Released: April 5, 2011

Featuring: Pat Brown

Songwriter: Dave Free Tae Beast Pat Brown Ab-Soul

Producer: Dave Free Tae Beast

[Intro: Sample]
I brought you something close to me
And left with something new
See through your head
You haunt my dreams
Nothing to do but believe
Just believe

[Verse: Ab-Soul]
And please don't confuse me with dot, I'm different
Long Term Mentality, still remember them cheap wood benches
How could I ever forget, I never could get
How niggas couldn't get up and get all they could get
Man I done seen a thing or two of things that he or she will do
To fit in with each other nitpicking at each other
Killing each other, bringing each other down, crustations in a bucket
Fuck it, roll your windows down in your bucket, play this loud
Soul brother number fucking two, my time on these 1's and 2's
I'm on this track like running shoes
I dedicate this one to Cletus Anderson for working harder
Than the average man, or bend over backwards for his family
Doing whatever is you ask for him
Shit, I know he fucking tired, he should be somewhere retired
Still trying, bills still due and between me and you
Until we get a mill, life smells like mildew

[Hook: Ab-Soul and Pat Brown]
Long term (This is long term!)
Long term (I hope you studied, cause I'm thinking long term)
Long term (I came, I saw, and conquered)
Mentality, mentality, long term (And it's an honor)
Long term (To share this with you, wait no longer)
Long term (Mother fucker this is long term)
Mentality, mentality, long term

[Outro: Conversation]
This situation is to relay how to make other people's lives
Uh...(better)
Better because of running into what you have to say (Exactly)
Of them finding your words
And they need to know this I've been doing this since
??? freestyle track
That's probably like, what? 2002-3? Know what I'm saying?
And I kept at it, I kept at it from there
(And you're only) 24
I just turned 24, I just turned 24 it's crazy, know what I'm saying?
So I dropped the -- you know, long term came out
I dropped that finally
Then I came back with the long term 2 shit they was like "oh!"
That's kinda cool, that's kinda cool right there
Then dot dropped the O.D. Kendrick dropped the O.D
That shit was like (It went over everyone's head)
Everyone's head (But they were still able to connect with it)
Exactly (But it was like you hadn't heard this in a minute)
It was like a rejuvenation (Exactly, exactly)
Almost like, saved hip-hop
And without preaching, none of y'all are trying to preach like
You're the new cats but it's just -- you're not --
You didn't ever look at it like it was dead but you're bringing it Back (Exactly)
You're bringing it back to life (Real shit)
Then Q dropped the Setback shit and that shit was like
You know what I'm saying? You know -- you already know
Groovin'
So Top -- Top talk to me like you know...
You gotta go ahead and try sell something
I'm thinking to myself it's a little too early for me to try and sell
I'm still fresh but he said you need to go and try it out
Everybody else selling
I gotta do long term something nigga I don't care what it is
But that's your brain, long term is your brain
I didn't want to do long term 3 yet until I'm rich
That's what long term 3 is about, being rich
So -- I'm like you know (Damn, okay)
So this is kinda, you know, just kinda like a -- I wanted it to serve
As like a summation of what long term is about
What it really meant
Know what I'm saying (You a cool cat)
I mean fuck I'm on tour now dog
I'm in Minneapolis, dog (People know you)
You know what I'm talking 'bout?
I'm in Minneapolis bruh, cold as fuck people know who I am over
Here bruh
I'm on tour with murderers right now, paid dudes too
Like what the fuck is going on? (That's long term!)
You are the paid dude, he just said it by putting you on it
(Soul!)

[Outro: Skit]
People talk about a soul
To me what we call soul -- the highest expression of ourselves
Is pure love
I don't care who you are, what your background is what you've Done
I don't care if you're Henry Kissinger or George Bush
Or David Rockefeller or the Queen of England or any of these
Guys that have been manipulating the world and still are
At that level of yourself, you're pure love
Everyone is but you can become disconnected from that level
And manifest in that disconnection anything but pure love
But that's what we all are, all of us

Ab-Soul

Herbert Anthony Stevens IV (born February 23, 1987), better known by his stage name Ab-Soul, is an American hip hop recording artist from Carson, California, signed to Top Dawg Entertainment and Interscope Records. Stevens is best known as a member of hip hop supergroup Black Hippy, along with fellow West Coast rappers and label-mates Jay Rock, Kendrick Lamar, and ScHoolboy Q. He has so far released three independent studio albums under the label Top Dawg Entertainment, Longterm Mentality, Control System, and These Days, and one album jointly with Interscope, Do What Thou Wilt.