Is Wisdom Overrated?
AKA: What sounds wise vs what is wise
We live in an age flooded with advice - some brilliant, some beautiful, some beautifully phrased. But lately, I’ve been wondering: Have we started confusing what sounds wise with what is wise? I’ve been dramatically overthinking this (hence why I sat at 7 a.m. on Sunday writing this….) as I read a new book, which led me somewhere surprising.
Lately, I’ve been wondering if wisdom is overrated.
Not the kind of wisdom you earn slowly through heartbreak, patience, and humility. I mean the kind that gets packaged for consumption. The kind that fits neatly into a keynote talk, an X thread, or a business book (or maybe a substack post, ha!). The kind we applaud because it sounds true, but how do we know if it is?
This thought came to me while reading Make What People Want: The New Science of Product Success by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky. It’s a book about a brutal truth: it doesn’t matter how clever your idea sounds in your head. What matters is whether it works for real people in the real world. The difference between success and failure isn't how clever you are or how well you can execute an idea; it’s how fast you find out what matters.
Reading it made me realise that the gap between good advice and good outcomes may be wider than we think.
How often do we fall in love with ideas that seem wise, not because they’re right, but because they’re beautifully phrased? Take Simon Sinek’s famous line: "People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it." It’s so crisp, so self-evident, it became doctrine. But what if we rephrased it? Would it still feel true?
1. "People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it."
Because purpose is magnetic, when you believe in something bigger than the product, others will too. Start with why, and you don’t just sell—you inspire.
I played with the idea and wrote a few other versions:
2. "People buy what you do."
Clarity sells, and simplicity builds trust. When you solve a real problem directly and honestly, people listen—and buy.
3. "People buy how you do it."
Style is a statement. People are drawn to your craft, your method, your fingerprints. It's not just what you make—it's the soul you leave in it.
4. "People don’t care how, why, or what. They care about how you make them feel."
Emotion is the final currency: no product, no pitch, no purpose matters unless it moves someone. Humanity isn’t a strategy. It’s the point.
Each version sounds compelling. Each could lead to a business, a movement, or a life. So which one is true? Who should we listen to?
Maybe the real mistake isn’t choosing the wrong wisdom—it’s believing that any single idea could be permanent.
Maybe wisdom is seasonal.
Maybe it’s local.
Maybe it’s not a commandment, but a conversation—one we have with the world, and with ourselves, over and over again.
Maybe wisdom isn’t something you "have." Perhaps it’s something you practice:
By listening longer.
By paying better attention.
Staying open enough to realise the answer that fit last year might not fit today.
Maybe wisdom isn’t about being right. Perhaps it’s about being awake.
And maybe that’s enough.
And maybe, that’s the idea that will click.
Peace, love and happiness, MP