The Biggest Weakness of “Smart People”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kG9Z1uAMvS8

I see a lot of intelligent people walking around with a feeling of superiority. They walk around thinking they’re better than everyone else because they’ve studied self-improvement or because they’re moderately intelligent. I can relate with these people because I used to be one of them. What most people don’t realize is intelligence doesn’t mean shit.

For almost two years before the launch of cameronchardukian.com I studied writing, internet marketing, and blogging. I knew all the strategies, and tactics and I was certain that as soon as I started a blog I could be successful. I thought I was a genius. The problem? For one I wasn’t a genius, but moreover I didn’t have the courage to start my blog until nearly two years later.

A lot of guys who study pickup read books, and watch dozens of videos, and on an intellectual level understand much more than even the most socially calibrated naturals. The only problem? They don’t go out, and apply what they’ve “learned” in the field, and thus they never internalize and embody the things they preach.

Want another example? I know a girl who wants to play soccer for the school team. She’s told me she “knows” she could make varsity. I asked her if she enjoys playing soccer. She said, “Yeah of course.” “Then why don’t you play?” Her response? In a defensive manner, “I-I-I already know I can make varsity. I-I know I can, so wha-what’s the point?

If you haven’t picked up on the problem yet it’s that many “smart” people personally identify with being intelligent. As a result, they paralyze themselves from taking action. Within the confines of your own mind it’s easy to avoid failure, and protect your ego.

However, the moment you take an action that risks failure you also risk destroying the egoic identity you’ve built for yourself. When you personally identify with failure, you perceive it as a threat to who you are because failing would destroy the intelligent persona you’ve created for yourself. The solution?

Refusing to identify yourself with being intelligent. Of course, that doesn’t mean you view yourself as an idiot. It simply means that intelligence becomes something you do rather than something you are.

In Eastern philosophy terms this may be taken as separating yourself from your ego, and understanding the voice in your head that identifies with being intelligent isn’t you. It’s merely an ego you’ve created through the false identification of self with your intellectual mind rather than your spiritual being.

In simpler terms, however, it simply means that you view your approach to life as intelligent rather than identifying your personal being with intelligence.

If your blog isn’t generating much traffic it’s because your approach to blogging isn’t intelligent. It’s not that you’re stupid. If you walk up to a girl and she rejects you it isn’t you that she rejected, it was merely your approach.

This entire line of thinking sounds like an insignificant shift in perspective, but from personal experience I can tell you that once you stop personally identifying with being intelligent you’ll feel completely unstiffled when faced with challenges.

This doesn’t mean achieving your goals will be easy, as you’ll still have to exert lots of effort, but you’ll no longer be paralyzed either. You’ll open yourself up to taking massive amounts of action, and you’ll produce results at an astonishing pace.

[grwebform url=”http://app.getresponse.com/view_webform.js?wid=12610802&u=BS1kr” css=”on” center=”off” center_margin=”200″/]

Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.