“One of the most sophisticated ways of thinking is listening, provided that it is not confused with ”obeying.” It is not enough just to lend an ear; it is necessary to resist the temptation to surrender to the voice of another simply because it sounds firm, confident, or, worse still, laden with prestige. Never forget that authority, on its own, is not an argument. Not even when the speaker speaks with the confidence that comes from experience or the charisma that engenders recognition. Quite the contrary: the more compelling the words, the greater the listener’s critical vigilance must be. Accepting a statement simply because it comes from an admired or revered source is a form of silent capitulation, a discreet abdication of one’s own judgment which, far from bringing one closer to knowledge, turns it into an act of imitation. And imitation—as Montaigne well knew—does not enlighten: it diminishes.
Reflection, when genuine, is not transmitted as a recipe or imposed as a doctrine. What is offered here is not a closed, definitive truth, but an open provocation. Listening should not be understood as immediate adherence, but as a willingness to try out what has been heard: to put it to the test, to let it resonate in the specific matter of a concrete life. And it is there, in the very body of existential experience, that any idea reveals its fruitfulness or its fragility. It is not, therefore, a matter of confirming what another has said, nor of adopting their voice as one’s own, but of passing that voice through the sieve of singularity: of turning what has been received into something thought from within oneself.
The musical example is not accidental. The score can be shared, but the interpretation—as any honest performer knows—never is. The same note played on different instruments produces different timbres, unexpected accents, silences with their own depth. So it is with thought: the same idea, when it passes through another biography, another character, another rhythm of life, no longer sounds the same. The authenticity of judgment does not lie in the originality of the content, but in the fidelity to that intimate modulation that only one person can give. I am not speaking, then, from a pulpit, from a throne. I am not trying to guide, teach, preach, or dictate; I am speaking from the partial and contingent place that constitutes me. My words do not claim universality, but sincerity and honesty. It is permeated by what is happening inside me. If anything I say resonates with the reader, it will not be because we share a doctrine, but because there has been, perhaps, a coincidence between differences. But even at that point of intersection, the distance remains: you are not me, nor could I ever speak from your place. That distance is not an obstacle. It is not an imperfection to be corrected or a hindrance that prevents us from approaching the truth. Quite the contrary: it is its most basic premise. Thinking is not seeking fusion between voices, but learning to sustain disagreement without severing the link. Real dialogue does not consist of reaching a sterile consensus, but of accepting that any truth worthy of the name is affirmed in the midst of plurality, and not in spite of it.”
Prabhuji
