Reading This Will Make You Stupider

Hey, stupid.  

There are a lot of thought leadership pieces out there. This is not that.  

This is a brain fart piece.  

Why?  

Because reading thoughts is cool. But thought reading has been done before - by people like Professor Xavier, Deanna Troi, Miss Cleo, and my fellow David, David Blaine.  

However, reading farts? Holy crap! Farts always make people laugh when they hear them, but reading them? Reading them!?!? Reading sounds smart. Farts sound stupid. How can these opposites coexist?  

They can exist when you’re a lil stupid. And being a little stupid is smart.

So, here are three smart steps to be stupid.

1. Play Connect the Dots

That sounds pretty stupid and childish - and that’s the point. Be childish. Write an entire article and call it a brain fart piece. It’s a little wrong, which makes it so right.

Being wrong (and stupid) is important.  

Comedian John Cleese said, “While being creative, nothing is wrong. There’s no such thing as a mistake, and any drivel may lead to a breakthrough.” Drivel creates the dots we follow to create a breakthrough for any business or life problem one may have.

Don’t believe funny people? Listen to science, or the scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson, who said, “I love being wrong because that means in that instant, I learned something new that day.”

Kid brains are more open to learning because they’re not boring know-it-all adults. They’re still a lil stupid, which is really smart. Because you’ll never get smarter by thinking you’re already smart, you need to be stupid to get smart. This is how you start connecting dots - metaphorically.

2. Erase All the Dots

Remember the first step on how to be stupid? I hope so because you just finished reading it. Well now I want you to forget it and erase all the dots. Why? Because when solving a business problem, a creative problem, or a life problem, no one hands you a sheet with dots numerically ordered to follow. You begin from scratch.

Sure, you can follow what others have done, or use testing and data and learning to best determine your route. But that is not going to stand out. Like if one business learns that saying the word ‘super’ helps sell a product, and another business follows that until we have a bunch of ‘super’ products, because everyone connected the same dots, then it’ll be like the super villain Syndrome on The Incredibles said, “When everyone’s super, no one will be.”

So when everyone’s ‘super’, be stuper, or stupider. Erase the dots. It’ll be fun, I promise.

C. Create New Dots  

Now that we erased all the dots, we need some new dots to connect.

You know how AI builds things? It collects a bunch of data points and reconstructs them. That’s what I want you to do too. I tell people I’m a professional surfer…of the internet. Why? Because I’m always absorbing dots and potential data points that I can connect in some new fun and surprising way. Cyberspace is like real space; in that each thing you learn is like a star in the sky. And the starry sky is like your connect-the-dots sheet of paper. There are soooo many dots and possibilities to connect and none of them are numbered. This is at times overwhelming, but also beautiful and exciting. When you make the right connections, other people see it and say, “Dang, I wish I thought of that.”  

Now you know my three smart steps on how to be stupid.* It’s as easy as 1, 2, C.

*Disclaimer: I’m definitely not advocating being stupid just to be stupid. That’d be stupid stupid.

 Like if you crap your pants. That’s just stupid. There’s not much smart about that.

 But, if it’s the zombie apocalypse, and rubbing the crap of zombies all over your body means that the zombies can no longer smell or detect you like on AMC’s The Walking Dead, then that just became STUPID SMART.

 I’m also not advocating going full on smart either. Like using a sponge to clean the crap off your body would be smart. But that sponge isn’t going to sell t-shirts, toys, or have amusement park rides and TV shows named after it.

 But slap some stupid on that sponge by having it live in a pineapple under the sea, and you have a STUPID SMART idea.

And to prove how well real stupid works with artificial intelligence, I had AI step in to wrap up this stupid smart brain fart piece. Take it away ChatGPT:

Conclusion
In a world that often separates intelligence from stupidity, it's important to recognize the beauty and value of embracing both qualities. By cultivating humility, openness, creativity, resilience, and the ability to relate to others, we can lead more enriching lives. So, let us celebrate the beauty of balancing stupidity and intelligence, allowing ourselves to learn, grow, and thrive in ways that transcend conventional expectations.

Watch: Stupid Smart with David