Looking Back to 2006: I'd Rather Be Wise

I'd Rather Be Wise
Original post date: December 26, 2006

My brother and I were talking last night about the group, Mensa. It's a social group for eggheads. There's only one requirement for membership -- an IQ in the top 2% (148 or more). My brother believes that I would qualify. Me thinks he is overestimating his elder brother's mental capabilities.

I'm not suggesting I'm a dummy. As a youth in elementary school, I was placed in the accelerated classes. Yes, I was a youthful egghead. In 6th grade, our class studied college algebra, among other things.

Unfortunately, I was only a minimal egghead. I occupied the bottom rungs of my class. I struggled to keep up. I missed many a recess period while I stayed behind with Dickie Henderson & Nathan Metzger, the three of us struggling to master the most basic elements of algebra or trigonometry.

Years later I told my parents how I wished they would have left me in regular classes. Instead of being one of the dim bulbs, I could have been one of the scholastic stars. Who knows? I might have been at the top of my class!

But that wasn't in the cards for me. Every team needs to have that one last player on the bench -- the one that NEVER gets sent into the game -- and that was me. So, if nothing else, I did serve my classmates by playing a most important role: intellectual doormat.

Of course, I've always followed the beat of a different drummer, even during my earliest days. Consequently, maybe I had the highest IQ of our group. Who knows and, for that matter, who cares?

Personally, I think rote intelligence is greatly overrated. I know a great many gifted individuals who have about as much commonsense as a heap of cow dung (ok, maybe that's being a bit unfair to the dung). I also know many other extremely bright people who, though they exhibit a good amount of commonsense, seem to completely lack compassion for others or even a modicum of ethics.

I don't know about you, but I'd much rather keep company with people of average intelligence who possess compassion, ethics and commonsense. Not that intelligence is a bad thing, but it's certainly not THE important thing.

In fact, intelligence can only get you so far in life; wisdom is what will lead you the rest of the way.

That's why I'd rather be wise, than smart.

To read the intro to this retrospective series of posts, go here.