Why Smart People Follow Cheap Gurus

Smart people love new ideas. They collect them like rare coins. They turn them over in their minds, admire their shine, categorize them, and rank them. They build entire identities on the scaffolding of intellectual frameworks. They seek the elegant theory, the model that explains the world.

And that search makes them vulnerable.

Because in walks the guru.

With just the right mix of certainty and mystery. With a vocabulary that flatters the listener into believing they, too, are in on something deep. Something the others missed. Something the herd couldn’t grasp.

And smart people fall for it — not because they lack critical thinking, but because they’re addicted to coherence. The guru offers a worldview that feels complete — a closed loop, a total system. It all fits together with no contradictions or loose ends. And that is catnip to the intellect. Because loose ends are exhausting, ambiguity is a weight, and incomplete explanations are a kind of psychic itch. The guru promises relief.

More than that, the guru rewards the smart person’s self-image. He doesn’t say, “Follow me because I know and you don’t.” He says, “You already know. I’m just reminding you.” And that trick works. It flatters the ego while smuggling in a belief system. It cloaks subservience in the language of…