Pizza Toppings

Everybody's Got an Opinion 

Everybody has an opinion about pizza. Thin crust or thick. Extra cheese or light. Pepperoni or plain. Some people won't touch pineapple. Some people think anchovies are a crime. Walk into any group chat and bring up pizza toppings, and watch how fast people start defending their side like it's a matter of principle.

Here's the thing. None of that is actually a problem. We're allowed to have different tastes. You liking olives and me liking bacon doesn't make either of us wrong. It just means we're different people with different preferences. That's normal.

That's fine. Order your pizza exactly how you want it. But here's the question I want you to think about today.

Are you arguing over pizza toppings while the whole pizza shop is burning down?

The Fire Nobody's Watching

Picture this. There's a potholder sitting too close to the stove in the back of a pizza shop. Nobody's paying attention to it because everyone up front is deep in a debate about whether pineapple belongs on pizza. That potholder catches a spark. Just a small flame at first. Still, everyone's arguing about pizza toppings.

The flame spreads to the apron hanging nearby. People are still going back and forth about crust thickness. The fire catches the wall. Somebody's still insisting Chicago deep dish is the only real pizza. By the time anyone looks up from the argument, the kitchen has burnt down.

Nobody meant for that to happen. The topping argument wasn't even wrong to have. Preferences are real, and they matter when you're deciding what to order. But none of that matters even a little bit once the building is on fire. At that point, the only thing that matters is putting it out.

Where This Shows Up in Real Life

This happens constantly, and it rarely looks like an actual fire. It looks like a couple arguing about how the living room is decorated while neither of them has addressed the distance that's been growing between them for months. The furniture isn't the problem. The furniture is the pizza topping. The real fire is the conversation nobody's having about why they feel like roommates instead of partners.

It happens at work too. A team spends an entire meeting debating font choices and slide formatting for a presentation while the actual strategy behind the project has never been agreed on. Everyone leaves the meeting feeling productive because they resolved something. But the something they resolved was 20 percent of the issue, while the 80 percent that actually determines whether the project succeeds never got touched.

It happens with kids and schools too. Parents will go to war over a schedule change or a dress code policy while a bigger issue, like whether their child is actually being taught well, or whether they're being bullied, or whether they're falling behind, sits untouched in the background. The dress code isn't nothing. But it isn't the fire either.

Assigning It a Number

I think in numbers, so here's how I look at it. Ask yourself honestly what percentage of importance something actually deserves, and then ask how much energy you're actually giving to it. If something is genuinely worth 20 percent of your attention, but you're pouring 80 percent of your energy, your time, your emotional bandwidth into it, that imbalance is the problem. Not the topic itself. The imbalance.

And on the flip side, if something deserves 80 percent of your attention and you're only giving it 20, that's how the real fire keeps spreading unnoticed while you stay busy with the smaller stuff.

Deal With the Fire First

None of this means your preferences don't matter, or that smaller issues are never worth discussing. It means order matters. Priority matters. Put the fire out first. Then, once the building isn't burning down around you, go ahead and have the pizza topping conversation. Have it all you want. There's nothing wrong with caring about the details once the bigger thing is secure.

But too many people, myself included at different points in life, have stood in a burning building passionately defending their stance on Hawaiian pizza.

So today, I want you to actually look around. At home. At work. In your friendships. In whatever group or community you're part of. Ask yourself what you've been arguing about, and then ask yourself honestly whether that thing is a fire, or whether it's just a pizza topping.

Because the next time you sit down to eat a slice, I want that question to cross your mind before the food crosses your lips.



Are you arguing over pizza toppings while the whole shop burns down?

Fátima Bey
International Speaker, Author & Founder of MindShift Universe

A MindShift Universe production

© 2026 Fatima Bey. All rights reserved.