Book smarts and street smarts both have a place in our lives.
I think I was in high school when I started playing Dungeons and Dragons.
Given my deep love of sci-fi and fantasy, D&D fueled that. I mean, c’mon, who doesn’t want to roleplay a mighty warrior wielding a sword, a sneaky thief, or a scary-powerful sorcerer? Even if it involves books, paper, and dice – imagination can take you to some really cool places.
Not only has D&D been an inspiration to my writing – I have found a few real-life applications. One in particular concerns book smarts versus street smarts.
For the most part, these are defined as such:
- Book smarts – All the things you can learn in school, via study, and any other intentional gathering of data
- Street smarts – All the things you learn by experience, interacting with people, working with tangibles and intangibles, etc.
Book smarts often get fancy degrees with letters attached to them. MD, Ph.D., JD, and the like. Street smarts are often equated with notions of running with gangs, understanding how the dark, dirty, mean streets of a given city work, and the like.
But I see this more like the stats you roll up in D&D. For any character you create in Dungeons and Dragons you roll dice to determine your stats. Those, in turn, help determine how you play the game.
These stats include:
- Strength (self-explanatory)
- Intelligence (smarts for reading and language)
- Wisdom (smarts for spells and healing)
- Dexterity (tumbling and dodging)
- Constitution (health)
- Charisma (people are drawn to you or not)
Here’s where I do the real-world equivalency.
- Intelligence = book smarts
- Wisdom = street smarts
Why should that matter? Because both smarts have a purpose in everything we do.
You can have one, the other, or both (or neither)
I have known people who were wicked smaht – either well educated or well experienced. I’ve also known people who had both book smarts and street smarts.
Here’s the thing – ALL intelligence is valid. Book smarts, street smarts – they’re both smarts. They are both forms of intelligence that can be extremely useful in various situations.
While these concepts can be mutually exclusive – really, they’re not. Both are forms of learning, experiencing, growing, and evolving in the world around us. These inform you about the world around you that you interact with.
For some people, they learn best from books. They read lots, seek out information, and love research and study. Other people learn best by doing. They tear apart computers, build things with their hands, hold debates and conversations with people, and gain knowledge via experience.
I love both. I’m a reader and love to listen to audiobooks to learn new things and gain new insights. But I also love experiences like building computers, holding conversations with people, and just generally people-watching.
Like D&D stats, most people have a higher score in intelligence or wisdom. For example, a friend of mine has a Ph.D. – but didn’t account for how alcohol would interact with cold medicine. The said friend got a ride in an ambulance for that maneuver.
Another friend of mine never went to college, barely got out of high school – but damn do they know computer tech. They can take all the constituent parts and build a powerful computer. But they don’t know jack shit about literature or philosophy.
Another consideration here is that intelligence (books smarts) is learned; wisdom (street smarts) is instinctual.
Intelligence, wisdom, or both – knowledge is power.
Balance for creatives
As a writer, I should, in theory, be an expert on explaining sentence structure and participles, predicates, prepositions, interjections, and all the other parts of speech and grammar. But I’m not.
I can tell a good sentence from a bad one. I understand how it should look and read. But breaking it down and explaining the bits and pieces? Nope, not something I can do well.
Am I less of a writer for my inability to do that? No. I have an idea, can convey it via words and phrases, and do so with proper grammar. I have no doubt the knowledge might be useful to have – but it doesn’t impede me to lack it.
Also, I can argue I DO have it. But it’s instinctual. It’s a form of street smarts – or wisdom, rather than intelligence.
This might be proof to tie these together. Or, at the very least, recognize the necessity of both.
I feel a compulsion to write. In many ways, it’s no different from being compelled to breathe, eat when you’re hungry, drink when thirsty, and so on. Words matter to me – and there are ideas, characters, stories, and philosophical thoughts in my head I need to share via the written word.
Other creatives I know have the same impulse. Painters, sculptors, woodworkers, blacksmiths, and on and on.
When it comes to the arts, I find that there tends to be a balance of street smarts and book smarts. Experience, as you create, increases your knowledge. But you can also study to learn the art to make it come alive.
Street smart or book smart, don’t let that impede on your creativity. For some, this is where things get complicated.
Book smarts versus street smarts
Some people argue the value of one over the other. Intelligence is greater than wisdom, wisdom empowers you more than intelligence, and even to hell with both, all you need is charisma to get ahead in life.
You need all the D&D stats in real life. Strength, dexterity, intelligence, constitution, wisdom, and charisma all go into the whole package that is YOU. And not everyone rolls well when it comes to their stats.
Over the last couple of decades, there has been a backlash against intellectualism – book smarts. But it’s been less about applying street smarts and more about focusing on strength and charisma. But neglecting smarts – book smarts of street smarts – comes with a price.
Modern society NEEDS intelligence and wisdom to function. When you neglect them – you get a broken infrastructure and demagogues ignoring reason and logic for their own edification.
Creatives tend to have their strength in a combination of book smarts and street smarts. That’s why creatives tend to be most remembered throughout history. Michelangelo, DaVinci, Dickinson, and Austen, for example.
But more than this, when society is spending too much time and effort on strength and charisma – at the expense of intelligence and wisdom – creatives restore the balance. It’s the artists, the creators, who provide the beacons in the dark to keep society going. And growing.
Hence why science, in my opinion, is creativity – and scientists are creatives. The search for meaning and information is imaginative – particularly when finding complicated answers.
Whether you have more book smarts or street smarts – don’t shy away from them. Make use of your intelligence and wisdom to help the world grow, change, and evolve.
Book smarts and street smarts both have a place in our lives. Keep that in mind – and let’s roll for initiative.
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