For those of you who do not know me, this is the time of year I attend to my annual ritual of a solitary retreat, taking my tent camper to an empty state park campground for the week. When I arrive late on Labor Day Monday, the campers are gone, the dumpsters are spilling over with trash, and only raccoons or cats scavenging for food can be seen in the campground.

A friend of mine remarked, “How can you spend a week by yourself? The most I have ever done is one day.”

After spending the mornings meditating and writing in the retreat journal, it is time to take a 3 hour hike on trails through woods and steep terrain. After an early dinner, I settle by the campfire or the river to read until dark, then retiring to sleep until the herons awaken me. (When I say dark, I mean dark, -- moonless, no electricity, stars only, dark. )

The retreat is an annual ritual; a time without human contact, a time to read, write and reflect on the life I have watched and lived over the past year.

“The life which is unexamined is not worth living.” Plato noted a few years ago.

Listening to the inner dialogue on retreat helps me find meaning in this life.

What are the characteristics of creative couples?


Periodically, I find in my practice, couples who consist of two people, each gifted in their own way in some physical, spiritual, psychological or creative way, who managed to find each other. While not totally rare, it is uncommon.
Over the past two decades, as my brain does its pattern recognition, I begin to build my own list of characteristics for "these couples" (I don't really know what to call them). In these next few blog posts, I want to begin to describe these creative couples; their characteristics, how they meet, their early relationship, and their relationship style.


CHARACTERISTICS: Here is a list of some common traits shared by these couples.

- each of the persons seems to have been on their own sojourn, or journey, often feeling that they a bit of a wanderer on some solo sojourn, searching for someplace, or person.

- each of the persons often is involved in their own spiritual or creative development; often having some form of regular ritual.

- at least one the persons, usually has had the experience of being the one that is estranged, different, "orphaned", or in some respects, separate from others in their family of origin.

- usually, at least one and sometimes, both of their lines of psychological, or career development is nontraditional, often being different from that of others within the family.

- developmentally, one or both of them have a relatively androgynous personality, that is, having interests and abilities that range along a broad continuum of characteristics we traditionally ascribe as either masculine or feminine.

- for one, or both, it is a subsequent marriage/partnership. It is rare for both parties to have this is their first marriage or partnership arrangement.

- significant age differential between the two parties is not uncommon; in fact, more likely to be the rule than the exception, with 7 to 14 years being the most common age span.

- couples of this nature, carry with them an energetic, auric field around the two of them that is noticeable whenever they appear at social functions. Their presence, or absence, is noticeable. They bring a noticeable energy to the group by their shared presence; an energy that neither of them brings on their own.

Next: How do they find each other? What is the early part of the relationship like for them? How do they keep their relationship vital?

Intensity, Complexity, and Drive are three primary words attributed to gifted adults in Mary-Elaine Jacobsen's The Gifted Adult, one of the most readable of all books on giftedness. Her extensive research also uncovers an additional element in all gifted individuals, children and adults: Altruism. Altruism, a kind of humanitarian vision along with a sense of Mandated Mission in life that is not taught to the individual but seemingly inherent in their temperament or DNA.

Living with Intensity by Susan Daniels, PhD is a compilation of 15 chapters of perhaps the most detailed and technically written research on giftedness, detailing the best of the best research in the past decade.

Three words emerge from these researchers; Intensity, Sensitivity, and Excitability. The researchers explore not only intensity but the emotional sensitivity and excitability or (inspire-ability) of artists.

Painter Amanda Dunbar: "Artists are inherently sensitive and emotional creatures. This is compounded when that artist is in childhood or adolescence. The very characteristics that are needed to create art can make hurtful issues even more difficult to deal with... As I mature, I am becoming more and more grateful for my earlier difficulties and challenges they give me a clear vision and a foundation to stand on in regard to who I am as a person and who I am as an artist."

The author of Gifted Grownups: The Mixed Blessings of Extraordinary Potential", Marylou Kelly Streznewski notes that while many gifted adults make outstanding contributions to society but "there are large numbers of frustrated gifted adults who do not find outlets for their potential. The author looks at a number of issues that affect how people realize accounts or fail to do so.

If you grew up feeling different from others in your family, or your classmates, it may be because you ARE different. Reviewing any of these three books will help you understand the ways in which "being different” can be a challenge as well as a gift. The authors help find ways to make the best use of what you have been given.

Streznewski comments, "One of the biggest aspects of it is to convince yourself that you are entitled to this, that your creativity is important... I was well into my 30s before I gave myself permission."


It is never too late.

Soon: Gifted Couples

In my conversations with gifted adults, often their focus is on what they have not yet mastered, not on what their giftedness has brought them. They recognize that they have an intelligence most around them do not possess, or a knowledge base others do not have, or a view of the world that others do not share.


That they cannot easily have a dialogue with others concerning their world view, breeds a sense of loneliness, and frustration and futility. The lack of a relationship they see ‘ordinary people’ taking for granted almost angers them. For the first time, they bump up against something that they, of themselves, cannot master. The sense of powerlessness is unnatural.


Their sense of the relationship challenge is not unlike couples with infertility issues seeing “‘everyone else is pregnant”.


“If it’s up to me, I can make it happen.” is usually the mantra of the gifted adult. But in the matter of relationships, one person, no matter how gifted, cannot make it happen.


The solitude and aloneness breeds sense of isolation, alienation, and loneliness. A low grade depression creeps into their lives, leaving them often in a state of edginess in their social relationships, or on the verge of tears in their solitude. It is this uncomfortable emotional dilemma that often drives them to seek therapy.


A part of my job as a therapist is to help them understand who they truly are; all of the advantages, and the disadvantages they have. I also want to give them some understanding of the statistically minority of which they are a part that makes communication and relationships challenging for them.


Three books, published in the past decade, more than others I have been able to locate give some of the best findings of research into the characteristics of giftedness of adults and children. In the next post, I will cover the key concepts of these three books.


What is this Giftedness about?” Parents and gifted adults often ask. “Is it just that we now have better ways of measuring and identifying it?”


My response is most generally along the following: Giftedness is a part of an evolutionary trend that we will soon more clearly identify, and that will someday demand a different way of educating our children to not just memorize facts, but to use their minds in a truly creative, imaginative way to make their lives and the world a better place.

Another response has come from someone who read over my blog posts on Zentangle and has seen my crosstrainer shoes asking, “What's the difference between the Zentangles and my doodles? I've been doodling all of my life."   It's an honest questioning from someone who wants to know.   

I often respond with, "Is your work teachable? Can you teach others to do what you do?"
At that point, I find myself in a mini-lecture with this analogy to music.


The 102 “tangles” are a form of standardized notation, much as in music, that students first learn to master. Each Certified Zentangle Teacher learns to master these 102 tangles so as to be able to teach students to make art in the first two classroom hours. Standardized tangles make classroom instruction possible. The students soon learn to recognize these tangles in a complex looking piece of art the way musicians recognize chord structure in someone else's music.


Yes, there are gifted artists who paint well without lessons, or gifted musicians who can write and play songs without reading music. But they have no method for teaching students their craft.


My father grew up in an Amish home where musical instruments were forbidden. While I was yet in grade school, I would see him bring home from his monthly excursions to the local auction barn keyboard musical instruments; a bellows organ, an upright piano, or several accordions. I would marvel as in a few minutes he could teach himself to play familiar hymns as the family sang along. His method of teaching me to solve any problem was, “If you just look at it long enough, it will come to you."  My brain was not wired like his.  I never learned to play “by ear.”


For certain gifted people no lessons are necessary to create art; not so for the general population. We need a way of learning to make art we enjoy. Zentangle makes that possible for us “one stroke at a time.”