I am not so smart. I find the following a good reminder of the perils of feeling "S-M-R-T":
I like to think I have done some bright things in my career. I have made my wisest decisions after I accept my beginner's mind. I look for genuine expertise. Mental models guide decision-making with that knowledge and context as inputs.
Wisdom, like happiness, is a rare thing. But, if we work hard at it and can be lucky in our friends, we find a bit of it each day. I have found a few sources to aid me in this quest.
First, I read as much as I can. I have written elsewhere about discovering my newfound ability to consume knowledge by audio. Ingesting monographs gives me a deep bench of expertise and humility: the more I read, the longer my reading list of unread books gets. The list of "favorites" in Hoopla, the "wishlist" in Audible, and my holds in Libby remind me how much I do not yet know that I desperately wish to!
Second, I listen to wise people. I am lucky to be in a family with some of the most brilliant minds I have met in my travels. And I have worked to participate in communities that let me engage with bright people in various domains. Most of the time that I can experience with them is helping other people. In my best moments, I listen closely to their advice to discern the mental models that back up the decisions. In this way, I build a "little" version of them in my head.
Third, I listen to unwise people. These can be the same people as I discussed in the previous section! I find that wisdom - or its lack - is a point in time. People are neither wise nor foolish - these words characterize reasoning and decision-making. Understanding where people are coming from in their unwise moments gives a great deal of perspective.
Dismissing their thought patterns as foolish or irrational is tempting in these situations. "How can they possibly believe that?" is such an easy dismissal.
But they do believe this thing at this moment. Why? What are the thought patterns that led them here? Maybe I could help. But I have something to gain too - a better understanding of how they got to this place. And I should keep my beginner's mind: maybe I am unwise in this situation. Perhaps they have a mental model that processes the context differently or better. I could learn that!
I am not sure I have ever convinced anyone of anything, nor others me. Sometimes they are, in fact, foolish in that moment; I cannot help. We can only open the door to let others see their own. In my best moments, I look for the symptoms to better recognize them in myself and others earlier in the process.
Fourth, I ship. A great way to get smarter is to see a project through. Of course, one cannot learn all things this way. But shipping helps me park ideas hidden to many because they don't go all the way down the rabbit hole. Some of the most valuable "secrets" (in the Thiel sense) I have are about the act of shipping itself in some particular domains. Action surfaces some wisdom that conversation and reading cannot. Where is your shipping-locked knowledge?
Fifth, I teach. What better way to get others to improve my wisdom - and point out its absence - than to share what little I have? The pushback on my ideas is an immediate source of value. Sometimes the idea is way off. Perhaps it just needs some adjustment. The messaging could be inadequate. Or maybe my interlocutor is just unreceptive, and that is valuable itself.
Plus, hearing the ideas in my ears makes me think about the concept more and grow it in my mind. Best of all, this happens twice: once when I say it, and another time when the interlocutor reflects it to me. My favorite moments are when what I thought might be novel is for the other "just another one of those." I have a place to go with the idea with less friction. A book wrote about this 30 years ago? Yes, please!
This essay is part of a series in which I try to share what little wisdom I have so that others can both profit and reflect to make me smarter. First, I have been writing them to completion and posting in about 90 minutes each day. Put a different way, I ship. Second, I have been announcing the essays on small communities to get initial feedback. The feedback has been universally kind and occasionally laudatory. I can see what subjects resonate with my "tribe." Third, based on one of those pieces of advice, I am copy-editing my essays in arrears. The side effect is that I am reading and debating "past me" from 20 days ago. That can be useful!
What next? Getting rid of the junk. When I was a kid, I learned about the USDA "four food groups." There's a story about a young me saying there are five food groups "these four... and donuts!" My job is to shrink the mental equivalents of this "fifth food group." The techniques above describe my efforts in my good moments. Unfortunately, I have too much time between them. There will always be some unproductive time in my life. But shrinking those spans is mostly a matter of figuring out healthier means of restoration than doomscrolling. At the moment, I am looking into app-based meditation.
Wisdom requires grace. If you permit yourself to be wrong, you gain infinite opportunities to become right in ways you could have never imagined. The techniques above are how I try to exploit these opportunities. I hope we meet one day. And that on that day, we make each other smarter.
Photo by Francesco Gallarotti on Unsplash