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After bein' 25, you know, just trying to survive in the world |
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Bout to have a little boy or baby girl. Who knows? |
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Anyway, just when you start gettin that little age and experience to you |
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You start thinkin about stuff...tryin to make the right moves |
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So bust it out, this is what I was thinkin, check it |
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Yo, the education of the Lon-chicka-Lonnie Lynn |
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Began, began with time |
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Bein my bloodline is one with the divine |
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In time brotha, you will discover the light |
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Some say that God is Black and the Devil's White |
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Well, the Devil is wrong and God is what's right |
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I fight, with myself in the ring of doubt and fear |
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The rain ain't gone, but I can still see clear |
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As a child, given religion with no answer to why |
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Just told believe in Jesus cuz for me he did die |
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Curiosity killed the catechism |
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Understanding and wisdom became the rhythm that I played to |
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And became a slave to master self |
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A rich man is one with knowledge, happiness and his health |
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My mind had dealt with the books of Zen, Tao the lessons |
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Koran and the Bible, to me they all vital |
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And got truth within 'em, gotta read them boys |
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You just can't skim 'em, different branches of belief |
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But one root that stem 'em, but people of the venom try to trim 'em |
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And use religion as an emblem |
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When it should be a natural way of life |
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Who am I or they to say to whom you pray ain't right |
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That's who got you doin right and got you this far |
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Whether you say "in Jesus name" or Hum do Allah |
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Long as you know it's a bein' that's supreme to you |
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You let that show towards others in the things you do |
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Cuz when the trumpets blowin, 24 elders surround the throne |
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Only 144,000 gon get home |
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Only 144,000 gon get home |
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Only 144,000 gon get it baby |
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Chorus Cee-Lo: |
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I've lived and I've learned |
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I have taken and I've earned |
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I have laughed, I've cried |
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I have failed and I have tried |
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Sunshine, pouring rain |
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found joy through all my pain |
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I just wanna be happy with being me |
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Cee-Lo: |
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Let me voice my concern |
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So many of my fellow brothers have given themselves a title |
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That their actions didn't earn |
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Our ignorance is in the same breath as our innocence |
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Subconciously, seeking to find an impressionable mind to convince |
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I've finally come to the realization why Black people in the worse |
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place |
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Cuz it's hard to correct yourself when you don't know |
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Who you are in the first place |
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So I try to find the clue in you |
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But evidently, White folks know more Black history than we do |
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Why're we bein' lied to? I ain't know our history was purposely hidden |
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Damn, somethin' in me wanna know who I am |
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So I began my search, my journey started in church |
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It gave my heartache relief when I started to understand belief |
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Hustlin was like a gift spent my share of time in the streets |
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Taught me survival from this evil I'm just gonna have to deal with |
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And I felt like a fool when I tried to learn it in school |
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It almost seemed like a rehearsal when the only |
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Science and math are universal |
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Takin elder advice, read the Bible, the Koran |
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Searched scrolls from the Hebrew Israelites |
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Hold on, this ain't right, Jesus wasn't White |
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Some leads were granted with insight |
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and it's all in the plan, but it took me some time to overstand |
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He still created with the imperfection of man |
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So, with followin' I disagree |
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By no means have I forgotten or forgiven what's been done to me but |
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I do know the Devil ain't no White man, the Devil's a spiritual mind |
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That's color blind, there's evil White folk and evil niggas |
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You gon surely find there's no positivity without negativity |
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But one side you gonna have to choose |
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Any chance to speak I refuse to misuse |
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So how can you call yourself God when you let a worldly possession |
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Become an obsession and the way you write your rhymes and |
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Can't follow your lesson |
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If a seed's sown, you make sure it's known, you make sure it's grown |
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If you God, then save your own, don't mentally enslave your own |
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If you God, then save your own, don't mentally enslave your own |
| [04:06.188] |
If you God, then save your own, don't mentally enslave your own |
| [04:09.072] |
Well, I've lived and I've learned |
| [04:11.299] |
I've taken and I've earned |
| [04:14.054] |
I have laughed, I have cried |
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I failed and I have tried |
| [04:20.294] |
Sunshine, pourin rain |
| [04:22.907] |
I found joy through my pain |
| [04:25.870] |
Just wanna be happy...bein me |
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Bein' me |