What is the truth?

"How could you have said that?" "Because it's the truth!" "I told the truth!" Typical lines from heated conversations in movies and everyday living. Then we have the one-liner philosophical sayings centred on truth: "Truth is bitter" "The truth shall set you free" etc

It was in my first year in University that I was first confronted with this question. Introduction to Philosophy was the course. The Lecturer had asked a member of the class to define "true". "Something that is not a lie is true" he answered. I was bemused; even as I hit away at the keys on my board, I have this smile playing at the corners of my lips as I recall this incident. That answer gave birth to many questions whose answers gave birth to more questions. Indeed, that lecture has a place in my heart as one of the most engaging and fun lectures I ever attended.

Take for granted that the above is an anecdote. But if I asked you the same question what would your response be? I had a discussion online with someone last night and my response to a question was "...but that's the truth" and he asked me that same question from my first Philosophy class in my first year at the University: "what's the truth?"..... And eleven years after I first heard it, I still didn't have a straightforward answer. Because I never searched.

Again, what's the truth?

I mulled over the question as I went to bed and I woke up this morning with the realisation of the truth! That truth that God has put inside of us. Did you know the truth is in us to guide us? Oh yes! Some call it conscience, others call it spirit - yes, the spirit of truth. What is the truth I found in me?

It is the truth that God is love and because he made us in his image and likeness, he expects us to love ourselves first, then treat each other as we would him were he to walk among us in flesh and blood;
It is a truth that we were neither born with a tribe nor a religion but into them. Therefore, whatever ideologies we have and hold on to were learnt;
That these ideologies were fed into us as the truth and have shaped our thought patterns for years;
But these learned "truths" can be unlearned to make way for a relearning of the truth as God wants us to know it - the truth that sets free!

So, what is the truth about our situation as a country?

Our leaders know that the seeds of ethnocentrism and religious superiority (and intolerance) have been sown in us over the years. They have watered and nourished what was sown into a weapon they manipulate us to employ against each other to their own advantage. This seed that was planted into us decades ago have been so well pruned, they have their roots in the core of our existence as a people. We fight ourselves while they smile; we cannot see eye to eye because of intolerance but they hobnob at their social gatherings; we kill ourselves over nothing while they protect themselves over our everything; we starve and thirst and quench even as they make their picks of choicest of foods and wines and flourish. The truth is that we know we are being used.

A few years ago, we resigned ourselves and fate to a "truth" that was propagated that they were more powerful than we are. But thank goodness, today we are aware of THE truth that if we CAN just put our sectional idiosyncrasies aside, we can defeat them; and free what is left of the now for ourselves and protect the future of/for our children. We can uproot that ugly tree with all its tap and burn it. Yes, we can! But first, each and everyone of us must reach into our inner selves and discover this truth. Only then can we speak in one voice.

Dear friends, what is your truth?

Good morning, have a great weekend ahead and a blessed June. So long, be kind! xoxo