Last week, someone slid into my inbox with an exciting opportunity.
Not for my work.
Not for a project.
For my thinking.
They wanted to “handle my social media” and “position me as a thought leader.” Monthly packages. Weekly deliverables. Guaranteed visibility. Apparently, my ideas just needed better lighting and a posting schedule.
I stared at the message and genuinely wondered.
Since when did thinking need a PR manager?
Here’s the funny part. The pitch wasn’t about what I think. It was about how often I should post it. Three reels a week. Two carousels. One inspirational quote every Sunday. Because obviously, wisdom works best on a content calendar!
And that’s when it hit me. We’ve reached the height of commercialization. Not of products. Not even of people. But of ideas themselves.
Let me ask you this.
Can a thought be outsourced?
Can curiosity be delegated?
Can years of lived experience be turned into a monthly retainer?
Somewhere along the way, thought leadership stopped being about thinking and started being about looking like you’re thinking.
Once upon a time, ideas were slow. They came from confusion, reading, failing, arguing with yourself, changing your mind at 2 a.m. Now they come pre-packaged with hashtags and engagement predictions.
Today, people don’t ask, “What do you believe?”
They ask, “Who’s managing your personal brand?”
Thought leaders are being sold like ready-to-eat meals. Same template. Different face. Add a little vulnerability. Sprinkle some buzzwords. Post consistently. Boom! Intellectual influencer unlocked.
But here’s the uncomfortable truth.
You cannot outsource originality.
You can outsource grammar.
You can outsource structure.
You can even use AI to refine your writing, clean it up, or make it readable.
And that’s fine.
Because if the idea is yours, the thinking is yours, the struggle behind it is yours, then refinement is just polishing the mirror, not inventing the reflection.
AI can help you say it better.
PR can help you share it wider.
But neither can give you something to say.
What we’re really selling today isn’t ideas. It’s the performance of having ideas.
And that’s where it gets funny, and a little sad.
Because real thinkers are messy. They pause. They contradict themselves. They say, “I don’t know yet.” That doesn’t perform well on social media, does it? So we smooth the edges. We simplify the complexity. We turn layered thinking into one-liners that sound deep but mean… nothing.
At that point, the thinker becomes the product. The idea becomes an accessory.
Let’s be honest.
Visibility is not intelligence.
Followers are not wisdom.
And a viral post is not the same as a valuable thought!
Buying a social media package won’t make you a thought leader any more than buying gym shoes makes you an athlete. You still have to sweat.
Thinking is slow. It’s inconvenient. It doesn’t like algorithms. That’s exactly why it’s being squeezed into templates and price lists.
Maybe the real rebellion today is simple. Think first. Post later. Speak when you actually have something to say.
Because ideas were never meant to be sold like soap.
They were meant to be lived, questioned, refined, and yes, sometimes rewritten with a little help.
If this made you smile, wince, or quietly nod, good.
That’s usually how real thinking begins.