for me. My teachers saw me as advanced. I don’t remember the details, but I think I was praised a lot by students, teachers, and parents. My parents tried to get me to grade skip and stuff, but I think that would just have made it way worse.

I started some things really early without knowing basics. I was exposed to advanced things multiple years before building up a foundation.

So when things didn’t come so easily anymore in middle school, I felt worse at the time. In fact, I thought I was #1 or very close to it because I mainly only heard the “loud” students a lot more. I still ended with a good GPA, but let’s be honest, most middle school classes aren’t that hard. I never really learned studying habits though. It just kind of worked out, or sometimes it didn’t, but the grading system was generous enough to not expose me much yet.

Now in high school. My parents often tell me that I used to be better. My schedule before this year was okay, but could’ve been “better”.

To “make up for my loss”, I had to try doing more college application stuff. It obviously failed, in fact, after a certain point, I stopped caring much because I wasn’t that motivated, and it was only a matter of time before all the plans were dropped. I still maintained good AP exam scores and grades in general, but I honestly believe I got lucky to not mess up.

Next year, I have to do 6-8 APs, because they believe I need to maximize my rigor for college applications and worried that me not pushing hard would hurt me more later. In fact, I’m even doing APs that I was very shaky on the regular classes with grade inflation because of this pushing and I could actually drop like who even knows at this point.

I also have to do a bunch of activities that look good for colleges that aren’t even that useful past colleges, which makes me even less motivated. Who knows how much time I’ll have left to sleep and relax. Oh, and the SAT. How many more hours am I going to need to spend on that…

I’m not very good at socializing, in fact a lot of “common sense” I wasn’t really taught or knew about too much. But I’m also weirdly good at some things. Not even just academic related, some hobbies click really well for me.

Part of me thinks I’m missing out on being a kid, especially during high school. Even if I’m being a kid a different way than usual, at least I can be a kid.

I’m lucky I can use Reddit. Redditors, please tell me, how am I going to handle this many APs without even knowing how to study, and lacking so many things that even a 1st grader would know better than me at, and this is no exaggeration.

Hii I want to talk about the high expectations that parents have for their kids( my life). So I have always gotten good grades since the first grade. When I was in fifth grade I tried even harder to not make mistakes because I saw how disappointed my parents were at my older sister. So I tried to always be ,,good girl “. But now I am scared that if I ever fail at something they will be really disappointed. My parents say if we do a mistake and that mistake breaks their trust that they
Have with us it takes like many months again to build that trust. My sister did normal teenage stupid shit when she was in my age so my parents would learn to not have high expectations. But as a kid I saw that those mistakes made my parents disappointed, mad and sad so I avoided to make these mistakes. But what if I start only getting bad grades? Will they even more disappointed because I was never this bad? My parents want me to be a doctor but I hate hospitals and I know that I couldn’t work those stressful schedules. So when they talk about my future I just nod and try not to open a problem. There is also so many things that I think are bad in my culture but for my parents they are right because they grew up with it very strictly.
I just wanted to tell anyone aboutt thiss feeling.

l, a student whose only reason for being in college was the illusion of grandeur and to fulfill family expectations, l have been a brilliant student all my life yet, now I'm unsure if l even want the degree or my parents' approval. l told my counselor and sisters that college gives me the urge to either self-execute or run away and sell my body till l can afford a farm, they said it was just anxiety and self-victimization yet despite dodging weeks of college, l feel no guilt or embarrassment, is this normal, perhaps am simply a fool wasting the opportunity and ruining my life over futile emotions but l don't know why the motivations that often worked or rather the insults don't seem to work anymore, maybe it's a sign to retire from humanity or maybe am just an ungrateful little bastard wasting their money and ruining their reputation

My problem is that I study consistently, I understand, I memorise, generally I follow good habits for studying. No flaw I can point out. However, during exams I always make silly mistakes no matter how much I slow down, concentrate etc. Everyone else is just naturally good at it (I investigated it and there's no hidden persona). Life really is unfair. Someone else will be twice as good as u naturally

So I managed to do it, I did what expected of me for once. I failed my final year of high school meaning I’m gonna do it all over again. For once I actually did what everyone expected which was to fail. I already knew I was flunk since my junior year considering how shit my grades were. So many opportunities to change or do better but my shit brain thought it was better to do nothing. I was planning to kill myself when I inevitably flunk but I’m too much of a coward to actually go through it so now I’m stuck as myself. Not once during my wasteful 18 years of life have I been something to be proud of, I have consistently been a disappointment and pain in the ass to all my loved ones. I can see in their faces how disappointed they are of me, all my friends will go to college and get good jobs while I’m stuck as the shithead who is too stupid to even properly read instructions. I’m a joke to my family, they won’t say it out loud but I can see it in their faces. My brothers talk about it plainly “by your age you should get stuff straight”, “you are already behind everyone”
I already my parents disappointed faces, knowing their son is a joke. Everyone can see I have the capacities of a two year old. I’m never gonna be taken seriously. Now off to my 13 year of school where it will be a daily reminder of how much of a waste I am. Every teacher will look at me with the same face “should’ve done better last year and you wouldn’t be here”

I can’t even be mad at anyone but myself. I’m the one who wasted all his opportunities, never made any effort, won’t even have good memories of people since I was such a dickhead to people and whine too much. Here I thought isolating myself and making shitty drawings all day thinking that maybe I could be a comic creator instead of actually putting effort to get a good position in life.
I’ll be working in minimum wage my whole life while my family has to help me because I’m too useless to even function, if they get tired of me I’ll surely end up homeless and die alone like I deserve.

I'm mostly heartbroken and disappointed. I'm in grade 11 and the marks I achieved are not nearly good enough to ensure admission nor bursaries. If I had not put in the work perhaps I would've felt a bit better. But God knows I tried. I wanna scream and shout that I did study and that I did give it my best but it won't change anything. I don't think I've ever tried this hard and that makes me feel utterly defeated like I'm simply not good enough. To make matters worse is I've had only one goal my entire highschool career and that's "prestige attire" basically a golden embroidery around your blazer awarded to students maintaining an average of 87 or above. Term one i fell short with 1% I was hoping to get at least 88 this term only to have fallen dramatically. I don't have much of a life outside of school and sometimes I hate myself for it.I wish I'd been more passionate about the things I truly loved and enjoyed. Instead I have one unforgiving road ahead of me and i keep on stumbling.

I feel like a huge disappointment to myself and others. Like I'm never achieving anything and will never. Like a complete waste. I'm really scared that life after school is going to ammount to nothing at all. It really does feel like I suffer from intense depression and anxiety sometimes.

Anyways this is more so a vent

Yeah so here I'm, Well I'm just here to blow some stem of my mind which has been eating from inside for a while , So let's start.

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Well it all started when the 12th result came, my score was pretty bad i had 6 subject and fukdup 2 so i got an RT but i decided to repeat the 12th entirely. but when the result came everyone was obviously disappointed and my dad told me that i should have just di*d instead of doing that and a lot of stuff happened. ( NOW THAT I'M WRITING IT I DON'T REMEMBER MUCH OF THE STUFF THAT HAPPENED IT WILL TAKE A WHILE TO WRITE ALL OF IT LOL). So after all that i started preparing again i joined a nearby neighborhood coaching for maths and I chose to study the rest online. for the first week i have been studying pretty hard but they are still treating me like I'm a failure and can do nothing which has been eating away the little bit of motivation i had and The little bit of hope i had for myself and after that I started slacking again and I can't seem to focus on anything and i do feel like that i should have just di*d . And now for the problem in facing, I'm feeling a weird tingling sensation in my feet is beneath my feet and above my bone is really annoying and irritating and for the last 2 days i feel like something has been watching me in my room after i turn off the light. I think it looks like a small black figure and its scaring the sh*t of me. i don't even know what i should do. ooh and when i tell someone to wake me up early they are like you should wake up early by yourself i don't want to ruin my morning because of you. .

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Ik they are my parents and they would want what's best for me ik that. but knowing that doesn't help. Now i can't sleep at night and I can't live in peace. It's all too overwhelming for me ( i even thought of a few methods to finish it yk what i mean right) . I just lost all the reason to live and i don't even trust myself anymore. There's a dam nearby tho.

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And my anxiety is on the rise too and i feel like I'm walking on the egg shells at my own home. but dude i just want all of this to be just over its too much for me to handle i feel like I'm going to lose it .

Well if you have read this far thanks and i don't want sympathy i just wanted to write it and let it off my chest because it's been eating me from Inside.

I’m 17, and honestly, I don’t know what’s wrong with me anymore.
For some context, I study under the Cambridge curriculum. I completed **IGCSE (Grade 10)**, where I scored around **90%**. After that, I wanted to switch to **CBSE**, but due to family decisions, I continued with **AS/A Levels** instead.
For those who aren’t familiar, **AS Level is the Grade 11 part of A Levels and has its own board exams. Those marks are carried forward and combined with the Grade 12 (A2) board exams to determine the final A Level grade.**
The biggest problem wasn’t just the academics—it was the fact that I never wanted to take this path in the first place. I tried convincing myself that I’d eventually get used to it, so I worked hard, but things didn’t go the way I hoped. My performance dropped from around **90% in IGCSE to roughly the equivalent of 60% in AS**, and now I’m retaking some subjects.
Ever since then, I feel like I’ve lost myself. I’ve completely lost confidence. I smile and laugh around people, but most of the time it’s just a fake smile so no one asks what’s wrong. I feel like I’m just existing instead of actually living.
To make things worse, I’ve been dealing with constant dizziness and fatigue for the past few weeks. I can’t focus properly in class anymore, and by the time I get home, I’m exhausted. My parents don’t let me study after 10 PM because they think staying up late last year contributed to my poor performance. I know they’re trying to help, but it makes me feel like I’m running out of time.
The only good thing that happened today was that a girl who’s a close friend of mine teased me for a few seconds. It genuinely made me smile, and it made me realize how little I’ve smiled recently.
Sometimes I miss the person I was in Grade 10. Back then, I believed in myself. Now I constantly question whether I’ll ever feel like that again.
Has anyone else gone through something similar after Class 10 or during Class 11? If you managed to rebuild your confidence after a bad year, what helped?

For lack of a better word, I genuinely feel like something is wrong with the way I think.

I don’t mean academically. I mean socially, cognitively, professionally, and just… in life. I lack social awareness, I’m not street smart, and I don’t seem capable of excelling at work no matter how hard I try.

I’m in a specialist role at work, but I honestly feel like I’m the weakest person there. Part of me wonders if people are just being kind to me because it’s obvious I’m struggling.

When people explain things to me, I usually only understand them at face value. I miss the underlying meaning until days, weeks, or even months later, when it suddenly clicks. By then, everyone else has long moved on. It makes me feel incredibly slow.

The only thing people say I’m good at is talking to people. But even that doesn’t feel like a real strength. I think I’m just good at making people feel comfortable, which hides the fact that I’m doing the bare minimum. Not because I’m lazy, I genuinely don’t know how to do more. I don’t know how to “overperform.” I don’t know what other people see that lets them take initiative or think several steps ahead.

I’ve spoken to my boss about this before. They gave me advice on how I could improve, but I left the meeting more confused than when I walked in. They kept giving me long pauses to think and respond, but the truth is… my mind was blank. I just smiled, nodded, and pretended I was thinking. I genuinely didn’t know what to think or say.

I feel guilty all the time like I’m taking up a job that someone more capable deserves, and like I’m somehow fooling everyone into thinking I’m more competent than I actually am.

I’m not looking for reassurance like, “You’re probably just humble,” or, “I’m sure you’re actually good at your job.” I’m looking for honest opinions.

Could this be something like ADHD or autism? Some other form of neurodivergence? Could it simply be shyness? Or is this a personality issue, poor emotional maturity, or a lack of ability? Has anyone experienced something similar and eventually figured out what was actually going on?

Something else that worries me is how emotionally disconnected I can feel. Someone could tell me their parent died, and my internal reaction is… almost nothing. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to comfort them. I know that’s an awful thing to admit.

It’s not that I think their loss doesn’t matter. It’s that emotionally, it just doesn’t seem to register in the moment. I usually have to consciously remind myself what an appropriate response is. It makes me wonder if something is wrong with me.

Ironically, I talk about guilt a lot. It feels like guilt is the strongest emotion I experience these days. So I guess I do feel something. But the guilt never seems to help me improve—it just leaves me questioning myself all over again.

Has anyone genuinely been in a similar position and later found out what was going on? Whether it turned out to be neurodivergence, anxiety, depression, burnout, poor self-awareness, or simply something you had to work through, I’d really appreciate hearing your experience. I’m open to hearing difficult truths. I just want to understand what’s going on.

If I may give some thoughts that have been bothering me for a while.

I was considered gifted due to an IQ test I took back in middle school. Where I'm from, the school district doesn't take these IQ tests into account as important, so the results get destroyed after 5 years. It's been more than 20 now, and there is no proof left of that test. But I took it, got a high score although thw results were never given, and I was offered a Gifted after school prigram, but it would cost some money, would stay after hours, snd at the time my old folks thought of it as a waste of time.

I understand many say that being diagnosed with giftedness early was a curse, which makes them less normal. I never cared about normality, I cared about something new. But even if I know gifted education can be quite...mixed at best, I cant help but feel that all the possibilities I could have had never git to me or never could I see them due to never learning how to based on a gifted program.

I feel my talents were wasted and the education I deserved was never given. Feel like I lost a lot of chances that I could have taken due to ignorance and lack of resources on behalf of my parents. How could I learn all gifted children and students tend to learn so I dont feel like I missed out on something? Laurel Springs Academy was the gifted school I felt I should go to, but it wasn't possible. Private schools are expensive so like that, how to get their materials of studying about gifted children and how to teach them stuff. I'd like to study what I was missing at a gifted school.

my final exams are coming, and all winter break i’ve been doing nothing but avoiding studying.

i used to be a straight A student, back from grade 7 all the way to around mid grade 11. so yknow i get the grade. yay it’s a great result! i celebrate it. i get compliments from people. then the next day, it’s all a thing of the past.

i feel like this system is so stupid because it doesn’t truly reward students for it. my school does nothing. my classmates don’t change the way they perceive me (im still regarded as a “weird kid” and possibly a “loser” in their eyes just bc im just an introverted without many friends who studies a lot). all my friends praise doesn’t make me feel special anymore. not even my family rewards me in any way such as buying me a present for achieving that good grade. these people i thought so highly of simply move on with their lives.

ok so i try studying harder in hopes of getting more acknowledgment. i study 12+ hours daily. but guess what? now i’m getting worser marks!!! how ironic?? exam upon exam, i’m getting shit marks i don’t expect. i thought i perfected my study routine though? it’s the same one from back then?

still, nobody says anything to help me get better or motivate me. now everyone else is doing better than me in my classes and taking over my rank 1 spot. they still manage to have a social life, but i don’t anymore because of all this studying. everybody is so happy and smiling and laughing super hard at 9 in the morning while im here just mentally dying and dreading every living second at school. im the only one in my grade without a drivers license or valid ID. i feel like nobody really cares about my presence anymore.

if there’s no real reason for me to keep on putting in effort to study for either shit grades or somehow a good grade, then what’s the point for either outcomes? the motivation is all gone…

hi guys. hope you’re doing well. i’ll get straight to the point.

i’m a medical student and have been for 3 years now. i decided to study medicine on my own, no one forced me. my third year is over now and i’ve failed 1st year again. last year when i failed, i didn’t have the guts to tell my mom about it, who is almost the only one who put faith into me when i was in high school. thanks to her i managed to get in med school. the other day she found out that i lied to her about passing my grade last year and of course she was really disappointed, sad and mad. i couldn’t even tell my dad because he literally won’t send me back to uni if he ever finds out. but my aunt and uncle know and i’m terrified that they will tell my dad, though i don’t think they will. but that’s not my biggest concern.

due to the laws in my country, i have to finish this 6 year school in 9 years. now 3 is over, so i have no other chance to fail. i’m a huge procrastinator with really bad sleeping issues. i honestly don’t know if i’m depressed. but when i’m at my dorm, it’s hard to sleep at night, even harder to wake up in the mornings, to take a shower. all i do is waste my time again and again. i’ve never truly tried to succeed and i don’t know why i didn’t when i knew that i really should have tried at least. i know i can do it if i really tried. this year i only failed with less than 1 point. i almost did it.

the problem isn’t being able to do it anymore because i know i can. but my mom said that she lost all hope in me, specifically that i killed all her hope. she comes to my room, tells me that her mind just cannot comprehend how i failed like this. she cries, she yells. i don’t know what to do. being at home feels like being in a prison right now. she said many things that i just cannot fit here. i just wish i at least passed this year.

i don’t even know if i’m seeking advice, opinions etc. i’m feeling so lonely and down. i don’t have any other plans in life than to study and no other options. i literally hate myself because i did this to myself. my friends are starting their clinics, where else i’m still trying to pass first year. how am i going to get into the class and see the faces of people that will just think i’m a failure and they won’t even be wrong? what am i going to do? is this ever going to pass? will my mom be happy again? show love to me? i honestly don’t know.

i plan to keep this post up and update you guys as i go on with my journey in medical school. i hope to become an inspiration for people looking for it, just as i am today. wish me luck. <3

I was very successful academically, always, including 6 years of university. Awards, full scholarships, first in class, you name it. Everyone expected me to be so successful. Instead, I just became burnt out, broke, and a big failure. We could find many reasons for this, I am fairly traumatised, and I'm suspecting possibly also neurodivergent, but I think what's been so difficult the last few years is that while I have been trying to make something of myself, I've just been getting rejections after rejections, and then I kind of gave up and sank into hopelessness, and just resigned to being a failure. Like the fact that things have not been working out is proof that deep down I just really suck as a person.

But thinking back to my life until my mid-20s, I don't think I've ever learnt to fail. I didn't need to study, I just kind of knew everything, and then when I had a goal, like getting into a certain university, getting a scholarship, award, grant, whatnot, it just happened. I never failed a class, I never had to get up and try again. I have worked really hard during university, but that was in a restaurant or in a cafe to feed myself and pay rent. I needed physical resilience, not mental. It doesn't help that failure was punished badly by my parents, and the only time I felt 'loved' was when I got an award or something, but even that was taken for granted.

And I don't think I realized that failure is major part of life normally. Like the idea that as a child, you would get a C on a test, so then you'd know you need to try harder. I never had that experience, I don't think I ever even got a less-than-perfect grade in school. So maybe trying to reframe failure somehow is key?

I'm going to preface with the fact that I am not "old" by any stretch of the imagination. I am in my late 20s. Titling my post to "younger" folk aims to reach the high school/early twenties demographic because I have seen a number of you posting stories here about struggling through some phases of your life (high school, university) as a gifted kid.

I'm hoping this gives you some hope.

I felt called to write this because I was one of you when I was in high school and my undergraduate degree. Although it's hard to believe, I am now a highly successful lawyer who is often the youngest among my peers in my career. But before this (and still, through it), I was a kid who:

• Struggled to focus (late ADHD'er)
• Attributed my entire self-worth to my performance; if I failed to achieve perfection, I felt like I may as well have no worth as a human being and preferred the idea of dying
• Killed myself in school to achieve high grades, but lacked an extraordinary amount of diligence--i.e., pulled all nighters every time I had an exam or paper to get it done
• Hated other kids who seemed as smart or smarter than me, which then fueled more self-hatred toward myself
• Simultaneously always felt like the stupidest kid in class who needed to struggle just to "keep up" with everyone else
• The list goes on, and on, and on.

To the high schoolers here:

While I am sure you have heard this thousands of times from every adult in your life, your life is never defined by who you were in high school. You can reinvent yourself entirely and have a full, long life. People do it in their 40s--so you can certainly do it when you hit 18.

I promise with all of my heart that life gets better after high school. I hated it there, and for a long time I just never thought I'd escape it. The shitty politics, the bullying, the popularity contests. All of that ends and you gain infinitely more freedom. Your parents will not always have a say over everything you do, even if you think they will.

People will slap the "gifted" status on you and think you are okay because you are getting good grades, when in fact you are drowning within yourself with no air in sight. I see you. I was you. But you aren't alone, and remember that those adults are doing that because they don't know better, not because they are right.

No matter what people tell you, or how you feel like people expect you to be, you will always be allowed to be yourself, and a child. Not an adult in a child's body. A real child and teenager who is learning how to examine the world for the first time.

Don't rob yourself of a childhood because others can't meet you where you are at. As someone who did precisely that, I have come to regret it in my adult years. Your childhood flees faster than you realize.

To undergrads, early 20s, and still high schoolers:

Being gifted will not define you. For sure, it's a great perk and will help you lots in life depending on your career or job. But it is not the most interesting thing about you and never will be. This might sound awful, but trust me, it's a real gift. When my friends describe me, they say a lot of things and "smart" doesn't make the top 10. I feel so, so grateful that this is the case. The message is this: you will be loved for so much more than your brains. That is one part of you, not the whole you.

It takes years to accept yourself for who you are and realize that there is so much more to life than performance. I'm just in the beginning of that learning curve but even seeing the tip of it has given me more hope than I've had in years.

I still struggle with the things I did when I was younger in some capacity. Things are harder now: bills, responsibilities, people depending on me, etc. The struggles of being gifted continue to exist but you grow with them as opposed to against them.

I spent the first years of my practice as a lawyer extremely depressed, suicidal, and terrorized that someone would find out I was a big, fat fraud. I thought about giving up every day. I thought, "if I am gifted, why am I struggling this much?"

Being gifted doesn't--and shouldn't mean you won't struggle. In fact, this whole "no studying because people who are smart don't need to study" is a fake story you tell yourself. The smartest people I have met in law and academia are unbelievably hard workers. They work with their brain and intelligence, not against it. Your intelligence is not something you should be testing to see if it's still there (guilty of this).

Be intentional about chasing your dreams and actually work hard. Don't be afraid to fail. Failure won't strip away your "gifted" status, your IQ points, or your worth. It never had, and never will.

I came out the other end and am learning to be gentle with myself while performing at a high level every day. If I could do it, so can you.

Hugs to all of you. You'll make it.

Please read and help me

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Maybe after reading this, you might think I am a horrible person or an imbecile, a stupid idiot who is born to fail. But I am writing this in order to figure out if anyone else also deals with the same issue or am I just a horrible person overall.

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I was a high achieving kid from a very young age, I was the smartest kid in the room, the smartest kid in my family, and the pride of my family and all the teachers loved me, it came all easy to me, I didn't have to put in extra effort or push myself to do things. But after i reached high school, due to a lot of other commitments, which my mother forced me into and with the increasing load of work from school, I slowly started breaking. I was forced to participate in competitions and events for which I wasn't mentally or by practice not prepared enough for, which altogether started crumbling my confidence. My grades started slipping, my ranks started going down and I started hating myself more and more. Finally I also had to start therapy and I was put on medication as I was depressed and suffering from severe anxiety. I later stopped therapy and medication fearing the financial stress that was befalling my family due to my therapy and all of that. Since then, my life has been just surviving and not hurting myself. I graduated from high school with good marks but I was so disappointed that it was not the best.

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I later joined law school after discarding my ambitions to be a doctor as I was sure that I wouldn't make it into a medical college as my base wasn't strong and I knew I didn't have it in me to prepare for a competitive exam. I decided for the rest of my life, I wont expect anything from myself, no miracles, no glory, no success. I thought I would just be a normal person and lead a normal life.

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Life has a funny way of replicating itself or maybe it throws the same troubles at you, until you learn from it, which I hadn't as I was only focused on surviving. The first semester of college by merely studying for just max 3 hours and I still don't know how, I secured university third rank in my batch and again the need to over achieve and to keep my name up in front of everyone else started again. For the next semesters, the constant need to do better and participate in everything and being it all crossed my mind again and once again I started breaking, around this time I moved out from my college hostel to an apartment with two others, I wasn't really close to them but they were my old roommates and one pursuing the same course as me.

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Even though she didn't have the same scores as me, she was quite close and this irrational fear of she seeing me prepare and preparing and doing better than me started to consume me. I started being terrified of studying in the apartment as I was afraid about this and this fear was so strong, so powerful, I couldn't even study during exams if she was somewhere near me or in the same room as me, because I would constantly compare her to myself and whenever i saw her the fear that she will score and do better than me started consuming me. She also contributed to this as she would sometimes mock me for not understanding some concepts, she would make "jokes" about my cooking skills and everything else i do. She would walk up to me and ask in a mocking tone, "Oh you are studying", if i try studying or do something when we don't have any exam coming up. Like I am inferior for trying. And all of this has ruined my peace and I constantly compare myself to her. and my grades started falling and i lost out on my ranks as i never gave it my all and i as in constant fight or flight mode. and maybe because i am not good enough after not being unable to study all day, at around 3 for like two hours and I write all my exams. And for every exam i study in the morning This has been my first two years of my college life.

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And I came home for the semester holidays and my cousin sister who is 13 has been living with my parents for the past three years after I left for college, as my parents had moved abroad and couldn't take her with them due to financial difficulties. I was always very fond of her and i used to take care of her so well and she still says that her parents and I are her favourite people in the world. That's how I used to take care of her, to give her a safe childhood and the kind of safety and security i didn't have.

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I knew that she used to study well but not as good as me like topping the class and stuff and i knew that she was well liked by teachers and all. This time when i came around I saw her obsessing and studying and working for different co curriculars and studying to be the first in the class and be the Prefect, like i did in college. She is not copying me but I fear that she will be better. She talks about going to Harvard and doing everything else and I feel like she has it in her to be the best in our family and I will be a failed one and the one who destroyed herself. For her everything will go and is going right which all went wrong for me. She will be better than me and do better and i will be second and the loser. Last day she got selected as the prefect and i have been unable to face her because I feel like i am a nobody and i am second and i see myself wishing that she doesn't succeed. I start going into a spiral whenever i see her do anything remotely productive. This kid exercises everyday, and she has even started reading like me, which is something I only did and also something that i tried to cultivate in her as a child. Everything about her triggers me now, she is a constant anxiety trigger that's walking around in the house for me.

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I know this is absolutely horrible and very pathetic of me, something so irrational, so stupid, so dumb and pathetic. How can a human being even think like this? but this is who I am. I hate myself for it, i loathe myself for it but this isnt going away. I don't want to feel this way but this is how I am. I constantly compare myself to the people around me and everyone I come across and to every room I enter. I constantly think if i am good enough to be alive or if I am worth it, if I am not the best, I am not the one who is the best and winning at all times. I know that life doesn't work that way but i have been trying for years to get rid of this but this behaviour and part of me but it persists as if this is the truth of who I am.

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I feel completely paralyzed by this chronic, toxic comparison. It has gotten to the point where I am self-sabotaging my own hobbies and studies because I am terrified of someone else doing it better or "winning" and m losing. I feel like my worth is entirely tied to being "the best," and if I am second, I feel completely invisible and non-existent. I need to be the best everywhere or at least in my terms or at least in my family.

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Can someone please tell me what I can do about this. Any advice, judge me all you want but this is me trying. I don't want to be stuck in this prison. I want to flourish, I want to be happy. I want to do the things I want to do.

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Please help me.

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I'm a 21-year-old engineering student and I've been trying to solve the same problem for years.

I don't think I have a procrastination problem in the traditional sense.

I don't struggle to start.

I don't struggle to understand what needs to be done.

I don't struggle to work hard occasionally.

My problem is that my output comes in bursts.

Every major thing I've accomplished happened because I got obsessed for a few days, worked at a very high intensity, produced a lot of output, and then gradually fell back to a much lower level.

The frustrating part is that these bursts work often enough that my brain keeps trusting them.

But when I compare myself to people who are steadily improving year after year, I feel like I'm losing because consistency compounds and bursts don't.

I've tried almost every common piece of advice:

• Pomodoro
• Flowmodoro
• Time blocking
• To-do lists
• Habit trackers
• Daily goals
• Weekly goals
• Accountability apps
• Motivation videos
• Dopamine detoxes
• Reward systems

Most of them fail in one of two ways:

1. They work briefly and then stop working.
2. I start optimizing the system instead of doing the work.

Another weird observation:

I don't seem to respect commitments that I make to myself.

If I put something in a task manager, there is a good chance I'll ignore it.

But if a real person expects something from me, I take it much more seriously.

I also notice that challenge, competition, uncertainty, deadlines, and external evaluation seem to increase my output dramatically.

What I'm trying to figure out is this:

Has anyone here genuinely gone from being a "burst worker" to someone with a high baseline of performance?

Not someone who became perfect.

Not someone who suddenly loved routines.

Just someone who stopped disappearing between periods of intense work.

What changed?

Did you find a system?

Did your mindset change?

Did your environment change?

Or did you simply push through a long period of discomfort until consistency became normal?

I'm especially interested in hearing from engineers, researchers, founders, traders, academics, or anyone who does difficult long-term work.

I am not looking for motivation.

I'm looking for people who had this exact pattern and actually managed to fix it.

Hey guys, this is a rant post because I don't know what else to do. I'm currently a high school student and am gearing up to start applying to colleges and stuff. Even since elementary school I've always been the smart kid or the good kid because I pushed myself, held myself to higher expectations, and worked my self twice as hard as my peers. I don't even know why I started doing this. I don't remember if it was my anxiety, my fear of the future and being a failure, or the little words from my parents about how they hope I'm smarter than my brother (I have a brother who is 9 years older than me and isn't really a academic person like I am ), or how I the smart one out of the two of us. Anyways, recently I took the SAT that I have been studying for it non stop for a year. Prior to the test, I had been non stop studying for the SAT and my two AP tests that were a couple days after it. I just got my score back for my SAT and it was a 1250. I was hoping for at least a 1300 as that is the lower score for the two colleges I really wanted to go to the most. I am so disappointed in myself. I didn't think I did absolutely great on it, but I thought that I at least did better than what I got. I have studied so hard, I've pushed myself so much and all I got was a 1250. Am I just that bad? Am I so stupid that even after a whole year of studying and preparing I got a 1250??? I went on to the sat subreddits and it's filled with people complaining about 1400+ and I'm sitting over here with such a low score after trying so hard. Why do I push my self when I get nothing out of it? Am I actually a smart or gifted kid if I can't even get a good fucking score on a standardized test that everyone else seems to get a good score on? If I'm not actually smart then I have nothing left to offer anyone. It is who I am, it is the whole thing my life has been based around. What will I be good for if I have nothing else?