(Originally Posted on Opulence in the Divine)
“She is more precious than jewels, and nothing you desire can compare with her”(Proverbs 3:15 ESV)
I wrote seventy-five percent of this article yesterday, but when I took a step back and proofread what I had written so far, I hated mostly everything about it. The style felt unnatural, as if I was writing for approval of the audience and not for me. Ironically, that is the issue I am supposed to be discussing here. Specifically, the process of woman shifting their desire away from male acceptance and prioritizing other, more important needs. The most important being themselves. Before going forward, I just want to say to you all it is great to be back! To describe what I have been doing during my hiatus can be summed up as “the way life goes”. I felt bad that I didn’t come back when I said I was, my apologies! But you just got to say, the right time will always come on time. Without further ado, today, I will be diving into the movement of de-centering men. Explain what the process is, the pitfalls of living a male-centric life, the most important step for woman to take in order to de-center men, and finally, how to navigate the dating world with this mindset.
What does it truly mean to de-center men?
I think the best way to explain the de-center men movement is to debunk an extremist stigma of it. The de-centering men movement is not about cutting men out of a woman’s life completely. Rather, to not make a man the reason why you rise in the morning and sleep peacefully at night if you get my drift.
Society places a woman’s value on what a man puts into to her, and yes, it is exactly what you think! If you are deemed screwable by a man, you are worthy. If you go against the grain of fu*kability, whenever that be not being attractive enough, showing assertiveness, and/or displaying emotions that are deemed “unladylike” i.e., anger and passion, you are deemed unworthy. Yes, we have come a long way from times when it was mandatory for a woman to conform to these standards of “marriage material”. But it is still discouraged and frowned upon to be anything but a dainty trophy wife. Think, older, unmarried, childless woman are treated like lost causes who “didn’t do right” in their younger days to secure a man. Younger woman who are also unmarried and childless have a carrot of marriage with a timer dangled over their heads constantly belting out “better get hitched before you turn 35”! This pressure on woman that deems them to be worthy on a man’s opinion, rather than their own opinions and volitions inevitably causes a pipeline of low self-worth. Now volunteering themselves on a mission to secure a man by any means necessary. If that means hiding their true selves, excusing any wrongdoing committed by a man, and/or stepping on eggshells to not gut punch a man’s pride. I’m only scratching the scratching the surface here.
How to de-center men:
I want us all to take a moment to breath a little, because this next part we have to unpack a real truth here that woman need to understand. Now I could sit here and scream about patriarchy and how men ain’t sh*t for the rest of the post. But take this babes, know that change starts with yourselves. Us ladies get a bad rep that we don’t take accountability. Lets be for real, we don’t. Nobody wants to be wrong, but everyone wants to be the victim. Being a woman ≠ victim. And when a victimhood mindset is coddled and encouraged by the community, It leads to a pipeline of toxic femineity. Without losing the focus here, checkout my post When woman do, men follow. But to bare bones for you babes, a man can’t center himself in your world, you let him do that. By simply acknowledging your fault and forgiving yourself for it, your already halfway through the process. Now we can go on to a deeper level of discovery and I can list ways you can go about de-centering men from your life:
1. Realize companionship is a bonus, but not the goal: I like men, I like good men. Having someone who you can learn from, laugh with, and love on is one of life’s great chances. But think of it as being rich, many want to be rich, but many will not become rich. Does that stop you from wanting it or trying to achieve it? Not at all. But the key is to know that there is a difference between wanting and obsession. You can want many things in life, but obsession takes all of time, energy, and investment into a singular cause. Obsessing over the validation a man gives you will lead to failure, as with obsession over the validation of being rich will give you. Put internal validation over external validation, as this will always be a permanent happiness rather than temporary happiness that others give you.
2. You are multi-faceted!: Stand in a mirror and look a look at yourself! Tell yourself several affirmations, but not only say physical ones, but mental and spiritual ones as well! A good one that encompasses all three is “You are multi-faceted”! Physically, your beautiful, but go into specifics. You have nice legs, healthy hair, shimmery eyes. You get my drift. Mentally, affirm how intelligent you are, what you do well in life, i.e., your career, schoolwork, and hobbies. Lastly, when it comes to spirituality, tell yourself “I am a woman, I hold a power, gift, and a presence like no other being. God made me special and with His love”!
3. Find out what you really want out of life and know what is in the center of your world: The last piece of advice I can give you babes, Is to really look into yourselves and ask, “What do I really want out of life?” Combined with the first two pieces of advice I gave, you should start to see that your need for male approval will become smaller and smaller, and your own volitions will start to grow bigger and bigger. Like I said, the goal of de-centering men is to be able to see them as just a small part of what makes up your world, and not your whole world. You, yourself, should be in the center of the world!
How to date with this mindset:
I don’t want to bloat this post more than it needs to. But it is definitely true that you can date with this mindset. In fact, I highly encourage you to do so. Check out my post Always seek righteous men! To bare bones it like I did earlier, there is a difference in seeking and chasing love. Seeking love goes hand and hand with a de-centered mind. You will see better results if you do so. I will make more dating advice posts in the future, be on lookout for those babes!
Closeout and going forward:
So, if you made it this far babes, I thank you! I know I should be restating what I said here, but I want to take the time to express my gratitude to God. Really, during my hiatus I felt like I lost my way, I actually tried to write an article, new poems, and new prayers after my school semester was over and I had time on my hands again. But I found myself unable to write entirely or wrote stuff that had no love in them. Mainly because I put my desires into the wrong places. I stopped praying, reading my bible, and questioned my beliefs. God abandoned me, I surmised. But as you know that is never the case. God never abandoned me, He was just waiting for me to come back. Why I write anything, is because of my faith. I have a divine gift that has given me a purpose. And when I found God again, my gift came back to me!
I have a lot of fall cleaning I have to do on my site, so posting might be irregular for a little bit. But trust and believe, I am back better than ever and hitting the ground running! Stay on the look out for the next post. Subscribe to the site and feel free to drop ideas for new content!
Love and Kisses Always!
XOXOXO
-Syd
Suede and Sunshade 