Given the other content, the author appears unhappy that some people may be smarter than he is. Perhaps even smarter than his grandma.

You don't have to be a genius to see that all of the author's "poorly defined problems" are social, relational, and emotional.

'One way to spot people who are good at solving poorly defined problems is to look for people who feel good about their lives; “how do I live a life I like” is a humdinger of a poorly defined problem.'

This is just silly. It is, as one smart person might have said once, not even wrong.

Happiness isn't a poorly defined problem. There's a lot of research and evidence. Being psychology, there's also a fair amount of opinionation and speculation. But the outlines of the mysterious object are fairly clear.

https://positivepsychology.com/psychology-of-happiness/

The problem is more that this is an emotionally underdeveloped culture which prioritises cut-throat aggressive competition. Instead of being fundamental, self-care techniques are treated as band-aids to reduce the stress of the rest of life and (supposedly) lead to greater success and - most importantly - productivity.

The subtext of competitive happiness is just more of the same.

And so is the subtext of competitve intelligence.