Lauryn Hill - A Lifetime of Lessons

Written By: Lindi B.

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Photo From Google

Ms. Lauryn Hill has educated me for almost three decades. I am sure she’ll do so for a lifetime. The album that needed no follow up, Grammy award winning, critically acclaimed, culturally received, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, was released when I was two years old. Undoubtedly too young to remember or comprehend any of it but, I know that it was always there. Her music was played on the radio during the car ride to school, in school, at home, and through speakers in my neighborhood. It was music that was always present, always relevant, and would stay that way for years to come. 

Ms. Hill's brief but poignant catalog went from the music I was given, to the music I chose. 

I listened to her duet with D’Angelo, “Nothing Even Matters,” religiously on the walk from the train to my high school building, yearning for a fraction of the love emitted from that song. She taught me about love. Loving one another and loving oneself. To turn on the television and see her in music videos with hair as coarse as mine and skin just as deep, it was significant in ways I wouldn’t gather until I got older. It taught me to remember my beauty, remember my confidence in a world that wanted to convince me it wasn't there.

I would always sing along, loud, proud, and unknowing. She taught me so many words. Expanding my vocabulary by adding ‘‘zealot,’ ‘reciprocity,’ and ‘iniquity’ to the arsenal. I found her music again as a young adult, navigating my first big girl jobs, big girl relationships, and big girl dilemmas. With the weight of the world seemingly fastened to my back, I gravitated towards MTV Unplugged No.2. Songs like “I Gotta Find Peace of Mind” and “Just Like Water” let me know that the weight can become lighter and I am not alone in learning how to carry it gracefully.

Ms. Lauryn Hill’s music reaches such a wide array of listeners, ones that are familiar to me and others that are not with the simple intention of staying honest, vulnerable, and open enough to admit that there's a lot we all need to learn. Even the educator. 

Sometimes in life, we need to learn the lessons for ourselves. Sure my parents knew, my community knew and lived the life to understand to resonate with her music beyond the sonics. To hear the lyrics and relate - to hear the lyrics and see yourself, the same thoughts that you wrestle with your own, so elegantly analyzed and reflected back at you is special. Growing up, reciting lyrics felt so instinctual, a second nature almost like prayer. Then one day, grown in body and mind, mouth open for a recital, you can hear the songs truly for the first time.

How you gon' win when you ain't right within?

How you gon' win when you ain't right within?

How you gon' win when you ain't right within?

And every couple of years you will hear them again, differently than the last, another first time. The lyrics fall upon new ears, as you are a new person than the years before. What a beautiful way to learn.

When you are trying to find love or find God or remember that they are essentially the same search, Ms. Lauryn Hill  is there to move you. Move you to action or tears or wonder how one's thought process can lead to such an intricate bar.

Now don't you understand man universal law

What you throw out comes back to you, star

Never underestimate those who you scar

Cause karma, karma, karma comes back to you hard

You can't hold God's people back that long

The chain of Shatan wasn't made that strong

Her music is a classroom of vocals with rasp and range, full to the brim with emotion. From child to teen to adult, shuffling between The Score, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, MTV UNplugged 2.0, you will learn. Someone will sample her work or reference it or you will simply find it again whenever you need a reminder that it is never too late to learn and the growth never stops and that this life, this music, her music is a lifetime of lessons.