531–540 of 651 posts
I’d do anything for a single high IQ , but open minded friend. I find every smart person I’ve met thinks the best strategy in life is to parrot other smart people. Don’t get me wrong it can be a successful strategy but I want someone to do first principles thinking with.
I know this is not the definition of smart the article goes for, but even if you are truly smart and have life figured out completely, can someone who’s aware of the current state of our world be actually happy?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
For me this has 100% been the main source of unhappiness in my life. I wish nobody had ever told me how smart I was as a child. The reality was that I was above average but in an unremarkable collection of kids mostly. I’ve done fine in life academically and career wise but I’ll never live up to the expectations that were planted in my head. Thankfully you can get over this/yourself and let go of ego, ambition, achie…
I think most kids in this situation eventually hit a wall where things become difficult and being "smart" on its own is not enough. And people hit that at different age, maturity and availability of support. They need to transition to working hard and that is tough.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think smart people are told much more often as kids how bright of a future they have. So they build up expectations of "succeeding" in some sense (becoming a doctor, getting rich, etc.). These are the sort of expectations you mention in your quote. Not only is there often pressure put on you if you're smart, you adopt those expectations yourself. Or at least hold yourself to that standard. Of course, being smart do…
For me this has 100% been the main source of unhappiness in my life. I wish nobody had ever told me how smart I was as a child. The reality was that I was above average but in an unremarkable collection of kids mostly. I’ve done fine in life academically and career wise but I’ll never live up to the expectations that were planted in my head. Thankfully you can get over this/yourself and let go of ego, ambition, achie…
Looking at what I've accomplished and obtained, they're objectively better than average along pretty much every dimension. But, I still struggle to be satisfied. I know this is a me issue, but I also don't know how to change it.
Might be useful to ask a different question: What makes people happy? It's things like relationships, satisfying work, accomplishment. (and many, many more) Then the real question emerges: How many of those happiness 'sources' are made better by intelligence? What percentage? Relationships? Seems like no. Work? Also seems like no, lots of work doesn't make use of a high IQ that people enjoy nonetheless. Accomplishmen…
> What makes people happy? Wellbutrin
What's so good about Bupropion?
Intelligent people are also pretty ambitious in my experience. More ambition raises the risk of failure and failing doesn’t generate the feeling of happiness. I know many smart people absolutely terrified of failure to the point they take meds for it and I know a handful who are emotionally crippled by failing at something 20 years ago. Smart people and failure do not mix.
This is a common coping mechanism for anxiety: you believe that the reason you are anxious is because you have access to some kind of special knowledge about the world that sets you apart from your peers. They are happy because they just don't know what you know.
Might be useful to ask a different question: What makes people happy? It's things like relationships, satisfying work, accomplishment. (and many, many more) Then the real question emerges: How many of those happiness 'sources' are made better by intelligence? What percentage? Relationships? Seems like no. Work? Also seems like no, lots of work doesn't make use of a high IQ that people enjoy nonetheless. Accomplishmen…
As I heard someone say, happiness is your reality minus your expectations. Smart people see more variables that could be changed, more components that could be modified, and are less likely to accept things as they are. This creates a false sense of ease by which reality could be modified, and thus higher expectations for the world around them. I suspect this misplaces happiness and contentment, but the two are also…