Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Wisdom and intelligence are coveted, rare virtues. These are mostly acquired with age and experience, though it isn’t impossible to get there with hard work and a willingness to learn. However, as is the case with the excess of anything, over-intelligence too has its downsides.
As one climbs up the ladders of success, they inevitably achieve a level of intellect that most others can only dream of having. And while this newfound wisdom does help them pull off extraordinary feats, it is also prone to a serious drawback.
More often than not, people with remarkable brains start reading too much into, well, everything. They complicate things more than they need to – even those that were meant to be simple. In fact, they often end up seeing these “analytical” skills as an advantage over others; for them, it becomes a hallmark of their supposedly superior intellect.
Unfortunately, however, the longer they make simple matters more intricate than they need to, the deeper they sink into the morass of misery and loneliness. Their proclivity for being unreasonably negative works like a canopy that prevents the sunlight from getting to them. As a result, they are caught in a situation where they are unhappy but yet take pride in the intellect that makes them better than their peers.
This is not to say that wisdom is something to be abhorred or avoided. It is definitely one of the most cherished qualities a person can set out to achieve. All this means is that true wisdom lies in seeing things for what they are. You need not call an apple an orange just to stand out in a crowd or read too much into straightforward stuff. That is what true intelligence is all about.
Ernest Miller Hemingway, popularly known as Ernest Hemingway, was an American author, journalist and sportsman. Known for his famed iceberg theory and daredevil lifestyle, Hemingway once remarked: “Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.”