Lisa Simpson is one of the smartest characters in the popular TV show The Simpsons which has been on TV for over thirty years. Despite the show's age, Lisa remains the same and she's still the 8-years-old girl she was all the way back in 1989. Her youth didn't stop her from proving her remarkable intellect over and over again.
Lisa often fights with her older brother Bart but she generally has a good relationship with her family. Her life might seem pretty perfect but nothing's as amazing as it seems and even though she's highly intelligent, Lisa still did some big mistakes over the years.
Ignoring Other People's Beliefs
Lisa considers herself to be tolerant and open to new things and opinions... Yet when the time comes to show it, she often behaves in a completely different way. She has trouble accepting other people for what they are, especially when she believes she's the one who's right and her family, friends and other Springfield citizens are wrong.
Just remember the time she decided to ruin Homer's barbecue with his friends because she believed that eating meat was wrong and even ran away from home when Homer wouldn't budge. Or the time when she made fun of her mom's faith. Lisa should learn to be more tolerant if she wants to along well with people.
Almost Hurting Clara
Lisa tries to act in a rational way most of the time but when she falls for someone, she suddenly throws everything she learned behind and changes into a dangerous person who can lie and hurt her rivals in love. When she and her family are on a trip, she meets a nice boy named Luke and falls for him.
Lisa wants to go with Luke to dance but then she overhears him talking to a girl named Clara on the phone. Instead of talking about it to Luke like any sensible person would have done, Lisa stays silent and when she meets Clara in the woods, she sends her the wrong way, endangering Clara's life in the process. Lisa acts somewhat remorseful but only once she finds out that Clara is actually Luke's sister and not his girlfriend.
Dating Nelson
Similar to many other The Simpsons characters, Lisa doesn't seem to have much luck when it comes to love. Sure, she's only eight, but most of her crushes end up in heartbreak, either for Lisa, the guy she likes (or doesn't like) or for both of them.
Her relationship with Bart's best friend Milhouse is a whole other category, but none of us should forget the time when Lisa dated Bart's biggest enemy Nelson, the guy who bullies Bart and other school kids. Not only did Lisa choose the one guy who tormented her brother, but these two also had absolutely nothing in common.
Getting A Restraining Order Against Bart
Speaking of Lisa and Bart... Their relationship throughout the show is sometimes sweet, but most of the time it ends up strained and filled with rivalry. And sometimes they take it too far even if you take into consideration the natural competition between siblings.
In one episode, after Bart bullies and teases Lisa during a school trip, she goes as far as getting a restraining order against him. While this may look like a bit of overkill, Bart did deserve his lesson. But later on, the restraining order changes and Bart can't be in the house as Lisa, which feels like an unfair punishment from her side and it certainly doesn't improve the relationship between them.
Not Having Any Friends
Bart may be difficult to get along well with at times, but Lisa is even worse. At least judging by the fact that she has no real friends. Her biggest friend is her mom and then the people in the books she likes to read. That's not normal behavior for an 8-year-old girl.
Even when Lisa temporarily manages to find friends, it usually doesn't last long because she either does something that ruins the friendship or pretends to be someone else than she actually is. Lisa should try to be more social, at least if she wants to experience life at its fullest.
Letting The Insults Get To Her
To be fair to Lisa, she also doesn't have it easy. The people at her school laugh at her and mock her for her intelligence and introverted nature. She usually does her best to ignore those who mock her but in one case, she lets it get to her head which, in turn, endangers her health.
In one episode, her classmates begin to mock Lisa about her big butt. Lisa is devastated by this and becomes obsessed with her weight. She exercises a lot and barely eats, effectively damaging herself, both her body and her mind. If only she had ignored those remarks, she could have saved herself a lot of trouble.
Sabotaging Her Classmate
Let's get back to Lisa and her friends (or really, lack of thereof). Lisa has trouble accepting when someone is better at something than her and this robs her of the chance to get closer to people with whom she might actually get along well and maybe even become friends.
Relatively early in the show, a new girl called Allison comes into Lisa's school and to her horror, Lisa finds out that Allison is better at everything she does - she's smarter, plays the saxophone better and even makes a better diorama for a school contest. Instead of trying to befriend her, Lisa decides to sabotage Allison's diorama which is very immature behavior.
Not Helping Her Sister
Not only doesn't Lisa get along well with Bart or her classmates, but she also allows her jealousy to endanger the relationship between herself and her baby sister Maggie. Maggie is a genuinely sweet child who seems to like to spend time with her siblings and her family in general, but Lisa doesn't pay that much attention to her.
That changes, unfortunately in a wrong way, when the Simpson family finds out that Maggie is a super-intelligent baby. Instead of being glad for her sister and her talent, Lisa is jealous of her and goes as far as teaching her the wrong words and their meaning, confusing her baby sister. And when she finds out that Maggie can play saxophone, she forcefully takes it from her.
Not Finishing Her Book
Let's ease up for a moment and focus on Lisa's hobbies instead. Lisa is a talented girl but she, unfortunately, possesses the mentality of a quitter. That means that when something doesn't go her way or when she finds out that somebody is better at something she loves doing, instead of working on her skills and pushing herself, she tends to drop everything because she thinks there's no point.
That's not a very healthy approach, and Lisa behaves this way over and over again. When she decides to write a book, she gives it up almost immediately afterward because she isn't able to start and is spending her time procrastinating instead. And when Bart proves to be better at music than her, Lisa decides to stop doing jazz altogether.
Getting Anxious About Her Future
This one is a bit understandable but still deserves mentioning. Unlike many young children of the same age, Lisa seems super worried about her future... maybe just a bit too worried, considering she's only eight years old and adulthood is far away for her (and since it's The Simpsons, it might never come in the first place).
Instead of enjoying her youth and all the possibilities it offers her, Lisa often worries about what will happen later on in her life and more than once, she imagines nightmarish scenarios in which she's either extremely fat or married someone completely bad for her or generally absolutely unhappy.