Even though I knew from intelligence tests that I had an above average IQ, I never fully realised that I also had a hypersensitivity. While this isn’t necessarily the case I was fortunate enough to be an excellent student, getting good grades with hardly any learning. Yet as a kid I was feeling different and had difficulty to be part of the cool guys. Later on I had difficulty to focus not because I wasn’t able to focus yet because I was following 3 conversations at the time. Also I was constantly getting a signal overload i.e. when making a presentation in front of a large audience I was scanning the facial reaction of all participants while talking and trying to adapt my message on the flow, which obviously turned out to be a total disaster.

The analogy between Zebra’s and high potentials relies on the following characteristics: firstly every Zebra is unique either through its stripe pattern or by the specific expression of your combination of intelligence and sensitivity. Secondly Zebra’s tend to be very strong animals or characters not being easy to tame in contrast to plain horses or donkeys. Last but not least the Zebra animal has a strong capability to adapt and resist both predators,  harmful insects and heat whereas the brain of a Zebra person is always in alert, constantly scanning for all kinds of signals, good or bad.

While I won’t go any further into any theoretical details my aim is simply to learn you how to deal with it and more importantly how to use your unique combination of skills as a true differentiator. Rather than being an unknowingly victim, you have all it takes to be an Olympic athlete.

Simply knowing that you’re not alone (which you never are by the way) and able to put a word on your feelings has been a great comfort to me. It largely helped me to recognise myself, as sort of the last piece of a very large living puzzle.

Certainly there are already thousands of coaches out there, psychology courses seem to be the hype of the decade, countless books have been written about the subject and yet here I am trying to find my spot in this crowded place. While I’m not even pretending to have followed a prime education at one of the major schools, I feel like I’ve got a story to share which can prevent others from making the same mistakes. My primary motivation for coaching is to do something that makes sense and create a real impact.

Through real life stories I strongly believe I can give some very practical advice to find your sweet spot. Some private examples which we can elaborate more in a first intake are the following:

• Making the right choice about what company is good for you as the grass is never greener on the other side.
• Dealing with unfair competition and jealousy at work.
• Overcoming your fear to fail.
• Mastering major setbacks i.e. loosing your job.
• Getting back from both burn and bore-out etc…

Hope to explore some of your blind spots and let you discover both stunning scenery as well as yourself.

Your hiking coach

Yves