Becoming an Interesting Person

The ad popped up and promised to help me become an interesting person at parties. Should I be offended at what my algorithm is implying?

It told me the best way for me to stop being boring is to use an app that summarises the main ideas of popular books. With a tool like this, I could get all the key talking points quickly and efficiently, and always sound thoughtful and informed. Would people be impressed? Perhaps. But I’m not going to buy the app. I think the ad made at least three major assumptions about becoming an interesting person that are just plain wrong (besides the assumption that I’m obviously boring at parties, which I hope is also false).

First, the ad assumed that being an interesting person is simply a matter of accumulating as much information as possible, as quickly as possible, so that you can always sound well-informed and up-to-date. If your goal is only to sound good in short conversations with new acquaintances, then I suppose short, efficient summaries might get you there faster than the time it takes to plod through entire books. If, however, you’d like to stay interesting beyond a pre-set stash of soundbites, you’ll need more than the app can give you. You can’t become a deep, insightful thinker by stuffing your brain with facts any more than you can develop a strong, agile body by filling your home with weights. To become strong, you have to do the hard work of lifting the weights, over and over again, day after day. To become a deep thinker, you have to do the hard work of thinking deeply, over and over again. You might be able to boil down the main points of a book into the size of a social media post, but the effect of spoon-feeding truisms to yourself will never be the same as the benefit you receive from working through complex ideas slowly and carefully with your own mind. So no thanks, algorithm. I’d rather use my mind, even if it’s slow (which it most certainly is), and grow thoughts from the bottom up, rather than just plucking a few nice-looking leaves off the top. Skimming the surface of other people’s ideas might help me impress a few people, but the effect won’t last long if the ideas I’ve learned to parrot haven’t had time to take root and grow profitably in my mind. I’m really not interested in sounding like a deep thinker. I want to learn how to be one. It’s not nearly as efficient, but I think it’s far more interesting.

The second major false assumption in the ad was that the best way to become interesting to other people is to impress them as much as possible. Again, I disagree. I’ve met a lot of impressive people in my life, and I don’t see any fundamental correlation between the interest they bring to conversations and their accumulated knowledge and accomplishments. Some folks leverage what they have to become boastful know-it-alls, which is not the same as becoming interesting, even if the things they say are true. The most interesting people I’ve met have something else in common: they are the most interested. They are curious. They ask questions. They interact genuinely with the thoughts and ideas and experiences of others, rather than just trying to impress people with their own prowess. They are humble enough to keep learning, and growing, and believing that other people have important things to say to them. This is harder and less efficient than memorising a few talking points from an app—but I think it’s far more interesting.

Finally, I think the most insidious assumption in the ad was the way it focused my attention on how other people perceive me—as if my value were somehow tied to the assessments of others. It’s not. Even if I’m never the life of the party and nobody thinks I’m particularly interesting, I’m still alive with the life God gave me. I’m still living in a world bursting with his creative wonders, and interacting with people who are fearfully and wonderfully made in his image (just like I am). There’s plenty of interest everywhere, if I only have the eyes to see it. At the end of the day, the question I’m most interested in answering is not whether I’m becoming an interesting person, but whether I’m becoming everything God made me to be in his endlessly fascinating world, and taking the place he made for me in his awe-inspiring plans. I think that’s far more interesting.