His facial gestures were elastic and performative: bulging eyes, exaggerated grimaces and sighs, and double takes to accompany his own jokes. He wore square rimless glasses. “People think I’m intelligent, but I’m not so sure,” he said. “Intelligent people have a danger. It’s easy for them to be boring."
May 7, 2015
"Intelligent people have a danger. It’s easy for them to be boring."
Said His Holiness the Seventeenth Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, the top lama in the Karma Kagyu order of Tibetan Buddhism.
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Yes, people are always calling me boring.
Some of them are poets, e.g. Levinas _Existence and Existents_, with the best analysis of boredom I've ever read in the first chapter.
The analysis of boredom is not boring.
It's just never done.
I agree with MadisonMan.
Seriously, Buddhism is essentially boring. It chases its tail until everyone gives up.
Finally, some evidence that Obama is intelligent.
"The Karmapa came to Princeton because he wanted to be a college student for a day. “It’s very important for me to feel this sort of sadness,” he said"
The Karmapa has a sense of humor.
Maybe admissions offices can use it as a slogan in advertising open houses.
"Intelligent people have a danger. It’s easy for them to be boring."
How would a Buddhist be able to tell?
I went to high school with a Tibetan prince. He spoke English with an American accent, and was a tremendous cornerback on the football team. A man's man.
He shipped his son off to Tibet at 4 years of age to live with the monks. He has tried to be an American, and conform to his legacy. I see him as tormented. The seduction of the American dream, and the call of his heritage.
Yes, he has above average intelligence. He's a lawyer for a local-global coffee company.
So that's my problem....
Weird Al Yankovich said it a different way "Dare to be stupid"
Which is, in my opinion, very good advice. Up to a point, anyway.
@rhhardin -- John Berrymore, Dream Song 14:
"Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so."
Boring in the sense of lacking the trauma and drama that compels us to watch a movie to the very end?
No one will ever make a movie about my life because it would be boring. I am quite happy with that circumstance. I don't need drama and trauma to have a fun and meaningful life.
The folks who are with me in this life are there because they want to be there. We are enjoying each other's boring life.
Nice to have companions while sitting out on the deck of life enjoying the spectacular view.
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