Using your weirdness as strength

I'm so right-brained that I had to learn to visualize math so that it makes sense. So I taught myself to do algebra from the equal-sign out and only had to go in front of the class once--ain't nobody else knows what's going on with that.

I think in branches, like lightning, so making up stories is easy--but following linear plots is hard. So I write multilayered stories and I help other writers by editing for structure and noting where they can add branches in. And I was a good game editor because I could hold all those branching narratives in my head at once.

I'm shy and introverted (they're not the same but tend to go together), so I watch and listen and know a lot of things other people don't, so I also do fact checking and I like telling people about stuff and sharing what I find.

Which is to say, these things that people will tell you make you weird--an inability to do math normally, nonlinear thinking, introversion--are not really problems if you own them and noodle around with them. There's always a way to make it into a strength. There's always a use, or you wouldn't have that thing.

Everything is an adaptation, and a tool to be used. Everything is a gift at some other angle.

Let's find out what our gifts are.