I dissected and studied human brains in my studies to become a doctor; every brain I saw was pinkish gray guishy stuff. None of the brains had a little talking person or movie screen. The inside of the brains were all pinkish, gray guishy stuff.
I suggest the notion of “measured intelligence”, like IQ, may be way off base. A scientist who studies birds, speaking on this subject insisted that “intelligence” is not descriptive of animals. She said all creatures have “environmental adaptability” and then we attempt to classify each animal by our observations of this “environmental adaptability”. Then we call it “intelligence”. We do the same kind of labeling with our children and they live out their labels. Our children get wrapped in a prison of descriptive labels. And so do we.
My gray guishy stuff was programmed at an early age by my environment. That programing overrode my natural five senses when I forced myself to choke down cigarette smoke and abuse alcohol. Which I soon learned to love.
My grades in high school were almost a C average. I knew I did not have much “intelligence” for school. The “environmental adaptability” of me growing up was mostly trying to survive my environment. Doing homework did not occur to me to be of any value. I did develop some other great skills though. I could build and repair automobiles, use construction power tools and hunt and fish. In school I learned to cheat, lie, withhold and not get embarrassed too bad. Not being of college material I enlisted in the Marine Corps.
I heard a person labeled with a genius IQ say the IQ label was simply a measurement of the speed of the processor, it had nothing to do with the quality of the information. Some of us process faster than others and we get labeled with a number. This number has nothing to do with being “bright” or not. Being “bright” is about the light of life enlightening us and those around us. It is not necessarily about doing advanced math. Our labels become a kind of personal prison of our expression.
I don’t think I am unique in this kind of labeling imprisonment.
I continued to abuse alcohol, smoke cigarettes, do recreational drugs and pretty much dull my senses and feelings because everyone else was doing this wherever I looked. I accepted that Wonder Bread builds bodies 12 Ways, Winston Taste Good Like a Cigarette Should, Light Beer was somehow better for you and that you could not smell Vodka on your breath.
I was adapting to my labels.
Hellerwork and Chiropractic began introducing me to my body and feelings. Never did my body like nicotine, marijuana or even alcohol abuse. My body seemed to like the short-term effects of these substances but in the long run my body does not like to be dulled or damaged, especially in the mornings.
At age 40 I gave up abusing alcohol and drugs and began to appreciate the wisdom of my body. Letting go of these and the nicotine was not easy at all, however I stuck with it.
When I went back to Chiropractic school in my 40’s I graduated with honors and did very well, I followed directions, asked for help and did the homework. Go figure, it was easy.
My gray guishy stuff forgot that it was supposed to be “less than average”. I think we are all capable of learning anything that we put our minds to. Each of us is capable of learning anything with persistence and confidence.
We can adapt to different environments.
And each of us are “Genius” in our own unique ways that we have adapted to our environments.
