TAKING YET ANOTHER HOP

re relationships between people (not just men and women, but all people).



they work better when we drop the 'roles' and the 'stereotypes' we hold ourselves and others to and just appreciate ourselves and each other for who we are, not who we want to be seen as, or how we think other people see us.


Since this comment was left on a recent entry and I like it, I will let it stand alone as to where I was going with my talk about the unique struggle that African-Americans face in romantic relationships. It is significant to me because ALL stereotypes are not equal and are not bad. A lot of times, almost as many times as they have been wrong, stereotypes can provide a frame work to base an opinion on. My experience has been one where all too often, I have had to deal with stereotypes of all kinds from those about sexual identity and the slipper wicket of racial politics. None of which felt like it went through any kind of processing by ‘the brain computer’.

But there IS a difference between ‘confirming’ something through stereotyping and having that presumption ‘verified’. To ‘confirm’ something is to have several sources that have a strong opinion on what may or may not be, as is the case with statements that seem to corroborate an ideal, like ‘all women are gold diggers’, or ‘all men are dogs’. Those statements, broad stereotypes can SEEM true if you only date girls from the discos and strip clubs frequented by the likes of NBA, NFL players, and Tiger Woods! As far as all men being ‘dogs’, maybe if all the men you date are NBA, NFL players and on the odd occasion, Tiger Woods!! The sample is too narrow and the idea posited to subjective, particularly if you are part of said sample population.


To have either of those broad statements ‘verifiable’, the authentication is much stricter. Sources are more objective and reliable. They aren’t as impeachable or prone to allowing emotions to sway their judgment. “Confirm, then verify,” is the way it should be done. Because you tend to assume too much and make an opinion based on subjective value judgments, when NO ONE CARES what you think or how you came to your crack pot reasoning. See, YOU are the one who did not perform the checks and amass the information necessary… and even when you do that, there is STILL enough room for something to be askew.


So what are you gonna do? Hmm??


YOU CAN BE BEHIND ME


Most folks who are unable to shift through the processes that strips away ‘confirmation’ and leaves you with a ‘verifiable’ result, prolly are confused because it is nearly impossible to repeat the conditions exactly the same. Remember, I am talking about the cocktail of emotions that make up relationships and individuals. But because you can take the archetypical result and in using it to measure the difference that a situation is from the ideal, it is almost the same as making a stereotype. I also think that it can result in a methodology that can be used to gauge and make assumptions when you are making evaluations about whatever it is you are observing with greater accuracy as well. In this case, predicting performance in a romantic relationship.

Or maybe I should call it ‘loving’. Yup, I think that you can predict whether or not you and another person can make a relationship work under almost any conditions. And it you don’t have to have the exacting ‘conditions’ needed to verify whether or not the two of you will make good partners. I think you have to take the things that you know you know and what you DON’T know you know (which is actually part of what you know), and hope that this knowledge is not dwarfed by the things you don’t know that you don’t know.


I believe one of the biggest challenges to finding a happy relationship is literally, ourselves, as we are both part of the things we know we don’t know and the things we don’t know that we don’t know. When I met My Delta Girl (because that is what I called her), it was during X-Mas break and she was still walking around the Four Season’s Mall where I was a shoe jockey at a sporting good and apparel store. The week prior I was talking with my roomie about women, and I described the kind of woman that I was ACTUALLY wanting in my life, as opposed to the ‘first in line at the casting call’, which is what I considered my ex-wife.


Listing the qualities that I hoped for and those that I found in her would be an exercise in redundancy. What I think happened in our relationship, was there was something else that I did not know about myself that determined our fail as a couple and it is something that has remained with me to this day.


The depth of what I call my ‘victimization pathology’ is incalculable and all kinds of monsters emerge when I am shaken by something to my core. When it formed when I was growing up, it was at first seen as ‘the way it was’, as with most children, we see everything colored by our immediate surroundings. The mix between all of the positives and negatives about my upbringing has led me to certain conclusions… and one of them happened to be the foundation to the events that led to our demise.

THINKING THINGS THROUGH

I don’t want anyone to think that I am abdicating Lovebabz’ challenge, because I most definitely am not!! I feel good, confident about my decision to move to Omaha. The worst thing that could happen is that I decide to go somewhere else, and even that is not a bad thing.

What I had worried while I was in Detroit was that it was going to have a ‘black hole’ like effect on me and I would be crushed by the gravity. Having the confidence in myself to figure out a way to my own spot has done so much for me that I find it hard to put it all into words.

As far as why I am combing through all this stuff… well, if I don’t, who will? Killing a few birds with this particular stone and I am going to see it through! (btw… watching SNL and is it just me, or is this Bruno Mars cat hot??)