On the Fragility of Ideas

There was a time I thought I owed the world my opinion. That if I didn’t speak, I’d be mistaken for uninformed. Someone made a claim—I had a response queued before they’d even finished. Not out of pride, not even out of certainty. Just a compulsion. A fear that stillness would be read as surrender.

I remember one night clearly. A fire. The scent of pine and ash. A friend spoke—something about suffering and providence that didn’t sit right with me. I gripped my pipe. The reflex kicked in: correct, clarify, rescue truth from error.

That silence taught me more than any rebuttal would have.

Since then, I’ve practiced something I call the five-minute pipe. Not always five minutes. Not always a pipe. It’s the discipline to let an idea rest in the air before I lay a hand on it. To let it breathe, unfold, test me—before I try to tame it. To be more controlled, more deliberate.

Most people don’t realize how quick we are to smother thought. To treat every new notion like an enemy at the gate. But most ideas aren’t threats. They’re seeds. And seeds don’t bloom when you take away their soil.

Real listening takes strength. Not the strength to speak—but the strength to wait. To hold back the clever reply. To resist the urge to prove. To let something strange, or bold, or difficult, linger.

Because maybe it’s not wrong. Maybe it’s just unfamiliar. Or maybe—it is wrong, but we need to understand why before we call it so.