Being smart is hard. Feeling is easy.
We like to read books that offer an illusion of understanding: clever detective-esque inquiries with a tidy revelation.
Between our repetitious “A-to-B” obligations, we don’t have to think: we consume the book/podcast’s form of thought without doing the act of critical thinking.
And yet, this escapist distraction away from emotion allows productivity in the sense of pacified inner turmoil: existing between thinking and feeling.
This placebo intelligence is often preferable to the chaos of continually existing in your heart or head.