Testify

I just took a mental age test which said I was born in 1990 (haha guess I'm still growing up at 52). This song was released a year after my mental age which I just rediscovered. Testify.

To proclaim a truth is rare today. Testifying has been replaced by criticism, rejection, argument, questions, wishes, slogans... anything but just proclaiming. Maybe social media encourages us to chase viewers, followers and fans by trying to attract rather than proclaim our true passion. While money and popularity are not evil in themselves, they can distract and invade our lives so that we loose the person we yearn to become.

To testify, is to just say something without apology. You can explain if someone interested has a question. Even that is rare today because few people think about context, content and implications anymore. Most arguments are just different ways to contradict one another.

In a recent New York Times bestseller Zero to One, Peter Thiel likes to ask start-up applicants "What important truth do very few people agree with you on?" (no wonder the standard of English is so low if such an intelligent man has to put questions in such an awkward way). I would just ask, "What truth will you dare to testify?" because conviction and passion are what drives a creative person.

I never realized it but I spent much of my life trying to learn how to convince my friends of myself and my view. After nearly 53 years, I conclude they are either not interested at all about me (and probably their own passion) while the people who care just want me to say who I am. Testify. No apologies.

No wonder my state of mind is 25. I just began to be myself.