By Black Love And Marriage.com on February 28, 2012
In Becoming One
By Neysa Ellery Taylor
You’ve heard it all before: “The plight of the black man. The struggle of the black woman. Black women don’t understand black men. Black men are all dogs. No one understands what black men have to face the minute they walk out the front door. Black women are the mules of the world.”Can we please call a truce? Do black men have it rough? Yes. Do black women have it bad? Yes. That is the end of the statement. We don’t have to be in a constant battle to see who has it worse. It’s like both of us having our throats slashed and arguing about who’s hurt worse. That doesn’t make any sense. We are all under immense pressure outside our homes. We are both dealing with huge socio-psycho factors that affect our emotional state. All of that is leading to feuding in our homes. So how do we stop it?
We all hurt and it is time that we deal with it individually.
All of us need to take a good look inside ourselves and deal with our pain. If you are married, you cannot deal effectively as a part of a covenant when you are full of pain. If you are single, you cannot try to search for a spouse when you are still hurt. You have to stop, look inside, and make a list of things that you first need to address. Let’s be honest, societal pressures will always be there. The pressures outside your door will always be there. But with help, how you deal with those pressures can change. And by help I mean spiritual and mental help.
We have to stop measuring our wounds against someone else’s pain.
Those “who hurts more?” conversations have to end immediately. We have to acknowledge our own pain but also recognize the pain in others. No, this isn’t psycho babble that removes personal responsibility. But instead of seeing someone’s hurt and saying “shoot! That aint nothing. Let me show you my hurt.” the conversation shifts to “I see that you are hurting. I’ve been hurting too. This is what I am doing to heal my hurt. If you’d like, I can share my journey with you.”
We have to stop holding the next person responsible for our past hurt.
So many men have been damaged by women who only want men for financial gain. So many women have been damaged by men that only want women for physical gain. You’ve heard the brothers say “all women are gold diggers.” I know you’ve heard the sistas say “all men are dogs.” But that statement is flawed. All doesn’t exist. Some men and some women are scummy. But not all. Once you do the work on yourself you will quit attracting the scummy. You have to realize that your next date will be one of two things: your first date with your future spouse or a person that will show you something about yourself that you still need to work on. But if you meet someone that is wonderful, stop holding them accountable for past pain. Leave past pain at the altar or at the therapist’s office. Take the wisdom but not the pain.
We have to be for others what we expect them to be for us.
A friend of mine wrote that women expect men to be knights in shining armor but never rise to princess status. The same is true in reverse as well. Iron sharpens iron. If you want a man that has a six-pack like Shemar and arms like Dwight Howard, then you need to hit the gym. If you want a woman that is full of the Holy Ghost like your mama, then you might want to go to church. Yes, I know opposites attract but let’s be real. Having similar values, plans, and vision is much more important and long lasting than any old cliche. Make a list of attributes you want your ideal mate to have. Read it over. If you were that person, would you date YOU? If the answer is no, get to working on yourself.I don’t have a fancy closing line or something insanely witty to day to drive the point home. The bottom line is we have to work together instead of against each other. We have to move from foes to family.
Neysa Ellery Taylor is an integral part of the writing team here at Blackloveandmarriage.com. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee with her husband, Chris, and their 4 children – Asyen, Maya, Preston, and Patrick. An Emmy-Award winning journalist, she hopes to share her passion for marriage and God through her writing. You can read more of her work atMyriadthatisme.blogspot.com
Posted By:
Thursday, March 1st 2012 at 10:46AM
You can also
click
here to view all posts by this author...
