All Language Is True, Precisely Because Language Has No Fixed Truth

I used to care deeply about whether a statement was “factual.”

In meetings, retrospectives, and conversations, whenever I sensed someone was “embellishing,” “dancing around,” or “speaking in platitudes,” my instinct was to resist—even feel a bit impatient. I would subconsciously think: This isn’t the truth. This is just posturing.

Only later did I realize how naive that judgment was.

The problem with language is rarely about truth versus falsehood. It’s about what you take it to be.

After spending enough time in organizations, you gradually come to see that most people aren’t “lying.” What they say is often true—just not the kind of “factual truth” you expect. More often than not, language carries positions, relationships, risk assessments, and even self-protection. It truthfully reflects where the speaker stands, not the event itself.

For example, “This is a bit complicated” usually doesn’t mean it’s complicated—it means the speaker doesn’t want to push forward right now. “Let’s observe a bit longer” doesn’t mean observation—it means unwillingness to bear the consequences of a decision. “Overall, it’s okay” doesn’t mean satisfaction—it means reluctance to admit disappointment. If you take these words literally, of course they feel hollow. But if you treat them as expressions of a state of mind, they become remarkably honest.

Language feels “empty” because we expect it to do more than it can.

We want a single sentence to accomplish three things at once: accurately describe facts, clearly express a stance, and avoid damaging relationships. In reality, these three are almost never compatible. So language constantly compromises in the middle—vague on the surface, yet deeply pragmatic. It serves not truth, but survival.

From a manager’s perspective, this becomes even more apparent.

The closer you are to the front line, the more concrete the language. The higher you go, the more abstract it becomes. Not because people become less genuine, but because the risk structure they bear changes. A frontline employee saying “This requirement doesn’t make sense” carries little cost. A middle manager saying the same thing has to consider upstream and downstream dependencies. A senior executive saying it might imply a wrong direction, wasted resources, or organizational upheaval.

So language begins to “deform”—but that deformation itself is a fact.

If you cling only to whether language “tells the truth,” you’ll miss a wealth of critical information. What truly matters is often: Why did this person say this in this way at this moment? Behind language lies the organization’s pressure distribution, power structure, and incentive mechanisms—not the right or wrong of a single event.

I once went through a phase where I desperately wanted to “speak clearly.”

I wanted to turn ambiguity into precision, attitudes into conclusions, and pull every conversation back to the factual level. Eventually, I realized that this impulse itself was also a perspective determined by position. When you don’t yet have to bear the consequences of complexity, you naturally favor clarity. But when you start being responsible for the system, you understand why many things can only be said to a certain degree.

So I’ve gradually come to accept this: Language doesn’t need to be “purified.”

It was never meant to be a vessel for absolute truth. It’s an expressive system that constantly adjusts under real-world constraints. It truthfully reflects people’s fears, expectations, calculations, and compromises. The reason language seems “unreal” is precisely because reality itself is messy, incomplete, and asymmetrical.

So now, when I hear those vague statements, I pause.

Not to judge whether they’re right or wrong, but to sense: What unspeakable thing lies beneath? What forces are shaping this expression? Often, understanding this layer brings you closer to the truth than chasing an “accurate statement.”

All language is true, precisely because language has no fixed truth.

It doesn’t owe us a reconstruction of the world. It only owes us a revelation of where we stand within it.