Does having a high IQ have any downsides?

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Yes.

My brother has a very high IQ. I don’t want to say what it is but it’s absurdly high. He used to beat adults at chess when he was a child, and he’d take electronics apart and put them back together again before he even started school. He is gifted in math and science but is also a critical and creative thinker.

He has struggled with chronic depression and alcoholism most of his adult life. He stopped drinking but now he smokes cannabis all day to dull his mind. He uses humor a lot to cope with life. He has a very dark sense of humor, is very cynical and can see through people very easily, which makes him unhappy a lot.

Society likes people with a moderately high IQ, especially if they can memorize information easily and learn how to do things easily. People like this are often rewarded in life. People with an extremely high IQ are viewed with suspicion and disdain by society because most are some kind of a misfit. They simply don’t fit in because they do not think the way most people think. It’s not a matter of just being a bit better than others at taking tests. They cannot turn off their mind.

A good example is Marilyn Manson. The man is said to have an IQ around 150. He is a musician, performance artist and professional troll who has been trolling people for decades with his shock performances. He was trolling people in the 90s before trolling even became a thing. If you watch his interviews you’d be surprised by how articulate, thoughtful, humorous and sad he is, like even his trolling or music doesn’t bring him happiness anymore, and the drugs stopped dulling his mind.