Nobel Prizes — one for chemistry and one
for peace.
Brooks describes two kinds of intelligence, one
that decreases as we age and one that increases
and stays high.
“Early on, we have fluid intelligence, which is
kind of raw smarts and focusing ability,” he told.
“That’s the harder you work, the better you
get in your first career. That tends to decrease
in your 40s and 50s. The second curve is your
ability to understand what things mean, to
combine ideas, to teach, to form teams. That’s
your wisdom curve.”
The latter, he said, increases through your 40s
and 50s and stays high in your 60s and 70s. “It’s
really, really important that you deal with going
from one to the other if you want to stay strong
and happy,” Brooks said.
For strivers, such deficits are what they
fear the most. “People are always afraid
of decline,” he said, “but for strivers really
invested in professional excellence, it’s their
death fear.”
Confronting that fear is another step, he said.
Also key, according to Brooks, is to embrace
weakness in a way that turns it into strength.
He called satisfaction “one of the three
macronutrients of happiness,” the others being
enjoyment and purpose.
“You need all three, and balance in abundance,
but satisfaction is not the hardest to get. It’s the
hardest to keep,” Brooks explained.
Rita Goodroe, 45, in suburban Washington, D.C.,
knows exactly what he’s talking about. Her pivot
came earlier than most.