STIQS stands for Strengths, Temperament, Intellect, Quirks, and Story. This theoretical framework explains how I see the difference between what makes us excellent and what makes us exceptional. It emerged from my work understanding how both nearly normal and neurodivergent brains, including my own, process and interact with the world in our own unique ways.

Your Stack of STIQS is uniquely yours. You do not choose all the capacities and circumstances you begin with, but your Story includes what you learn and experience. The Chooser gets to choose from what is visible and available in the moment. First establish whether the choice is yours to make. You can then consider whether to carry your STIQS like a burden, a heavy weight strapped to your back, or to ignite them and use the light and energy they create to illuminate things in the way that only you can.

Your Story belongs in the stack. The relationships, circumstances, instruction, and experiences through which you developed help explain how your strengths show up in your life.

We can either carry our STIQS as burdens on our backs or toss them into what I call the cosmic bonfire - where they combine with others' STIQS to create energy and light. When analytical strengths meet creative traits, when systematic processing meets intuitive thinking, we can achieve things none of us could alone.

It requires an Empire of Empathy - gathering perspectives from others who can see aspects of ourselves that we can't. These outside viewpoints help us understand how our STIQS manifest in ways we might not recognize.

The goal isn't to build a "better" Stack of STIQS - it's to understand and work with the one you have. Your quirks aren't flaws to be fixed but features to be leveraged. Your idiosyncrasies aren't problems to be solved but tools to be utilized. What looks like chaos in one person might be their most efficient state. What presents as attention to detail in one might manifest as analysis paralysis in another.

When we understand our Stack of STIQS, we can create environments where these elements work together optimally. Instead of forcing ourselves into someone else's mold, we can develop systems that work with our natural tendencies rather than against them.

Throughout the past years of caregiving, I witnessed how my capacities, experience, and circumstances came together. These observations are part of my Story.

Processing and advocacy: the ability to process complex medical information rapidly, to communicate effectively with healthcare providers, to advocate fiercely when necessary. These weren't new capabilities I developed under pressure; they were fundamental parts of who I've always been.

Analysis and resilience: the analytical mind that could track medications and symptoms, the emotional resilience that allowed me to be present while maintaining clarity, the stubborn determination that kept me going when exhaustion set in.

Attention to detail: the obsessive attention to detail that others might view as excessive but ensured nothing was missed, the need to understand every aspect of her care that some might see as controlling but guaranteed she received exactly what she needed especially when her voice was gone.

Patterns and focus: the ability to hyperfocus for extended periods, the tendency to process information through patterns and connections, the capacity to function on minimal sleep when necessary. The ability to be so completely in the moment that everything outside of that hospital room disappeared. The reality that once I crashed it would be completely but until that point, I was on.

Knowledge and experience: both learned and innate, from medical knowledge accumulated through years of curiosity to the intuitive understanding of what she needed even when she couldn't express it.

The crisis brought these capacities into view. My Story—the knowledge I had accumulated, the people who had taught me, and the caregiving circumstances—was part of how they came together.

Understanding your Stack of STIQS is the first step toward conscious choice:

Will you carry these elements as burdens, or will you throw them into the cosmic bonfire where they can light the way for both you and others?