DifferentBy Design!by

Sharon M. Barnes, MSSW, LCSWCreative Transformation Specialist

Phone: 303-987-0346

email to: Sharon@AcademyofCreativeLiving.com

www.GiftedTherapyDenver.com

Encouraging

Gifted Students:

“Finding the

Magic in Being a

MisFit”

Sharon M. Barnes, MSSW,LCSW

AKA the ScrapLady

Creative Transformation Specialist

MSSW, (San Diego State)

LCSW- CO

AKA the Scrap Lady: I help You

Create Success from Life’s Scraps

Creative Healing Presentations, PlayShops

& Retreats

Creative Healing & Creative Transformation

counseling & psychotherapy

Guide to the Gifted

I’ll Guide You through the Wilderness of

Inner Territory to Destinations of Delight!

Encouraging Gifted Students: “Finding the Magic in Being a MisFit”

Different by

DesignFiction:

Giftedness = (unfair) advantage

Gifted = Different = Deficient, Defective, Inferior

Truth:

Gifted = Different by Design

“Magic” can be hidden inside the experience of being a MisFit

What’s Going On?

High intelligence often combines

with

Asynchronous development

Intensity

Sensitivity

Complexity

Overexcitability

Dumbing Down

Wasted Potential

Inner Dissonance →

↑Vulnerability → Different = Inferior

Different = Inadequate

Different = Defective

Different = MisFit

Social isolation

Alienation

.

I feel like an alien

from another

planet

I feel like an

outcast

MisFits Come in Many Forms

Good Gifts Gone Bad

Bullying

Copping out, Dropping out

Under-Achievement

School drop-outs

Teen Suicide

Violence

Deviance & Violence

Under it all: A Need to Belong

Magical MisFits

?

Gifted = CASIGY

Creative

Acutely Aware

Super-Sensitive

Intense, often Introverted

Gifted

You!

o First to raise my hand

o Last to be called on

o Last & worst on the

playground

o “What’s wrong with

me?”

o Cold War Era

o Air raid drills

o McCarthyism

o Bomb Shelters

o Night storm

o Lightning hit

tree

o Tangled in

covers

o No one came

when I called

o “Something’s

wrong with

Different By

Design!

Who Am

I?

Meet our Mascot!

o He had a RED NOSE; others’

noses were black

o He was ridiculed

o He was excluded

o He was shunned

o He was shamed

o He was ostracized

o He was banished into exile

o All because of his RED NOSE

o He ‘Saved the Day’ for everyone

o Also because of his RED NOSE

The Cycle of CASIGY Discouragement:

• 2• 3

• 1• 4

ReturnRed Nose: MisFit

Out- casteExile

How to Identify

CASIGY Discouragement

SAD CASIGYs

Super-sensitivity

Anxiety

Depression

CASIGY Underachievement

↓ or ↑ sleep

↓ or ↑ appetite

Exaggerated reactions of any

kind

The Cycle of Recovery:

Finding the Magic in Being a MisFit

Antidotes

to CASIGY Discouragement

Bonus Tip!

What is the most powerful, yet hidden tool that parents and

teachers have to help CASIGY kids and teens deal with their

discouragement?

It’s the most natural way we all learn

It takes one to know one

You can't lead someone

where you are not willing

or able to go

The most powerful influence on the child is the

unlived life of the parent/teacher (Jung)

Use these tools for yourself first, then pass them

along

Antidotes to CASIGY Discouragement

Antidote # 1: Creative Coping

• 2• 3

• 1• 4Creative Coping

What else doesn’t work: “F’in” your way

Fake it

Fight it

Flee it

Flood it

Force it

What works: EEEEK your way through

Experience it (Coping)

Explore it (Coping)

Express it (Coping, Healing)

Embrace it (Healing)

Extract Benefit (Transformation)

Kreate a demonstration of it (Transformation)

EEEEK Your Way through Tough Times

CASIGY Tool Box: Coping Tools

Experience it

What you FEEL You Can HEAL (Gray)

Catch & Release Breathing

Explore it Stop, Look & Listen

Daily TNT (Tune iN Tool)

What’s Happening?

How am I feeling?

Express it Let your experience and your feelings out

Help something other than your body be the container for all of this emotional and psychic material

o #1 CASIGY Coping Tool: Breatheo Belly Breathing

o Catch & Release Breathing

o Relaxation/De-escalation Breathing

CASIGY Tool Box:

1. Breathe

CASIGY Tool Box: Tools for

Parents & Teachers of CASIGY

Students

Misbehavior = attempt to communicate needs

How to Know the Real Need:

Your own emotional reaction → Real Issue

Real Issue → Hidden Need

Hidden Need → Effective Intervention

Antidotes to CASIGY Discouragement

Antidote #2: Creative Healing

• 2• 3

• 1• 4Creative Coping

Creative Healing

Creative Healing

Creative Healing is needed when

o Hurts or emotional wounds are present

o Emotions are complex, conflicting and changing, like

cross currents, rip tides, & undertows in ocean

waves

Creative Healing involves Composting

Transforms negative into positive energy

Nature’s original recycling project

Manure becomes fertilizer─nature’s best

What in your life needs fertilizer?

Do you already have the raw materials?

Creative Healing CASIGY ToolBox:

Embrace it

Shovel it

Pick it up

Turn it over repeatedly, periodically

Extract Benefit from it

Connect with it through your senses

Limbic system assigns meaning

Kreate a Demonstration of it

Allow your hands to work with it

symbolically

What is implicit becomes explicit

Mind, body, soul & spirit become

healed, connected and integrated

Antidotes to CASIGY Discouragement

Antidote #3 Creative Transformation

• 2• 3

• 1• 4Creative Coping

Creative Healing

Creative

Transfor-mation

Creative Transformation

o Creative Healing targets your inner

wounds-what happened to you

o Creative Transformation targets your

Self-who you are

o As you continue to work with the

images revealed in the tangible

materials,

o The internal meaning changes

o Your Self is transformed.

o You are Set FREEMy Life’s Gone Up in Smoke

Nourish the Fire Within

1.Create

2.Contemplate

3. Crystallize

o Let’s Do It!

My Heart’s On Fire

4. Creative Contribution

• 2• 3

• 1• 4Creativ

e Contri-bution

Creative Coping

Creative Healing

Creative

Transfor-mation

Creative Contribution

To transform your RED NOSE

from a liability into an asset -

find the Gift hidden inside

your Red NOSE that

taps the depths of your CASIGY

uniqueness

develops all your CASIGY

abilities

Makes You COME ALIVE when

you do it

meets a need in those around

you

answers the call of your Destiny

Creative Contribution

Use your RED NOSE to “save the day”

Have the courage to return from exile

Have the heart to help (even) those who have hurt

you

Have the resolve to keep going through the tough

times

Have the love to fulfill your Destiny-to meet the

need that only you can meet

Have the faith to follow the Still, Small Voice

Have the creativity to be unconventional

Have the authenticity to BE YOU!

Your Personal Pilgrimage

o Personal = Universal

o RED NOSE = Call

o Creative Awareness

o Creative Coping

o Creative Healing

o Creative Transformation

o Creative Contribution

Thank You!