That is to say, I fucking hate having to say "no" every time (and it happens at least once every couple weeks) I am asked if or where I played basketball.
I'm also somewhere around 3 std dev above average IQ (mid 130s if I look at SAT equivalents, ~150 if GRE) and experienced the "but you're so good at school, why don't you like it" stuff.
In both cases, physical and... mental feels wrong, but it's the best word I've got, I feel as though I have wasted huge gifts. I don't take solace in any of it.
And since I'm full of anecdotes tonight, your bullying comment made me remember another. I had a target on my back for bullying due to my size I believe, everyone wanted to take a shot. I once got gang tackled by about 5/6 football players when I was 16 - the resultant slamming of my right knee into the tile floor means it will be my "trick" knee for the rest of my life. So, the size didn't give me a pass - if anything it made me stand out more. YMMV and all that.
A lot of people will just stream their consciousness in the case that they observe a trait that they wish they had. It's a projection, but it's also a tell.
Is it the anxiety that makes you feel wrong for receiving compliments?
Why? Why to do you think this? Could you provide your sources. Here's a source for the opposite: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/06/the-s-...
If you excel in any other trait, people will acknowledge it and praise you for it, especially visual traits. Beauty, height, strength, speed, endurance, etc. Intelligence, by contrast, is rarely acknowledged. It's not as easily discerned. Confidence is an important part of achieving your best potential. Learning to accept compliments with grace is an important skill for life. Giving yourself such compliments is even more important.
Obviously smart people need to understand that their intelligence does not protect them from being wrong or delusional or failure. That's an important part of growing up and maturing for any human though.
But you know, we do this too with other natural gifts. My exceptionally tall friends were constantly encouraged to enter sports like basketball. Tall people are built up emotionally through compliments that they receive on a daily basis from people. I would say it's not necessarily bad to compliment smart people for being smart.
I was a short scrawny kid growing up and I was bullied but I definitely took solace in the fact that I had a higher IQ than most people.