Over the course of the past couple of years, I’ve learned to identify myself as a multipotentialite. I’ve known since my childhood that I was different from most people in that I had an insanely varied and ever-changing range of interests, but I never knew how to explain why.
Reading recent books like Refuse to Choose and regular psychotherapy has helped me understand my characteristics better.
There were many times why I wondered what was wrong with me for always having too many things I wanted to do and seemingly never going to the very end in any project I undertook. There seemed to be some hidden finish line where my heart would suddenly decide that I’ve done enough of this thing and it’s time to move on to the next. My heart and my mind used to be at odds as I would interpret this as a failure and struggle to understand why I’m finding it so hard to continue investing time and energy into something I was obsessed about just a few months ago.
In the light of multipotentiality, this all makes sense, so here’s some more information about multipotentialites, scanners, or renaissance souls; all these terms refer to the same kind of person.
Typical multipotentialite traits:
- Have an unusually wide range of interests and a low tolerance for boredom
- Change jobs, careers and/or fields of study more often than most
- Follow their energy and inspiration more easily than a schedule or calendar
- Either have lots of diverse projects on the go at once, or bury themselves in one project until they lose interest and move on to something different
- Are better at starting projects than finishing them
- Prefer variety rather than concentrating on one single thing
- Will lose interest in a topic or task when they’ve learned what they wanted to know or achieved a particular goal
- When they reach a goal or level of success, they decide to change to something different, rather than going deeper into the same subject or project
Do you identify with the above? It can be a revelatory moment to understand that you’re not alone and there’s nothing wrong with you. I highly suggest working with a psychotherapist once you’ve identified as a multipotentialite, so you can get past any negative emotional feelings about yourself and flourish.
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