“My advice is just don’t be too nice to niggas … just set the price so niggas’ll live your live, my nigga.”

Up until I just looked up the lyrics to this song (I should do that more often) I thought the second half of the bar was: ‘just set the price on niggas and live your life my nigga.’ I can’t help but wonder if the meaning’s the same. My interpretation and internalization of what I thought the bar was, is a powerful one. An empowering one. One that instills freedom. I’m a pleaser. Most of the time for most of my life I did things others wanted to do. I went along with things. I followed. Almost as if I was putting off my life, my wants, my goals to some arbitrary later date. Until my next life maybe? It was frustrating. Made me disappointed in myself. This bar brings into focus, in a succinctly eloquent way that only Jay-Z can, that sometimes you just can’t keep pleasing, following.

Sometimes you have to say fuck it, this is what it is. This is how things are going to be when it comes to me. That’s the “price” of dealing with me. These are my goals, this is what I’m shooting for. I’ll of course help you out along the way if I can, but I won’t allow you to derail me. Not anymore. It’s time for me to live.

~ Thursday 12.05.2019 @ 6:26am