How to be smarter?
- Thread starter Godziwa
- Start date
White Night
Senior Member
- Nov 29, 2013
- 827
- 294
just hang out with the dump and you automotive feel smart
BreaknBrix
Power Member
- Mar 25, 2014
- 778
- 4,523
BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS!
Reading books makes you smarter. There is no doubt in my mind about that. In college I was forced to read my ass off. And anytime a professor told me to do something I went above & beyond what 98% of my peers were willing to do.
Like I had to write a paper about Freud once. I needed just 15 references for the paper. I wound up reading so much about Freud, not just his work but what other people had to say about his theories, and I read read read for 4 weeks straight all about Freud.
My brain became like a Freud encyclopedia.
Then I spent 5-6 days writing a very persuasive 18 page essay with more than 40 references and handed it to my professor.
2 days later our professor was handing back our papers, stops at my desk and asks out loud, "did you write this paper?" I said "yes". She said, "are you sure this is your writing"? I said "every word of it". She smiles, takes a deep breath and says something like, "I've been teaching this class for almost 40 years now, and this is the single best paper any student has ever written on Freud". She went on and on to praise my style of writing and single me out. Telling me, "you have a very bright future as a writer Robert", meanwhile everyone in the class is staring at me and I'm slowly sinking down in my seat hoping she'll shut up about my paper.
But that's a day I'll never forget in college. I realized even if you're not that smart, if you read A LOT about a topic, and really go above and beyond what most people are willing to do.... all that information just stays in your head like a sponge. Not just the information but all the different styles of persuasion that great writers use. And when it comes time to write... another side of "you" takes over and you can write the most incredible prose anyone's ever read.
I had similar things happen in my creative writing course. My teacher would ask permission to read a lot of my papers out loud. Then the class would face my direction and start applauding. I'd sit there just thinking "what the fuck? why am I being singled out again? am I possibly not as dumb as I always thought"? LOL. The point is, I got a lot of feedback from professors in college who told me I was a very talented writer. And I mostly thank books for that.
So I can say for a fact, reading a lot of good literature and books, without a doubt will make a person smarter. It will also make you a much better writer.
My brother has raised all 3 of his kids to be book-a-holics. I have no idea how he got kids that young to read so much but every time I see them they are ALL reading a new book. They're not playing around on their tablets or playing video games... these are kids who actually ENJOY reading. And his oldest son who's now 15, the kids a fucking genius. He's smarter at 15 than I probably am now at 32. And I know every one of those kids are gonna go to an IV league school and graduate with honors.
So again, reading is the most fundamental thing you can do to keep your brain sharp, to expand your horizon, expand your vocabulary, gain deeper, more relevant insights on life, to write better... it even helps you learn quicker. Cause the more you read the more you understand the more you CAN read and faster you can learn.
Some people say "reading can't give you street sense or common sense" but that's also wrong. Read enough books about psychopaths and criminals and you can sure as hell learn a lot about common sense or street sense. You might not learn how to talk like thugs. Like how a homicide detective can automatically mirror the way a criminal talks to gain rapport, trust and extract information about crimes. But generally speaking, you can learn A LOT through books. As long as they are GREAT BOOKS from GREAT WRITERS. Like Glenn Greenwald. The man is incredibly smart. He reads his ass off. His social skills are great. And his writing is some of the best journalism in the world. He writes with this righteous, controlled fury and has more independent persuasion than 99.8% of the population. Some of the articles he's done for guardian, the guardian, etc are absolute masterpieces.
Which goes without saying, don't just read books. Read work from some of the highest ranked journalists in the world. These people are incredibly persuasive writers. They can trigger catastrophic & worldwide political shit storms in less than 2-3,000 words. Had Snowden contacted some shitty, no-name journalist nobody would give 2 fucks what the NSA is doing right now.
There's a saying, "the pen is more mighty than the sword". But there should be another saying like, "books pack more power than bombs". A great example of this, the Bible or Koran. If we had people around the world chopping each others heads off over different interpretations of shakespeare, which is essentially happening right now just in a slightly different context.... the world might realize how powerful literature really is. We might also realize how dangerous certain forms of literature can be. But noone's ready for that debate yet. We don't allow it on forums. It's not allowed in many social contexts. Which is understandable considering how primitive an age we're still living in. FFS, 200,000 years ago we learned how to stand on 2 legs. But only 50 years ago race equality became a serious topic. We are really not much more than a bunch of bald apes with fancy toys most of us don't even know how to use yet.
-BB
Reading books makes you smarter. There is no doubt in my mind about that. In college I was forced to read my ass off. And anytime a professor told me to do something I went above & beyond what 98% of my peers were willing to do.
Like I had to write a paper about Freud once. I needed just 15 references for the paper. I wound up reading so much about Freud, not just his work but what other people had to say about his theories, and I read read read for 4 weeks straight all about Freud.
My brain became like a Freud encyclopedia.
Then I spent 5-6 days writing a very persuasive 18 page essay with more than 40 references and handed it to my professor.
2 days later our professor was handing back our papers, stops at my desk and asks out loud, "did you write this paper?" I said "yes". She said, "are you sure this is your writing"? I said "every word of it". She smiles, takes a deep breath and says something like, "I've been teaching this class for almost 40 years now, and this is the single best paper any student has ever written on Freud". She went on and on to praise my style of writing and single me out. Telling me, "you have a very bright future as a writer Robert", meanwhile everyone in the class is staring at me and I'm slowly sinking down in my seat hoping she'll shut up about my paper.
But that's a day I'll never forget in college. I realized even if you're not that smart, if you read A LOT about a topic, and really go above and beyond what most people are willing to do.... all that information just stays in your head like a sponge. Not just the information but all the different styles of persuasion that great writers use. And when it comes time to write... another side of "you" takes over and you can write the most incredible prose anyone's ever read.
I had similar things happen in my creative writing course. My teacher would ask permission to read a lot of my papers out loud. Then the class would face my direction and start applauding. I'd sit there just thinking "what the fuck? why am I being singled out again? am I possibly not as dumb as I always thought"? LOL. The point is, I got a lot of feedback from professors in college who told me I was a very talented writer. And I mostly thank books for that.
So I can say for a fact, reading a lot of good literature and books, without a doubt will make a person smarter. It will also make you a much better writer.
My brother has raised all 3 of his kids to be book-a-holics. I have no idea how he got kids that young to read so much but every time I see them they are ALL reading a new book. They're not playing around on their tablets or playing video games... these are kids who actually ENJOY reading. And his oldest son who's now 15, the kids a fucking genius. He's smarter at 15 than I probably am now at 32. And I know every one of those kids are gonna go to an IV league school and graduate with honors.
So again, reading is the most fundamental thing you can do to keep your brain sharp, to expand your horizon, expand your vocabulary, gain deeper, more relevant insights on life, to write better... it even helps you learn quicker. Cause the more you read the more you understand the more you CAN read and faster you can learn.
Some people say "reading can't give you street sense or common sense" but that's also wrong. Read enough books about psychopaths and criminals and you can sure as hell learn a lot about common sense or street sense. You might not learn how to talk like thugs. Like how a homicide detective can automatically mirror the way a criminal talks to gain rapport, trust and extract information about crimes. But generally speaking, you can learn A LOT through books. As long as they are GREAT BOOKS from GREAT WRITERS. Like Glenn Greenwald. The man is incredibly smart. He reads his ass off. His social skills are great. And his writing is some of the best journalism in the world. He writes with this righteous, controlled fury and has more independent persuasion than 99.8% of the population. Some of the articles he's done for guardian, the guardian, etc are absolute masterpieces.
Which goes without saying, don't just read books. Read work from some of the highest ranked journalists in the world. These people are incredibly persuasive writers. They can trigger catastrophic & worldwide political shit storms in less than 2-3,000 words. Had Snowden contacted some shitty, no-name journalist nobody would give 2 fucks what the NSA is doing right now.
There's a saying, "the pen is more mighty than the sword". But there should be another saying like, "books pack more power than bombs". A great example of this, the Bible or Koran. If we had people around the world chopping each others heads off over different interpretations of shakespeare, which is essentially happening right now just in a slightly different context.... the world might realize how powerful literature really is. We might also realize how dangerous certain forms of literature can be. But noone's ready for that debate yet. We don't allow it on forums. It's not allowed in many social contexts. Which is understandable considering how primitive an age we're still living in. FFS, 200,000 years ago we learned how to stand on 2 legs. But only 50 years ago race equality became a serious topic. We are really not much more than a bunch of bald apes with fancy toys most of us don't even know how to use yet.
-BB
Last edited:
DeathGunSAO
Newbie
- Jan 23, 2015
- 31
- 2
To BreaknBrix: Woah. that was a long detailed reply hahaha. I hope i can also be diligent in reading books hahah
- Feb 27, 2009
- 3,219
- 4,935
True that brother. Reminds me that I need to get my kids to start reading way more. Need to find some resources on how to do this. Isn't going to be easy weening them off of the TV and ipads.
Learn to delay gratification. Think long term. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_gratification
Have a sense of humor. (coping methodology)
One doesn't have to be a grand-intellectual, but find advantageous use of your time constantly.
lilmasta
Elite Member
- May 21, 2009
- 2,864
- 1,346
at first i thought you wrote BOOBS BOOBS AND SOME MORE BIG BOOBS
too much adult/prono marketing i guess