The Characteristics of Truth

Truth can withstand your doubt.

It isn't frightened by your questions. It doesn't become less true because you are unconvinced. You can interrogate it, dissect it, turn it upside down and examine it from every conceivable angle.

Truth will still be standing there.

“And then?” 🫡😏

Truth doesn't need your cooperation.

You do not have to participate in its existence. You don't have to agree with it, understand it, acknowledge it, or even believe it.

Truth existed before your opinion arrived.

It will continue existing after your opinion has left.

Truth doesn't bargain.

It doesn't sit across the table from you and ask what version of reality would make you more comfortable.

It doesn't say, “What if we meet halfway?”

There is no halfway between what is and what isn't.

Truth simply says:

This is what is.

Truth doesn't need your agreement.

Consensus is useful for deciding where to have dinner.

It is not required for reality.

Ten people can agree that something is true and still be wrong. Ten thousand can reject something that is true and still be wrong.

Truth does not conduct a popularity poll before becoming reality.

Truth doesn't become stronger when you believe it.

And it doesn't become weaker when you don't.

Truth doesn't chase you when you walk away.

You can leave.

You can turn your back on it.

You can construct an entirely different explanation and live inside it.

Truth will not run after you screaming,

“Come back! Please believe me!”

It has nothing to prove.

Truth doesn't shame you when you walk away.

You do that yourself.

Truth doesn't have to humiliate you for rejecting it.

Reality has a way of doing its own accounting.

Eventually, what is true and what you have chosen to believe may meet again.

And when they do, Truth won't say,

“I told you so.”

It will simply be there.

Truth is patient without being passive.

It doesn't move simply because you refuse to move.

It doesn't become cruel because you are resistant to it.

It doesn't require vengeance.

It doesn't require applause.

It doesn't require witnesses.

Truth does not perform.

Truth has no public relations department.

It doesn't need better branding.

It doesn't need to become more impressive.

It doesn't need to shout louder than the lie.

It simply has one extraordinarily inconvenient characteristic:

It is.

But Truth has another characteristic that is less often discussed.

It can be scary.

Not because Truth is cruel.

Because Truth is a threshold.

And thresholds are frightening.

At the threshold, you can see what Truth might require you to surrender.

The explanation you built.

The identity you constructed around it.

The story that kept everything in place.

The certainty you were using as shelter.

The version of reality that allowed you to remain exactly where you were.

At the threshold, Truth can feel enormous.

Almost merciless.

But Truth isn't merciless.

It simply refuses to become smaller so that you can remain comfortable.

And then you cross.

And something changes.

The thing you thought would destroy you did not destroy you.

The thing you thought would diminish you did not diminish you.

The truth you were afraid to face becomes the very thing that allows you to stop carrying what was never yours to carry.

And suddenly, Truth is beautiful.

Scary at the threshold.

Beautiful when you exit.

Because Truth did not take something from you.

It returned you to reality.

And reality, once you stop fighting it, is remarkably beautiful.

Perhaps that is the ultimate characteristic of Truth.

It does not need to become itself.

It already is.

So doubt it.

Question it.

Investigate it.

Walk away from it.

Argue with it.

Refuse it.

Build elaborate theories around avoiding it if you absolutely must.

Truth can take it.

Because Truth isn't fragile.

It doesn't need your cooperation.

It doesn't bargain.

It doesn't require your agreement.

It doesn't chase you.

It doesn't shame you.

It doesn't collapse because you looked away.

It just stands there.

Quietly.

Patiently.

Entirely unimpressed by the fact that you haven't decided to believe it yet.

A humble flex, really. 🫡😏