Given the choice, would you prefer to be a world-class (visual or performing) artist or an intellectual genius? Which, in your opinion, would facilitate a more fulfilling career and social life?Submitted By numbartistView 1210 Answers
Wow, this is a tough question. If I go along with what my nature is, I am inherently creative, so I would really love to be a world-class artist. Poetry and art would be top in my domain. I think that if I had a chance to go back to my younger years and take formal art classes, I would be able to discover what art medium would suit me, and I would make it a craft just like I'm doing with poetry. I believe all types of art (including poetry) are what make people more human and connected, so it would be much more fulfilling for me in every way--socially, intellectually, and emotionally. Also, artists challenge the world to find beauty even in the most mundane things.It would also be great if I could be a world-class intellectual genius too--like Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, or even Michael E. DeBakey. I would be able to use my intellect to solve the world's problems and change the world for the better as well as to give the world a different perspective--that is, challenge the world to think differently, more positively, more just, and more tolerant/accepting of others.So for me, I am perfectly fine with not being a world-class intellect or artist. I cannot divide myself in half like that and value one side of me more than the other. I love my intellectual side. I love reading and browsing through the dictionary in my free time. I love doing sudoku, word search puzzles, logic puzzles, and playing chess, checkers, pool, and mahjong. On the flip side of the coin, I love art, which includes origami, reading and writing poetry, putting together collages, doodling, scrapbooking, cooking, and experimenting with other forms of art like looming.I've been battling myself for years. As of now, I'm trying to find a career that will not only become a profession, a field I'm proud to work in, but something that will also be a vocation, a calling that will encompass both my intellectual and artistic sides of me. So, if I am known to be a world-class hybrid (a genius and an artist), by all means, I will celebrate those kinds of people, too. I feel that those kinds of people are more at peace with themselves and find life more meaningful and beautiful.
