6 things you do that hinder your intelligence

Actions that hinder your intelligence

“Being busy does not always mean real work. The object of all work is production or accomplishment and to either of these ends there must be forethought, system, planning, intelligence, and honest purpose, as well as perspiration. Seeming to do is not doing.”

— Thomas Edison

You are a smart person. The fact that you are reading this blog shows that you have enough self awareness to recognise the weaknesses in your arsenal and you want to take steps to turn those weaknesses into strengths. As Voltaire says: “Common sense is not so common.”

However, there are several down sides to being smart, and often these downsides are self imposed and end up making us look less smart. Although other people may not perceive us in that way, our self interpretation certainly does and we ultimately end up believing our self interpretation, regardless of what other people say. 

In fact, researchers have found that when it comes to initial reactions, smart people have a higher tendency of providing the incorrect response because our brain over-complicates the situation, trying to think of all possible scenarios and permutations, gets overwhelmed, and then just blurt out an answer that in hindsight is often devoid of the logic and the thinking that's been put in.

To help adjust those self interpretations, here are a few stupid things that smart people do that you should watch out for.

You always need to be right

Deep thinking introverts find it hard to bare the thought of being wrong. After all, we've thought long and hard about a problem haven't we? All that brain power and thinking, yet we come up with the wrong answer? Inconceivable!!

But the reality is, it doesn't matter how smart you are, you can't always be right. And the more you try to be right, the more you brain shuts down its scope of thinking. You become tunnel visioned and overplay the situation. In the end, the answer you come up with is so limited in scope, it doesn't convey the extent of thinking you've gone through and you've lost your impact. 

So take this action: practice becoming detached from the outcome of right or wrong. Often, there is no right or wrong (sounds like something out of the Matrix). If you've thought about a problem 80% of way, and the opportunity is there to provide an answer, just do it. 

You give up too soon

Following very closely from the above, you provide your input and it's not well received or 99% of the time, there's no reaction to what you've said. So in your head you think you've failed and then you just give up. You don't push your point, you don't re-clarify your thinking, you take no action to make sure the audience understands what you're trying to say. If you don't push for your point, who else is going to do it? Other people won't because they didn't get your point. You only fail if you give up. 

So take this action: if your input didn't get a reaction, speak again and clarify what you meant and expand on it. Tell the audience the logic you went through to get to that point. Don't give up and stop saying anything just because your first point didn't get a reaction. Keep thinking and keep putting your points forward. Nobody thinks you've failed except you.

The multitask trap

You are not an iPad or a computer. You cannot keep track of multiple things (i.e. keep track of the meeting, side conversations, and check your emails at the same time) and still expect to provide a quality point. Be present in the discussions. Focus on what is being discussed, think about the points from different perspectives. Those emails can wait and those comical side jokes can wait. 

So take this action: be present in the meeting. Leave your laptop lid closed. Leave your phone facing down or better yet, don't bring your phone into the room.

Seek and digest feedback

Your brain is saying, if I'm so smart, how could anyone possibly find fault with me? Nobody is perfect and how could you grow and become the best version of yourself if you don't digest feedback? Really successful people seek out feedback. They proactively look for other people's opinions on their performance and seek ways to improve.

So take this action: practice seeking out feedback both positive and constructive. Start with people you trust and then expand to less familiar people. Write down what the feedback says and then develop some simple actions to operationalise the improvement points. Don't just look for positive feedback.

Your brain moves too fast

I'm sure we've all been on the receiving end of this and more likely than not have done the same. The person we're speaking with seems to have suddenly moved onto another topic or stayed on the same topic but now comes from an unexpected angle. You're now lost in translation and can't keep up. Smart people think about multiple perspectives and often we forget to take people on the journey. We communicate the conclusion, expecting our audience to have magically guessed the logic we used. Then we wonder why they disagree with us, can't see our point of view, or just don't react.

So take this action: Convey your conclusion then provide a quick summary of how you got there. Now people can get engaged and interact with your point.

You don’t ask questions

As Socrates says "I know I am intelligent, because I know that I know nothing." Yes you are smart, it just means you have a fast CPU in your brain. But you don't have all the inputs. So don't assume that you do. If you think there are several unknowns that need to be made known, or if you think you don't have the context, then just ask the question. Nobody will every judge your intelligence for asking questions. But they will judge your abilities if you make a decision without understanding some of the basics.

So take this action: Ask questions. Ask enough questions until you are comfortable you know as much as everyone else in the room. Then you at least have enough data points to crunch those variables in your head and provide input.

Blog photo by Ryan Jacobson on Unsplash