You aren't listening. You're reloading.

I caught myself doing it again last week on a call. Speaker was mid-sentence explaining why his timeline slipped. I was nodding. Making the right sounds. Performing the physical theater of a person who gives a shit.

But I wasn’t there.

I was three sentences ahead, waiting in the dark with a line I’d been sharpening since he opened his mouth.

Not because I wanted to understand him. Because I wanted to be ready. Because understanding is slow and being right is an instant hit.

We do this constantly.

Someone shares an idea and your brain doesn’t receive it. It hunts it. Scans for the weak spot. The loose thread. The one sentence you can pull to unravel everything and prove you were the smart one in the room, except you weren’t even in the room.

Disagreement feels like intelligence. Understanding feels like surrender.

So we reload instead.

The worst part? We do it to ourselves too.

You make a mistake and the voice doesn’t slow down to understand what happened. No curiosity. No witness. No fair hearing. Just the same prosecutor who already knows the verdict and is tired of waiting.

Here we go again. You always do this. What the hell is wrong with you.

You don’t get to process anything. The cross-examination starts before the evidence is even in.

Our words should be bridges to comprehension, not barriers to connection. Disagree less, understand more.

Or keep reloading. See how long you can stay the undefeated champion of an empty room.

~ aq