The Fabric of the Lie

I’m listening to Spotify’s top songs of all time for me, and then Beyoncé comes on.

I act like I’m shocked, but then I look down at the numbers, as if Spotify is saying: "You stupid b*tch, we knew you were lying this whole time. We know what your mother listens to, too, and she’s not even on the platform. Oh, and here’s a playlist your future baby might like."

Years ago, I remember an engineer at a tech conference showing us, in real time, how he could get someone from Katy Perry to Swedish death metal.

People have cited music as the influence behind a range of behaviors, from making babies to ending those babies' lives. Its power has already proven its existence. The real question is: who holds that power?

Surely the artist would.

Or are we so sure?

How can we be certain that artists themselves have not become bound to the beauty of their own creations? That they have not accepted being bought and sold within economies from which they are largely excluded, if only because the illusion requires them to believe its value system is the ultimate arbiter of worth?

That’s like being taken out for your birthday dinner and then paying not only for your own meal, but someone else’s too.

(The food was aight, by the way.)

If we know these systems are devaluing the very people whose contributions keep them alive, perhaps we should leave them to their devaluation exercise.

Easier said than done, you say.

For me, it’s easier done than said. After all, an idea that offers comfort to the mind but never reaches the soul is merely a dream deferred.

You mean to tell me that the makers and narrators of this story we call Life cannot materialize their creativity from one form of value into another? I refuse to insult your intelligence.

The undercurrent of this tension remains: when creativity is abundant, how do we channel that energy into the material world in a way that's not just about survival but about creating a self-sustaining ecosystem?

A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Value does not disappear simply because it's been mislabeled.

This question emerged in my own karmic loop of claiming my creative identity. For years, I lived in its shadow, watching from the sidelines as people created narratives about who they thought I was.

I guess because we ate pizza at 4 a.m. together.

Woooo. Such wild times.

Forgive the match-lit sense of humor, but it is genuinely stunning how long we can endure the dissatisfaction of handing something as precious as our creative identities to people and systems that were never designed to tell the story correctly.

The label is hand-picked for you. Made from special ribbon. Ill-fitting, but technically wearable. This becomes the fabric you bind yourself into and unwrap every night. The welts where you've outgrown the bounds begin to sting. And on top of that you can’t even tell me what fabric it’s made from?

So we must own our value, all of it, not for this fleeting world, but for our soul’s purpose.