give the idea five minutes

how often does this happen?

someone shares an idea with you. or you find one while scrolling the internet. within a few seconds, maybe a minute, your brain has already decided. this is stupid. this will not work. someone must have tried this already.

it is fine to disagree. honestly, it is good to have strong opinions and beliefs. but at least give the idea some time before killing it.

there is a big difference between asking questions and pushing back. when you ask questions, you are trying to understand more. when you push back too quickly, you are usually saying, “i already know enough.”

learning to think before reacting might be one of those lifelong lessons.

Steve Jobs is probably one of the best examples of someone who deeply loved making things. he treated creativity with a rare kind of reverence. not every idea was treated like a finished product, but the process itself mattered. the rough version mattered. the fragile version mattered.

Mark Zuckerberg has said something similar about ideas. they do not arrive fully formed. they show up as thoughts, and in the beginning they are fragile. they can be compromised so easily. they can be squished before they ever get a chance to become real.

there are two things that take almost no skill: spending someone else's money and dismissing someone else's idea.

dismissing an idea is easy because it does not ask anything from you. you can ignore it. you can leave it. you can say no and move on. it takes nothing from you in the moment.

the hard part is to work with the idea for a little while. to hold it with some respect. to ask what is actually inside it. to see if there is a smaller truth hiding inside the bigger, messy version.

the right idea could come from anywhere. a reel, a tweet, a book, a conversation with a friend, even a wrong idea. sometimes the wrong idea has one tiny correct part inside it, and that is enough to start something useful.

maybe the rule is simple: give it five minutes.

next time you hear something, read something, or someone tells you an idea, give it five minutes before ignoring it. think about it a little. ask one better question. let it breathe before you decide it has no value.