The Difference Between Smarts and Intelligence

I'm an intelligent guy. I'm also poor, which means I'm not very smart.

But this girl...

...may be intelligent or she may not. But she's smart. Very smart.

From the New York Daily News
Sarah White, a 24-year-old psychology buff, conducts online therapy sessions in her birthday suit. The naked therapist's unique approach to helping people solve their issues has, she says, aroused interest from dozens of suffering New Yorkers.
"For men especially, who are less likely than women to go to therapy, it is more interesting, more enticing, more exciting," said White. "It's a more inspiring approach to therapy."
White begins her sessions with her clothes on. But as the hour-long appointments heat up, she gradually sheds all of her duds until there's nothing left to take off.
"Freud used free association," she said. "I use nakedness."
The initial sessions, which cost $150, are conducted via a one-way Web cam and text chat. Once she develops a rapport with a client, she'll move on to two-way video appointments via Skype and even in-person consultations.
White said her roughly 30 clients are an eclectic mix of college students with sexual issues, middle-aged men with relationship problems and even a couple of women who just enjoy chatting with a nude peer.
A freelance computer programmer, White said she got the idea to perform therapy sessions in the nude after being uninspired by the theories she learned as an undergraduate psychology student. She conceded that naked therapy is not approved by any mental health association. And she is not a licensed therapist.

A $150-an-hour striptease marketed under the guise of a "therapy" session? Damn it, that's brilliant. And she's getting all kinds of national press out of it. Book deal, anyone? Reality show?

 But every time I hear a story like this, about someone who's identified a niche, a schtick or a gimmick, some savvy hustler who hops on the the prevailing zeitgeist and then rides it all the way to the bank, I just get depressed. Why? Jealousy, of course. I mean, it obviously helps that she's pretty hot, but she identified a unique way to generate income and publicity and went after it.

I never could do that. I'm just not smart enough. No matter how intelligent I believe myself to be, I'll never be smart enough to convert the shamelessness and chutzpah that's demanded of modern success into riches.

Damn my ordinary looks and my tasteful and understated aesthetic sensibility! I knew they'd always hold me back...