Discovering Your Giftedness
A Step-By-Step Guide
Looking for Your Pattern
Remember that there are two steps to the giftedness discovery process:
(1) Tell Some Stories
(2) Look For a Pattern
You’ve told eight Giftedness Stories to your partner. Now it’s time to look for a unique pattern of behavior and motivation that your stories reveal.
What Do We Mean By a Pattern?
A pattern is something that repeats itself on a fairly consistent basis. See if you can find a pattern in the following series of statements:
Story 1: “I fed my hamster every day. I’d come home from school and get her dish and put food in it. I also refreshed the water bottle twice a week.”
Story 2: “The dog had ticks and he was miserable! The vet gave him a shot to kill the ticks that were embedded in his skin, but he showed us how to pick off the ticks that were still on the surface, so that we could keep an eye out for any new ticks. Every afternoon I looked Blue over and picked any ticks I found off of him. Eventually they were all gone.”
Story 3: “With Dad’s arm in a sling, it became my job to service the tractor. I used a grease gun to lubricate the bearings, and since it leaked oil a lot, I had to check that almost every other day.”
Story 4: “The hogs were ugly and smelly, but they were smart. They figured out what time of day I was going to feed them and where I was going to deliver the food. “
Story 5: “My unit was out on security detail in a village near Baghdad when we came under enemy fire. It wasn’t anything too heavy, but a bullet’s a bullet. We took our positions and fired back. Right in the middle of the firefight, a dog comes wandering across the street. Shots were firing every which way. I just knew that dog was going to get hurt. But somehow he made it to a porch right next to where I was crouching. I waited until the heaviest part of the fire, because that’s when I knew the enemy’s attention would be the least focused on the dog, and I popped up and grabbed him and pulled him to safety.”
Story 6: “She was screaming at me. Honestly, she was outright cussing at me. I knew she was doing everything she could to hold on until that that baby was ready to come out. I just stroked her hair and said, ‘Baby, I’m not going anywhere. I’m right here with you. You’re doing great. We’re almost there. Keep pushing.’ You know, I was just trying to coach her a little bit through the delivery.”
Story 7: “Yeah, the kids loved that horseback ride. I led them up to the top of Devil’s Head, and we could look out for miles and miles. Jenny took a picture with her iPhone, and when we got back I sat down with her and we made up a song about our ride to the top of the world.”
Story 8: “All of us on the team were there. It was a nice place for an executive retreat. We were all sitting in this big room that had a fire pit and sofas, waiting for the facilitator. Then all of a sudden this little deer comes bolting into the room! I have no idea how he got in, but he was obviously scared and lost. He was crashing around. Everybody started yelling and diving and trying to get out of the way. That’s when I stood up and made myself real big and spoke calmly to it, ‘Whoa! Whoa!’ It stopped and looked at me, and then as if someone had flipped a switch, it just calmly turned around and left. Craziest thing I’ve ever seen in my life!”
What keeps showing up in these stories? Animals. In Stories 1, 2, 4, 5, and 8, the storyteller is directly working with animals. That’s at least 5 stories out of 8. And Story 7 involves horses, even though the story is about the storyteller’s interaction with his kids.
That’s what we call a pattern. When an element repeats throughout a series of stories, it shows a pattern. What can we conclude from the pattern in this person’s stories? That he clearly has a knack for animals.
Your Pattern
The Giftedness Stories you’ve told your partner will reveal elements of your pattern of behavior. To find them, you need to analyze your stories. There are two steps to doing that:
First, you must sort out the details of each story.
Then you must examine the details to see which of them repeat and recur throughout the stories.