The Smartest Guys on Earth!

I’ve got the following text from an AI analysis on Google and I’m using it here as a quote, although I had no idea who’s written it or when—the analysis is not revealing its source, if any. Of course, it’s only a part of the analysis that impressed me most, and therefore I thought of putting it down here for all people of the same ilk. And yes, I’ve tweaked it bit to cover more of the categories of people obviously involved.

 "Many emerging or existing artists/writers/discoverers feel ignored, with their work going unnoticed, which is often a burden of being in creative industries, rather than a reflection of talent." 

Very right indeed! Creative people who have put out their work in the public domain would most naturally like to be noticed and be told if their work is poor or mediocre or even good. When nothing of that sort happens they most naturally get frustrated and even indignant that nobody is even aware of their work and the very few who have indeed gone through never bothering to put in a comment or in the least a rating, forget about reviews. We don’t want to go into the medley of the paid services like marketing, social media blasts, participating rights in glamorous events, reviews in prime outlets and even mere comments—paying up all the money to get noticed.

Their goal is basically to get noticed the natural way which they always justify by saying they’ve done their job, made their work available in the public domain, given options to avail it free of cost too, and so they think it’s up to the consumers to do the expected. But they don’t! and you can’t really blame them for as far as the creative works are concerned there’s has been so much quantity of late that the ‘quality’ gets missing from the eyeballs like the proverbial needle in the haystack. Anyway, the smartest guys on earth are always there for them to behold, and they hope to be among them someday. But alas! They’ll most likely never make it and on the contrary have to put in the extra efforts to get going with their further creative works against all the depressing odds.

In this context, I must mention about a unique experience, rather two experiences at that, a friend of mine had recently. A painter struggling to showcase his work and struggling even more to have a solo exhibition, he’s consistently been one of the most ‘most ignored guys’ on earth per his own assessment. He’s long accepted the untold verdict, but still manages to get along with his inspirations and the resultant works. Therefore, he was thunderstruck when two peculiar incidents happened to him in quick succession that left him thoroughly confounded, confused and perplexed.

One wintry evening, he along with his better half was having tea with potato Chops on a street eating joint where they fortunately found two vacant chairs on the pavement. While enjoying the moment he noticed one well-dressed gentleman pacing up and down the pavement, casting sideway secretive glances at them, quite regularly. As he tried hard to remember if he knew him, the gentleman finally approached them, standing in front as there were no vacant chairs.

The gentleman addressed him very politely, “Hello sir!”

He smiled at the stranger, “Hi! Do I know you or have we met somewhere?”

“No sir! I don’t think we’ve even seen each other! But I find you so decent, disciplined and nice that I thought I must not let go of the opportunity to acquaint myself with you!” he said a bit apologetically though.

Trying to hide his great astonishment my friend introduced himself, introduced his wife and got into a lively conversation with the gentleman till there were any remnants left in their tea cups.

The next incident happened in a matter of just three days. That afternoon he accompanied his wife to the bank and as they were looking for the right entrance into the longish building, two bank officers came out from what they called later the rear entry/exit used only by bank staff. My wife immediately accosted one of the officers asking him about the obvious.

The other officer suddenly offered his hand to me saying, “Sir, you’re looking so smart and perfectly gentlemanly that I thought of introducing myself to you!”

My surprised friend had a warm handshake with the officer, exchanging pleasantries and had a good conversation till the officers left them at the right entrance.

My friend was gloating with as much perplexity as pride as he narrated his experience. From his looks I got rather frightened thinking that he must’ve already considered himself as one of the smartest guys on earth. I only smiled sweetly at him, never wanting to discourage him.

Well, what the heck! It could really happen to him someday as well as to many of the same ilk. There’s nothing wrong hoping or even daydreaming the latter is in fact very much a part of positive thinking, as told to me once by a management trainer.